As too many around the world continue to recognize the continuing threat of Nazi terrorist activity, Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) was sad to see a report from the Wall Street Journal about a book of “satire,” “comedy” music distributed by college band members, which mocks the Holocaust.  It reported the Ohio State University Marching Band (OSUMB) created a book of “parody songs,” which denigrated people of minority identity groups.  R.E.A.L. is also aware that OSUMB song book also had a song for Adolf Hitler singing about him killing Jewish people as part of their “comedy” songs (which was clearly part of their “parody” songs at least since 2006).

In the most recent OSUMB “parody song book” the members distributed a song called “Goodbye Kramer,” which mocked the Holocaust.  The Wall Street Journal reported that the song mocking the Holocaust made “joking references to furnaces used in Nazi concentration camps and the train cars used to transport Jews to their deaths.”  The Wall Street Journal reported that the contemptible song had “lines about Nazi soldiers ‘searching for people livin’ in their neighbor’s attic,’ and a ‘small town Jew…who took the cattle train to you know where.’ ”  The Wall Street Journal reports additional details on graphic, disgusting remarks mocking the Holocaust in the OSUMB song book, which R.E.A.L. will not republish here.  The detailed lyrics in the OSUMB Holocaust mockery song clearly demonstrate there were sung by those with no conscience and no respect for human life and dignity.

Former band member Lee Auer, who is now a band instructor in central Ohio, told the WSJ that he knew the parody song book was fun: “It was fun for me as an individual, but we knew if the public ever caught wind of them, people are going to lose respect. Now, I feel worse about it than I ever did. ”  But let’s be clear, Mr. Lee Auer is not concerned that it was WRONG, he is concerned about whether people will lose respect for him.  He doesn’t make a public statement apologizing that it was morally and ethically wrong.  His concern then, as now, is only for himself.

The Daily Mail also reports that the OSUMB “parody tune written by members of the controversy-riddled band included references to furnaces used in Nazi concentration camps and the train cars used to transport Jews to their deaths.”

What none of the media has reported is that this OSUMB “parody song book” also had an earlier version in 2006 with a song for Adolf Hitler called “The Hitler Song,” where members of the OSUMB band sang “Kill the Jews all night, Kill the Jews all day.”

The OSUMB song book introduction stated it was including the Holocaust mockery song as a new edition with instructions to the OSUMB members: “Some of these [songs] may be offensive to you. If so, you can either ignore them, or you can suck it up, act like you got a pair and have a good time singing them.”  The disturbed OSUMB found a moral equivalence with obscene attacks in contempt of human rights and a form of “courage.”  Responsible for Equality And Liberty declares that contempt for our shared universal human rights and dignity is not any form of courage at all.  It is nothing less than the epitome of cowardice.

R.E.A.L. has also posted representative public comments to the Wall Street Journal on this disgrace by Americans respecting human rights and dignity from average citizens as: Aviva Sucher, John Butler, Jeffrey Sonheim, David Perez, Douglas Wasserman, Steven McDonald, and Jerry Knoski. In Jerry Knoski’s comment rejecting such contempt for the Holocaust, one of the replies he gets back is “Don’t ever watch ‘The Producers’! It may even make you laugh.”

As Jeffrey Sonheim writes, this “kind of hatred, once tolerated, then gets the nerve to become a tiny bit more open, Then ever so slowly cascades into total openness as hatred finds a home.” Closing his comment, most appropriately, with “When do you intend to grow up?”

The OSUMB band was brought to Washington, D.C. four times to march in presidential inaugurations.

The existence of the OSUMB band “parody” song book first came to light in July 2014, after an investigation into the band’s culture.  In 2014, the band director, Jonathan Waters was fired, after what the investigation found was a “deep culture of sexual harassment and sexualized behavior existed in the band.”  The report also stated “many if not all of the traditions predate Waters.”  In the report, it also indicated that a mocking nickname for one of the Jewish members of the band was used.

The Wall Street Journal could not reach former OSUMB band director Jon Woods, who was band director in 2012 according to the WSJ, for comment.  Jonathan Waters was the assistant band director and been with the band since 2002.

Three words for the OSUMB and its leaders:  SHAME ON YOU.

Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) stands by the B’nai B’rith in its condemnation of this “satire” mocking the Holocaust, as R.E.A.L. stands in defiance of all racist symbols of hate.  As R.E.A.L. protesters were recently told to our faces by a young man in Maryland at our protest on Nazi symbols, some people find the Holocaust appropriate for “comedy” and “mocking.”  R.E.A.L. and adult people of conscience do NOT.

Responsible for Equality And Liberty stands in solidarity with every word of B’nai B’rith and their report on this disgusting mocking of the Holocaust.

B’nai B’rith has stated in a press release:

“B’nai B’rith International is highly offended by the despicable Ohio State University marching band’s Holocaust-inspired song called ‘Goodbye Kramer.’ The song, sung to the tune of Journey’s ‘Don’t Stop Believin’,’ references Nazis looking for Jews living in attics and Jews traveling by way of cattle car, to their deaths at Nazi concentration camps.  The song was discovered in an updated version of the band’s highly controversial songbook exposed in 2014 after a school investigation into the band’s culture. An initial report discovered the book that had been a long held secret with songs centering on bestiality, rape and homophobia. A follow-up investigation revealed ‘Goodbye Kramer’ was added to the band’s repulsive repertoire in 2012, as was another song denigrating the University of Nebraska. It is never acceptable to trivialize Holocaust imagery. To do so in a jovial tone and completely for the sake of offending is even more abhorrent. The Ohio State marching band has long been dubbed ‘The Best Damn Band in the Land,’ but this sort of behavior does nothing to back up that title.”

While adult people of conscience reject the OSUMB members support for hate “songs,” the Nazi / Confederate group Stormfront’s members are pleased by the OSUMB’s actions.  Stormfront members regularly call for and praise terrorist attacks on the United States of America, including praise of the Nazi terrorist James Von Brunn’s attack on the Washington DC U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Stormfront Nazis were pleased to hear about OSUMB’s hate songs mocking the Holocaust, and one of the comments on the Nazi hate blog stated: “Of course they don’t give what the lyrics were in the article but I would like to hear them. The point is the holycaust has had its day as a sympathizing sucking machine that everyone bows down to as a religion. The fact is the holycaust has become a joke.”

This is what those who demean the atrocity of the Holocaust and Stormfront Nazis have in common – the normalization of Nazi atrocities and figures.

Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) believes that support for our universal human rights begins with recognizing the need to have a moral conscience towards atrocities and towards hateful languages against minority groups.  The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed by the nations of the world on December 10, 1948, begins with recognizing that “disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind.”

There are white Americans who have privileged lives where the need for such a conscience has been replaced with only the needs for their own momentary amusements.  There are white Americans who have grown up learning about the “relativity” of world events and history, rather than a genuine understanding of human rights, ethics, morality, and respect for their fellow human beings.  R.E.A.L. believes this toxic culture must change, and we urge parents and adults to set an example on such issues and to take a stand to be responsible for equality and liberty.