General Holocaust denial discussion Part III

[A'isha]

This is the problem. If there is no consensus definition of the Holocaust, then the word doesn't have any real meaning. If there's no definition of the Holocaust then how can we define what it is to be a victim of the Holocaust?

The Nazis weren't so kind as to leave us a specific definition and headcount of everyone they systematically targeted and murdered. That information has to be gleaned by historians from a wide variety of sources, and different historiographic methodologies (often combined with new information that comes to light during historical investigations) result in different results sometimes. That's how history works.

Again, Gerlach discusses all this in the book I cited above.

According to Pew, 73% of Jews say that remembering the Holocaust is an essential part of what it means to be Jewish to them. Only 19% consider observing Jewish law to be essential part of what it means to be Jewish. 68% of Jews say that a person doesn't need to believe in God to be Jewish. Clearly, the Holocaust is important to the Jewish community. If somebody insists that almost half the victims of the Holocaust were not Jewish, wouldn't that same person have to agree that it's a little self-centered for Jews to care so much about it?

No, since while the Nazis systematically persecuted and murdered a whole lot of different groups, they (from Hitler on down) had a particular focus on Jews, and Jews formed the primary victims of both Nazi rhetoric and their campaign of genocide.

If you add up all the other groups who were victims of the Nazi program systematic murder, it can almost equal (or exceed) the number of Jewish victims. But you still have to add up all the other groups together to do so. The millions of Jewish victims were all part of a single group.

And if something horrible happened to millions of people and only some of those people were Jews, why would a Jewish person or anybody at all think that it's anti-Semitic to deny it?

Because of the above.

I don't believe in diluting the word into meaninglessness. Yad Vashem uses Holocaust and Shoah interchangeably.

"Shoah" was a word chosen because the word "holocaust" has unpleasant religious connotations. However, "holocaust" is still how it's most commonly known, so that's the word that's most often used, even by people who prefer the term "shoah".

 

[TubbaBlubba]

It is more correct to say that the Final Solution (to the Jewish question) only refers to the Jews; that is, the universal policy of systematic execution, gassing, cremation and so forth of Jews on a mass scale that began at some point after the invation of Russia. It's a meaningful distinction since it was a specific part of Nazi policy, considered as important (or as part of) as the war effort.

Sometimes "The Holocaust" refers to the persecution of Jews beginning with the Nuremberg laws (so it includes e.g. Kristallnacht) but it is really a vague term that should not be used without qualification, when precision is important.

 

[smartcooky]

There were two main types of Concentration Camps

Death Camps such as Treblinka, Auschwitz and Chelmno, where mostly Jews, and many others as well, were mainly gassed to death. Chelmno was the first death camp, opened in December 1941. Jews and Roma were murdeed there using mobile gas vans.

Forced Labour Camps such as Dachau, Ravensbruck, Bergen-Belsen and Neuengamme, where mostly Jews, and many others were worked, beaten, starved and shot to death or died from exposure.

(Yes, I know there were other types of camps such as transit-camps)

If you survived incarceration in these camps, then you are a Holocaust survivor.

 

[Tolls]

As the USHMM says, though:
"In addition to former inmates of concentration camps and ghettos, this also includes refugees and people in hiding."

I would have said survivors of the camp system, myself, but the museum feels otherwise.

 

[smartcooky]

As the USHMM says, though:
"In addition to former inmates of concentration camps and ghettos, this also includes refugees and people in hiding."

I would have said survivors of the camp system, myself, but the museum feels otherwise.

Well that is an even wider definition of Holocaust Survivor than I would have thought.

http://holocaustlearning.org/survivors

Note that among the people whose H Survival stories are people who

Escaped to England or Norway, some even before war broke out.
Survived several Nazi slave labour camps.
Survived the Lodz ghetto and Auschwitz concentration camp.

 

[Nick Terry]

Amazon stops selling more than 70 Holocaust denial books

My summary of a surprisingly underreported story. This all went down late afternoon or early evening yesterday without any announcement from Amazon, who did not respond to queries from the Jewish Chronicle and at least one other news site to explain why they decided to pull denial books (but not all such books, and not that much grade-A antisemitica) from sale.

