Edge City Response

[schlimmerkerl]

First of all, the joke was in dubious taste, so i apologize in advance. Also, if you are inclined to post anything truly loathsome, please be my guest. I've heard it all.

In Europe, from about the time of the sack of Rome to the present day, the European monarchies and clergy would stir up the population against Jews. They were accused of everything from The Plague to murdering Christan children for their (the Jews') religious rituals.

Thus incited, an angry mob would oftentimes descend on their Jewish fellow-citizens, confined in walled ghettos or rural communities ("shtetels"), and murder the inhabitants. This kind of violence was called a "pogrom", and they usually occurred around Easter-- when the priests were especially rabid in their denunciations.

I found it… what? Curious? Interesting? That Terry LaBan (whose work i admire) would choose to tell this particular kind of story so close to any Christian holiday.

[cwmorrow]

I thought you were confusing Passover and Channukah, Easter occurring near, indeed, determined by, Passover. I am new to the comic, and thought it ran because of Channukah.

[jfruh]

I'm not sure I'm following you -- are you saying Christian holidays are a bad time to bring up the fact that anti-Semitic violence used to peak around Christian holidays? As you note, it was Easter (which often featured Passion plays with anti-Semitic elements) that was generally the holiday more associated with pogroms. I don't think Christmas (which was not traditionally as important a holiday as it is today) really has much of a history of that sort of thing.

The Edge City sequence strikes me as a fairly straightforward Hanukkah/Jewish history story, timed to come to a conclusion during Hanukkah -- it's centered around a menorah, which is a part of the Hanukkah celebration. The fact that Hanukkah and Christmas fall in roughly the same time of year is pretty much a coincidence (except in the sense that most religions and cultures have festivals during the midwinter).

Josh

[schlimmerkerl]

Yes, it was intended as a joke, and, as noted, a lame one at that.

Basically, i found Terry's story charming and hats off to him for featuring the only Jewish family in comic-dom.

While i've got you "on the line", has this site been "under attack"? Sometimes, over the last few days, i've been unable to access anything, postings are screwy, etc. It may be my server, but everything else is ok.

[jfruh]

I've definitely been having some server problems -- in fact, there were a copule of hiccups just now, as you probably noted. I'm working with my host to try to figure out what exactly is up.