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| Vatican to Boycott Holocaust Memorial; speaking of papal ax-grinding | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Apr 13 2007, 02:34 AM (502 Views) | |
| jon-nyc | Apr 13 2007, 02:34 AM Post #1 |
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Cheers
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Haaretz.com Last update - 02:09 13/04/2007 Vatican ambassador plans to boycott Holocaust memorial By The Associated Press The Vatican and the Yad Vashem Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority got into a public spat yesterday over the wartime conduct of Pope Pius XII during the Nazi genocide, threatening to upset fragile relations between Israel and the Catholic Church. The controversy came amid new developments in the Vatican's case to make Pius a saint. A massive dossier on Pius' virtues was handed over to a panel of bishops and cardinals earlier this month to study, church officials said yesterday. At issue in the Yad Vashem-Vatican dispute is a photograph of Pius in Yad Vashem's museum, with a caption saying, "Even when reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican, the pope did not protest, refusing to sign a 1942 Allied condemnation of the massacre of Jews." The Vatican's ambassador to Israel, Monsignor Antonio Franco, confirmed yesterday that he would not attend Yad Vashem's memorial service for Holocaust victims next week, because of the Pius photograph. "I don't intend to go to Yad Vashem if things remain the way they do," he said. Yad Vashem is shocked and disappointed by Franco's decision, said spokeswoman Iris Rosenberg. The memorial service is traditionally attended by all foreign ambassadors to Israel or their representatives. Yad Vashem said this would mark the first case in which a foreign emissary deliberately skipped the ceremony. Franco said in his letter to Yad Vashem that he found the Pius XII caption offensive to Catholics. "I respect the memory of the martyrs of the Holocaust but also the memory of the pope," he said. "The right of one does not infringe on the right of the other." |
| In my defense, I was left unsupervised. | |
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| Klaus | Apr 13 2007, 03:01 AM Post #2 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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I think to judge this story one would have to hear the arguments of both sides. As far as I remember, the version of the story told by the Catholics is that Pius XII's decision not to sign the condemnation was a strategic decision - he hoped he could help the Jews better if he would superficially stay "neutral". |
| Trifonov Fleisher Klaus Sokolov Zimmerman | |
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| Axtremus | Apr 13 2007, 03:09 AM Post #3 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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1. Is it a historical fact that, indeed, Pius refused to sign the 1942 Allied condemnation of the massacre of Jews? (This should be easy to verify -- just look up the document and see if Pius' signature is there, and whether there's any credible document that says that Pius has been extended an invitation to sign the document.) 2. Is it an accurate characterization that "the pope did not protest" after "reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican"? (This is harder to verify -- Pius could have protested, perhaps less publicly and less vocally, that his protest did not get widely recorded in publicly available documents.) 3. Even if we accept, for the sake of argument, that indeed Pius never protested -- is the Vashem museum's treatment of Pius "fair" when compared to its treatment of other religious (or even political) leaders who also did not protest (i.e., are they singling out Pius) ?
4. If (for argument's sake) we take away the less easily verifiable bit about "the pope did nothing" and leave only the (presumably) factual claim that "Pius did not sign the 1942 Allied condemnation document", what's is it about stating this historical fact that the Catholics can find offensive? 5. How does this become an issue of the right of the Jew to Holocaust remembrance infringing upon the right of the Catholics' remembrance of Pope Pius (or vice versa)? |
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| Klaus | Apr 13 2007, 03:39 AM Post #4 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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I think this citation probably reflects the point of view of the catholic church:
from http://users.binary.net/polycarp/piusxii.html |
| Trifonov Fleisher Klaus Sokolov Zimmerman | |
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| Mikhailoh | Apr 13 2007, 03:46 AM Post #5 |
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
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Whenever these stories come out they always seem to be colored with the implication that the Vatican tacitly approved of the carnage. I cannot imagine why anyone would even want to think that way. I think one also has to take into account that the Vatican resides in Rome, at the time the capital of an Axis power. So there was clearly a bit of tightrope walking going on anyway. |
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Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball | |
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| John D'Oh | Apr 13 2007, 05:02 AM Post #6 |
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MAMIL
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My reading of the history would not lead to any implication that the Pope approved of the holocaust. However, he didn't exactly provide a brave and moral leadership to the millions of Catholics who looked up to him. Many organisations and countries deserve to feel some shame over their behaviour in those times, and the Roman Catholic Church is one of them, IMNSHO. |
| What do you mean "we", have you got a mouse in your pocket? | |
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| bachophile | Apr 13 2007, 05:42 AM Post #7 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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i imagine this thread will continue along the usual party lines...i know who will protest, i know who will defend. i have not done enough reading on the topic to have an informed opinion, but i imagine that as always, the truth will lie somewhere in the middle. but to try to answer your questions ax...
