This year, a number of neo-Nazi organizations had planned a demonstration in Budapest for August 15, to mark the death of Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess. In response, a large coalition of groups planned a "Day of Peaceful Protest against the Far Right". With a week to go, the Budapest police officially banned the neo-Nazi demonstrations, but the Peaceful Protest events still went on.
The Peaceful Protest events were organized by a group called the "Civelek a Szélsőjobb Ellen" Mozgalom (or the Citizens Against the Far Right Movement). The movement is an umbrella group of over 50 civil society organization including anti-Fascists, Jewish organizations, Roma organizations, gay rights groups, green organizations and humanists. The day included music, information tents, and short speeches -- including the one above by Michael.
You can read more (in Hungarian and English) about the day's events on the website linked above or here in PDF (English text near the end). Also, our friend JD, as usual, is on the case: You can find audio (Hungarian) and photos of more of the day's speeches on his blog at http://lmv.hu/redjade.
UPDATE - 3 Sept 09:
After we updated the video above to our blog, Michael's daughter Aishah posted it on her own facebook page. Later, Aishah wrote to Michael to share a comment she had received on the video from a friend on facebook:
Very cool to make the connections between history & contemporary issues, but odd to speak out against Neo-Nazis in Eastern Europe without once mentioning Jews or antisemitism ("Roma, lesbian, gay man, African Muslim..." "racism, sexism, xenophobia Romaphobia"), especially since the far right he speaks against continue to include Jews as targets alongside the ethnic, racial and religious groups listed.
Aishah's friend was not the first to raise this point. Michael sent the following response to Aishah, who posted it it for her friend.
(Aishah), she is absolutely right. Most of the speech was done while I was speaking and I only had a couple of notes. In fact, I significantly changed my speech right before I spoke because I did not want to just repeat what others had been saying. However, as soon as I left the stage I realized my error--and it was an error.
This is not an excuse but I may have been the only speaker, out of at least 10, who did not mention antisemitism but also the only speaker who mentioned Muslims, LGBT, and Black and Asian folks. This does not excuse my personal omission but please assure your friend that antisemitism was well addressed at the rally.
-- Dad
For those who may be interested, here is some further reading on the attempted neo-Nazi demonstrations:
- A rendőrség megtiltotta a neonáci emlékmenetet. Index.hu 12 Aug 2009 (Hungarian)
- Hungary police ban neo-Nazi marches. UPI.com 12 Aug 2009 (English)
- Neo-Nazis banned from marching in Budapest. Expatica.com 13 Aug 2009 (English)
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