 

[smartcooky]

My summary of a surprisingly underreported story. This all went down late afternoon or early evening yesterday without any announcement from Amazon, who did not respond to queries from the Jewish Chronicle and at least one other news site to explain why they decided to pull denial books (but not all such books, and not that much grade-A antisemitica) from sale.

That is really great to see, although I expect a few of the more fanatical "freedom of speech advocates" will be breaking out a fresh supply of "Dear Editor" letterheads and wringing their hands furiously!!

 

[Ivanesca]

Here are the pictures of those newspaper articles I promised you.

truthist is now banned (good riddance), but it's still worth noting that even arch Holocaust denier and proven serial liar Germar Rudolf admits that this is garbage.

holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.com/2017/03/germar-rudolf-destroys-don-heddesheimer.html?m=1

[Heddesheimer's book] deals with Jewish fundraising campaigns during and after the FIRST World War, and therefore if only for chronological reason does not deal with the Jewish Holocaust of the SECOND World War.

even a stopped clock is right at least once a day.

 

[EtienneSC]

My summary of a surprisingly underreported story. This all went down late afternoon or early evening yesterday without any announcement from Amazon, who did not respond to queries from the Jewish Chronicle and at least one other news site to explain why they decided to pull denial books (but not all such books, and not that much grade-A antisemitica) from sale.

Well done Nick Terry and HC for reporting this. The take-home message for those interested in revisionism/denial is that from now on they will have to visit revisionist sites to learn relevant information about archival research - this at a time when UK records withheld for 70 years are being declassified.

Sadly, you will no longer learn much about this highly-politicized subject from browsing on Amazon.

 

[LemmyCaution]

His essay is one of the few to argue against revisionism on the basis of a prior sympathetic knowledge of revisionist literature.

Jason Myers, contributor to the HC paper on Aktion Reinhard, included an essay in that paper on how he came to abandon revisionism. Jason had contributed to Incoherent History and other significant denier efforts prior to his re-thinking of his views.

Less formally, recently Black Rabbit of Inlé has stated that "I'm convinced by the Nazis' own documents that there must have been an extermination programme operating at the AR camps. So, I can pretty much accept there was something similar happening at Chelmno, even if it's not a place I've yet been to or know that much about. There's certainly a lot of unanswered questions for which we'll probably never get satisfactory answers, but there's really nothing to support the transit camps theory"; that the aerial photos of Birkenau were not doctored after all (https://rodoh.info/forum/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2699#p85837), and that "The evidence for gassings with CO at Majdanek is strong" (one of BRoI's YouTube videos was a defense of Eric Hunt's earlier video that no gassings took place at Madjanek, BRoI remains skeptical about Zyklon B being used there).

Here's a link to one place where BRoI explained some of the reasons for his change of mind: http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=27426&p=540012#p540100.

 

[LemmyCaution]

Here is a recent Germar Rudolf essay on the Aktion |Reinhard camps that in effect is a response to Eric Hunt's remarks on the subject on his questioningtheholocaust site:
One Single Survivor

Relative to Rothstein, how does a man whose fate is unknown (two Yad Vashem records have him sent from Theresienstadt to Minsk, two YV records have him sent to Treblinka, none has him sent via Treblinka to Minsk - and the data comes from memorial-book-type sources) become representative of anything, let alone a supposedly vast transit program?

You do know, don't you, that during the period of Rothstein's supposed arrival in Minsk the Germans were shooting Jews in Minsk?

Rudolf's comments on Rothstein are based on very shoddy work and wishful thinking: http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=27891

 

[LemmyCaution]

I don't think I've ever seen a Holocaust denier that wasn't also an anti-Semite.

I have but they are a distinct minority. Quoting from the aforementioned essay by Jason Myers: "My revisionist beliefs neither began nor were fuelled by any prejudice against Jews, although I certainly recognized an anti-Semitic presence among the majority of deniers." Jason was in a position to know.

 

[Belz...]