yes
this is obviously the whole issue and no clear answer will be forthcoming ever. nontheless, it is clear the church did save many jewish lives. the point of contention is the lack of a loud vocal public response, in lieu of a probably more discreet activity, for which the church had its own reasons and interests. i dont know the answer to that one.
the museum makes explicit mention of the saving of jews in monasteries and convents. and to be fair others, like the americans dont get off so easy, the documentation showing the US war departments refusal to bomb the aushwitz railway lines in 1944 (as is also shown clearly in the washington holocaust museum) is shown, yet the americans dont boycott the museum to the best of my knowledge.
they shouldnt find it offensive.
sorry but thats something i really dont understand...very weird statement. its an unfortunate incident, this little spat. not appropriate for a solemn day of holocaust memorial day. |
| "I don't know much about classical music. For years I thought the Goldberg Variations were something Mr. and Mrs. Goldberg did on their wedding night." Woody Allen | |
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| jon-nyc | Apr 13 2007, 07:39 AM Post #8 |
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Cheers
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By the way, has anyone read Goldhagen's new book on this topic? |
| In my defense, I was left unsupervised. | |
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| Frank_W | Apr 13 2007, 07:57 AM Post #9 |
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Resident Misanthrope
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I hope this rift can be bridged. Hasn't there been enough grief and enough pain? Or do the Jews and Catholics continue to perpetuate Hitler's poisonous legacy, by holding hands with his ghost and deepening the chasms and turmoil that continue to divide us, fifty years later? *sigh* |
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Anatomy Prof: "The human body has about 20 sq. meters of skin." Me: "Man, that's a lot of lampshades!" | |
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| Mikhailoh | Apr 13 2007, 07:58 AM Post #10 |
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
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Well said, Frank. |
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Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball | |
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| John D'Oh | Apr 13 2007, 09:26 AM Post #11 |
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MAMIL
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The Northern Irish protestants still goad and sometimes fight their Catholic counterparts over memories of William of Orange and The Battle of the Boyne in 1690. 50 years is nothing. |
| What do you mean "we", have you got a mouse in your pocket? | |
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| Frank_W | Apr 13 2007, 09:45 AM Post #12 |
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Resident Misanthrope
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Human beings are certainly silly creatures, aren't they? Blacks still bitching about slavery, the Middle East "Hatfields & McCoys" still rocketing each other... The whole world has gone (or has always BEEN) fcuking crazy, and I'm really not very happy about living here. There's got to be something better than this, because this really sucks ass. I'm homesick.... It's like being a little kid that has spent all day at the fair, ridden all of the rides, played all of the games, stuffed myself full of cotton candy and soda, and now it's dark, I'm tired, and want my good, wise, and loving father to pick me up and take me home, but I've never had a father like that, and I've never had a home, either. *long sigh*
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Anatomy Prof: "The human body has about 20 sq. meters of skin." Me: "Man, that's a lot of lampshades!" | |
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| AlbertaCrude | Apr 13 2007, 09:48 AM Post #13 |
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Bull-Carp
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Not only are they silly, they're scared silly to the point of being dangerous. |
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| John D'Oh | Apr 13 2007, 09:56 AM Post #14 |
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MAMIL
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This is as good as it gets - it used to be a lot worse. |
| What do you mean "we", have you got a mouse in your pocket? | |
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| Jeffrey | Apr 13 2007, 06:15 PM Post #15 |
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Senior Carp
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It turns out that the Vatican Express escorting senior Nazi war criminals out of the hands of justice to hideouts in South American never really existed, newly opened Vatican Archives prove. They used Star Trek teleporters, not Vatican passports, as had been widely documented elsewhere, according to Vatican spokesman Monsignor Lucteoderway. Interestingly, and on a more serious note, Pius 12 excommunicated anyone supporting communism in 1949, but to my knowledge the RCC never excommunicated anyone for participation in the Nazi party, even at the highest levels, and regardless of their actions (and in fact helped many of them escape justice). Of course, the main issue is that Hitler's actions were made possible and built upon 2000 years of anti-jewish preaching and actions by the RCC and other Christian churches, starting from Augustine's arguments that Christians take a justified Shadenfreude in viewing the persecution of Jews, which were proof of the truth of Christian teachings, to Luther's urgings to kill Jews walking on the streets (in "On the Jews and their Lies"). |
