Talk:Holocaust denial/Archive 4

message: Much of the current intro properly belongs in the article itself. I suggest the following redacted version as an alternative, while most of the valuable material excluded from it should be put into the appropriate article sections.
Holocaust denial, or Holocaust revisionism as it is referred to by its supporters, is the belief that the Holocaust did not occur as it is described by mainstream historiography. Key elements of this belief are the explicit or implicit rejection that, in the Holocaust:
*The Nazi government had a policy of deliberately targeting the Jews and the Gypsies for extermination as a people;
*Over five million JewsDonald L Niewyk, The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust, Columbia University Press, 2000, p.45: "The Holocaust is commonly defined as the murder of more than 5,000,000 Jews by the Germans in World War II."  Estimates by scholars range from 5.1 million to 7 million. See the appropriate section of the Holocaust article. were systematically killed by the Nazis and their allies.
*Tools of efficient mass extermination, such as gas chambers, were used in extermination camps to kill Jews.
In addition, most Holocaust denial implies, or openly states, that the current mainstream understanding of the Holocaust is the result of a deliberate Jewish conspiracy created to advance the interest of Jews at the expense of other nations. For this reason, Holocaust denial is generally considered an antisemitic conspiracy theory. Because of this, Holocaust denial is also illegal in a number of European countries, as their governments hold that it is motivated by an anti-Semitic and anti-democratic agenda.
Holocaust Deniers themselves do not accept the term as an appropriate term to describe their point of view, preferring the term "Holocaust Revisionism" instead. They are nevertheless commonly labeled as "Holocaust deniers" or "negationists" to differentiate them from historical revisionists by those who consider their goal to be not historical inquiry using evidence and established methodology, but rather to try to prove that the Holocaust did not exist, regardless of historical evidence.Berger, p 154
Dietwald 14:42, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: IF next time I drop by there are no objections, I'll make the change, ok? Dietwald 07:24, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's an improvement. But it's still longer than it should be, I think. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 07:32, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggested new Intro

message: The following text of the intro was replaced by the one suggested above:
Holocaust denial, or Holocaust revisionism as it is referred to by its supporters, is the belief that the Holocaust did not occur as it is described by mainstream historiography. Key elements of this belief are the explicit or implicit rejection that, in the Holocaust:
*The Nazi government had a policy of deliberately targeting the Jews and the Gypsies for extermination as a people;
*Over five million JewsDonald L Niewyk, The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust, Columbia University Press, 2000, p.45: "The Holocaust is commonly defined as the murder of more than 5,000,000 Jews by the Germans in World War II."  Estimates by scholars range from 5.1 million to 7 million. See the appropriate section of the Holocaust article. were systematically killed by the Nazis and their allies.
*Tools of efficient mass extermination, such as gas chambers, were used in extermination camps to kill Jews.
In addition, most Holocaust denial implies, or openly states, that the current mainstream understanding of the Holocaust is the result of a deliberate Jewish conspiracy created to advance the interest of Jews at the expense of other nations. For this reason, Holocaust denial is generally considered an antisemitic conspiracy theory. Because of this, Holocaust denial is also illegal in a number of European countries, as their governments hold that it is motivated by an anti-Semitic and anti-democratic agenda.
The Holocaust is generally considered by historians to be one of the best documented events in recent history, and is the subject of thousands of books and articles.Donald L. Niewyk, ed. The Holocaust: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, D.C. Heath and Company, 1992. Most historians and scholars therefore reject Holocaust denial as "grounded in hatred, rather than any accepted standards of assertion, evidence, and truth"Alan Milchaman, editor, Postmodernism and the Holocaust Rodolphi, June 1998. and a "pseudoscience" that "rejects the entire foundation of historical evidence,"Ronald J Berger, Fathoming the Holocaust Aldine, 2002 and is instead based on a "blatantly racist"Charles Maier, The Unmasterable Past: History, Holocaust and German National Identity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), p. 64. ideology.
While a few Holocaust deniers have training as historians, some of their most prominent representatives have been shown in court to have a pattern of falsifying historical documents (David Irving) or deliberately misrepresenting historical data (e.g. Ernst Zündel). This history of Holocaust deniers distorting, ignoring, or misusing historical records has led to almost universal condemnation of the techniques and conclusions of Holocaust denial, with organizations such as the American Historical Association, the largest society of historians in the United States, stating that Holocaust denial is "at best, a form of academic fraud."American Historical Association, press release, January 8, 1994.   Similarly, Public Opinion Quarterly, summarizing the work on the subject done by a range of historians including Jaroff, Lipstadt, Riech, Ryback, Shapiro, Vidal-Naquet, Weimann, and Winn concludes "No reputable historian questions the reality of the Holocaust, and those promoting Holocaust denial are overwhelmingly anti-Semites and/or neo-Nazis."Public Opinion Quarterly Vol. 59, p. 270
Many Holocaust deniers insist that they do not deny the Holocaust, preferring to be called "Holocaust revisionists".  They are nevertheless commonly labeled as "Holocaust deniers" or "negationists" to differentiate them from historical revisionists by those who consider their goal to be not historical inquiry using evidence and established methodology, but rather to try to prove that the Holocaust did not exist, regardless of historical evidence.Berger, p 154 -- Dietwald 18:30, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Replacement of Old Intro

