# I don't understand holocaust denial **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 11, 2017, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963 "2017-03-11T23:15:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/181 "2017-03-17T00:22:05Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > It also seems strange that there are witnesses like Marika Frank, who arrived at Auschwitz-Birkenau from Hungary in July 1944, when thousands were supposedly gassed and cremated daily. She testified after the war that she heard and saw nothing of gas chambers during the time she was interned there. She heard the gassing stories only later. I noted above the evidence of Maria Vanherwaarden, who was there from 1942-1945. The causes of death she witnessed were due to disease. Most of this seems to come from the spin of well known holocaust deniers. In the case of Marika Frank what holocaust deniers like Mark Weber “forget” to tell his readers is that the Jewish population of her town and she were sent to Auschwitz late in the war, but they were in 3 groups, the first and second groups were sent to Vienna because the train tracks to Auschwitz were bombed; the third transport was with her and her family. And that one did go to Auschwitz, what Marika Frank did remember was that indeed virtually all the ones sent to Austria did eventually return to her city. Almost all of the ones going to Auschwitz did not return. This is important because it makes a mockery of the holocaust denier’s attempts at what took place in Auschwitz, what holocaust deniers do is to ignore the part were she was told by others at Bergen-Belsen that they thought that they were the selected few by the Nazis that avoided being gassed, shot or let to die. As it happened, it is clear that the size of the place and the different areas of the camp explains why a few survivors missed how the extermination was done, denying it does not help to remove the fact that the families of those few survivors were wiped out. Oh, just one more thing: Maria Vanherwaarden was not Jewish, she had indeed better treatment than the Jews. And as she reported “It was a big place”. Easy then to miss how even the bodies of the ones dying naturally of typhus (and as pointed before, dying that way is no reason to take those victims out of the Holocaust count) were disposed of. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/182 "2017-03-17T00:35:22Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > I’m sorry, I don’t recall you. No worries. > [@](#): > > Perhaps your dismissive, judgemental style was evidenced in your earlier post and I chose to ignore it Well, if you left-click on the blue text in my question (hint: it’s the word “asked”), you could easily see for yourself… > [@](#): > > - I can’t be bothered to look back. … ah, never mind, then. > [@](#): > > Talking of which, the facts I bring in my most recent post Sorry, but no. Your post was commentary, not a provision of facts. > [@](#): > > is that the evidential standard at the quoted Nurenberg tribunals should not be confused with mainstream criminal proceedings. Well, with that I cannot disagree. The “evidential (_sic_)” standards for those accused of the crime of industrialized mass murder in your local burg or parish are probably somewhat patchy, what with the paucity of incidents preceding this one. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/183 "2017-03-17T00:36:27Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Quoted for the extraordinary arrogance. Quoted for the extraordinary irony. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/184 "2017-03-17T00:40:49Z")
> [@Larry\_Borgia](#): > > How about a straight forward question then, do you hold that the holocaust–The murder of approximately six million Jews–happened? yes or no? > [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Okay. But bear in mind I work with big data. > > I tend to lean to the view it’s not possible to offer more than a very broad ballpark figure for most minority populations during that period largely because undocumented refugee flows were so great in the mid-late 1930s, adherence to central Reich policy varied enormously across occupied countries and also because, in relation specifically to Jews, quite literally no one knows what the Soviets did post 1941. There is an awful lot of unaviodable guesswork. > > We do know, for example, that 25% or so of German Jews fled the country before 1938, though mostly not to the USA. This from a conference organised by the often characterised anti-semite French: > Ra-ra, USA. > > [The Evian Conference | Holocaust Encyclopedia](https://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007698) And, let it show for the record, that in the inimitable style of a certain Ms. K. Conway, **up\_the\_junction** has (at length) answered the question without answering the question. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/185 "2017-03-17T00:50:35Z")