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| TomK | Apr 13 2007, 06:20 PM Post #16 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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Jeffery up to his old anti-Catholicism again. He really doesn't like anyone.If he wasn't a Jew he'd be a anti-Semite. |
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| ivorythumper | Apr 13 2007, 09:29 PM Post #17 |
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I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
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More disinformation from Jeffrey. In 1930 the German Bishops Conference excommunicated all Nazis. Under Canon Law (1917) Hitler incurred a latae sententiae excommunication (as do all Catholics) for his apostasy and crimes against persons. According to the account by Ion Pacepa, published in National Review, it seems that Jeffrey has perhaps bought rather uncritically into the KGB's efforts to attack Pius XII and to frame him as a nazi collaborator and an antisemite. |
| The dogma lives loudly within me. | |
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| Jeffrey | Apr 13 2007, 10:07 PM Post #18 |
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Senior Carp
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IT: Here is a picture of Hitler with Archbishop Orsenigo, Papal Nuncio, in 1935, giving words of greetings and praise to Hitler: http://www.nobeliefs.com/nazis.htm Is this what happens when you are excommunicated? Also look at the picture of a German Bishop performing the Goering wedding. By the way I did a web search on the alleged 1930 German Bishops conference. This is a legend. The documentation for this alleged conference does not exist, nor did clergy and Vatican officials act as if there was such an action after 1930. Mein Kampf was never put on the index, no leading Nazi was ever excommunicated, after the 1933 Concordat Catholics in Germany were ordered to follow the rules of the state, the Vatican Express saved many Nazis like Treblinka commander Stangl from justice after the war (an odd action, if they were all excommunicated, why receive such high-level Vatican support?), many Nazis thought they were good Catholics and were given no reason to think otherwise. You might also find time to discuss the Vatican's support for the Fascist government of Croatia, and the actions of the Croatian government during this period. |
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| bachophile | Apr 13 2007, 10:42 PM Post #19 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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i think that IT refers to this....not really excommunication, but whatver, 1931 February 12 The eight Catholic bishops of Bavaria, organized in the Bavarian (Freising) Bishops Conference under the chairmanship of Cardinal Faulhaber, the Archbishop of Munich and Freising, strictly forbids all Catholic priests from taking part whatsoever in the National Socialist movement. here is the wiki on him.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_von_Faulhaber but as i said, i havent read enough on this stuff to pick the wheat from the chaff. lots of chaff out there. |
| "I don't know much about classical music. For years I thought the Goldberg Variations were something Mr. and Mrs. Goldberg did on their wedding night." Woody Allen | |
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| ivorythumper | Apr 13 2007, 11:44 PM Post #20 |
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I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
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I am not going to spend much time debunking photo "evidence" -- it is often intentionally manipulated as propaganda. One of the images on the page Jeff posted is such a whorish lie that, as rychlak notes in his review of Goldhagen:
![]() Even the site that Jeff links to is not scholarly enough to actually verify the person in the picture, and rather makes some tendentious and rather general point about how it really doesn't matter who it is, and whose reputation is being besmirched. I cannot image that you could do anything but condemn such things as bad scholarship and unethical -- right, Jeff? For another example of the unethical propaganda that Pius XII detractors engage in, take a look at the intentional distortion with the photo on the cover of Cornwall's "Hitler's Pope" analyzed here.. Jeff -- again, do you condemn such deliberate distortions as unethical? |
| The dogma lives loudly within me. | |
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| ivorythumper | Apr 13 2007, 11:56 PM Post #21 |
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I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
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This British site notes the event, without footnote -- 1931, not 1930.