message: I deleted the line about Franjo Tuđman and Croatians denying the Ustaše genocide. Tuđman never explicitly denied the Ustaše genocide. He was accused of doing something else - reducing the estimated number of those killed in Jasenovac, and one cannot be too sure if he was right or wrong since the estimated number of Jasenovac victims is a very debatable issue. Some have reduced the number to mere two thousand victims, others have exaggerated and claimed that over million people had been killed there. He could have been right, but even if he wasn't and did reduce the number on purpose, that's not the same thing as completely denying a genocide. To tell you the truth, I never liked Tuđman at all and I have no intention of justifying his rather controversial moves. My father's firm almost went out of business due to Tuđman's privatization in Croatia. I'm just not happy when I see things written that, I assure you and believe me, are not true. I'm not saying there aren't Croats who deny the Ustaše genocide, but I assure that they are just a minority compared to Croats who never supported or glorified the Ustaše.
:Rather than deleting it outright, let's correct the text to say that he was more of a revionist, if that's the case. There are gradations of denial. -Will Beback 01:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Ustaše genocide denial

message: :Holocaust denial, or Holocaust revisionism as it is referred to by its supporters
Given that I have just added a reference that all four London based broadsheet newspaper and the BBC uses the term revisionist when referring to David Irving and his Austrian adventure, is this introduction correct as not one of the papers or the BBC is a supporter of Holocust revisionism? Perhapse this is a difference of the use of an expression on the different sides of the pond.
It is not just British press, for example here is an Australian article  Ratbag now a martyr in the Herald Sun. Articles have also appeared in the New Zealand Herald which are wire copies of articles published in London which include the term revisionist and historical revisionist. None of these media would usually be considered supporters of Holocaust revisionism. As the page historical revisionism (negationism) says
:This usage has occurred because some authors who publish articles that deliberately misrepresent and manipulate historical evidence (such as David Irving, a proponent of Holocaust denial), have called themselves "historical revisionists". This label has been used by others pejoratively to describe them when criticising their work.
--Philip Baird Shearer 21:20, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: We might perhaps say that some ignorant newspapers continue to use the term "revisionism". --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 00:47, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

text: The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. This means that we only publish material that is verifiable with reference to reliable, published sources.
Do you have a source which says that the four London broadsheet news papers and the BBC are "ignorant newspapers [to] continue to use the term "revisionism""? If not, I put it to you that the introduction to this article needs fettling --Philip Baird Shearer 11:07, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Holocaust denial, or Holocaust revisionism 

message: The Good article nomination for  has failed
:This article is far too long and far too controversial for the single-person review system at WP:GA to be effective.
  Worldtraveller 19:46, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Good articles|Good Article]] [[Wikipedia:Good articles/Nominations|nomination]] has failed 

message: Holocaust Denial itself is not a historical topic, though holocaust deniers deny history. The Holocaust could be a controversial historical topic -- but holocaust denial is not historical. I am not sure what else to call it but political. Maybe it's just a controversial topic? Dietwald 10:23, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Article not a Controversial Historical Topic

message: There is no reason to delete ().  It is in the appropriate section, and it is indeed a website with a message board that denies AND discusses the Holocaust.  Keep your pro-jew agenda away. Thetruth566
*Wikipedia is not a web directory. And don't worry, people with pro-jew agendas will stay away from your website. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 01:50, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Your website appears to be down, and please avoid discussing other editors.  Thanks. Jayjg (talk) 02:35, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, he just doesn't remember what he called the website, which is kinda funny, since he created it just today. He named it accurately in the article, just not here on the talk page. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 02:53, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:   switched to openly antisemitic language. Even though I dislike reverting talkpages, I had to clean it up and blocked him indefinitely. ←Humus sapiens ну? 10:41, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Keep the Website

message: Surely this section should be moved to another article (linked to under See Also). Other genocides are not the Holocaust and so don't belong in this article. 84.70.132.186 19:24, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: They are important as they follow the same mechanism as Holocaust denial. In the serious academic literature about Holocaust denial, genocide denial in general is discussed with most of these examples. It is the features and processes of denial that make it an area of study with certian descernable patterns.72.75.63.86 03:36, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Other genocide denial

message: Maybe someone posted this already. 
Paulus Caesar 19:54, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It was a source that could've been relevant to the article.. Paulus Caesar 00:12, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  *cough* 

message: WP:NPOV#Fairness of Tone: "Refuting opposing views as one goes along makes them look a lot worse than collecting them in an opinions-of-opponents section." Despite the fact that, from all apperances, this seems to be a collection of views disputing the Holocaust, a WP:NPOV#POV Fork born of requirement, the article refutes every allegation as it progresses and has a very verifiable slant when read-through. Can we please start splitting off the rebuttals to a seperate section located afterward? --Avillia (Avillia me!) 18:47, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV. 

