As I write this, my Jewish friends are observing Yom HaZikaron laShoah ve-laG’vurah—Yom HaShoah, Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day. A recent survey revealed that 63 percent of Americans don’t know that 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Nearly 20 percent of millennials and Gen Z in New York—New York!—feel that Jews caused the Holocaust.
Clearly, Yom HaShoah is an auspicious day, and important day—and all this past week I have been thinking deeply about the Holocaust and our own nation’s role in it.
In fact, I could think of little else since April 11. That day began at 7 a.m. when I picked up Paul Wolff, my friend for many years, so that he could give a presentation at my Tuesday Morning Kiwanis Club. It ended that evening at Two Broads Cider, where Paul was featured as the guest of honor at a fund-raising mixer for Access for All. AFA is a local organization that advocates for persons with disabilities.
Paul Wolff is one of my favorite people to hang out with. His presentation on the dangers of fascism, hatred, and bigotry goes down more easily when you’re handed a cold mug of Two Broads’ Bearded Queen hard cider (ABV is 6.9 percent). Though Paul is 93 years old and mostly blind, his very existence is testimony to the resilience of the human spirit, and his career confirms the idea that human progress is possible.
Paul was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1929. His father was Capt. Karl Wolff, a successful Jewish businessman and a decorated infantry officer whose bravery in World War I had won him the lasting admiration of the men under his command. Twenty years after WWI, in 1938, all of Germany saw the devastation of Kristallnacht, the tragic events that signaled the rise of the SS and led directly to the Holocaust. Jews throughout Germany were rounded up and thrown in jails. Few of them survived the systematic murder of their people over the next seven years.
One of those who did survive was Capt. Karl Wolff—but only because a soldier who had served under him in WWI was also one of those ordered to seize and interrogate him.
With the secret help of his former comrade in arms, Karl Wolff was released, and his family was able to escape the Nazi regime. Ultimately, they found asylum in San Francisco. It was a favorable twist of fate that would lead to Paul’s education as an architect at UC Berkeley, and a lifelong practice devoted to the field of universal design.
Every time you see a wheelchair ramp and notice the special signs for wheelchair access, you’re seeing the results of Paul’s work as a founder of the specialized field of architecture for everyone. Since 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires every building in the entire nation that is open to the general public be designed to accommodate people with disabilities—especially those using wheelchairs.
Side note: Several disabled people joined Paul and me at both the Access for All event at Two Broads Cider and at my Morning Kiwanis Club. One major feature of our club is our hospitality to anyone with disabilities; many of our members have intellectual as well as physical impairments.
Paul’s presentations are largely devoted to the dangers of prejudice, discrimination, bigotry, and the false patriotism that breeds fascism and “ethnic cleansing.” Whether it is a burning hatred of Jews, a racist hostility toward people of color, an aversion to LGBTQ people, or a rejection of people with disabilities (including the elderly)—it’s all the same, really: We prefer to be among our own kind, and we’d rather not be confronted by “those people” who fail to meet our definition of “normal.”
Paul Wolff is living proof that the individuals of a despised minority—when given the opportunity to thrive in a nation that values skill and creativity—can truly add value to all of our lives. In fact, he was born the same year as Anne Frank, author of the famous diary, whose single published book has enriched the lives of millions of us. Think of what we might have learned from Anne, had her life not been cut short at the age of 15 in Bergen-Belsen?
We still have too many people in this country—and a few even in this county—who dwell in the depths of hatred, racism, and bigotry. We still have too many places where people feel unwelcome or unsafe because they are living with disabilities, or are LGBTQ, or members of a racial or religious minority.
In this week of Yom HaShoah, let’s all take a cue from Paul Wolff and all those who, by their living example or by their words, are there to testify to the truth. Δ
John Ashbaugh probably suffers from an excessive obsession with “truth, justice, and the American Way.” Seven decades in, he’s still wondering how—or whether—the real Superman will ever arrive to lead us. Respond with a letter to the editor by emailing letters@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Apr 20-30, 2023.
