WEBVTT
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[♪♪♪]
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When I was nine years old,
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I went to Jewish summer camp
for the first time.
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For our small community
growing up in Alberta,
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it was a place
to just kind of be ourselves
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and feel like we\'re at home.
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In a nearby small town,
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the mayor, who was also
a Social Studies teacher,
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was teaching his classes that
there was a Jewish conspiracy
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behind everything bad
that happened in the world.
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And he actually
tested his students on this.
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In Edmonton,
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the Jewish community
tried to figure out
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what they could do
for his former students,
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who had been taught
so much wrong information
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and had never actually
met Jewish people before.
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[door opens]
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The camp director said,
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\"We should bring
the kids from Eckville
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to camp.\"
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A counsellor came up to me
and said,
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\"Do you want to take part
in this social mixer
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to encourage cultural
understanding,\" or something,
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and I was, like, \"Sure.\"
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I was so happy
just to be at camp,
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let alone have
a cute counsellor talk to me...
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But once they actually
announced what was happening,
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that there was
this day of fun and fellowship,
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a basketball game
with these kids,
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I realized
what I\'d signed up for.
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One kid was, like, \"They\'re going to come
and burn the camp down.\"
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And my friend Barry
was, like, \"Well, you know, they\'re going
to try to kill us!\"
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My friend Danny actually said
that he felt sorry for them.
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I didn\'t understand that.
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I just thought...
\"They hate us.\"
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We\'d gone to school
and learnt about the Holocaust.
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They\'d gone to school
and only learnt this lie,
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that the Holocaust was a hoax.
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I remember thinking
that they looked old,
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that, you know,
one kid had a moustache...
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There was a picnic
and some speeches
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and that kind of stuff,
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and then the director was, like,
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\"Okay, everyone move over
to the basketball court.
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This kid came up to me
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and actually asked me, like,
\"Do you really have horns?\"
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I couldn\'t believe
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that they could see
Jewish people that way.
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Is this kid really
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from an international
banking conspiracy?
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Is this kid, like, magical,
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and can create
natural disasters?
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I felt, like,
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they\'re no different than
Skinheads or Nazis or the KKK.
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[whistle blows]
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This kid said to me
at one point, \"Hey, nice shot.\"
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[♪♪♪]
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[cheering]
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Looking back, it\'s kind of amazing
that it happened at all,
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that they were
invited to the camp,
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and that they actually came...
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All this thinking
the worst of each other
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didn\'t really hold up
to a basketball game.
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[♪♪♪]