I'll try to find some substantiation. |
| The dogma lives loudly within me. | |
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| bachophile | Apr 14 2007, 12:04 AM Post #22 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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what did i tell u???
but just to bring us back to the original issue in the thread, not the role of the church in nazi germany, but rather the boycott of holocaust day ceremonies... (the other topic is worthy of the a thread but we all know that no one will convince anyone else...) my personal opinion on this is that the vatican ambassador makes a big mistake. i wonder if this is a personal initiative or on orders from rome... why a mistake? let's assume for arguments sake that the emissary takes issue with the said photo caption (here is the full text of the caption...)
so, if the emissary doesnt like this statement, he can go on the public record as stating that this is contrary to the vatican's policy on the subject. but to boycott this event either shows a lack of understanding of the sensitivity of this event (the central memorial ceremony of holocaust day in israel) to the israeli public,or worse, deciding that taking this provocative public stand is the best christian way to display their displeasure. this comes across so badly here. the word on the street is basically..."what do u expect from them? nothing changes...ect..." and does absolutely nothing to repair what is obviously very deep rifts of anger. here is yad vashems official response...
anyway...its a shame. holocaust day, as is memorial day to israel's fallen, has a yom kippur high holiday sanctity to it. when the siren blows and the whole country stands silent, all traffic stops, all activity stops, and u think, exactly why this country needs to continue to survive. |
| "I don't know much about classical music. For years I thought the Goldberg Variations were something Mr. and Mrs. Goldberg did on their wedding night." Woody Allen | |
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| Jeffrey | Apr 14 2007, 05:57 AM Post #23 |
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Senior Carp
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Bach - Very good points about the contemporary issue, and I will drop the thread for now. In general, JP2 and B16 have made efforts towards interacting with Jews and historical anti-semitism on a more positive basis, and I am at a loss to exlain the diplomat's motives at this point in history (something over P12's sainthood movement?) IT - You (seem) to make a good point about Cornwall's picture cover. I have never read the book. I am also very confident there was no 1930 RCC excommunication of Nazis, all reliable historical sources repeat that Nazi figures were not excommunicated, including the Rabbi you mention in the other thread (he defends the policy, saying that excommunication would have only inflamed the situation). I would believe that some RCC group didn't want priests joining the Nazi party, as Bach cites, and this makes perfect sense (in 1931 or some other time). Most of the pro-Pius 12 writings one finds, do not claim that there was an excommunication (as you do, twice over) but defend the policy of not excommunicating as being tactically prudent so as not to inflame the situation with meaningless moral gestures. |
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| TomK | Apr 14 2007, 06:37 AM Post #24 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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I have no proof--but I'm 99% sure that a decision like that came from Rome. I agree with you the ambassador should have attended. On the other hand the Pius issue is a sore point with Catholics and the Vatican doesn't want to seem to go along with even the slightest hint criticism that they think is unfair. Overall though, there is little incentive for the Vatican representatives to attend, besides for with the US, Israel is pretty marginalized (unfairly, of course) in the world. The Church really looses no standing with anyone except the Jews--but it had very little rapport there anyway. Bad situation all around. |
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| bachophile | Apr 15 2007, 07:05 AM Post #25 |
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HOLY CARP!!!
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change of heart... Vatican reverses decision to boycott Holocaust memorial service By The Associated Press Archbishop Antonio Franco, the Vatican's representative to the Holy Land, will attend a Holocaust memorial service at the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, reversing an earlier decision to boycott the event, officials said Sunday. The boycott had threatened to upset fragile relations between Israel and the Vatican. Vatican officials had said they would skip the event because of a caption at the museum describing the wartime conduct of Pope Pius XII. Yad Vashem issued a statement saying 'the ambassador's decision is the right thing to do. Yad Vashem believed all along that it is inappropriate to involve historical research issues in the commemoration of the victims of the Holocaust." The caption next to the picture of Pius in Yad Vashem's museum reads, even when reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican, the pope did not protest. Officials from Yad Vashem, the Vatican's Embassy and the Israeli Foreign Ministry confirmed that the Vatican's ambassador to Israel, Monsignor Antonio Franco, would attend the ceremony. |
| "I don't know much about classical music. For years I thought the Goldberg Variations were something Mr. and Mrs. Goldberg did on their wedding night." Woody Allen | |
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He really doesn't like anyone.

12:46 AM Jul 13