Chicago news station WGN-TV apologizes for displaying Holocaust symbol during Yom Kippur broadcast
Chicago news station WGN-TV apologizes for displaying Holocaust symbol during Yom Kippur broadcast
BY Rachelle Blidner
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Updated: Wednesday, September 23, 2015, 3:08 PM
Chicago TV Station WGN showed a patch Jewish people were forced to wear during the Holocaust during segment on Yom Kippur Tuesday night. WGN
Chicago TV Station WGN showed a patch Jewish people were forced to wear during the Holocaust during segment on Yom Kippur Tuesday night.
A Chicago news station is repenting after displaying the patch Jews were forced to wear in the Holocaust during a segment about the Jewish day of atonement.
WGN-TV's graphic showed a yellow Star of David with the German word for Jew, "Jude," on Tuesday night while explaining Yom Kippur, one of Judaism's holiest days of the year.
The star is against a background of blue and white stripes, as though it were placed on the uniform of a concentration camp prisoner.
An inmate uniform jacket worn by Maurice Raichel in Germany's Buchenwald Concentration Camp is photographed in Chicago suburb Skokie, Illinois. Brian Cahn/© Brian Cahn/ZUMA Press/Corbis
An inmate uniform jacket worn by Maurice Raichel in Germany's Buchenwald Concentration Camp is photographed in Chicago suburb Skokie, Illinois.
The graphic was taken from an image bank, the station said in an apology Wednesday.
"Regrettably, we failed to recognize that the image was an offensive N**i symbol," WGN said in a statement. "We are extremely embarrassed and we deeply apologize to our viewers and to the Jewish community for this mistake."
"Ignorance is not an excuse."
The image was the only one used during the 20-second clip, in which reporter Tom Negovan explained the basic tenets of Yom Kippur. The holiday began Tuesday night and ends Wednesday at sundown.
WGN vowed to review its policies and to "do better." It said it has already made changes to "make sure a hurtful oversight like this never happens again."
Jewish Germans were forced to wear the yellow star for identification beginning in September 1941. The measure spread to France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Slovakia the following year, according to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Mark Karlinsky, an editor at two Chicago law publications, was one of the first to point out the poor taste of the WGN image.
"Holy crap, WGN News, this is your stock photo for a Jewish holiday?? Nobody thought that's a bad choice of photo?" he wrote on Twitter.
We are truly sorry for inadvertently using an offensive image in our Yom Kippur story. We apologize and deeply regret the error.
WGN TV News (@WGNNews) September 23, 2015
"How could your employees in your newsroom be so ignorant they don't know what this image means?" Duke Mantee wrote on twitter.
"Who are your editors Ann Coulter or Ted Nugent?" Arthur R. Marcus wrote.
Some people said they understood the mistake but were glad WGN apologized
OK Where are the r**ts caused by this horrible insult against Jewish people. Why aren't the studio being burned and all employees murdered. Some groups r**t when they find an excuse and this is not one of them. Glad Jewish people are more civilied, aren't you?
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