Jewish Group
Related: About this forumThe Other Denied Genocides
By Daniel Jonah Goldhagen
Published February 15, 2012, issue of February 17, 2012.
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is the author of Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity, which is the basis of a PBS documentary of the same name. His work can be read at goldhagen.com
Like the Holocaust itself, Holocaust denial is a well-known if often misunderstood phenomenon. In its most naked form, it denies the historical fact that during the Nazi period, Germans, helped by many other Europeans such as Ukrainians, sought to kill the Jews of Europe and managed to slaughter roughly 6 million of them. In somewhat less brazen forms, it denies not the Germans perpetration of the Holocaust in its entirety, but merely central aspects of it, such as that they used gas chambers or that they killed a number close to 6 million Jews. In a still somewhat more attenuated form, Holocaust denial practitioners say little about the events themselves or about the Germans or others who slaughtered Jews, and instead attack survivors or scholars, calling them frauds when they seek nothing more than to tell the truth about what happened.
Holocaust denial consists of more than outright denial of the Holocaust. It includes a variety of attempts to cast doubt on, cover up and confuse people about the Holocaust, in essence to falsify the history of this period and to fabricate a fictitious version, because it serves many people in diverse ways, primarily politically, to have such a fictitious history become accepted. Defenders of the name and honor of Germans or of Ukrainians or other Europeans, anti-Semites, enemies of Israel, propagandists of many stripes and sensibilities, all see the truth about the Holocaust to be inimical to their agendas. In this sense, the original name that the Holocaust deniers gave themselves, Holocaust revisionists, is correct insofar as they used a variety of strategies, many of which were not outright denial, to revise (albeit falsely) the understanding of the Nazi period and what the Germans and others did to Jews.
Read more: http://www.forward.com/articles/151051/#ixzz1mid5PyPU
Liora24
(34 posts)At my college last year. The Holocaust denial is just the icing on the cake for a lot of them though because you have to be pretty screwed up to be an intelligent person and deny the Holocaust. As far as I know he was into a lot of strange stuff like weird cults (I think one of them was called Shaktim Dorje or something like that) and said thinks like how Hamas were heroes (and he wasn't even Muslim was the strange part), and also would refer to Kim Jong Il as "the dear leader" on his blog.
Luckily there were ways to deal with such people. Since he had written such things in his blog and there was actual proof I submitted a complaint to the Conduct Council and there was a hearing. He actually tried to claim that since he'd written them from his apartment and not from the school that he couldn't be punished. Of course the Conduct Council was very reasonable and decided that he should be kicked out, and I'm glad. People like that are a menace to decent society and don't belong in the university.
On a personal note, ellisonz, are you Jewish?
ellisonz
(27,711 posts)...and believing in Holocaust denial and the love of violence in general are correlative - they all require an inability to emphasize with the plight of others. I'm surprised a college acted in that manner frankly given our expansive interpretation of First Amendment rights. Was this a private college?
I am Jewish by birth, but I also embrace the principles of Buddhism, so I'm kind of a JuBu
Good to meet you Liora. Aloha
Apparently this was a "repeat disruptor" - who knew
Mosby
(16,317 posts)Means "my light" or "I have light".
ellisonz
(27,711 posts)12. Christians are the ultimate hypocrites
Claim to be pro-life but send kids off to war to die for oil (actually pro-choice IS pro-life but that's another topic)
Claim to teach tolerance and peace, but persecute non-Christians (especially Jews) and gays
Claim to be peaceful but want the death penalty and gun laws
Claim to care about the poor but support big corporations
I could list more but then I'd be here all day!
Hey I noticed when you deleted a bunch of your posts, I'm pretty disappointed with how the system here is working, but stick with it Mosby.