By now, most people are familiar with the famous image of the Jews of Warsaw – particularly a terrified little boy – being rounded up at gunpoint by Nazi soldiers. It’s an intimate reminder of the horrors faced by European Jewry, and puts a face to at least one of the six million Jews (to say nothing of tens of millions of Roma, Homosexuals, and other “undesirables”) murdered by the Nazis. It’s one of those defining images that helped the world wrap its brain around the atrocities of the Holocaust, and has since gone on to be one of the most iconic pictures of the 20th Century.
And goddammit if the internet hasn’t gone and made it so much worse.
As discovered by redditor TimothyGonzalez, it seems as if the horrors of the Holocaust weren’t quite hitting home for one member of the sprawling internet artist community Deviantart.com – at least, not until someone added a stylized cartoon of a fucking pony to the picture.
Yes, that’s a My Little Pony…in the Holocaust. But wait, it gets worse. In the comment thread underneath the picture, we have this:
It’s a little tough to read, so here you go:
This is amazing work. As a student of history I can say that I’ve seen hundreds of pictures like this, and have shown little to no emotion. The pictures were just windows to a past I’ve never lived in, people who I never knew or would ever know. But this picture made me stop and evaluate. Putting Rainbow Dash in made me actually look at what is really happening. Putting something that everyone is familiar with in a situation that no one knows, and to make people feel those emotions well, that takes amazing talent. Thank you.
No. No no no no no.
Not only did someone feel the need to add a cartoon pegasus to the picture, but someone else – a “student of history” (admittedly, one who has a hard time connecting with “a past [he’s] never lived in, people [he] would never know [sic]) – is profoundly moved by this “amazing talent.”
Next time planet Earth has a close call with an asteroid, I’m seriously considering rooting against the home team.
Firstly I agree with your statement that this is distasteful buy your complete lack of professionalism makes this article sound like something I would find in a comment flame war and not a news article. This is very tame compared to what a lot people do with these pictures so you should probably get some perspective before declaring this “the end of humanity”.
Lemme guess, Thomas – First time here?
That the commenter knew the name of the pony makes me think they’re television historians… and disturbed.
I don’t know much about bronies, but I am aware that they’re often stereotyped as being autistic. I understand it’s unpopular to characterize autistic people as lacking empathy, but yikes at that comment. It’s certainly lending to credence to the autistic brony stereotype, I would say.
Speaking as a fan of the current iteration of MLP, I’d like to say that the level of obtuseness displayed in that comment is not community-wide, and may even be a clumsy attempt at actually relating to to victims of The Holocaust. Regardless, most of is are fairly normal and realize that there is a world of difference between anything we may have experienced and the systematic efforts to exterminate entire groups of humans. There are disagreeable or poorly-spoken people in every group. In general, much of The fan community makes an effort to be less divisive and judgemental towards others.
[…] Some complete idiot photoshopped an image of a My Little Pony into a notorious photograph of the Warsaw ghetto (Heeb Magazine) […]
I think this photo shows tremendous insensitivity to the millions of Care Bears who died during the war.
Absolute bullshit echo alpha.
There are gigabytes upon gigabytes of your fandom doing and saying awful bullshit similar if not worse than this.
I wish bronies would stop ignoring the nasty elephant in the room and simply come out and admit the bullshit their fandom produces on a daily basis and properly call it out. Not simply sweep it under the rug with a “They’re just a minority,plz ignore” ESPECIALLY when this “bad side” has to gall to harass and spam others.
By ignoring it,you’re only giving critics and (Please don’t smite me for using this word) “haters” more fuel against you. A truly “loving” community(Which is impossible, but there are already some fandoms that are able to not create drama every single day of the week over stupid bullshit) would talk their problems out and if necessary,oust these douchebags. Not protect them by claiming they’re a “small minority” when they’re clearly not.
Yes,all fandoms have jerks and asswipes, but the amount of asswipes and the extreme actions these douchebags do varies from fandom to fandom. And honestly, some fandoms simply have more of these extreme assholes than others.
“The fan community makes an effort to be less divisive and judgemental towards others.”
That’s fucking hilarious because last time I checked your fandom has been harassing a certain “someone” for a year because they stated an unpopular opinion of a 30 second background character. Instead of I dunno, intelligently conversing about this and trying to be as civil as possible, your fandom sent this person death threats and other bullshit over a fucking cartoon horse that your fandom has a pathetic boner over.
ALSO the person who made this image has admitted that they are simply doing it for attention, please stop fucking reposting this.
Next time planet Earth has a close call with an asteroid, I’m seriously considering rooting against the home team.
Oh, I’m WAY past that point. It’s time for humanity to go.
It is distasteful for sure. But does not work up my ire nearly as much as the anti-semetic tweets from activist Samira Ibrahim, who was almost given an award by the White House. Ibrahim quoted Nazi leader Adolf Hitler in her tweets and has described the Saudi ruling family as “dirtier than the Jews”.
Just my opinion, but this just struck me as mildly offensive. Mostly because of how stupid it is. I just can’t grasp the logic behind this piece of “art”.