Huh, I was under the impression up\_the\_junction’s #174 was _agreeing_ with my #173, in the sense that even if _some_ of the claims are questionable, it doesn’t really matter since the greater amount of evidence clearly points to the conventional narrative, and even if the Nuremburg trials had a number of ad hoc procedures and irregularities that would never fly in conventional criminal proceedings, it doesn’t really matter since the greater amount of evidence clearly points to the conventional narrative. I guess my sensors are not as finely-tuned as some. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/186 "2017-03-17T00:53:33Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Okay. But bear in mind I work with big data. > > I tend to lean to the view it’s not possible to offer more than a very broad ballpark figure for most minority populations during that period largely because undocumented refugee flows were so great in the mid-late 1930s, adherence to central Reich policy varied enormously across occupied countries and also because, in relation specifically to Jews, quite literally no one knows what the Soviets did post 1941. There is an awful lot of unaviodable guesswork. > > We do know, for example, that 25% or so of German Jews fled the country before 1938, though mostly not to the USA. This from a conference organised by the often characterised anti-semite French: > Ra-ra, USA. > > [The Evian Conference | Holocaust Encyclopedia](https://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007698) What does all this have to do with whether the Holocaust happened? Yeah, America didn’t come out smelling like roses, what with not taking in Jewish refugees from the murderous Nazis. But there’s a level of moral culpability in not saving someone from their murderous government, and then there’s actually murdering them. So were millions and millions of Jews exterminated by the Nazis, or not? Nevermind the exact numbers, because of course such exact numbers cannot be provided. But millions of Jews disappeared from Europe somehow during the 40s, so what happened to them? What happened to them is there was an organized policy by the Nazi government to exterminate them, and such extermination took many forms. Some were simply shot. Some were starved. Some were worked to death. Some were packed into concentration camps where they died of infectious disease. Some were gassed. And so on. But the policy of the German government was to kill them all, and they succeeded in killing millions and millions of them. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/187 "2017-03-17T01:01:02Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > So were millions and millions of Jews exterminated by the Nazis, or not? Nevermind the exact numbers, because of course such exact numbers cannot be provided. But millions of Jews disappeared from Europe somehow during the 40s, so what happened to them? They didn’t end up in Canada. I’m sad to say my country had [thoroughly shameful policies in place for wartime refugees.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/None_Is_Too_Many) ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/188 "2017-03-17T01:20:12Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Huh, I was under the impression up\_the\_junction’s #174 was _agreeing_ with my #173… That’s not the impression I get. Let’s look at his words: \*"And of course Nurenberg was itself ad hoc, victors theatre justice dressed up with faux gravitas - effectively military tribunals with crimes created after the fact, and with random evidential standards. Interesting enough, but not to be confused with conventional legal proceedings. "\* It looks to me like he’s saying that they were shoddy show trials rather than proper justice. Maybe I’ve misunderstood him, in which case I’ll apologise if he clarifies what he meant. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/189 "2017-03-17T01:25:26Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > It looks to me like he’s saying that they were shoddy show trials rather than proper justice. Thing is, they could be both - shoddy show trials that improvise ways to punish enormous crimes that had not been (or had only rarely been) committed and punished before. I could even buy that the supervising countries were of mixed feelings about prosecuting these cases, their leaderships being indifferent to (or even in minor support of) what had happened. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/190 "2017-03-17T07:06:51Z")
> [@Fuji](#): > > And, let it show for the record, that in the inimitable style of a certain Ms. K. Conway, **up\_the\_junction** has (at length) answered the question without answering the question. I had a bet with myself that that was going to happen, and I won. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 10:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/191 "2017-03-17T10:44:36Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Okay. But bear in mind I work with big data. > > I tend to lean to the view it’s not possible to offer more than a very broad ballpark figure for most minority populations during that period largely because undocumented refugee flows were so great in the mid-late 1930s, adherence to central Reich policy varied enormously across occupied countries and also because, in relation specifically to Jews, quite literally no one knows what the Soviets did post 1941. There is an awful lot of unaviodable guesswork. > > We do know, for example, that 25% or so of German Jews fled the country before 1938, though mostly not to the USA. This from a conference organised by the often characterised anti-semite French: > Ra-ra, USA. > > [The Evian Conference | Holocaust Encyclopedia](https://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007698) Speaking of hand waving, this is a pretty good example and it closely resembles many efforts of Holocaust denial. Making a point of the number off German Jews who were murdered is not particularly relevant to a “big data” view of the Holocaust. There were around a half million German Jews to begin with. The vast majority of Jews and others who were murdered were taken from captive countries after the war began. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 10:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/192 "2017-03-17T10:51:49Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Okay. But bear in mind I work with big data. > > I tend to lean to the view it’s not possible to offer more than a very broad ballpark figure for most minority populations during that period largely because undocumented refugee flows were so great in the mid-late 1930s, adherence to central Reich policy varied enormously across occupied countries and also because, in relation specifically to Jews, quite literally no one knows what the Soviets did post 1941. There is an awful lot of unaviodable guesswork. > > We do know, for example, that 25% or so of German Jews fled the country before 1938, though mostly not to the USA. This from a conference organised by the often characterised anti-semite French: > Ra-ra, USA. > > [The Evian Conference | Holocaust Encyclopedia](https://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007698) I know it wasn’t directed to me, but I thought it might be helpful to **upthejunction** to get a different perspective. Okay if I answer your question, **Larry Borgia**? > [@Larry\_Borgia](#): > > How about a straight forward question then, do you hold that the holocaust–The murder of approximately six million Jews–happened? yes or no? Yes. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/193 "2017-03-17T11:17:41Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > **Chen019** , are you ever going to ignore the recorded words of Heinrich Himmler in which he explains the need to exterminate Jewish men, women, and children? Certainly. For starters, there are considerable doubts that Himmler actually said this. For example, Robert Wolfe, supervisory archivist for captured German records, has commented that the word translated to mean extermination is more precisely translated as “extirpation” or “tearing up by the roots.” Further, in his handwritten notes, Himmler used the term, " Judenevakuierung ," or “evacuation of the Jews.” In terms of the written notes, incredibly at the point where the alleged incriminating comments begin _the type script changes, a page appears to have been inserted by a different typist, the numeration of the pages changes from a typewritten page number at the top to a pencilled page number at the top_ (see discussion p185-186 of Hayward’s Masters Thesis _[The Fate of Jews at German Hands](http://www.vho.org/aaargh/fran/livres8/hay.pdf)_. Given Himmler & co were apparently keeping this all a secret it also seems odd that he would make these admissions to a large audience and for it to be recorded. Small tape recorders that could be smuggled in didn’t exist back then. The evidence is also consistent with deportation to the East, but not extermination for the various reasons I’ve noted above. **Other directives** Further, on 26 October 1943, twenty-two days after Himmler’s Posen speech, Oswald Pohl, chief of the SS Economics and Administration Main Office (SS-WVHA), stated in a circular letter to the commanders of all concentration camps:[111] > [@](#): > > “The work capacity of the detainees has become significant and all measures taken by the commanders, the heads of the food service, and the physicians have to aim for the health and efficiency of the detainees. […] My first priority is: No more than 10% of all detainees should be disabled because of diseases. This objective must be achieved by the joint efforts of all concerned. Thus, it is necessary to ensure: > > 1. Good and proper diet > > 2. Good and proper clothing > > 3. Use of all natural health agents > > 4. Avoidance of all unnecessary efforts not immediately connected with the task in question.” Three days before Himmler’s Posen speech, on 1 October 1943, SS-Obersturmführer Werner Jothann, chief of the Central Construction Office of the Auschwitz concentration camp, drafted a preliminary cost estimate for the enlargement of the prisoners’ hospital of the camp. The enlarged hospital was to comprise 114 hospital barracks, 11 barracks for patients in need of care and 12 barracks for critically ill patients. **The combined cost of these 137 barracks was estimated at 5,161,329 Reichsmark (about 50 million Euro at current rates)**. A massive expense if sick detainees were soon to be exterminated by gassing? On 9 December 1943, two months and five days after Himmler’s Posen speech, Richard Glücks, inspector of the concentration camps, sent a circular letter to the commanders of all camps including Auschwitz in which he stated that Jewish prisoners in urgent need of an operation could be treated in the nearest hospital, but the operation had to be performed by a Jewish doctor. Five days later the directive was modified: In case no Jewish doctor was available, a non-Jewish physician could be used as well. (Archiwum Glownej Komisji Badania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu, Warsaw, NTN, 94, p. 143.) \*\*If there were an extermination programme in place why would they be providing operations for jewish prisoners? \*\* **Inmate records** According to the official story, from spring 1942 at Auschwitz all Jews unable to work were gassed upon arrival without previous registration. If this assertion were