If you want to go with the expansive definition of the Holocaust, go right ahead. Lord knows there are enough pop-historians who buy into the 5 million non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust that Simon Wiesenthal made up to give non-Jews a reason to care about the event. I hope you're not one of the people who was upset that Donald Trump didn't mention the Jews on Holocaust Remembrance day, what with Jews being just one of the groups of innocent civilian persecuted by the Nazis.

They were decimated as a people, Howdy. The Jews of Europe came real close to being wiped out. I think that's quite significant.

And how is the 5 million figure made up? Where did those 5 million Jews go, Captain?

 

[smartcooky]

They were decimated as a people, Howdy. The Jews of Europe came real close to being wiped out. I think that's quite significant.

And how is the 5 million figure made up? Where did those 5 million Jews go, Captain?

No. Captain Howdy is talking about NON-Jews here. He says the five million NON-Jews is a made up number. It isn't, its just the upper end estimate of a number that will probably never be known for sure.

 

[dudalb]

My summary of a surprisingly underreported story. This all went down late afternoon or early evening yesterday without any announcement from Amazon, who did not respond to queries from the Jewish Chronicle and at least one other news site to explain why they decided to pull denial books (but not all such books, and not that much grade-A antisemitica) from sale.

When I saw this, I typed ,into the Kindle store search engine, the word "Holocaust" which, previously, would bring up a great many Holocaust Denial books along with the legit ones. Now almost of the all of the Denier crap is gone..and no one will miss it.
I suspect that the current wave of Anti Semitic incidents has a lot to do with it.
The whole problem was that Amazon, a few years ago, set up what amounted to a "Vanity Press" app whereby people could put up their books for sale..for a fee...on the Kindle Store. Most of it was fairly harmless...crappy fiction that no legit publisher would touch with a ten foot pole...but some of it was truly obnoxious,the Holocaust and other Anti Semitic crap being among it. I guess that Bezos figured out that whatever income Amazon made from this was far outweighed by the damage done to it's image by selling this crap,even if it was as a "third party".

 

[EtienneSC]

Jason Myers, contributor to the HC paper on Aktion Reinhard, included an essay in that paper on how he came to abandon revisionism. Jason had contributed to Incoherent History and other significant denier efforts prior to his re-thinking of his views.

Thanks, I have this as a Kindle and will read it at some point.

Less formally, recently Black Rabbit of Inlé has stated that "I'm convinced by the Nazis' own documents that there must have been an extermination programme operating at the AR camps...
Here's a link to one place where BRoI explained some of the reasons for his change of mind: http://www.skepticforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=27426&p=540012#p540100.

Several people seem to be shifting their ground, without being in BROI's position to cite documentation. The practice on CODOH Forum is often simply to raise the standards of proof to a point where they cannot be met and then freeze the threads. This keeps the threads focused, but it is also an easy way of winning almost any argument. It also involves double standards for those who make claims of missing Germans deported from Prussia and Silesia and deaths under the Soviets. If I relax the standards of proof I can find corroborating evidence of shootings in the East. Baldur von Schirach recalled hearing one of Himmler's speeches to that effect in his published memoirs which matches the Einsatzgruppen reports, for example. The bodies at the AR camps must have got there somehow and if they were shot there would likely be bullets and bullet casings found. Everyone would like more evidence of what exactly happened. The scale of events and the reasons remain opaque to me.

My concern is for the political and religious ideologies at work and the theories of human nature that their implementation imply. Here I still have general problems with historical accounts drawn from the Allied version of events that prioritize eye-witness testimony. What is alleged is not mass killing that is justified by a government, as with the fire bombing of German cities or the bombing of North Vietnam. These were acknowledged by the governments and reported in the newspapers, along with the reasons they were carried out and the demands (unconditional surrender, withdrawal from South Vietnam) under which they would stop. The former was widely regarded as retaliation or within the rules of war Germany had declared (and still is - Britain recently built a monument to Bomber Command). The latter gave rise to a mass protest movement. Nazi Germany had a less free press and limited possibilities of opposition (though the euthanasia program was known about and protested against). You would still think that comparable information would be available, but it is not so. We have the Auschwitz Camp Orders (published by Norbert Frei), but they contain no relevant orders. Nor is there anything higher up that is not subject to reasonable doubt.

