UK journalist slammed for Holocaust comments

The art critic of London’s main evening newspaper has come under heavy criticism by Jewish community leaders after saying that the Holocaust has been used to “whip guilt into society”.

In a column published in the Evening Standard last week, art critic Brian Sewell came out against a new exhibition commemorating the end of the slave trade currently on display at the Victoria and Albert museum in central London.

While Sewell clearly deplored the slave trade he said he believed the exhibition, which features artistic works inspired by the years of slavery, was unworthy.

But in a sentence described by Board of Deputies Chief Executive Jon Benjamin as "apalling", Sewell accused Holocaust memorials as well as those remembering the horrors of the slave trade as being used to make people feel guilty.

“The historical slave trade was a business at least as appalling as the Holocaust, with many, many, more victims, and like the Holocaust its memory has been hijacked by the descendants of those victims and turned into a scourge with which to whip guilt into society,” Sewell wrote.

Abused

Holocaust Education Trust Lord Greville Janner was one of a number of Jewish leaders to speak out against Sewell’s words.

“The Holocaust and the slave trade were both vile injustices and wicked betrayals of humanity,” Janner said. “To defile the memory of these acts as Brian Sewell saw fit do is an abuse of his journalistic platform and a sad reminder that the lessons of the holocaust and other similar horrors have not yet been learned .”

Benjamin echoed Janner’s sentiments, pulling no punches in his criticism of Sewell. “After cataloguing the appalling human cost of the slave trade and categorising it alongside the Holocaust, it is quite appalling to dismiss the suffering of its victims and their descendants in this way,” Benjamin said, adding that he believed that Sewell “shows the conceit of those whose comfortable existence has never been affected by such monstrous inhumanity.”

No complaints

However, according to Managing Editor of the Evening Standard Doug Wills there had been no complaints sent to the newspaper about the column and that he believed those expressing their concerns were taking the sentence out of context.

Willis said: “It is wrong to bring out this partial phrase in isolation. The focus of this 1,800-word feature and this reference is on the horrors of the slave trade and this is absolutely apparent to those who read the whole article.

"I am not aware of the Evening Standard receiving any complaints about this article. This was an historic reference of measure and certainly did not diminish the Holocaust or survivors in any way. The Evening Standard is well known for its supportive coverage of Holocaust survivors, as our readers will be very much aware."

European Jewish Press