NO ANTISEMITISM TO SEE HERE. NOPE, NOTHING. MOVE ALONG, NOW. . . .

COPENHAGEN, Denmark – Parents of more than 100 Danish scouts were outraged over a game of tag at a scout camp in which children acted as Jews wearing yellow Stars of David and tried to escape from adults pretending to be Nazis.

The group of about 160 scouts, aged 11-14, included a dozen teenagers from the Danish-speaking minority in northern Germany. The school yard was turned into a concentration camp with swastikas on the windows. . . .

Jes Imer of the local FDF chapter told the tabloid B.T. that they “may have crossed the line this time with a night game where Nazis chase Jews.”

The school yard included a sign with the German words “Arbeit macht frei,” or “Work will set you free,” the infamous inscription over the entrance to the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland.

“I don’t know whether I should apologize,” Imer told B.T.

Oh, I know. You couldn’t make stuff like this up. Sadly, you don’t have to. At least the parents were shocked.

UPDATE: Reader David Rosenberg says not so fast with the antisemitism charges:

I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that the people who organized this game were anti-semites.

I was a counselor at a Jewish day camp in California where we once concocted a similar game although without the props like Jewish stars etc. I think we had the kids trying to escape from Europe past the Nazi border guards.

Later on, the other counselors and I agreed that the game was too scary and totally inappropriate. But I don’t think we would have thought that it could be interpreted as anti-semitic, even if it had been a non-Jewish day camp and even if we had been non-Jews.

Sure, let’s hold the Germans (even Danish-speaking ones) to a higher standard, but I’d like to see more facts before I call it the A word.

Meanwhile Ben Dolfin writes:

This sounds similar to a game we play at our church in the youth group. We have persecution Sunday where Youth Group members pretend to be Christians located in a country that doesn’t allow the freedom of religion. Roman Empire, Russia during communism, China, etc. The kids are all dropped off outside town at night in groups of 2-3 and they need to all assemble and meet at a location in town and hold a bible study. Meanwhile the counselors and friendly volunteers drive around with spotlights and attempt to run down and capture the Christians. The point of the exercise is to who people that in some areas people can’t freely assemble and worship, but in reality it turns into a big hide and go seek game for adults with 500,000 candlepower deer spotlights, full camo outfits, and running through cornfields at midnight. If you got caught we even loaded people into a “prison truck” which was basically a big van. It’s very similiar sounding to what they appeared to be doing.

So although it may sound bad, I think there was a moral lesson that they were teaching in there somewhere. Instead of giving the groups labels of Nazi and Jew they should have called them “evil tyrants” and “free people”. I think that was their biggest error. It sounds bad, but I think it was probably harmless in it’s intent. That’s my guess at this time anyways.

Um, okay. But if that’s true, there’s no hint of it in the story. Which would make the story very bad reporting, though that’s certainly not out of the question.