During the era of protest against the Vietnam War, anti-war activists asked, rhetorically, “What if they held a war and nobody came?”
Madison Jewish Community Council (MJCC) Executive Director Steven H. Morrison’s response to a neo-Nazi rally scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 26, at the State Capitol is reminiscent of that rhetorical question.
Morrison, in a Wisconsin State Journal guest column, on Thursday, Aug. 10, wrote, “We encourage everyone to totally ignore the rally.”
Morrison said in the column, “The MJCC is a strong supporter of the constitutional right to free speech and assembly and fully supports the National Socialist Movement’s right to publicly express its messages of hate.”
But, he added, the neo-Nazis’ right to speak does not mean that anyone has to listen. “Don’t give them an audience. They don’t deserve it,” Morrison said in a telephone interview with The Chronicle.
Instead, he suggests, join in a celebration of Madison Jewish life at the MJCC annual picnic that will take place Sunday, Aug. 27. According to Morrison, the picnic usually draws about 1,000 people.
“It’s well known that a counter protest is just what the neo-Nazis want and count on,” Morrison said.
So for those who find the National Socialist Movement’s message abhorrent and want to express their opposition to it, Morrison proposes attending the picnic and rejoicing in the Madison Jewish community’s long-standing support of equal opportunity and gay and immigrant rights.
Morrison offered a second suggestion; to make a donation to a Lesbian/ Gay/Bisexual/Transgender, immigrant rights, Latino, African-American or Jewish organization — “perhaps a few dollars for everyone who shows up at their hate-fest. These two suggestions are the antithesis of what these neo-Nazis are all about,” Morrison said.
The Jewish community picnic will take place, rain or shine, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Irwin A. and Robert D. Goodman Jewish Community Campus, 7762 Highway PD, Verona.
On July 14, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that the Minnesota-based National Socialist Movement intended to gather the day before the Madison rally for a “Unity Under the Swastika” conference.
That event was to take place at a shrine to Adolf Hitler on the property of self-described German Waffen SS veteran Ted Junker in Walworth County.
But subsequently, a July 27 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article reported that Walworth County has filed a motion in Circuit Court contending that Junker is in contempt of court.
The county asserts that Junker is violating an agreement he signed on June 16 not to hold public assemblies on his property because he lacked the proper zoning or permits. A court hearing for Junker has been set for 2 p.m., Aug. 22.
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