The US just cant win sometimes

MG1962

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MG1962
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http://whitehouse.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/30/words-at-medal-ceremony-causes-trouble-with-poland/

Apparently at a speech - the President said "Polish death camps" Instead of Nazi death camps. The Polish Foreign Minister has already unleashed his displeasure..........Now it appears the Polish Prime Minister is going to make a public statement about this disgraceful outrage to the Polish people.

All in spite of a clear apology from the White House, explaining the President miss spoke, and the whole point of the speech was to honor a Pole's amazing courage during WW2.

Either it is a slow news day in Poland, or at least one country in this world needs to get over itself.

I wonder what the reaction might have been if the speech had been made by the President of Kiribati?
 
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Well, Auschwitz was and is in Poland, which (in English) makes it a ' "Polish " death camp'

How that translates into Polish is the issue , I suppose.

Seems to me that a wee bit of thought on both sides might have avoided the problem.
 
A very understandable, I would say default, political reaction to such a blunder in communication.

The death camps were in Poland´s territory, but they were neither built nor operated by Poles. Calling them "Polish" is quite self-evidently an offence to Poles.
 
MG1962 said:
http://whitehouse.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/30/words-at-medal-ceremony-causes-trouble-with-poland/

Apparently at a speech - the President said "Polish death camps" Instead of Nazi death camps. The Polish Foreign Minister has already unleashed his displeasure..........Now it appears the Polish Prime Minister is going to make a public statement about this disgraceful outrage to the Polish people.

All in spite of a clear apology from the White House, explaining the President miss spoke, and the whole point of the speech was to honor a Pole's amazing courage during WW2.

Either it is a slow news day in Poland, or at least one country in this world needs to get over itself.

I wonder what the reaction might have been if the speech had been made by the President of Kiribati?
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Probably the same way the US press would react to a foreign minister praising the brave soviet troops that died on omaha beach during D-Day while visiting the white house and giving a live press conference.

It was a stupid blunder and any politician NOT claiming to be outraged and doing the formal complaint thing will commit political suicide, wether they themselves find the actual apology acceptable or not.

And since polish politicians care as much about what the american public thinks as american politicians think about the polish public its just politics as normal everywhere.
 
The US just cant win sometimes
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Seems to me, in this case, the US would have won if they had said German or Nazi death camps... Am I wrong? :confused:
 
I would have just thought he called it a Polish Death Camp because it was a death camp used for the Polish. I've heard people call the Nazi Death Camps the Jewish Death Camps too, this is silly.
 
Yes; similarly the camps we made in the States are usually referred to as "Japanese-American internment camps". Again, at least in English, defining the prisons according to the prisoners is reasonable.
 
Soapy Sam said:
Well, Auschwitz was and is in Poland, which (in English) makes it a ' "Polish " death camp'

How that translates into Polish is the issue , I suppose.

Seems to me that a wee bit of thought on both sides might have avoided the problem.
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Obama's uncle also liberated Auschwitz :rolleyes:
 
I doubt the Polish goverment is as offended as their posturing makes them appear to be. It would be silly to get so offended at a very minor mistake - especially one uttered during a ceremony designed to honor a Pole.
 
So would it be the same if he had said Jewish death camps?


I doubt it. Everyone knows what he meant, this is picking nits with language which is more flexible than what is being presented.

Polish death camps, being death camps filled with polish poeple is not wrong, just not the standard way of referring to them, but when you are talking specifically about a certain group of people I see nothing wrong with it.

The only thing worse than offensive people saying offensive things, is people who will find offense in anything.

Unless this guy was seriously trying to rewrite history, then this should have been a non-event.
 
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To think Obama was literally under the impression he was visiting Poland in honor of their own death camps is just the silliest thing I'm seeing Obama detractors say about this. There are so many people claiming Obama meant what he said because he was confused I want to appeal to the Wild Stallions who united the world in the timeline we've not yet experienced.

And Poland,... lighten up.
 
MG1962 said:
http://whitehouse.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/30/words-at-medal-ceremony-causes-trouble-with-poland/

Apparently at a speech - the President said "Polish death camps" Instead of Nazi death camps. The Polish Foreign Minister has already unleashed his displeasure..........Now it appears the Polish Prime Minister is going to make a public statement about this disgraceful outrage to the Polish people.
Click to expand...
Make a public statement about what? It was clearly a bungling of semantics. Just explain why it's offensive, understand that it was a bungling of semantics and accept his apology. Blown way out of proportion.
 
They were in Poland, but they were international death camps. It barely matters, a slip, a stock response, nobody's going to be expelling ambassadors. But it's foolish to pretend they were 'Polish' death camps because they were full of Poles. They were in Poland, but the nazis weren't fussy who they put in there.
 
Does this mean that the CIA's secret prison in Poland should be called an al Qaeda torture camp?
 
Juniversal said:
Make a public statement about what? It was clearly a bungling of semantics. Just explain why it's offensive, understand that it was a bungling of semantics and accept his apology. Blown way out of proportion.
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Who knows - If I see any statements I will definitely post them
 
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