Nass 'Top 10' goes too far

I find it hard to believe that the editors of the Nassau Weekly actually thought that an article titled the "Top 10 Holocaust movies I've never seen but would like to" would be received, out of all things, as funny. The list itself, which included titles the likes of "Jew on a Hot Tin Oven," "Dude, Where's my family?," "Debbie does Dachau" and "Honey, I had the Catholic Church Baptize the Kids because Otherwise They Would Have Been Gassed," was definitely the most offensive, upsetting and inappropriate thing I have ever read in a student publication.

The Nassau Weekly, a student run publication funded in part by the University, prides itself on dry, sarcastic humor has always tended to push the level of acceptability with their outlandish mocking of students and faculty (incidentally, the list is adjacent to a cropped photograph of Evan Baehr's head on the body of a woman). But never before have I heard of there ever being an article that has provoked such disbelief and outrage amongst such a large portion of the student body.

The article reminded me of the little stunt that the young Prince Harry pulled at a London party recently, where he branded a Hitler youth uniform, complete with armband swastikas. As with this recent article, I was left asking, "What were you thinking?" I assume the Nassau Weekly thought the list would provoke shock laughs — those sights, sounds, jokes that your baser human instincts find comical but that a moral society has forbidden you from showing any outward reaction towards except shock and horror. The title of the article, "And Now for something completely offensive," while sardonic, did slightly prepare me for the content, yet ultimately, humor at the expense of the systematic extermination of the Jewish people, is simply distasteful, wrong and is never going to be funny — no matter what comical spin you attempt to put on it.

Arguments I have heard attempting to maintain the integrity of the Nassau Weekly have argued that since the writers are Jewish, they are allowed to make such jokes and moreover that the writers showed it to other Jewish students before submitting it, all of whom did not find offensive. That being said, hiding behind one's religious ethnicity in an attempt to justify the use of blatantly offensive material is both wrong and should not be tolerated. There is a certain line of acceptability that students on an ethnically diverse college campus should not cross, a line which supercedes any religious affiliation. In the 21st century, when jokes in poor taste can constitute the end of someone's career (think Whoopi Goldberg making fun of "Bush," or golfer Fuzzy Zoeller's "fried chicken" comments directed at Tiger Woods), there is a fine line between tasteless and unacceptable humor. Chris Rock, the stand-up comedian who is to host the Oscars at the end of the month and who often mocks African-Americans, wouldn't be able to book a show on a carton in a back alley if he began his routine by trivializing or deriding the assassination of Martin Luther King or Malcolm X: this same standard of social acceptability should inherently apply to the editors of the Nassau Weekly. While I don't think that disciplinary action is in order as ultimately the Nassau Weekly has the right to publish whatever they want, had this happened in the real world, University funding would have been immediately revoked, the advertising sponsors would be running in the other direction, the editors would most probably have to resign and the magazine would be completely defunct in the eyes of its readership.

Although, maybe I just have no sense of humor; maybe jokes on the holocaust in the form of fabricated movie titles such as "A Cattle-Car Named Desire" are in fact funny. Or maybe this was some darkly satiric way of bringing people's attention back to holocaust and the atrocities that were committed; something that many often choose to overlook and forget in our daily lives. The Nassau Weekly obviously doesn't think so — the list has been removed from its online addition and many associated with the magazine are scampering for cover under a detailed apology to be printed in their next edition. Ultimately, there are some things that are sacred; there are some things that you just don't make fun of. Chris Berger is a history major from London. He can be reached at cberger@princeton.edu.