4/19/04

Ignorance is bliss

From pinoyexchange:

Originally posted by xiao_g

"but if you're talking about the philippine society"

Philippine society too. Actually there ARE Jews in the Philippines, they don't advertise themselves. But even if they don't have an obvious presence, must we patronize a movie that raises an old and false charge against them?

The Catholic church considers Jews our brothers; without them, there would never be Christianity. Should we be insensitive to their fears, their history? Much of it is our history too, even the anti-Semitism--in most cases it's the Christians who inflicted the worse violence on Jews.

"i've never heard of the issue anti-semitism until this movie came out. and i attribute my awareness to the fact that i'm in the US, a culturally diverse society, and where racism is not totally eradicated"

ESPECIALLY in the US is anti-Semitism an issue. Check out the New York Times, the New Republic, the New Yorker for articles on anti-Semitism.

And in France and Europe, cases are on the rise. Check out google.

do you really think that they're aware of this issue before going into the movie theaters?

They should be.

"ignorance is bliss"...

Try "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" and "never underestimate the power of human stupidity."

Plenty more quotes, but really, the preponderance of sentiment is in favor of trying to know more and being less ignorant. Ignorance is the basis of racism.

i really can't see in which part you would think "teka lang, jews ang may kasalanan kung bakit namatay si Jesus!" (again, if you go into the movie theater unaware of the issue).

What I'm saying is that the movie tells too little of the story, that we don't know WHY the Jews want Jesus dead, we don't know if Jesus himself help provoke them (he did), and worse of all, that the movie, above and beyond the gospels read separately, exonerate Pilate and lay the blame on the Jews, particularly Caiaphas.

More clearly laid out in my article:

http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/noelmoviereviews/message/425

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