# What exactly are holocaust-deniers trying to accomplish? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 29, 2009, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719 "2009-04-29T10:24:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/61 "2009-04-30T02:26:37Z")
> [@DaphneBlack](#): > > I don’t think it is too widespread. My impression is that amongst the older generation, especially survivors themselves, there was a tendency to ignore other victims – partially, I think, because in the years after the war the data was there on what happened to the Jews and less on what exactly happened to the Roma, the dissidents, the Jehovahs witnesses, and the homosexuals. > > Particularly the homosexuals; cultural prejudices kept the homosexuals’ fate under the Nazis very much out of the discourse. It was really AIDS which brought it out for the first time, I think. There is some evidence that homosexuals prisoners were treated even more brutally than others. > > In my Hebrew school class (c. 1990-95) we learned about the Jewish story in greater detail, of course, but we also learned about the fate of the Gypsies and the political dissidents. Not the homosexuals, or, oddly, the Jehovah’s witnesses. What are the numbers for them? Relatively small compared to the other groups. From this [JW](http://jehovah.to/gen/holocaust/index.htm) site: > [@](#): > > In the concentration camps, Jehovah’s Witnesses were required to wear a purple triangle to distinguish them from other inmates. Many of them died from disease, hunger, exhaustion, brutal treatment, and exposure to the cold. About 10,000 Witnesses were imprisoned in concentration camps during the Nazi period. An estimated 2,500 to 5,000 died. This was not the total extent of their persecution, though, as the site details, and still, in my opinion, stunningly significant in that they had the option of avoiding any persecution and internment at all by signing a document renouncing their religion and swearing allegiance to Nazi authority. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/62 "2009-04-30T03:02:02Z")
Jehovah’s Witnesses take pretty seriously the precept of not swearing any oath, and some at least maintain that involvement in or allegiance to politics is against their faith. They are also very pro-martyrdom as current Christian sects go. I’m surprised there were that many JWs in the Reich, I had no idea. I suppose they don’t get mentioned often due to their general reticence to get involved in public affairs, so they aren’t out there making it known. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/63 "2009-04-30T12:00:50Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > Are they trying to say, “look, Hitler wasn’t such a bad guy, he didn’t really kill all those Jews!” What are they hoping to accomplish with this? I really don’t get it at all. Could someone please try to explain why anti-Semites, and people who clearly WISH that all Jews would be exterminated, try to claim that the holocaust never happened? I think part of it is a firm belief that what actually happened was very much distorted by the allies/victors and history rewritten. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/64 "2009-04-30T13:26:22Z")
> [@cwthree](#): > > I have encountered Jews who were outraged that a Holocaust museum or Holocaust memorial dared to recognize that Gypsies and homosexuals were also victims of the Holocaust. > [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > FWIW, I’ve heard Jews (some, not many) insist that the Holocaust was unique in world history, suggesting that no one has ever been persecuted or mass-murdered to the degree they have been Obviously one cannot refute anecdotal assertions like these, or my own anecdotal experience that is completely different. Are there any Jewish organizations or well-known commentators or spokesmen who make documented assertions like these? I haven’t seen any. The Holocaust does have a special place in that it was an ethnic slaughter occurring in a modern, “enlightened” Western society, employing a degree of organized brutality and singlemindedness against its main target that had not previously been seen., > [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Just ftr, depending on the estimates, an even higher percentage of Roma were killed than Jews - but where is their memorial? Or those of the homosexuals, the Communists, the disabled, etc.? Are you directing this question to leaders of those groups? Re Holocaust denial: do any of the individuals or groups who push this do so as a way of targeting Roma, homosexuals, Communists and the disabled? Or is it solely a means of fomenting anti-Jewish hatred? I think you can figure out the answer to that one. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/65 "2009-04-30T14:55:23Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > The Holocaust does have a special place in that it was an ethnic slaughter occurring in a modern, “enlightened” Western society, employing a degree of organized brutality and singlemindedness against its main target that had not previously been seen. This is not true. There have been multiple other similar campaigns in the 19th and 20th centuries. Perhaps not with the degree of success, but there have been other ethnic genocides, even in the US. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/66 "2009-04-30T17:02:51Z")
The methodical, mechanised nature of the Holocaust is pretty different than most genocides. I don’t think that makes it morally different, but it makes it more shocking to Western sensibilities. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/67 "2009-04-30T18:11:00Z")
