Two May 4 speeches to remember

"It's what we tell each other about every year: that it existed. And I notice over the years, it actually only becomes more essential to me. Now that my father and mother are no longer here, who still honors it?"

An excerpt from Hans Goedkoop's May 4 speech, this year. His question is elementary; there are fewer and fewer people who can keep the memory of World War II alive with their own experiences. And perhaps because of this, we see concepts of war being increasingly brutally hijacked. Putin condoning his war with the need to "denazify" Ukraine. Willem Engel who draws the comparison between the mouthpiece requirement and the Star of David. Baudet who writes that the unvaccinated are "the new Jews," and "looking away exclusionists are the new Nazis and NSB members."

Not only harmful rhetoric because it hurts people, but also because it dilutes the meaning of these Holocaust concepts and obscures the view of what happened then. It can diminish vigilance.

How do we keep it alive?

So in addition to "who keeps it alive?", the question arises, how do we keep it alive? Lest we forget, what actually happened.

Two May 4 speeches gave rock-solid answers to both of these questions this year.

Hans Goedkoop's phenomenal "What shouldn't be allowed

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And "Badmeester Henk" by Tieme de Laat

Both deal with the same theme: staying true to your own moral compass, even when circumstances give reason to condone deviation. And their how also shows similarities. I list three techniques they both apply with verve.

Three techniques that make speeches extra powerful

1. BEB: Image, Effect, Meaning

Both speakers apply the so-called BEB model. First they set up a powerful image, then they share with their audience the effect it has on them ("the I"), and finally place it in a larger framework ("the we"). Thus Goedkoop poignantly sketches Abel Herzberg's Bergen Belsen, shares its effect: "And I notice with age, that it actually only becomes more essential for me. Now that my father and mother are no longer here, who keeps it alive?", and ultimately confronts us with today's condonation by circumstance, and its inequity, because "If it could be done then, it can always be done."

The BEB construction allows the audience to experience the message in three layers.


2.Playing with time

You can further enhance your audience's experience by the time in which you narrate. For example, Goedkoop places us directly in Bergen Belsen with the sentence, "Allow me to take you to Bergen Belsen." From there, he describes the conditions of the camp in the present tense. It makes us eyewitnesses for a moment.

Tieme starts in the past tense, but draws us to the now with his transition to the present tense: "And then still in the chaos of war continue to think rationally. Not making the bad worse by doing evil yourself. Keep helping the prisoners but leaving the guards alone...". It makes what he says of all times, so also of now.

Note how Goedkoop switches language tenses several times (quite deliberately?) and how he underlines his message by doing so.


3.Hook up with your audience

With the passing of generations, it becomes increasingly important to explicitly answer the question "Why should I care" in May 4 speeches. In other words, how do you make what happened then relevant to people now. Both speakers do that by drawing parallels with the present. Not by hijacking loaded concepts and sticking them on current events, but by exposing the universal mechanisms behind the war and translating them to today. For example, says Tieme, "And more and more I see it happening, that we are busy undermining the opponent, instead of helping the friend." And Goedkoop also draws comparisons to the present that encourage self-reflection.

This is ultimately why we commemorate, which allows us to "honor" it all.

Let's dwell on that for a moment.