true, no names of old Jews or Jewish children would figure in the Sterbebücher of Auschwitz. But a study of these documents, which were published in printed form in 1995 (Staatliches Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau (ed.), Die Sterbebücher von Auschwitz, Saur Verlag, Munich 1995), reveals that many old Jews and Jewish children were registered at Auschwitz: – 2 Jews over 90 years of age; – 73 Jews from 80 to 90 years of age; – 482 Jews from 70 to 80 years of age; – 2,083 Jews from 60 to 70 years of age; – 2,584 Jews from 0 to 10 years of age. The documents of the Auschwitz camp administration show that there were 85,298 inmates at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp on 31 December 1943. No fewer than 19,699, i.e. more than 20%, belonged to the category “unfit to work.” (Archiwum Glownej Komisji Badania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu, Warsaw, NTN, 134, p. 277 f.) \*\*On 27 July 1944 the administration of the Auschwitz camp compiled a statistics about the prisoners “temporarily quartered in the camp of the Hungarian Jews.” The document shows that until that date 3,138 Hungarian Jews had received medical treatment at the camp hospital. 1,426 of them had undergone surgical operation. \*\*(Gosudarstevenny Arkhiv Rossiskoj Federatsii, Moscow, 7021-108-32, p. 76.) Again, this is not what you would expect if there were a programme of exterminating jewish prisoners who were unable to work. Plus, there is also the boring stuff I mentioned above that suggests this atrocity propaganda is no more plausible than the claims that were accepted at Nuremberg about mass extermination programmes in Germany. Remember similar claims were made in WWI. The difference was that following WWI there were no Nuremberg style trials and confessions extracted by torture and imprisonment for those who later disputed the claims. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/194 "2017-03-17T11:56:49Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Certainly. For starters, there are considerable doubts that Himmler actually said this. For example, Robert Wolfe, supervisory archivist for captured German records, has commented that the word translated to mean extermination is more precisely translated as “extirpation” or “tearing up by the roots.” Further, in his handwritten notes, Himmler used the term, " Judenevakuierung ," or “evacuation of the Jews.” Completely and utterly false, from my incomplete knowledge of German and my German (Jewish) grandmother’s fluent native knowledge of German (her immediate family escaped in the 30s, by the way – the ones who stayed disappeared). This claim from deniers has been debunked time and time again and is only used with non-native German speakers… native German speakers laugh out loud at this ridiculous argument. In the context of living things, like people, _ausrotten_ means to destroy such that it cannot return. Further, he explicitly refers to killing Jewish women and children. This is a frankly laughable assertion, and that you would use it demonstrates that you either have no serious understanding of German or of these speeches, or no interest in being honest. > [@](#): > > In terms of the written notes, incredibly at the point where the alleged incriminating comments begin _the type script changes, a page appears to have been inserted by a different typist, the numeration of the pages changes from a typewritten page number at the top to a pencilled page number at the top_ (see discussion p185-186 of Hayward’s Masters Thesis _[The Fate of Jews at German Hands](http://www.vho.org/aaargh/fran/livres8/hay.pdf)_. > > Given Himmler & co were apparently keeping this all a secret it also seems odd that he would make these admissions to a large audience and for it to be recorded. Small tape recorders that could be smuggled in didn’t exist back then. > > The evidence is also consistent with deportation to the East, but not extermination for the various reasons I’ve noted above. The “reasons” above are totally ridiculous and come from either pathetic ignorance or deception. It shows the fatuousness of the denier community that they ignore phrases about killing Jewish women and children and pretend German words don’t mean what they mean. Snipping the rest of your ridiculous nitpicking. There is a mountain of evidence: we have the architect of the Holocaust trying to steel his men for the task of killing Jewish women and children, we have thousands of eyewitnesses, we have mountains of other documents (like the [Hofle Telegram](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%B6fle_Telegram) and the [Korherr Report](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korherr_Report), and many others), mountains of physical evidence (including mass human remains), and countless photographs of the atrocities and their aftermath. On the other hand we have some false understanding of German words, and a few cases in which Nazis might not have immediately killed or otherwise mistreated large numbers of Jews, and a few cases of doubtful witness testimony. Whether or not all Nazis were always 100% of the time engaged in killing Jews, or whether every single witness was 100% accurate, doesn’t affect the undeniable mass evidence that Nazis were at many times engaged in killing Jewish men, women, and children. Every assertion of yours in this thread has shown to be either irrelevant or false. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/195 "2017-03-17T12:10:09Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Certainly. For starters, there are considerable doubts that Himmler actually said this. For example, Robert Wolfe, supervisory archivist for captured German records, has commented that the word translated to mean extermination is more precisely translated as “extirpation” or “tearing up by the roots.” Further, in his handwritten notes, Himmler used the term, " Judenevakuierung ," or “evacuation of the Jews.” > > In terms of the written notes, incredibly at the point where the alleged incriminating comments begin _the type script changes, a page appears to have been inserted by a different typist, the numeration of the pages changes from a typewritten page number at the top to a pencilled page number at the top_ (see discussion p185-186 of Hayward’s Masters Thesis _[The Fate of Jews at German Hands](http://www.vho.org/aaargh/fran/livres8/hay.pdf)_. > > Given Himmler & co were apparently keeping this all a secret it also seems odd that he would make these admissions to a large audience and for it to be recorded. Small tape recorders that could be smuggled in didn’t exist back then. > > The evidence is also consistent with deportation to the East, but not extermination for the various reasons I’ve noted above. Meh, as if the counter to that embarrassing dumb holocaust denier point had not been made, or your point discredited, the debunking of it is old already. > **[Posen speeches](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posen_speeches#Holocaust_denial)** > > The Posen speeches were two speeches made by Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS of Nazi Germany, on 4 and 6 October 1943 in the town hall of Posen (Poznań), in German-occupied Poland. The recordings are the first known documents in which a member of the Hitler Cabinet spoke of the ongoing extermination of the Jews in extermination camps. They demonstrate that the German government wanted, planned, and carried out the Holocaust. > The Posen speeches of October 1943 are eight of 132 speeches obt... > [@](#): > > Holocaust deniers have frequently attempted to negate Himmler’s speeches as proof of the Holocaust. In particular, where Himmler – in his speech of 4 October 1943 – refers to the “Ausrottung des jüdischen Volkes” (extermination of the Jewish people), they will read the verb ausrotten (literally to “root out”, aus = out; rott = root) and its related noun Ausrottung to offer a much more benign interpretation, i.e., Himmler was merely referring to the deportation of Jews and a desire to “root them out”, as opposed to their mass destruction.[35] > > Ausrotten can mean “to stamp out/to root out”, but only figuratively, e.g., in contexts of concepts or ideals.[35] In the context of living things (such as a people or race), ausrotten accordingly means destroying something so that it cannot return.[35] David Irving considers the usage of the word “Ausrotten” vitally important and also agrees that the term was referring to eradication. He confirms this in an interview from 2007 when he compares its usage with Goebbels half-word “Ausrott…” during the Sportpalast speech from February 1943.[36] In the subsequent paragraph, Himmler compares his disdain for individuals gaining personally (e.g. stealing) from Jewish victims, and the necessity to prevent this personal gain, to becoming sick and dying “from the same bacillus that we have exterminated” (weil wir den Bazillus ausrotten, an dem Bazillus krank werden und sterben). This use of ausrotten can be read as killing or extermination in the context of living things, because arguing for the deportation of bacteria would make no sense.[35] The reference to a bacillus in this statement is figurative, however, in line with Nazi rhetoric that encouraged dehumanizing concepts of Jews as a pathogen or malignant presence, rather than people. > > In the “Ausrottung des jüdischen Volkes” paragraph, Himmler says: > > Original > … wir hatten die Pflicht unserem Volk gegenüber das zu tun, dieses Volk, das uns umbringen wollte, umzubringen. > > Translated > … we had the duty to our people to do it, to kill this people who wanted to kill us. > > Himmler thus confirms that the context is explicitly physical extermination, since umbringen simply has no meaning other than “to kill”.[35] Because of this, critics explain that Holocaust deniers will arbitrarily select words from the dictionary that have nothing to do with the given context, such as cherry-picking the definition for Unkraut (weeds) and erroneously applying it to Volk (people).[35] > > In the second speech in Posen, critics point to the fact that he defines the meaning of ausrotten, where the operative word is umbringen. > > Original > Es trat an uns die Frage heran: Wie ist es mit den Frauen und Kindern? Ich habe mich entschlossen, auch hier eine ganz klare Lösung zu finden. Ich hielt mich nämlich nicht für berechtigt, die Männer auszurotten- sprich also, umzubringen oder umbringen zu lassen – und die Rächer in Gestalt der Kinder für unsere Söhne und Enkel groß werden zu lassen. Es mußte der schwere Entschluß gefaßt werden, dieses Volk von der Erde verschwinden zu lassen. > > Translated > We came to the question: How is it with the women and children? I decided to find a clear solution here as well. I did not consider myself justified to exterminate the men – in other words, to kill them or have them killed – and allow the avengers of our sons and grandsons in the form of their children to grow up. The difficult decision had to be taken to make this people disappear from the earth. > > Holocaust deniers will also offer erroneous translations of ausrotten by analysing the word’s compounds, on the basis that “aus” and “rotten” are cognate with the English “out” and “root”. To native German speakers, this is simply wrong.