The sheer numbers as well, and let’s face it, the fact that the victims were white. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/68 "2009-04-30T18:19:21Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > The sheer numbers as well, and let’s face it, the fact that the victims were white. Were Jews considered white at that time? They haven’t always been. That potential hairsplitting aside, **DaphneBlack** ’s right about why it feels like a different type of mass murder - and genocide was coined to describe the Holocaust, wasn’t it? - from the many similar crimes earlier and later in history. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2009, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/69 "2009-04-30T18:29:12Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > This is not true. There have been multiple other similar campaigns in the 19th and 20th centuries. Perhaps not with the degree of success, but there have been other ethnic genocides, even in the US. Heck, it’s been going on at least since Carthago got itself delenda’ed. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/70 "2009-04-30T19:12:56Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > > [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > > > The sheer numbers as well, and let’s face it, the fact that the victims were white. > > Were Jews considered white at that time? They haven’t always been. Not only were Jews not considered “white”, there were often specific legal prohibitions and quotas against Jews in the United States through the early 1960s. Physicist Richard Feynman went to MIT for his undergraduate degree because Columbia had filled its “Jew quota” (nuts to them), and many of the educated Jewish refugees from Europe ended up teaching at upstart “black” colleges because traditional schools would not hire them. As for sheer numbers, even more died in the Soviet Union and China then were executed by Germany in WWII. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2009, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/71 "2009-04-30T19:28:05Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Obviously one cannot refute anecdotal assertions like these, or my own anecdotal experience that is completely different. Are there any Jewish organizations or well-known commentators or spokesmen who make documented assertions like these? Michael Medved’s complaint about the Berlin memorial to gay holocaust victims is quoted and discussed [here](http://www.jewcy.com/post/michael_medved_owns_holocaust): > [@](#): > > Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit (who happens to be gay) and Culture Minister of the Federal Republic Bernd Neumann recently unveiled a memorial to the gay people murdered by the Third Reich near the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe that opened a few years ago just south of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. […] [T]his small act of decency by the people and city of Berlin has Michael Medved incensed: > > > [@Michael Medved](#): > > > > Across the road from Berlin’s monument to Jewish Holocaust victims, the new shrine features a pavilion-sized concrete slab with a window through which visitors view a video of two men kissing. This commemoration follows a longstanding, misleading attempt to depict homosexuals as prime targets of Hitler. In fact, even historical material released with the memorial noted only “an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 gay men deported to concentration camps”–and by no means all of them were killed. While homosexuals surely outnumbered the less-than-one-percent of the German population that was Jewish, Jewish victims of Nazi death camps outnumbered estimated gay victims by more than 500 to 1. Persecution of any group deserves condemnation and remembrance, but it’s wrong to exaggerate the extent of victimization for politically correct P.R. purposes. > > […] The memorial for Jewish victims of the Holocaust (see aerial view above) takes up a large city block in Berlin and is composed of 2711 “stelae.” The memorial for gay victims of the Holocaust (see right) is one single slab four meters high. By Medved’s grim, cynical arithmetic, the twin Berlin monuments overstate the relative toll of the Holocaust on Jews by a ratio of more than 5 to 1. Medved cannot possibly sincerely believe this memorial “exaggerates” the extent of the victimization of gay people during the Holocaust — not if he knows what “to exaggerate” means. Notwithstanding his empty lip service to the notion that “persecution of any group deserves condemnation and remembrance,” Medved’s problem is with any recognition of Nazi atrocities inflicted on gay people as a part of the Holocaust. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2009, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/72 "2009-05-01T12:24:56Z")
With regard to Medved, I’ve never heard him regarded as a “Jewish Spokesman” - he’s a movie critic, right-wing talk show host and self-appointed guardian of public morals. I had to look up his bio to confirm his religion. And while his quoted remarks are stupid and bigoted, there’s no indication he falls into the “Jews hogging the Holocaust” stereotype. His problem is that he finds homosexuality repugnant; therefore in his eyes it deserves no distinctive memorial or recognition. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719/73 "2009-05-03T16:19:29Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > No German, soldier or civilian, was completely innocent. _No_ German? A large percentage of the Jews and Communists and Homosexuals and disabled people that the Nazis exterminated _were_ German. Maybe not by the Nazi definition, but certainly by any other definition. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-are-holocaust-deniers-trying-to-accomplish/494719.md?page=3)