message: In a gross and stunning irony the small text within on the Armenian genocide has been changed from a noting of the policy of denial -- to a denial itself. Here on these pages!
The user "ruzgar" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ruzgar has put a classic genocide denial on a page designed to educate and illustrate the problem! here is the edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Holocaust_denial&diff=50780967&oldid=50724263
The concenus of genocide scholars, including Israeli scholars is that therr is a policy and campaign of denial. It fits into the classic mechanism and methods employed by Holocaust deniers (that is why it belongs here as an example). yet instead of an example of denial, the denial itself has been injected here without qualification.
It as if David Irving's garbage were to be regurgitated here simply as statements without noting they are examples of denial. It is a full reversal of the intent and purpose of the article. I am going to change this back as I would like to continue recommending this to my students who as part of standard curriculum begin with the Armenian genocide as the first 20th century genocide, and its denial as an temporary abberation of nationalist state policy.72.75.63.86 03:48, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Armenian genocide graph irony 

message: I think it was Michael Shermer who first provided the argument that Holocaust Deniers have provided an important historiographic service by forcing historians to look into the matter in more detail. In other words, without people like Butz, Faurisson, etc, there would not be this amount of factual knowledge about the Holocaust we have today. The holocaust deniers have mostly been cranks and politically motivated rewriters of history, but it was necessary to address them. There is a similarity to the current amount of excellent popular literature on Evolution which was necessitated by the increasing onslaught of creationists in the public. I think this is a fascinating argument, particularly as this topic affects the history of ideas (see above discussion on Copernicus etc.). Does anybody here think this is an aspect that should be discussed here? Dietwald 09:09, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Are there good sources on this? Jayjg (talk) 16:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Again, I am writing from memory, as my library is on another continent. I think the argument was made in "Why people believe weird things", and was also repeated in the "Skeptic" edition that dealt with holocaust denial (late 1990s, I think 1998, but I could be totally out of line with that date. I will try to find something on-line at least, but if anybody has these sources, he may find the material quite easily. Dietwald 09:22, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  A related problem is that Holocaust deniers take advantage from these sentences by saying "you see, even our enemies have to acknowledge that we say interesting things" (i.e. they say it was acknowledged that they contributed research, not how they contributed). Did holocaust deniers, as they claim it, really find new material? If not, did Shermer or other people reply when the deniers took advantage of these "credits"?Apokrif 18:04, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Historical Value of Holocaust Denial

message: The continuous POV-warring on the Israel-Lebanon-War page should not affect this page! It is probably no coincidence that suddenly Nasrallah is being added and added and added to the list of Holocaust Deniers (HD), while never before. 
There is accompanying "evidence" (after asking for it twice): http://www.memritv.org/Transcript.asp?P1=1023 - It is a speech Nasrallah made on the subject of the hypocritical freedom of speech and discrimination in Europe. There is freedom to insult millions of muslims and ignore their feelings, but there is not the same freedom when it comes to Europeans themselves and HD. That is double standards, he says, and we do not want double standards. It is not a speech on trying to convince us of HD. He briefly uses the example of a French Holocaust denier who's been convicted for it.
This so-called "evidence" is way too thin to make Nasrallah an HD. Especially with the POVwarring going on right now, we need HARD evidence. We cannot accept that some users try to change this page because they want to back-up their POV on some other page (the Israel-Lebanon-War). Show us the speeches with full blown HD of Nasrallah. Show us his HD books of Nasrallah. Show us the HD meetings of Nasrallah, and Nasrallahs ties with for example French HD organizations. ActiveSelective 20:57, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nasrallah 

message: ...some are exclusive claims of Holocaust deniers, while others borrow from other realms of history and are, by the wording of the article, also discredited. There is nothing "weaselly" about stating that some of the claims listed are shared by Holocaust deniers and other patrons, or that some are actually valid points. What certainly is suspicious is including certain claims in Holocaust denial territory and stripping away their credibility when paired with some of the beliefs of Holocaust deniers that are, and are written off as, completely absurd. You can't say "here is what the Holocaust deniers believe" and include items that are accepted outside of H.C. denial territory without identifying them as such. That is just wrong.
--72.92.0.83 02:23, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. The entire article is rife with bias of a sort that wouldn't be tolerated on other pages. As pointed out in discussions above, the name of this article is itself a POV. "Holocaust supporters" or "holocaust deniers": it's all such tripe. Why don't we stick to the facts? The point is that "deniers" are actually "questioners" or "seekers after the truth". Lumping people who don't fit a certain profile together into one denigrated group is the tactic of Stalinism and fascism. Perhaps we should all read Orwell's "1984" once more with feeling. Al-Fie 03:18, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: concerning the list of "Holocaust denial beliefs"