Thank you both for your words. Gwen, I agree with you on freedom of speech (and with you, Sergey); however, it is really hard NOT to listen, don’t you think? Sergey’s suggestion about the “White Paper” is a great one, but my feeling is that European governments would not really be so keen on contributing to this enterprise. As it is, they disagree on a variety of issues, and the EU is a vivid proof of that. In any case, convincing (or reforming) deniers is not a possibility. I truly don’t think that is possible. In truth, I worry about the ones who are still looking for answers, who have not being exposed to historical evidence of recognizable and valid sources. As Vaard pointed out in his comment, that might be quixotesque of me, but I still stand behind the power of education.
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6 comments:
Well, my suggestion was theoretical, because, of course, there is little chance that Germany of France will abandon their anti-denial laws. But in case they decide to abandon them, they will have a problem on their hands - the growing "revisionist" propaganda. So they will have to deal with it anyway, and in our imaginary scenario they have only one way to deal with it - competent education.
Usually, when a group of historians examines deniers' arguments, they utterly destroy it - if only because they have an access to the sources, to which non-historians usually don't have an easy access. Thus, recently historian Peter Witte examined several unpublished stenograms of the trials of "Gasmeisters" - people, responsible for installing gassing engines in Aktion Reinhardt camps. It is widely believed by the general public and many historians, that diesels were used in these camps. According to Witte, however, testimonies of these people prove that rather gasoline engines were used. Why is it important? Because for more than 20 years deniers have been babbling about how difficult it is to kill with the diesel engine exhaust, that it was absurd for the Nazis to choose diesels and not gasoline engines, etc. So just one competent historian was able to debunk this argument by simply going to the primary sources.
Concerted effort by such historians, resulting in some summary analysis of most denial arguments would be a good vaccine against denial. Again, probably most deniers wouldn't be convinced, but it's not the goal.
Of course, at present several similar works exist - like books by Shermer and Grobman, and Zimmerman, but they contain some serious mistakes and don't really account for "most" of deniers' arguments (especially the fresh ones, created since, say, 2000 - and believe me, there are lots of them).
It is important to have such a work so that anyone who, after reading deniers' sophisticated trash, comes to doubt this or that historical aspect of the Holocaust, would have a ready answer to his/her questions.
It's not for nothing that "public" fact-checking a la http://www.factcheck.org became prominent in latter years, with whole organizations devoted to it. "Getting facts straight" is important for people. So such an imaginary (alas!) project would simply be a giant fact-checking routine, which would leave no stone unturned and which would intellectually discredit denial forever (in my opinion, that it is negatively seen by the majority of people now - is hardly a result of intellectual effort - most people don't examine deniers' arguments and summarily dismiss them; but in our hypothetical situation, after being attacked by slick-looking propaganda, many people _could_ change their minds and start to doubt the Holocaust).
Anyway a man can dream, can't he?
;]
That wouldn't change a thing. Deniers will see it as a ZOG plot anyway.
edwin
That _is_ the idea: the things should stay as they are, statistically speaking. I.e. no _new_ deniers after the onslaught of denier propaganda after the cancellation of anti-denier laws.
Sergey Romanov wrote:
"Thus, recently historian Peter Witte examined several unpublished stenograms of the trials of "Gasmeisters" - people, responsible for installing gassing engines in Aktion Reinhardt camps. It is widely believed by the general public and many historians, that diesels were used in these camps. According to Witte, however, testimonies of these people prove that rather gasoline engines were used. Why is it important? Because for more than 20 years deniers have been babbling about how difficult it is to kill with the diesel engine exhaust, that it was absurd for the Nazis to choose diesels and not gasoline engines, etc. So just one competent historian was able to debunk this argument by simply going to the primary sources."
It's called damage-control. Let's see these "primary sources" in detail.
The only one I know of is SS-Scharführer Erich Fuchs (testifying against Bolender for a lighter West German sentence), and Fuchs' story lacks other important technical details.
~ Scott
Sergey wrote:
<< [...]Why is it important? Because for more than 20 years deniers have been babbling about how difficult it is to kill with the diesel engine exhaust, that it was absurd for the Nazis to choose diesels and not gasoline engines, etc. So just one competent historian was able to debunk this argument by simply going to the primary sources. >>
Damage-control it is. As Scott pointed out only SS-Scharführer Erich Fuchs talked about gasoline engines. All the other 'perpetrators' and victims talked about diesel engines. Or did they? Lets see, before the diesel gas chambers story had been adopted it was claimed(Treblinka and Belzec)the murders were commited with 'steam chambers', vacuum chambers, electrocution chambers, unslaked lime,etc.
I must say however, the biggest problem for exterminationists is not even the engine type. It is the lack of material evidence. Only loonies will believe 800.000 to 1 million people can be destroyed in a especif area without leaving evidence aplenty. The soviets investigated Treblinka I and II in August of 44. They found few more than 300 bodies and if I remember correctly, these had not even been burned. At the end of 45 the poles did another investigation. They too, didn't find much.
Of course it didn't stop the soviets and poles to "conclude" that mass murder had been commited.
There many other logistical problems I'm not even mentioning here.
Luca K
Luca,
Please refer to my posting "Treblinka Talk" for my response to your comment.
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