What exactly is wrong, if anything, with denying that the Holocaust happened at the alleged scale?

Question

David Irvin, a british historian, has been trialed in Austria for denying that the hollocaust happened at the alleged scale. Do you think this is fair? Or do you think that double standards are operating here? And besides, isnt history always open to interpetation and correction?

Answer 1

There is nothing wrong, in principle, with denying that the Holocaust happened, or for that matter that any other historical event did or did not happen, either at all or as it is generally accepted to have happened. The problem arises when one simply ingnores evidence because it does not fit with what one prefers to believe, and that is what Holocaust deniers are doing. There is so much evidence in support of the Holocaust having occurred, and on the scale that it did, that for anyone to deny it requires either willful blindness or an irrational belief that the greatest hoax in the history of the world, by far, has been perpetrated before the eyes of the world, involving not only the "alleged" survivors, but also the "alleged" eyewitnesses, and even the "alleged" perpetrators themselves, all in their many thousands.

Certainly history is "always open to interpretation and correction," but only on the basis of evidence and argument. Simply making assertions is not enough. I have yet to see any claims of Holocaust deniers that relied on real, verifiable evidence or logical argument, particularly when compared with the mountain of evidence to the contrary.

As for whether someone should be hauled into court because he chooses to believe something which is demonstrably untrue, no, I do not agree with that, at least not when it comes to historical interpretation. People should be free to entertain their delusions, provided those delusions do not bring real harm to someone else. While denying the Holocaust may outrage people and even cause hurt feelings, that does not justify denying someone the right to hold, and even promote, that belief. One of the benefits of living in a free society is the freedom to be willfully stupid.

Answer 2

Nothing is wrong in denying anything, the fact that the Germans were meticulous in their record keeping, provided all the evidence needed to prove the scope of the genocide. The two boxcar loads of documents and film produced by the prosecutors during the Nuremburg Trials are enough to satisfy most historians. Why someone would be jailed for not believing the scope of the Holocaust is idiotic, there must be more to the story.

Answer 3

The debating of the Holocaust question can easily be ended if all parties would simply examine the German tax and property records of the era.

The German society as a whole was very organized and efficient
They kept record and counts on everything for ever.

You will find a very large number of Jewish German citizens stop paying taxes during the period just before the WWII and never paid them again.

Migration of such a mass of people is not support by the foreign office records or by the visa / passport records maintained by the German govt.

So what happened to all those people?

Answer 4

Historians have gone to great lengths to get the numbers right. When we as a species look at the facts and deny their validity we are proving that we do not learn from past mistakes. Thus, the genocides in Rwanda and currently The Sudan are repeating this inhumanity. Instead of looking at the facts and saying, "up with this we will not put," denying the facts allows us to stick our heads in the sand and do nothing. I personally am horrified when I meet someone who denies the Holocaust. It frightens me to know that this is going on regardless of the facts. It also makes me feel like our species is doomed.

Answer 5

Double standards are definitely operating here. When Philip Cohen wrote his book, which (among other derogatory remarks) denied the scale in which Serbs were Butchered during WW2 (In the Jasenovac Death Camp and otherwise), former Brish PM Thatcher praised this crapp. Stern's Gang in today's Israel tried to reach a deal with the Nazis, according to which the Nazis would have deported the Jews to today's Israel (and massacre Goyim as they did) in return for Stern's Gang cooperation with them against the British. Tzachi Hanegbi (the sone of a key SG figure, Geula Cohen) once compared any conspiracy theory regarding Rabin's assassination to "the denial of the Holocaust". So yes, double standards are operating here.

Answer 6

Playing down a major event to make it look smaller and less significant only hurts the reason the event was remembered in the first place.

The Holocaust happened and it wasn't just Jews that suffered. Gypsies,Gay people and other minorities were also "exterminated" during that time.

Remembering History helps us prepare for the future.
Ignoring any major event in history means that the likelihood of something similar happening is larger and that the lessons weren't learned.

Answer 7

Denying the Holocaust happened on the scale it did is a lie, pure & simple. The Germans (who kept very detailed records of their actions) & the Jews (who suffered from those actions) both agree on the scale, as do the military & civilian personnel who investigated the death camp atrocities, the thefts of real estate, art & other property, and other crimes. The only people who are in denial are people like Irvin who weren't there, anti-Semites who like to pretend the Jews are complaining about nothing, etc.

Answer 8

I have to question the intellegence of people who deny the Holocaust ever took place or even have the audacity to say "But it wasn't on that grand a scale".

Its well documented. Not just by the allies but by the Germans themselves, who were meticulous record keepers. They even went to the point of keeping track of how much hair went out for matteresses, gold fillings for smelting and even how much fertilizer the burned and ground bones of their victims would produce monthly.

I agree that history is always open to interpretation but...does it matter that say 600,000 people were executed or 6,000,000? Genocide is the name of the game here. That was the master plan. Criminal in any case.

Answer 9

No i dont think a person should be jailed for it however it goes against rational thinking to consider that it didnt happen or that the scale was not what has been reported. History may be open to interpretation but making genocide seem better than it is is not right either.

Answer 10

Nothing wrong with differences in interpretation, as long as you stick to the facts--in this case, the well-documented fact that over 11 million humans were murdered by the Nazis, including 6 million Jews.