“A recent survey revealed that 63 percent of Americans don’t know that 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Nearly 20 percent of millennials and Gen Z in New York—New York!—feel that Jews caused the Holocaust.”
63%
Who did they survey?
What age group?
What were the questions? A survey can be slanted or misunderstood, correct?
Who did the survey? Did they slant it towards disbelief?
Is it what was or is being taught in our schools?
Does the public in general not watch the documentaries, movies or read the books written by survivors.
“Ableism”? Disputes over the rights of the disabled usually involve the expenditure of funds to improve accessibility, or forcing businesses to change their operations to accommodate those with disabilities, not any sort of display of hostility towards those who suffer from disabilities. The reluctance to spend one’s own money is not rooted in malice. It is not personal. We can all see ourselves as someday possibly finding ourselves in the same boat, so there is no hatred involved. There is an unfortunate tendency in some to vilify and demonize anyone who differs from them in matters of any sort of policy,no matter how far femoved from actual prejudice and bigotry, whichs is unfair, polarizing, and destructive. Name calling is not helpful.
Ok. Gail, I will bite: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/survey-…
Check the sources that NBC News used, if you need to do so. I consider this “mainstream” news media to be a reliable source. You probably don’t. That’s ok, we can agree to disagree. We usually do.
But you can’t deny that bigotry, racial and ethnic hostilities,and hate crimes targeting people of color are on the rise throughout the nation.
Or maybe you,too, are in denial. I certainly hope not.
And to John D, your comment here trivializes the deep social and economic and structural disadvantage faced by people with disabilities, including those associated with advanced age. You seem to excuse the resistance to compliance with the ADA to ” reluctance to spend one’s own money”.. a typical canard thrown out by conservatives who fight any attempt by government to regulate businesses and private citizens in order to advance the public interest
I can cite my own examples of open,repeated, and thoroughly ignorant rejection of the need to provide reasonable accommodations to people with disabilities. You will probably read about that story in a future column.
Maybe you live in a perfect world where everything is done to assure that people with disabilities, and those with advanced age, are treated with dignity and respect. I am trying to do my part to make such a world a reality.
When that happens,I will commit to seeing that you and your conservative colleagues are invited to join us. We won’t drag you kicking and screaming, but perhaps you will find it attractive?
John A: Your new world is going to cost money. A lot of money, which SOMEBODY is going to have to pay. And, of course, what is a “reasonable accommodation” can be pretty subjective. I have been on both sides of the disabilities access movement. As an undergraduate, I worked in a legal aid office where my main focus was on pressuring SF to implement the existing access laws, primarily ramps into public buildings and on sidewalks. Access requirements have obviously become a lot more complex since the 1970’s, and are now applied to the private sector. As a young attorney, I represented an architect who got caught up in a battle with the State of California over the remodeling of a historic building, which could not be brought up to the newly devised access requirements without major changes to the structure and historical features, something the city did not want. Government has no need to be pragmatic, when they can just fling down edicts which others must implement and pay for. Lofty concepts like “dignity and respect” sound more compelling when considered in a vacuum, and when ensuring them is someone else’s problem.
An anecdotal example: When the ADA was passed, and it was apparent that attorneys would have a role, I attended a California State Bar continuing education program on the subject offering hypothetical situations in which the ADA might be implemented. One hypothetical was a solo private practice attorney who found that he was getting busy enough to hire an attorney associate, and was considering applications. The applicant with the best qualifications was blind. The State Bar program then advised that he must be hired, and that the “reasonable accommodation” was to hire a second person to read for him, and to drive him to court, etc. Only someone who worked for the government, and who had never paid a salary, nor rent, nor any of the other costs of a private practice, would believe that it was “reasonable” to require someone to pay TWO salaries to perform ONE job.