[35] Critics compare this attempted etymological explanation to an attempt to cite the Latin origins of “ex” (out of) and “terminus” (borders) and on that basis, claim that “exterminate” means deportation, which would be equally nonsensical to native English speakers.[35] > > Critics point out that German Holocaust deniers do not dare suggest a translation to a German audience where ausrotten does not mean physical extermination,[35] citing instances of German deniers dismissing failed etymological analysis by English speakers by responding to confirm that ausrotten means complete destruction, and material written by German deniers where, in the context of people, ausrotten and vernichten are used synonymously.[37] > > Germar Rudolf and Udo Walendy have claimed that the recording of the first speech is a forgery: Himmler’s voice was actually that of a 1945 Allied voice imitator.[38] However, the discovery of the second Posen speech in the Koblenz Bundesarchiv rendered allegations of falsification completely irrelevant. Himmler’s explicit statements, such as making the decision to make the Jews “disappear from the earth”, leave no room for alternative interpretation.[39] ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/196 "2017-03-17T12:21:44Z")
Over and over again it’s proven that the deniers aren’t actually interested in evidence, since there’s oodles that they ignore or sidestep. They’re no more interesting than birthers, truthers, moon-landing hoaxers, or flat-Earthers – everything contrary must be conspiracy or lies to the point that challenging them just reaffirms their belief. ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/197 "2017-03-17T12:54:17Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > native German speakers laugh out loud at this ridiculous argument. In the context of living things, like people, _ausrotten_ means to destroy such that it cannot return. Yes. Rotten means ‘to unearth’, ‘up-root’. Ausrotten is to kill the weed, roots and all. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/198 "2017-03-17T13:14:45Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Certainly. For starters, there are considerable doubts that Himmler actually said this. For example, Robert Wolfe, supervisory archivist for captured German records, has commented that the word translated to mean extermination is more precisely translated as “extirpation” or “tearing up by the roots.” Further, in his handwritten notes, Himmler used the term, " Judenevakuierung ," or “evacuation of the Jews.” > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Completely and utterly false, from my incomplete knowledge of German and my German (Jewish) grandmother’s fluent native knowledge of German (her immediate family escaped in the 30s, by the way – the ones who stayed disappeared). This claim from deniers has been debunked time and time again and is only used with non-native German speakers… native German speakers laugh out loud at this ridiculous argument. In the context of living things, like people, _ausrotten_ means to destroy such that it cannot return. I just want to hammer this nail in, as it’s clear to anyone knowledgable that it represents the quality of Chen019’s evidence. Here’s “ausrotten” in the most used German dictionary: > [@](#): > > schwaches Verb - 1. vollständig, bis zum letzten Exemplar vernichten, vertilgen > 2. beseitigen, aus der Welt schaffen > **[ausrotten](https://www.duden.de/rechtschreibung/ausrotten#Bedeutung1)** > > Definition, Rechtschreibung, Synonyme und Grammatik von 'ausrotten' auf Duden online nachschlagen. Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache. Translation: weak verb - 1. completely, to the last exemplar, annihilate 2. kill, remove from the world There’s just nothing there. I mean, even the claimed better translation includes the meaning “annihilate”: [EXTIRPATE Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com](http://www.dictionary.com/browse/extirpate) It’s the standard attempt at challenging contemporary meaning by way of original etymology, only taken to ridiculous lengths. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/199 "2017-03-17T13:20:43Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The question becomes, then, what the conspiracy is REALLY up to. If you cannot believe the thousands of eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust’s atrocities, why can you believe the handful of accounts that seem to cast doubt on it? Wouldn’t it be easier for the Shadowy Conspiracy to have manufactured those, for an unknown motive you’ve not yet uncovered? You think conspiracy theorists could be led to believe that conspiracy theories are a vast conspiracy? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2017, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963/200 "2017-03-17T13:48:03Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > You think conspiracy theorists could be led to believe that conspiracy theories are a vast conspiracy? 😃 Shh–we’re not supposed to talk about the plan in public! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-holocaust-denial/781963.md?page=11)