The form of a historical narrative is something like: "So and so believed this, so he did that and here is what happened." Appropriately footnoted and with content that matches our general view of human nature. Holocaust narratives are more like: "These people were so bad you wouldn't believe it and deserved what they got. Don't be like them! This is the best documented genocide ever." "OK, about these footnotes, where are the documents?" "The Germans destroyed them. That's how cunning they were." "That's not what you said at first...(turns to Germar Rudolf)"

 

[LemmyCaution]

Several people seem to be shifting their ground, without being in BROI's position to cite documentation.

A bit of a rough patch for denial, when its main activity is YouTube comments, eh?

If I relax the standards of proof I can find corroborating evidence of shootings in the East.

I'm not sure what you mean but you can find corroborating evidence of the open-air shootings using exacting standards of proof, the same ones that historians use for anything they study.

Everyone would like more evidence of what exactly happened.

This doesn't make me particularly anxious; I am most interested in new and better interpretations, because the existing evidence base is rich. I'd never say that the evidence is complete, and I welcome new finds, for sure, but in comparison to other historical eras I've studied, the source material for the extermination of the Jews is strong.

The scale of events and the reasons remain opaque to me.

Gerlach's latest book is excellent on this issue.

Here I still have general problems with historical accounts drawn from the Allied version of events that prioritize eye-witness testimony.

But, first, Allied versions are decades, well, half a century old; they form an interesting object of study but to think that "Allied versions" are what animate scholarship is absurd. It may surprise you but there are no longer the Allies and the Axis, and that frame doesn't accurately describe those studying the extermination of the Jews, the Third Reich, or WWII in general. Second, in 1961 Hilberg published the first of his three editions - almost entirely eschewing eyewitness testimony and relying on German documents, just as the IMT and NMT made use of German documents. The Einsatzgruppen trial saw two witnesses called - not really eyewitnesses either - and rested nearly the entire case on German documents. It was the defense in fact that went to witnesses. Third, you must not read works of history if you're under the impression that they are witness centric. The integrated history turn, and a lot of recent work, has drawn on witnessing quite extensively, but not to prove the extermination of the Jews - rather to broaden the scope and object of study. Taken as a whole, recent scholarship has relied on a broad range of different kinds of evidence, from German documents to testimonies, from diaries to physical studies, etc. Reducing this range to eyewitnesses fails against even the most cursory review of recent publications.

You would still think that comparable information would be available, but it is not so.

Not sure what you mean by comparable, but, no, the German press didn't give extensive coverage to the mass murders, and the German people didn't develop protest movements against them. You might have the Third Reich confused with another place?

We have the Auschwitz Camp Orders (published by Norbert Frei), but they contain no relevant orders. Nor is there anything higher up that is not subject to reasonable doubt.

Have you read the 5-volume Auschwitz camp history, with 3286 references to a variety of sources? Your single source here is laughable in view of works like that one and many others - e.g., Fleming's Auschwitz, The Allies and Censorship with 847 references and in-depth discussion of contemporary reports about the camp.

The form of a historical narrative is something like: "So and so believed this, so he did that and here is what happened." Appropriately footnoted and with content that matches our general view of human nature. Holocaust narratives are more like: "These people were so bad you wouldn't believe it and deserved what they got. Don't be like them! This is the best documented genocide ever." "OK, about these footnotes, where are the documents?" "The Germans destroyed them. That's how cunning they were." "That's not what you said at first...(turns to Germar Rudolf)"

Again, you might want to acquaint yourself with some of the works you want to dismiss and haven't read - or if you have, have failed to understand. I would suggest that you read books like the following and look at the references closely, e.g., in Angrick & Klein's study of Riga or Stangneth's Eichmann book or Silberklang's Lublin work.

Since Nick Terry posted this, some important titles have been added: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=11434970&postcount=1073, sadly the only one I recall is Wolfgang Seibel, Persecution and Rescue: The Politics of the "Final Solution" in France, 1940-1944 - 944 end notes

 

[dudalb]

The scale of events and the reasons remain opaque to me.

