Courage to Care Victoria We are sharing this post from Courage to Care Victoria, and repeat those crucial last few lines.
The Courage to Care message is universal and is needed more than ever. As Edmund Burke is quoted as saying “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”
At Courage to Care we do something. If you are in NSW, contact us to find out more at info@couragetocare.com.au ... See more
FLYING A NAZI FLAG DEMONSTRATES ANTI-RACISM EDUCATION IS NEEDED
The Age reported that a couple in the town of Beulah is flying a flag with the Nazi swastika and other Nazi symbols high over their house. Its presence has outraged neighbours, who have complained to police, and it has been condemned by both the state government and the opposition. Heartening but insufficient.
That this open display of Nazi symbols is happening in 2020 in Australia, against the alarming backdrop of the recognised surge in racist and discriminatory attacks, is horrifying.
It is horrifying that there are those amongst us who openly condone the extreme racist violence enacted by the Aryan policies of the Nazis in the Holocaust 80 years ago.
It is horrifying that there are Australian citizens who feel no compunction in declaring to everyone in their community that they advocate for this same hateful ideology, now, today.
That Nazis now openly boast that they are in our midst, and racist and other discriminatory behaviour is increasingly prevalent, must signal to all thinking people that we’ve gone wrong somewhere. We have failed to learn from history.
It’s important to remember that the Nazis did not start by building gas chambers. The Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum tweeted, “This hatred gradually developed from words, stereotypes and prejudice, through legal exclusion, dehumanisation and escalating violence.”
Education is a vital part of the solution in creating a society in which our young people recognise racist ideas for the social malignancy that they are. Even more effective is to learn from history to ensure there is no fertile ground for such ideas in the first place.
It is the mission of B'nai B'rith Courage to Care to educate Australians – especially young people - about the dangers of prejudice, racism and discrimination, and to empower them to challenge and speak out against such unacceptable human traits. We all have the power to do, or to say, something that will make a difference for others and for our society.
Our volunteers travel to schools and workplaces throughout Victoria, to educate about the roles of victims, perpetrators, bystanders and upstanders. Participants learn the importance of not allowing prejudices to turn into hateful and discriminatory acts. Holocaust survivors inspire participants by sharing their stories about the critical actions of their rescuers, challenging them to consider their own attitudes through the examples of the power of an individual to make a difference.
The Courage to Care message is universal and is needed more than ever. As Edmund Burke is quoted as saying “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”
At Courage to Care we do something.
Contact us to find out more at office@couragetocare.org.au or PM ... See more
