Badge protest turned the vile into the vacuous
The Yellow Star of David is a chilling historical symbol, not a fashion accessory for celebrity attention-seekers
The standard of public discourse routinely hits new lows, but every so often it can still take my breath away. This week, the jaw-dropping moment came from across the Pond, where, at separate events, two entertainment industry numbskulls (both Jewish) turned up to public events with yellow Star of David badges slapped on to their jackets.
The yellow star badge is, of course, one of history’s most powerful symbols of anti-semitic persecution, famously required to be worn by Jews in Nazi Germany before they were sent to the gas chambers. For attention-seeking celebrities, this apparently makes it a super-cool way to signal your disapproval of American neo-nazism.
“We cannot tolerate hate,” tweeted the C-list Hollywood producer with a picture of himself at the MTV awards with the star on his jacket. “In awe of my former husband,” simpered Billy Joel’s ex-wife, in praise of his decision to wear a yellow star badge for his latest concert in New York.
I, too, was in awe, and not in a good way. I wondered how they couldn’t see it. How could they fail to realise that wearing a yellow star badge isn’t a snappy form of protest? It’s a way of changing a historical symbol from something chilling and grotesque into something hip and righteous. It turns a tool of genocidal persecution into a must-have fashion accessory. It makes the vile into the vacuous.
In his book about the Holocaust, Saul Friedlander discusses a photograph of a newly qualified doctor collecting his degree in Nazi Germany. The young man, David Moffie, stands nervously before a university official, wearing a big yellow star on his jacket. “Let us return to Moffie’s photograph, to the star sewn to his coat, with its repulsive inscription, and to its meaning,” writes Friedlander. “The new MD, like all the carriers of this sign, was to be wiped off the face of the earth. Once its portent is understood, this photograph triggers disbelief.” This disbelief, Friedlander argues, is important. It keeps alive a sense of horror. It brings us closer to history and makes real our outrage. It keeps our moral compass ticking.
These star-wearing celebrities achieve precisely the opposite. They have ripped this symbol from its context. One of the photos of these men is already being used to illustrate a salacious story about a “foursome… revealed in Toofab interview”. At a stroke, that photograph trivialises a symbol of genocide. In a booming age of narcissism, that sets a new standard for crass.
While the star-wearing celebrities got away with their stupid politicking, the world saved its opprobrium for four Welshmen dressed up as a Jamaican bobsleigh team for a town parade. The Welshmen were taking their inspiration from the comedy film Cool Runnings, a fictionalised story of the real-life trials and tribulations faced by Jamaica’s first Olympic bobsleigh team. They donned Lycra costumes in Jamaican flag colours, made a bobsleigh parade float, danced around it in a silly way and – here’s the trouble – blacked up.
The world went bonkers when a photo of the four chaps in blackface was posted online by the area’s local Labour candidate, who claimed to be “utterly horrified”. “How could this have been considered acceptable, even legal?” she demanded. In no time, the police – yes, the police – had started “investigating” what they said was a suspected “hate crime”.
Blacking up has an intensely troubling history and the men should have known not to do it. But is this incident worthy of a police investigation?
How is it that a couple of attention-seeking celebrities can use a symbol of the Holocaust to make a childish political point without criticism, but four naive men in a bobsleigh are put under police investigation for blacking up? I suspect it is all about political tribalism. As long as you are on the “virtuous” side – anti-brexit, anti-trump, and so on – allowances are made. Whereas those deemed too Right-wing or oafish are strung up at the first opportunity.
The real-life Jamaican bobsleigh team has now waded in to defend the men, saying they made a mistake “without malice”. If they’re not offended, then let’s not be offended on their behalf.
While on holiday I received a text from the NHS, informing me that I had been given an appointment for a day when I was out of the country. Naturally, I decided to reschedule, a process I assumed would be fairly straightforward, given the vast amount it costs us all when patients miss appointments.
Foolish assumption. My emails went unanswered. A phone message, left on my behalf by someone in the UK, was ignored for days. It took more than a week and four phone calls to inform the health service I would be 2,500 miles away during the time allotted. It wasn’t until the morning of the appointment that the message finally reached the right person. How much time and money is wasted this way?