OT: Why do some groups/ people deny the Holocaust?

[ha98ed14]

I just read this article on CNN about a group (NGO, 501c3, I'm not sure) but it is a group devoted to denying or debating the Holocaust. Somehow they managed to get an ad saying as much in the Harvard Student Newspaper, The Crimson. Everyone at Harvard admits running the ad was a mistake. They say it got missed because of the 3 weeks of summer vacation. Article link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/09/09/massachusetts.harvard.holocaust/index.html

My question is, why do some people deny the Holocaust? What do they gain from denying it? And why do they devote time and resources to denying it? I just don't get it. *I* know it is real because my dad's family is Jewish, from an area that has been part of Russia, Ukraine and Poland in different points in history. My grandfather's parents came here before WWII, but all his cousins and aunts and uncles died. We know that because we have the letters from Europe from before the war saying how things were. After a certain point there were no more letters.

Since the vast majority of SS soldiers or people suspected of war crimes are dead, who are these people who keep denying it? What is their motivation? I just don't get it.

[kijip]

I just read this article on CNN about a group (NGO, 501c3, I'm not sure) but it is a group devoted to denying or debating the Holocaust. Somehow they managed to get an ad saying as much in the Harvard Student Newspaper, The Crimson. Everyone at Harvard admits running the ad was a mistake. They say it got missed because of the 3 weeks of summer vacation. Article link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/09/09/massachusetts.harvard.holocaust/index.html

My question is, why do some people deny the Holocaust? What do they gain from denying it? And why do they devote time and resources to denying it? I just don't get it. *I* know it is real because my dad's family is Jewish, from an area that has been part of Russia, Ukraine and Poland in different points in history. My grandfather's parents came here before WWII, but all his cousins and aunts and uncles died. We know that because we have the letters from Europe from before the war saying how things were. After a certain point there were no more letters.

Since the vast majority of SS soldiers or people suspected of war crimes are dead, who are these people who keep denying it? What is their motivation? I just don't get it.

This is not a reason I am willing to use often because I generally believe people to be very intelligent and well-intentioned, but it applies here:

Because some people are racist, cruel, heartless and stupid.

Repeat, some people are stupid.

To deny that Hitler aimed to eliminate Jews and others systematically is to deny first person accounts, news records and soooooo much other documentation. It takes a lot of hate, a lot of willful ignorance to deny that or attempt to explain it away as famine; necessary or elected diaspora; or as overdone hype.

I don't think a lot of people outside the Jewish community in this era realize the depths to which anti-semitism reached and continues for some to reach. For example, many in the US would be surprised to realize there were once limits in the US as to how many Jewish people a college would accept, if they would accept them at all. This includes publicly funded colleges. I know people that still grumble about when their country club started letting Jews join. Crazy, isn't it?

[c&j04]

I didn't really comprehend how much some of these feelings still existed until three or four years ago when my dad was in his "approval" stage to be on the transplant list. One of the questions was is there ANY person he wouldn't consider taking an organ from. The person interviewing him specifically asked if a Jewish donor was a problem. After he answered, she said almost everyone IMMEDIATELY said absolutely any organ besides one from a Jew! At a Jewish hospital!!!!!! I cannot understand this thinking at all.

[blisstwins]

Sadly, I have to agree with kijip. There are many profound antisemites (and racists) who believe Jews control banking and media and therefore dreamt up the holocaust as a means of manipulation.

[LexyLou]

This is not a reason I am willing to use often because I generally believe people to be very intelligent and well-intentioned, but it applies here:

Because some people are racist, cruel, heartless and stupid.

Repeat, some people are stupid.

To deny that Hitler aimed to eliminate Jews and others systematically is to deny first person accounts, news records and soooooo much other documentation. It takes a lot of hate, a lot of willful ignorance to deny that or attempt to explain it away as famine; necessary or elected diaspora; or as overdone hype.

I don't think a lot of people outside the Jewish community in this era realize the depths to which anti-semitism reached and continues for some to reach. For example, many in the US would be surprised to realize there were once limits in the US as to how many Jewish people a college would accept, if they would accept them at all. This includes publicly funded colleges. I know people that still grumble about when their country club started letting Jews join. Crazy, isn't it?

Exactly, this. It's insane!

[Nooknookmom]

My 14 yo came home from school last yr w/ the same question! She was fuming. It infuriates me as well-how do these idiots dissmiss history...

[ChunkyNicksChunkyMom]

Because you can't fix stupid. Seriously.

[egoldber]

Because some people are racist, cruel, heartless and stupid.

Repeat, some people are stupid.

:yeahthat:

And for some, add in healthy doses of paranoia and group think.

[MamaMolly]

Because some people are racist, cruel, heartless and stupid.


