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Letters: ‘Hunters’ TV Show, ‘Chinese Virus’ and Ethnic Slurs

[additional-authors]
March 27, 2020

‘Hunters’ TV Show
After reading Stephen D. Smith’s column (“The Danger of Nazi ‘Hunters,’ ” March 20), I totally agree with him that Amazon must cancel “Hunters.”

I’ve been watching the show with my father and we have realized that even though the show is set in New York after the Holocaust, the Nazis are still conveyed as more powerful than the Jews. The show also doesn’t express how much the Nazis did to the Jews. The show features an inaccurate scene that shows Jews killing each other as human chess pieces. Most of all, it makes the Jews look like a vengeful and unruly people.

Holocaust survivors weren’t seeking revenge on Nazis. Rather, they were on a quest to achieve justice for their brothers, sisters and parents who were tortured and slaughtered. However, I would be open to seeing a new season if it were to show realistic stories of the Holocaust.
Aaron Javidzad, Los Angeles

‘Chinese Virus’ and Ethnic Slurs
President Donald Trump and members of his administration have defended calling the novel coronavirus the “Chinese virus,” and some have referred to it as the “Kung flu,” as if it were appropriate to mix an ethnic slur with a pun in such a tragic and serious situation. Saying “we have no racist intentions” and “it originated in China, so it’s a Chinese virus” doesn’t diminish the damage to our multiethnic society.

Perhaps the administration and its apologists would benefit from thinking from a different perspective.

If the first cases of COVID-19 had appeared in Israel instead of China, would the president have been free to refer to it

as the “Jewish virus” or the “Jew flu”?
Richard W. Merel, Hermosa Beach

Some on the left have accused President Donald Trump of racism for referring to COVID-19 as the “Chinese virus,” although Trump and others have explained that this just means where it originated.

The Chinese government is as oppressive to Uighurs and others as Pharaoh was to the Israelites. Its use of slave labor, harvesting prisoners’ organs, forcing women into unwanted abortions, forbidding free speech, censoring the internet, and its policing system that utilizes facial recognition and public humiliation is right out of “1984.” Should American media be supporting it?
Rueben Gordon, via email

No Chicken, No Meat
In answer to Judy Gruen’s question, “Buddy, Can You Spare a Chicken?” (March 20), the answer is “no” if we wish to prevent pandemics in the future. From the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic to the present, these deadly viruses jump from animals to humans as a direct result of our unnecessary use, abuse and slaughter of animals, be they from factory farms, bushmeat or wet meat markets.

It’s dismaying that people fail to see the connection, the “message” of this pandemic, and continue to promote this deadly system by “filling carts with titanic mountains of meats, chickens, turkeys and briskets …”  Are we doomed to repeat this cycle again and again? Are the costs, both economic and in human life, worth it? Let us look forward to the day when no one says, “All I needed was a chicken,” joyfully eating healthful plant-based foods instead.
Michael Lackner, Los Angeles

Religious Jewish Community: No One Wears Masks
We are intensely concerned about the lack of care that some in the religious Jewish community have about this pandemic that is killing thousands around the world. Some of them walk through the streets here in Hancock Park and elsewhere with little care or concern, as if nothing is wrong. It is upsetting to see how uninformed or neglectful they are about this crises.

Please do something about running a story in the paper about this matter right away.
Eva Dayan, via email

Adam Schiff on the Coronavirus
It’s rather incredulous that Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) is criticizing President Donald Trump stating “the initial response was very poor and the most important time for the response was early on.” Perhaps if Schiff and the Democratic in Congress hadn’t spent the entire month of January on the president’s impeachment trial, the focus of our government would have been on the rise of the coronavirus.

Trump wisely suspended all flights from China the second week of January and should be given credit for preventing a worse-case scenario. Instead he was criticized by Democrats for being racist and xenophobic.
Janet Polak, Beverly Hills

Prayer in the Time of Virus
During these troubling times, our thoughts and prayers are with everyone impacted by the spread of COVID-19 and we hope that this crisis will pass quickly.

We pray for those affected; we mourn those who lost lives. We come together the world over, 7 billion strong, beseeching almighty God.
Heal us in this time. Strengthen us in this turmoil. Give us the vision and understanding to overcome and see an end to this pandemic.
Amen.
Rabbi Israel Rimler, via email

Making the Federal Aid Package Fair
The Republicans, conservatives, major corporations and the Koch brothers rail against high taxes, “big government,” government regulations, environmental controls, etc. To them, “government is the problem.”

But when they wake up and realize that their beloved earnings and share prices and 401(k) s are threatened by the coronavirus, they immediately turn to Uncle Sam for a handout — airlines, cruise ships, automakers, etc.

If we are going to help any large corporations, let’s do it this way: have our government offer to infuse cash in companies by buying additional shares of their stock (at current depressed prices).

Call it socialism — I don’t care. I call it finally waking up to the fact that not only individuals but also businesses rely on and need our federal government for a lot of things.
Coleman Colla, Los Angeles

Time of Pandemic
Chassidim say those who sow
with tears and joy
will reap with joy
At sunrise here in Venice,
a double rainbow
Arches across the sky
And I know we will survive
Leah and Moshe say, “We’ll try to make up for the six million … not a day passes
when we don’t think of them …”
And they come to their child’s wedding
Moshe’s father. Child survivor
of the Warsaw ghetto … their nine children, grandchildren … friends … just to say “Mazel tov”
From Jerusalem, Cleveland, Atlanta, Phoenix
New York … in airlines, private planes, cars
Undeterred by collapsing borders
Microscopic murderers
Under the chuppah, they pray …
Circling … seven blessings
While police wait outside …
Chussan and kallah dance the mitzvah dance … folded napkins between them
Young yeshiva bochurs
on pink skateboards
bounce for the chussan and kallah
And there is simcha and music
And laughter. And ancestors, six million
stand behind them, grandfathers, grandmothers, children
And they break the glass
Space between them
But no distance
Mina Friedler, via email

CORRECTION
The captions on the two photos that ran with the March 20 food story (“The Cauliflower Cult”) appeared on the wrong photos.

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