Funny, they seem clear to everybody who is not a Holocaust Denier or is not playing some sort of tiresome intellectual game.....

 

[LemmyCaution]

@EtienneSC, out of curiosity, roughly what % of the books on Nick Terry's list have you read and analyzed?

 

[Ivanesca]

The form of a historical narrative is something like: "So and so believed this, so he did that and here is what happened." Appropriately footnoted and with content that matches our general view of human nature.Holocaust narratives are more like: "These people were so bad you wouldn't believe it and deserved what they got. Don't be like them! This is the best documented genocide ever."

Again, you might want to acquaint yourself with some of the works you want to dismiss and haven't read - or if you have, have failed to understand. I would suggest that you read books like the following and look at the references closely, e.g., in Angrick & Klein's study of Riga or Stangneth's Eichmann book or Silberklang's Lublin work.

Someone's having a tantrum.

1) There is an actual subset in Holocaust studies about the motivations of the perpetrators. One recent example would of Harald Welzer and Sonke Nietzel's excellent study of the average German soldier, based on candid, recorded and influence free conversation records. Their approach is also about comparisons, i.e. using their findings to interpret the behavior of other soldiers in other wars, including the US wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. It might sound repetitive, but once more, EtienneSC's fantasies don't match up with reality.

2) For someone who talks big about "Human Nature", EtienneSC has repeatedly shown that he doesn't know jack about it. i.e., in this very thread, he writes the following:

In terms of the sources Reinecke used, these include prominently the writings of Sigmund Adler, who is there in Reinecke's bibliography. Looking up Adler, I find that he lived from 1853 to 1920 and was the son of a well to do Jewish merchant. He was a teacher and historian with particular interests in inheritance law and research into legal sources. He was the brother of Victor Adler, a prominent politician who corresponded with Friedrich Engels, the friend of Karl Marx. By acknowledging a debt to Adler during the Third Reich, Reinecke does not evince the sort of casual or visceral anti-semitism found in the Taubner verdict.

In other words, I like some, individual Jews, therefore I can't hate Jews as a group!. This is like saying that because someone has an Asian wife, or worse yet, is deeply into Asian Pornography, or is into martial arts, they couldn't possibly hate Asians as a group. EtienneSC also seems to think that just because someone belongs to a certain minority group, they can't possibly be racist against that same group. See trustbutverify's excellent explanation about the phenomenon of "internalization", exemplified not only by EtienneSC's "Jewish Deniers", but Asian Americans such as Tila Tequila who embrace white supremacism.

Really, EtienneSC doesn't even know the basics of "Human Nature". He has no business, and for that matter, no right to decide what fits and doesn't fit "Human Nature". Between him and actual psychologists or sociologists who have studied the Holocaust and have an actual background in studying "Human nature", such as Sonke Nietzel, Wendy Lower, Stanley Milgram or Phillip Zimbardo, or even survivor authors like Primo Levi who reflected on their experiences and what they meant, and some ignoramus spouting off ignorant word salad about "human nature", I'll take the former any day.

Also...

...Stangneth's Eichmann book...

Sorry, Lemmy. You're wasting your breath. EtienneSC is not going to read Eichmann before Jerusalem. Not only because EtienneSC is lazy and would rather spout straw men, word salad, or preconcieved notions than familiarize himself with the literature, understand its claims and know how to respond to them, but also because Stagneth's work in EBJ completely demolishes two of EtienneSC's pet peeves. Bettina Stagneth not only does a lot of source analysis and explains both the character of Eichmann and the broader Post War society, but she also highlights the fact that several governments and intelligence agencies, including the German and American ones, colluded to protect Eichmann and other Former Nazis. She also draws attention to how the German government blackmailed Israel into stopping Eichmann from exposing former Nazis in the West German government. In other words, the facts Stagneth cites refute EtienneSC's repeated insistence on "Allied versions of the story". Given how he has completely and repeatedly ignored the fact that his "Allied version" or propaganda never happened, he's not going to be interested.