:yeahthat: I have an uncle who I always KNEW was a racist, but only recently learned that he denies the Holocaust. I am flabbergasted to explain it, other than the reasons above. I think he'd be shocked to hear himself describes as such, he considers himself a 'good Christian'. How he reconciles the evil in his heart with the beliefs he spouts I will never, never know.

[BabyMine]

What burned me is when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denied the Holocaust in public. To me that just shows what a stupid a$$ he is. I cannot fathom why people pick a certain ________ (fill in religion, race, sexuality..ect) to hate. It makes absolutely no sense.

[happymom]

As someone who's maternal grandfather was a partisan in WWII and lost his 10 siblings, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins...(thought he was a sole survivor until he met a cousin 55 years later on a park bench in Florida....amazing story!) yeah, there is no possible way to explain or understand the thinking of those ppl.

[HIU8]

I don't get it either. Esp b/c there are whole chunks of my family gone and some that we know survived, but we have never been able to find them.

[shawnandangel]

This is not a reason I am willing to use often because I generally believe people to be very intelligent and well-intentioned, but it applies here:

Because some people are racist, cruel, heartless and stupid.

Repeat, some people are stupid.

To deny that Hitler aimed to eliminate Jews and others systematically is to deny first person accounts, news records and soooooo much other documentation. It takes a lot of hate, a lot of willful ignorance to deny that or attempt to explain it away as famine; necessary or elected diaspora; or as overdone hype.

I don't think a lot of people outside the Jewish community in this era realize the depths to which anti-semitism reached and continues for some to reach. For example, many in the US would be surprised to realize there were once limits in the US as to how many Jewish people a college would accept, if they would accept them at all. This includes publicly funded colleges. I know people that still grumble about when their country club started letting Jews join. Crazy, isn't it?

Adding to this. The United States denied amnesty to Jews and sent several thousand back to their deaths. I'd have to find my notes from my college Holocaust class but I believe we had only filled something like 3% of the total amount of people we could give amnesty to.

[BabyMine]

Adding to this. The United States denied amnesty to Jews and sent several thousand back to their deaths. I'd have to find my notes from my college Holocaust class but I believe we had only filled something like 3% of the total amount of people we could give amnesty to.

:47:I had no idea this happened. That is horrendous.

[edurnemk]

After he answered, she said almost everyone IMMEDIATELY said absolutely any organ besides one from a Jew! At a Jewish hospital!!!!!! I cannot understand this thinking at all.

OMG! So they would rather not get an organ and die?! I agree with kijip, some peaple are stupid.

And as for why people want to deny the holocaust... well in part it may be because racist groups want to portray the jews and other minorities as evil, the cause of their problems... accepting the holocaust would be to accept that they've been victims, not victimizers. And all the followers who believe it are just stupid... I'm sorry for saying that, but it's true.

And the other thing that is just ridiculous to me, is that all these self proclaimed "good christians" treat jews like they're animals, don't they know that Jesus was a jew? I hate it when people hide behind religion to justify being cruel.

[codex57]

They're racist. I dunno about stupid. I don't think they're stupid. I just think they're so racist, that they willingly choose to ignore reality. Like hating the sky so much, you refuse to call it blue and insist it is olive colored.

Kinda shocked about the people refusing jewish organs at a jewish hospital. You'd think that if you're on an organ transplant list, you take anything available, even if it's from a serial killer. That's stupid, but while holocaust deniers can be stupid, in general, I don't think they all are. Like the Iran president. That's just hate without pure stupidity (assuming you don't say that having that much hate makes you stupid which can be a valid claim).

Then again, I don't quite understand the animosity against jews. I can understand why some people are racist or perpetuate stereotypes (if you're brutally honest, it's because stereotypes actually describe a particular group some of the time; the key is to not assume it's a universal truth). However, the animosity against jews are so great, it's just abnormal compared to other groups that get discriminated against. I mean, this is animosity that spans centuries, continents, cultures, etc.

[GlindaGoodWitch]

Hmmmm. I saw a man smoking at the gas station yesterday, so I'm gonna say that yes, people can be mind numbingly stoooooooopid.

[pinkmomagain]

They're racist. I dunno about stupid. I don't think they're stupid. I just think they're so racist, that they willingly choose to ignore reality. Like hating the sky so much, you refuse to call it blue and insist it is olive colored.

I dunno...to me:

racist = stupid
ignoring reality = stupid

I just don't see how someone can be a racist who ignores reality and be intelligent at the same time.

[niccig]

I cannot fathom why people pick a certain ________ (fill in religion, race, sexuality..ect) to hate. It makes absolutely no sense.

I don't get it either. I do think it's ignorance and also a refusal to treat all people equally. Maybe it's also insecurity. I'm doing OK, if there's someone that I think is beneath me.

I also think some can be no experience of people of a different religion/race/sexuality etc. We went to SeaWorld with family, and one family member commented on how there were so many people of different races. DH and I looked around and saw a normal group of people for SoCal, but for their hometown it is different to see people of different races and ethnic backgrounds.

[MontrealMum]

Adding to this. The United States denied amnesty to Jews and sent several thousand back to their deaths. I'd have to find my notes from my college Holocaust class but I believe we had only filled something like 3% of the total amount of people we could give amnesty to.

The US practiced a quota immigration policy in those days. Here's a link from the US Holucaust Museum: USHMM (http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007094) which explains a bit further. It was eventually revised (beginning) in 1944, but not enough so to take in all the thousands of Jewish immigrants.

To the OP: I have no good answers. Scary thing is, you encounter these people even in the history community :(

[codex57]

I dunno...to me:

racist = stupid
ignoring reality = stupid

I just don't see how someone can be a racist who ignores reality and be intelligent at the same time.

They are otherwise intelligent and rationale, except when dealing with the people they hate. Then they turn into idiots. Or, they use that intelligence to come up with all sorts of crap to perpetuate their agenda. Politics and PR take real smarts to be able to play well. We like to rag on Paris Hilton, but this chick created a multi-million dollar industry on playing a dumb blonde celebutante.

The unabomber wasn't an idiot. Misguided maybe, but definitely not an idiot.

[DrSally]

I cannot begin to fathom the reasoning/motivation. My guess is that it's a mixture of extreme anti-sematism, ignorance, craziness, and combativeness.

[DrSally]

I didn't really comprehend how much some of these feelings still existed until three or four years ago when my dad was in his "approval" stage to be on the transplant list. One of the questions was is there ANY person he wouldn't consider taking an organ from. The person interviewing him specifically asked if a Jewish donor was a problem. After he answered, she said almost everyone IMMEDIATELY said absolutely any organ besides one from a Jew! At a Jewish hospital!!!!!! I cannot understand this thinking at all.

Huh? Wow.

[DrSally]

As someone who's maternal grandfather was a partisan in WWII and lost his 10 siblings, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins...(thought he was a sole survivor until he met a cousin 55 years later on a park bench in Florida....amazing story!) yeah, there is no possible way to explain or understand the thinking of those ppl.

Wow, amazing story!

[ha98ed14]

They are otherwise intelligent and rationale, except when dealing with the people they hate. Then they turn into idiots. Or, they use that intelligence to come up with all sorts of crap to perpetuate their agenda. Politics and PR take real smarts to be able to play well. ...

The unabomber wasn't an idiot. Misguided maybe, but definitely not an idiot.

I agree with you. I think their beliefs are inane, but the people themselves must be pretty with it to create these groups that perpetuate the lies. I mean, somehow this guy and his group made themselves look totally legit to people at HARVARD! They had have had their sh!t together to even get in the door.

I just don't understand what they gain from it. Being a racist is not something that an individual person can reap benefits from. Any belief is just that, something you attribute truth to, but it will not make you wealthy or powerful; so what have they to gain by exerting efforts to spread their racism. I just see no benefit to them individually and usually people are willing to put effort into something that benefits them personally. Maybe they get a form of twisted personal/ spiritual satisfaction for spreading hate. Wow. That makes them way more than misguided. Evil is the word that comes to mind.

[egoldber]

Well, for people in positions of power, I don't think they necessarily believe it. Creating hatred for a group that is an "other" is a time honored successful means of controlling (and usually oppressing) your own population. So it can be a useful political tool.

[kijip]

Doing something that is stupid or maintaining ignorance is not the same as being dumb or an idiot. There are many people with fine thinking powers that still opt to believe stupid things or hold stupid beliefs. I really do think that racism and such hatred equates well with stupidity, because it is usually maintained beyond all reason or rational discussion for the person.

[KBecks]

I saw a post on FB about the movie "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas". Have not seen it. I don't go out of my way to watch Holocaust movies and in fact, I hardly ever see movies anymore, but it sounded like it might be a good one.

[gatorsmom]

Well, for people in positions of power, I don't think they necessarily believe it. Creating hatred for a group that is an "other" is a time honored successful means of controlling (and usually oppressing) your own population. So it can be a useful political tool.

I think this is a really good insight. For example, who knows how Hitler personally felt about the Jews. What he did understand is that after WW1, by blaming the post-war woes of the Germans on the Jews, he made them the scape goats and unified the country against them.

Now, DH says most conflicts can be traced back to money. Hitler needed an army for his ambitions and that required money. By alienating the Jews and turning the rest of Germany against them, he could take their money and belongings and it wasn't deemed wrong.

Honestly, I have a hard time understanding how people can be so stupid/in denial/cruel/hateful to perpetuate these lies. It just boggles my mind. And scares me to my core.

[mommy111]

Well, for people in positions of power, I don't think they necessarily believe it. Creating hatred for a group that is an "other" is a time honored successful means of controlling (and usually oppressing) your own population. So it can be a useful political tool.
:yeahthat: :yeahthat: :yeahthat: