101. Comment #175632 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 6:29 pm

Said DetpackJump:

You're argument is to just shoot holes in the available evidence about the holocaust.

No, I don't shoot any holes. I simply show you the holes. It's not my fault if the "Holocaust" idiocy beats any Swiss cheese.

Unless, of course, there are no holes where there should have been several, as in the roof of Krema II (see my previous comments), which is really the most impressive hole of them all.

Complicated stuff.

It's not clear where you exactly stand on the issue.

So, lets go to the basics. In 500 words or less can you please describe what you DO believe about the holocaust. What do you think really happened? You seem to well read on the subject, so you must have an opinion as to what really happened. Please share it with us.

Sure. I've made it absolutely clear over and over again, but I don't really mind making it absolutely clear once more, though you might find it more interesting to read about it in greater detail in some of my previous comments.

On the issue of the "Holocaust" (extermination attempt, homicidal gas chambers, approximately 6 million murdered Jews) my position is as follow:

a) Extermination attempt: FALSE.
b) Homicidal gas chambers: FALSE.
c) Approximately 6 million murdered Jews: FALSE [*]
d) Therefore the "Holocaust": FALSE

[*] Unless you consider one million dead Jews a good approximation of six million murdered Jews. It's naturally difficult to come up with precise statistics after so much obfuscation, with no real official investigation ever done on the subject, but I would consider a probable figure of around 1 million (most certainly less than 2 million) for the total of Jewish dead of all causes during the War in Europe, including those fighting as partisans at the side of, or integrated in, the Soviet army. And a figure no larger than 500.000, probably something between 200.000 and 360.000 for all Jews dead in the concentration camps from 1934 to 1945. This is based on the most convincing estimates I have come across, certainly on the "revisionist side" of the debate -- you may even say that on the "other side" of this practically one-sided debate (both in the quality of arguments and in the use of censorship and police state measures), meticulous studies on the wartime demography and movements of European Jews are practically inexistent. And the very few ones (maybe I should really say "one") that exist on the conformist side have only come aprés la lettre, as very weak attempts to counter revisionist investigations into the matter.

Do you believe that the pictures of dead Jews from the camps that we can find on the internet and in museums are completely fake, or do they just show that only some Jews were executed, not the full 6 million?

You don't seem to understand what I've been saying about the photos, and I cannot obviously make it clear to you as a single verdict on all of them. However, I will probably be able to offer you some informed comments on many of those you may wish to know anything about. Simply look for them on the web, post the URL and I'll be glad to tell you what I think of them and -- most importantly -- why I do.

You have an issue with the gas chambers, so do you think they are completely false, or do you think that they were used to exterminate some Jews, just not as many as stated.

"Completely false" should be the verdict here.

Of course, I won't be able to prove a complete negative to you, inasmuch as I cannot prove, say, that Hitler did not once have a Jew gassed in his Munich apartment's kitchen for his private amusement. But I think the Orbiting Teapot Brigade will easily understand that.

Or maybe... come to think of it, I'm not so sure any longer, after seeing some of the posts on the great "Holocaust" taboo that I have seen here...

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102. Comment #175641 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 6:53 pm

Said mordacious1:
I don't think we should reply to ASM any longer

I might agree with you. Dawkins, the champion of reason and science, should be offering some ideas for the missing holes of Krema II, not mordacious1. But why not following your own advice then? Do you suffer from some sort of split personality disorder?

He probably lives in a one room cabin in the woods in Montana writing his manefesto.

Cold, my friend, cold. Actually I'm posting via satellite from my finca on the banks of the Paraguay, here in the beautiful Chaco countryside, if you zee vot I mean.

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103. Comment #175669 by sane1 on May 5, 2008 at 8:30 pm

This interviewer is a dolt. She has trouble asking questions at all sometimes. Weird. Is she actually often on TV somewhere? RD, as usual, was eloquent and interesting and gracious. Very nice of him to finish her goofy stuttering questions for her.

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104. Comment #175693 by Jedi Knight on May 5, 2008 at 10:13 pm

Great to see such a relaxed tone to the whole thing, don't see the point in berating her interview skills I for one found it made RD seem more approachable to her obvious demographic.

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105. Comment #175978 by Rawhard Dickins on May 6, 2008 at 10:07 am

ASM

Skepticism is good but I don't think it is worth wasting any more key-strokes on this, as with evolution the evidence is overwhelming.

There were plenty of surviving witnesses and the photos were not pictures of shop dummies.
Perhaps you think the Nazis didn't have the mentality to do this? Perhaps they were too busy waging war against the rest of the world?

Even if it were one tenth as bad as is thought, it was bad enough to be called The Holocaust.

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106. Comment #176154 by troyboy on May 6, 2008 at 5:27 pm

aaaahhhh!!!! Richard Dawkins was in Vancouver and I missed it. As for ASMarques, if you want to argue the holocaust, take it somewhere else!

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107. Comment #176165 by ngeorge001 on May 6, 2008 at 6:13 pm

This woman is perhaps one of the worst interviewers i have ever seen. Wow...I mean, way to suck the life out of the room. Anyway, Dawkins is awesome in this interview though!

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108. Comment #176181 by beauroland on May 6, 2008 at 7:56 pm

Great! Really dug it. She's a little boring, but at least asked questions that go beyond the normal stuff people ask Richard. We didn't get any Stalin-atheist questions, anyway. Oh, and nice sweater!

edit: were those trucks in the video??? I thought they were on my street!

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109. Comment #176187 by ASMarques on May 6, 2008 at 8:20 pm

Said Rawhard Dickins:

Skepticism is good but I don't think it is worth wasting any more key-strokes on this, as with evolution the evidence is overwhelming.

You may believe repeated prayer will see your wishes accomplished, but I'm afraid you're indulging in wishful thinking.

Well, let me repeat my prayer as well: wouldn't you be able to send me any concrete evidence of "extermination, homicidal gas chambers, approximately 6 million murdered Jews" you might know of? Thanks.

There were plenty of surviving witnesses and the photos were not pictures of shop dummies.

I don't mean what I call evidence by vague generalization followed by exclamation mark as in "oh, there are lots of eyewitnesses!" (to what?) and "oh, there are lots of photos!" (of what?). I mean the name of a favourite eyewitness or a favourite photo. Are you under some religious taboo interdiction?

May I recommend a short introductory article and a book to you?

THE LIBERATION OF THE CAMPS: FACTS VS. LIES
By Theodore J. O'Keefe

Nothing has been more effective in establishing the authenticity of the Holocaust story in the minds of Americans than the terrible scenes US troops discovered when they entered German concentration camps at the close of World War II.

[Read on]
http://www.ihr.org/leaflets/libcamps.shtml

THE HOAX OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
THE CASE AGAINST THE PRESUMED EXTERMINATION OF EUROPEAN JEWRY
By Arthur R. Butz

[Free PDF download]
http://www.vho.org/aaargh/fran/livres3/HoaxV2.pdf

Let me show you a quote that may interest you:

[Quote from Butz, footnotes not transcribed]

It is a tragic fact that, even in modern times, "camps" established during wartime have amounted to death traps for many sent to them. The basic causes for such conditions have been similar: people thrown together chaotically in hastily organized camps, with inadequate sanitary measures and an uncertain situation as regards food and other supplies. Thus during the American Civil War, the POW camps in the North such as Rock Island and Camp Douglas experienced death rates of 2%-4% per month. These figures were even exceeded in camps in the south such as Florence, where diarrhea and scurvy caused 20 to 50 deaths per day, in a prisoner population of about 12,000. Conditions at Andersonville were even worse, and 13,000 of the 50,000 Union POWs who were interned there perished.259 During the 1899-1902 Boer War in South Africa about 120,000 non-combatant white Boers and 75,000 black Africans were placed in British concentration camps. For about a year, the Boer mortality rate ranged from 120 to 340 deaths per thousand per year (1.1% to 3.4% per month) while the Boer infant mortality rate, due chiefly to epidemics of measles, was as high as 600 per thousand per year (7.35% per month). About 20,000 Boer women and children died in these camps.260 During World War I the Germans mixed Russian POWs with those of other nationalities, resulting in typhus epidemics in their POW camps; conditions were strikingly similar to those experienced in the World War II concentration camps.261 We have seen that Russians were used as labor at the concentration camps, especially at Auschwitz, so they were no doubt one of the principal sources of typhus. Because they were not considered regular concentration camp inmates, it is not clear whether or not they were included in the camp death figures which were reviewed above. However, it is certain that they contributed to the overall death rates at the camps, and that their bodies were disposed of in the same crematories, but numbers are not available.

A ridiculous feature of all this, as it strikes the student of the subject, appears in NMT volume 5, which summarizes Case 4, "US vs. Pohl. In section B, "The Concentration Camp System," we are presented with documents which show that the camps experienced remarkably high death rates. These have just been summarized above. Then in section E, "The Extermination Program," we are presented with documents showing that the Germans were building crematories at these camps at the time of the high death rates. Apparently it is believed that nobody would actually read one of these volumes, or maybe the compilers of the volumes did not read them!

Taking into account the different death rates, we can see that the number of ovens at Auschwitz was completely comparable to those which existed at camps where there were no exterminations. In 1942 crematories were constructed at Dachau and at Sachsenhausen; each contained four ovens. At Dachau, a crematory consisting of two ovens had existed prior to 1942, and the older crematory continued to be used after 1942. It is most likely that the same situation with respect to an earlier crematory held at Sachsenhausen. At Buchenwald, the pre-war cremation facilities were those which existed in the nearby towns of Weimar and Jena. After the war started, crematories were constructed at the camp, and by the end of 1941 Buchenwald had a six-oven crematory. It appears that the Weimar crematory continued to be used until the end of the war.262 It is also possible that concentration camp crematories, whether at Auschwitz, Dachau or elsewhere, were used to dispose of the bodies of people who had nothing to do with the camps (e.g. Russian POWs).

Okay. Back to political school... *sigh*

Perhaps you think the Nazis didn't have the mentality to do this?

I'm, sorry, Rawhard, but I simply cannot understand why it is that Brights don't seem to be able to distinguish between conjecture and fact when it comes to their own (religious) beliefs.

I'm interested in the alleged "Holocaust" as propaganda hoax, or alternatively -- if I'm wrong and you're right -- historical fact, not in the psychoanalysis of "Nazis." You shouldn't pronounce a guilty verdict based on "mentality" reading. You should investigate the facts.

Perhaps they were too busy waging war against the rest of the world?

They certainly were. Your point is well taken. Butz makes much the same point in his book recomended above (my bold type):

[Quote from Butz, footnotes not transcribed]

I claim an additional contribution of this book that may seem ridiculous on its face. I treated the German concentration camps as specific institutions that existed in specific locations, with the alleged events that took place in them taking place, if at all, in real space and real time, together with other events that happened simultaneously in those same camps or in real space. By "real space" I mean a space that we all exist in so that, whatever happened at Auschwitz, it happened at the same time President Roosevelt held meetings in Washington, and I as a child went to school, etc., and in the same space.

That is so obvious that it may seem preposterous for me to present it as an original perspective, but please hear me out. My impression of the extant literature was that the events claimed there may as well be imagined as having taken place on Mars if at all, so absent was a concern for the broader context. As I reminded readers in my Chapter 5: "There was a war going on during World War II."

[The passage alluded to is: "This seems to be as good place as any to point out a fact that seems to be effectively forgotten by many writers on this subject. There was a war going on during World War II. The Germans were thinking about ways of winning it, not about exterminating Jews. The claim of NG-2233, that the extermination program had rail priority over military production, is absolutely ridiculous."]

Since you won't post any positive evidence of the "Holocaust" maybe you'll be kind enough to enlighten me on a fast couple of matters:

-- How come the figure of 6 million was already known to the US Congress in March 1945, at a time when the war was still on, no German top officials or camp administrators had been captured, and no confessions had been obtained, 3 weeks before the Americans took over Dachau and the British took over Belsen, and 6 weeks before the Soviets released their Special Comission Report on Auschwitz?
See clip at (08:46):

http://www.onethirdoftheholocaust.com/nazishrunkenheads/nshrunkenheads.wmv

-- How could the all-important alleged extermination method pictured in the link below have taken place in the real world of human experience without breaking the ordinary rules of physics, and without even leaving any evidence at all of the alleged holes in precise places on the large morgue's roof (still in existence)?
See the top image (try it with your brain in active mode):

http://forum.codoh.com/viewtopic.php?t=2651&highlight=1000

Would Richard Dawkins accept any other story concerning allegedly real events with this extraordinary level of -- at least! -- implausibility as indisputable, and would he call those calling it into question "liars" if the same standards of "proof by eyewitness" were being applied to it, and indeed the so-called "liars" were being censored, fined, persecuted and imprisoned for trying to bring this into the public consciousness, as "Holocaust" deniers are?

Even if it were one tenth as bad as is thought, it was bad enough to be called The Holocaust.

You mean to you 600.000 dead Jews is hardly different from 6.000.000 murdered Jews? And no homicidal gas chambers at all is the same as genocidal gas chambers all around?

Don't you have any feelings at all for Jews? No respect at all for Germans? Don't you think they -- indeed the innocent men, Nazis or otherwise, hanged for crimes they didn't commit -- deserve some form of justice, let alone an apology?

But I don't think you really understood what I'm saying. I couldn't care less whether you called the alleged extermination, gas chambers and 6 millions murdered Jews, the "Holocaust," "The Plague," or "Return of Moby Dick." Let's call it "Event X," for your benefit. What I'm saying is:

1) The alleged historical event known as Event X (the extermination, gas chambers and 6 millions murdered Jews you hear about at breakfast, lunch and diner) is a gigantic lie.

2) It becomes impossible to analyse and discuss Event X (extermination, gas chambers, 6 millions murdered Jews), if the first requirement to any discussion of it is to accept that it is necessarily true, since its basic tenets may be changed at will to Event X (blank, blank, blank) for the purpose and duration of the debate.

****** A MESSAGE TO THE SITE KEEPERS ******

I know this is not a personal site maintained by Richard Dawkins, but rather one kept by an international team of volunteers who post the content they think other fans will enjoy. Though Dawkins himself seems to pay attention to comments sent by readers and often replies to them, I understand he is not the one in control, so please allow me a suggestion.

I notice some of the images that decorate the site show Dawkins in what looks to me like heroic stiff upper lip poses. I understand those responsible, as well as legions of fans, love to see their hero bravely standing up to silly elderly bishops, or dressing down superstitious young women in head scarves, but hasn't it occurred to you that he may feel embarrassed by your well-meaning but somewhat silly portrayal of him? In my opinion a slightly lower profile would do.

Other Comments by ASMarques

110. Comment #176203 by ASMarques on May 6, 2008 at 10:14 pm

Said troyboy:

As for ASMarques, if you want to argue the holocaust, take it somewhere else!

Hi, troyboy. I'm always interested in individual reactions coming from youthful religions.

Tell me, why do you accept that Dawkins should present his "Holocaust" as an obvious truth and anyone who denies it as a liar, but any argument against that unkindly view should be taken "somewhere else" instead of argued where it is being proposed?

I mean, I've seen lots of conversations going on on this site. This is the only subject that apparently hits some deeply ingrained religious taboo, right?
;^)

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111. Comment #176224 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 12:42 am

On a different register, what a silly theory this "sucide bombers blow themselves up because they think they'll be rewarded in heaven" thing is.

That's not the reason why they do it. Palestinian bombers, for example, do it because they are furious at the way they have been occupied, robbed of their land, humiliated, oppressed and their predicament ignored by the World at large, and they cannot fight back their Jewish overlords with equal weapons.

Of course, religious belief in heavenly reward may to some degree, in some individuals, facilitate the act, but pretending that's the reason for it is simply ridiculous. A suicide aimed at killing others is always an act born of desperate anger and impotence, not of blissful expectation of a ticket to heaven.

Dawkins's argument is exactly like the one that says Stalin murdered millions because he was an atheist. Of course that was not the reason at all, although obviously the fact that he presumably didn't fear punishment in hell may have helped...

Sillier than the "Holocaust" sham. Well, almost...

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112. Comment #176235 by Goldy on May 7, 2008 at 1:21 am

A suicide aimed at killing others is always an act born of desperate anger and impotence, not of blissful expectation of a ticket to heaven.

Does this include doctors driving into Glasgow airports, or well off Dewsbury residents...or even rich Saudis learning to fly planes?

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113. Comment #176253 by Goldy on May 7, 2008 at 2:49 am

ASM, you said

A suicide aimed at killing others is always an act born of desperate anger and impotence

Can you really say the examples I gave were as the highlighted? If there is such feeling, is there not recourse to legal methods? Killing innocents justify the means? Makes things better? Are you telling me these people who live comfortable lives, who have no ties to Palestine outside a shared religion with the majority of Arabs, these people are feeling impotent and angry, enough to kill people who just happen to be citizens of a country, not through choice but through birth?
I'd also be interested to know your views of Jews and of Zionism.
Why don't the German and Austrian governments deny the Final Solution? Come to think about it, I don't think the East German (DDR) government denied it either - one would have thought the Soviet regime would have allowed them (poking the west, as it were).
Just interested. Does throw a light in the historicity of Jesus and the veracity of the gospels. I mean, if a fairly major genocide can be denied within the lifetime of the survivors, what does that say to us about the Gospels?

Other Comments by Goldy

114. Comment #176255 by Goldy on May 7, 2008 at 2:57 am

That's odd. I'm sure ASM had a comment between numbers 115 and 116, telling me the rich Saudis were desperate.
Shit, I only had one beer! Can't be halucinating, can I?

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115. Comment #176258 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 3:06 am

Said Goldy:

That's odd. I'm sure ASM had a comment between numbers 115 and 116, telling me the rich Saudis were desperate.
Shit, I only had one beer! Can't be halucinating, can I?

You could, but you aren't. You saw correctly. I took it down to make a few corrections and am now putting it up again for your benefit.

Said Goldy:

ASM: A suicide aimed at killing others is always an act born of desperate anger and impotence, not of blissful expectation of a ticket to heaven.

Does this include doctors driving into Glasgow airports, or well off Dewsbury residents...or even rich Saudis learning to fly planes?

Yes, if they have no tanks and war planes at their disposal as is usually the case, and are brave enough not to send others in their place, as cowardly presidents and prime ministers do.

[No, I'm not supporting their actions, I'm just answering your question]

Maybe I should explain something to you. What I called "desperate anger and impotence" may not necessarily come out of what someone in your immediate vicinity is doing to you personally.

It may come, for instance, from your perception of enormous and prolonged injustice committed on people you don't even know, maybe even in your name, under a vast conspiracy -- yes Virgina, there are a few conspiracies going on in the World -- of indifference and obfuscation.

If this may help you, up to 9/11 I was following on the web what was going on in Palestine and I was dumbfounded. My only wonder was how much it would be taking for an Arab response to the unbelievable events that were daily developing under the media blackout and my gaze, with Palestinian children daily massacred in cold blood while Arafat was ordered around and expected to pay homage to the Jews at the Yad Vashem shrine to the only worthy martyrs in the whole wide World, under penalty of incurring in the accusation of... anti-semitism. Then I saw the Towers going down in flames and I instantly knew why.

At the moment, I follow closely the involvement in the Middle East and Central Asia of the United States, a country whose political foundations (really our universal heritage, to which Bill of Rights we owe the free web) I deeply admire -- which makes it even easier for me to detest its current despicable leadership and its foreign overlords -- and I have little doubt that one day a much worse catastrophe than the Twin Towers will hit America, and still worse and more savage events will be launched under the banner of "no more holocausts" and the cries of "down with (some new) Hitler."

You see, it's easy to understand what's going on, provided you pay attention. I assure you desperate anger and impotence in the developed world do not stem only from having some neighbour of yours playing the telly too loud.

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116. Comment #176260 by jam007 on May 7, 2008 at 3:15 am

It was fun to notice how Dawkins, and I as viewer, in the beginning of the interview anticipated standard attacks from Kiefer but she turned out to be friendly.

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117. Comment #176261 by Goldy on May 7, 2008 at 3:16 am

Damn - how did you move that comment like that? Now the chronology is all wrong.
I understand the anger felt about Israel (reading your comment, I think I know how you feel about it) in the Arab world.
I just want to know how this anger can be expressed as suicide murders when the full use of law adn of systems in place within the western world can be used to change things legally.
Sounds all rather conspiratorial to me.
OK, 10:15, time for me to hit the hay. Might be back tomorrow, might not. Got a heap of HPLC (google it) to do.

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118. Comment #176268 by bachfiend on May 7, 2008 at 3:54 am

I think that we should stop commenting about the Holocaust, but I would like to note that David Irving (not exactly an unbiased authority, to put it mildly), in his book "Hitler's War" provides many examples of mass-murders of Jews. The main point point he makes, is that there isn't a single document signed by Hitler, ordering the Holocaust. He made many statements, though, including treating Jews like the tubercle bacillus (you don't deport bacteria or put them into camps).

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119. Comment #176278 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 4:49 am

Said Goldy:

ASM, you said

A suicide aimed at killing others is always an act born of desperate anger and impotence

Can you really say the examples I gave were as the highlighted? If there is such feeling, is there not recourse to legal methods? Killing innocents justify the means? Makes things better?

According to common Western wisdom under its current Jewish supervision, it doesn't, unless the victims are Arabs or elderly ex-national-socialists hiding in the remotest parts of the solar system.

Are you telling me these people who live comfortable lives, who have no ties to Palestine outside a shared religion with the majority of Arabs, these people are feeling impotent and angry, enough to kill people who just happen to be citizens of a country, not through choice but through birth?

Yes.

Killing people who just happen to be citizens of a country not through choice but through birth is their definition of war. Shows you how different they are from the rest of us...

I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying it isn't the 70 virgins as Dawkins apparently would have it.

I'd also be interested to know your views of Jews and of Zionism.

JEWS: ordinary people, often with big noses and very nice IQ, under the curse of the worst religion ever invented.

ZIONISM: a pernicious religious / ethnic ideology of blood & soil much similar to German National-Socialism, only with a more confused notion of the blood (Ashkenazi Jews are largely turkic and indo-european, while Sephardis are mostly semitic, though probably less so than Palestinian Arabs) and a strictly religious claim to the soil.

Why don't the German and Austrian governments deny the Final Solution?

I think basically for Carthaginian reasons, i.e. for the same reasons the Roman Carthage built over the ruins of the old Punic city didn't oppose Rome. This may sound strange to you, but the larger picture may be too large for us to aprehend. It's not really political, it has to do with the utter destruction of heritage and soul. It's the small things that really give you the Jewish flavour, like the humiliation and the negation of burial. You don't find that in the Iliad, the New Testament, or even in the final rape by Solzhenitsyn in his epic Prussian Nights. You find it in the Talmud.

See comment #159112 on "Richard Dawkins on The Big Questions":

http://richarddawkins.net/articleComments,2443,Richard-Dawkins-on-The-Big-Questions,BBC,page8#159112

Come to think about it, I don't think the East German (DDR) government denied it either - one would have thought the Soviet regime would have allowed them (poking the west, as it were).

Are you joking? The East Germans ruining the historical mystification largely propped up at Nuremberg and elsewhere by their masters...?

Just interested. Does throw a light in the historicity of Jesus and the veracity of the gospels. I mean, if a fairly major genocide can be denied within the lifetime of the survivors, what does that say to us about the Gospels?

About the Gospels, nothing. About the survivors, it says they were not exterminated.

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120. Comment #176281 by ForestMist on May 7, 2008 at 4:59 am

ASMarques - could you please explain to me why every historian who has ever written anything on the Holocaust (apart from those who go against it, of course) goes along with the world wide hoax which you appear to believe in? And do you really think that the German and Austrian government would go along with this hoax for "Carthaginian reasons"? And why didn't every single German who was tried at Nuremberg say that the Holocaust never happened and it was all made up? Quite a few of them were sentenced to death anyway, so them then saying it never happened wouldn't have done them any harm. And why did Albert Speer keep on apologising for it if it had never happened?

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121. Comment #176286 by AllanW on May 7, 2008 at 5:47 am

ASMarques;

I've read your posts for the last month or so, read the links you have provided and tried to understand your point of view. Yet I'm absolutely flummoxed by why you want to believe that no mass deaths of Jews occurred.

You position (cutting-through the obvious paranoia) is summarised as;

1. Some Jews still live who were at the camps or were interred by the Nazis therefore they didn't all die.

2. There is no documentary evidence that you are willing to accept that shows every dead body that was created in the Nazi era so you don't believe that vast numbers did die.

3. There are sufficient anomalies between contemporary accounts (whenever are there not?) for you to dismiss that a mass extermination ever occurred in reality and therefore it is all a big hoax. Perpetrated by Nazis, Jews and anybody who aligns themselves with these people. And this hoax is maintained now through constant repetition without reference to any evidence at all.

You plainly believe this holocaust-denial position but my question to you is why? You are not unintelligent; you can plainly read and discover evidence; you are equally plainly interested in something (bordering upon obsessively interested) but it seems to me that this 'something' is not the Holocaust.

Would you care to address the 'why' question, please? I have no further interest in anything you can say, write or link to as regards the Holocaust itself; you have dismally failed to persuade me of your case. I'm only interested in your mental state and motivations for your denial position.

Thanks.

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122. Comment #176294 by alan baylis on May 7, 2008 at 6:17 am

It cannot be only me who is struck by the overwhelming similarity of the arguments for holocaust denial and those for id/creationism. Just try substituting "evolution" for "holocaust" and it's plain to see.

I was going to give a long list of these similarities. However, regular posters and viewers of this website will have heard it from IDiot/cretinists so many times before, that I felt it would be like teaching my granny how to suck eggs.

There is though, one resemblance that especially tickles me. Cretinists like to claim that evolution is just another religion that needs faith in miracles to be believed. Now where have we been hearing that lately?

For an example of the similar modus operandi of both camps, have a look at the current discussion at
http://richarddawkins.net/articleComments,2498,Is-religion-a-threat-to-rationality-and-science,Dan-Dennett-Lord-Winston,page19#comments

This features someone calling himself seeker of truth who is debating the age of the universe etc. and various dating techniques. (Be warned though, that seeker is almost as long-winded and as thick as ASMarques)!

Seeker has obviously read up on the subject but judging from the links he supplies, it seems this has been mostly from creationist sources. He bangs on and on quoting carefully selected pieces of information to support his ideas whilst rejecting the mountains of evidence put to him showing that he is wrong. Also, he will simply not accept that proper peer reviewed data is the only thing that will back up his arguments.

Oddly, in all of this, at least as I far as I can see, seeker seems to be claiming that he is not a creationist, nor even particularly religious. Of course no one believes him, just as they don't believe ASMarques when he claims not to be a bigoted anti-Semite and an admirer of the Nazis.

Of course what both camps don't get or choose to ignore is that it is actually the "convergence" of masses of evidence from a wide range of disciplines and sources that ultimately proves their delusions wrong.

Against the case of holocaust denial of course, can be added the vast numbers of eyewitness accounts of survivors, perpetrators, onlookers and relieving armed forces personnel.

It seems that a good summary of each of their cases would be as follows:

IDiot /creationists believe that goddidit.

Holocaust deniers believe that the Jews made it all up just to get compensation.

I'm now waiting for a long rebuttal garnered mainly from the holocaust deniers' own websites. Jeesh, ASMarques, you are a dreary windbag!

Other Comments by alan baylis

123. Comment #176297 by al-rawandi on May 7, 2008 at 6:25 am

ASMarques,

I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying it isn't the 70 virgins as Dawkins apparently would have it.

How come many suicide bombers wrap their genitals in wet towels? Virgins have nothing to do with it?

Good try.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

124. Comment #176425 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 10:01 am

Said bachfiend:

I think that we should stop commenting about the Holocaust,

Why so? Seems on topic and the site managers don't seem to mind. Should we also stop talking about Christian or Muslim pseudo-history just because the subject might annoy some people?

but I would like to note that David Irving (not exactly an unbiased authority, to put it mildly), in his book "Hitler's War" provides many examples of mass-murders of Jews.

True. No one denies mass killings occurred on all sides, though I think we should make a distinction between mass executions and mass murders. For instance, if you surround and capture 100 people engaged in irregular warfare out of uniform, you may find them guilty of terrorism or murder and execute them, but it's not the same as murdering civilians wholesale, which unfortunately also happened on all sides.

You'll find many descriptions of wholesale murder of innocent German civilians here:
http://www.wintersonnenwende.com/scriptorium/english/welcome.html

War is a terrible thing, but no "Holocaust" in sight: no extermination, no gas chambers, no 6 million. Only a gigantic hoax.

Shall we now try to prove the "Holocaust" by talking about the weather in general, just to avoid the gas chambers, as in "NO HOLES, NO HOLOCAUST"...

The main point point he makes, is that there isn't a single document signed by Hitler, ordering the Holocaust.

Yes, but nowadays everybody accepts that. Hilberg was reluctant at first (see the early editions of his book), but later on he went so far as to claim the "Holocaust" had been the product of a wide-ranging telepathic meeting of minds...

He made many statements, though, including treating Jews like the tubercle bacillus (you don't deport bacteria or put them into camps).

No, you're wrong. They are few and easily identifiable. The one you probably mean (and are actually misquoting) is rather dubious. The statement is alleged to have been made on April 17, 1943 when Hitler met Horthy and presented the situation of the Jews in Poland to him thus:

"If the Jews there did not want to work, they were shot. If they could not work, they had to be treated like tuberculosis bacilli, with which a healthy body may become infected. This was not cruel if one remembers that even innocent creatures of nature, such as hares and deer, which are infected, have to be killed so that no harm is caused by them."

I find it unlikely that Hitler who wanted to get the Hungarian Jews deported to Germany -- whether for labour or "extermination" is beside the point -- would actually be informing Horthy that they were to be killed like bacilli. Again, the only evidence for the statement was presented at the Nuremberg show-trial, and the only source was Paul Schmidt, Hitler's interpreter who testified first that he was present at the meeting, but in a later book wrote that he was not present because Horthy had insisted on his leaving the room.

Doubtful as the statement may be, it's possible that it may have been made. You should bear in mind that oral excess is by no means an exclusivity of Hitler. Churchill, for instance, is reputed to have spouted nonsense in many occasions, especially about the "Jews" of the British Empire, i.e. Indians, African blacks etc. When the Japanese took Singapore he is alleged to have said that he would see the day when every Japanese -- man, woman and child -- would have been exterminated. It may be true or false, but if true it's not to be taken literally, nor should the British be made to pay indemnities to the Japanese till kingdom come on that account. And of course, he even ordered poison gas to be dropped on German cities when he was drunk, an instruction which Alanbrooke, his chief of staff, didn't pass on, though unfortunately the air bombing was, of course, a Churchillian true holocaust (in the sense of an incineration of entire cities, not of really attempting to "exterminate the Germans." My point being we are dealing with what really happened, not what might have happened or some people might have wished had happened.

The "Holocaust" didn't happen, a gigantic hoax did.

Other Comments by ASMarques

125. Comment #176429 by al-rawandi on May 7, 2008 at 10:05 am

ASMarques,






And my post regarding virgins being a non factor, despite all evidence to the contrary?

Looks like you are the one putting on a hoax.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

126. Comment #176442 by SaviorPilate on May 7, 2008 at 10:46 am

Poor Richard Dawkins.

I've watched so many interviews with him, and speeches by him, and lectures by him, and one thing I've noticed is that he's always asked the same questions, over and over and over again.

If I were in that position, I would lose my mind.

How could such a man react civilly to someone talking about Pascal's Wager, like it was some new discovery?

Other Comments by SaviorPilate

127. Comment #176444 by SaviorPilate on May 7, 2008 at 10:50 am

What the hell.. all you crazy mofos talking about the Holocaust...

If people put as much effort into debating the present as they do the past, I think our planet would be a pretty cool place to live.

My grandparents fled from Poland during WW2, so I say that even if the Jews didn't get as badly screwed as we may think they did, certainly a lot of people got very thoroughly screwed.

And even if the Holocaust never happened, there are plenty more genocides and mass exterminations in Mankind's history that I don't think it should matter that much.

Also, people who disbelieve things like the Holocaust tend to think that those same insecurities are manifest in the current generation of a people; for example, someone distrusting Jews on some level because they believe it was a hoax. Or someone disliking the Germans for the same reason.

Human nature is only ephemeral because we continue to argue about things in the past. If there was one thing that should be taken with more than a grain of salt from the Neocons, it's that Humans need to focus more on the future and less on the past (not in the closeminded way that they do, but still...)

Hitler was evil to me not because he tried to exterminate the Jews, and not because he invaded Poland. He's no evil because he believed that Germans were superior and destined to rule the world. He's only evil to me because he took Nietzsche's philosophy and turned it into an abomination. LOLz!

Other Comments by SaviorPilate

128. Comment #176470 by ForestMist on May 7, 2008 at 12:15 pm

ASMarques - any chance of an answer?

Other Comments by ForestMist

129. Comment #176476 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 12:37 pm

Comment #176224 by ASMarques:

On a different register, what a silly theory this "sucide bombers blow themselves up because they think they'll be rewarded in heaven" thing is.

That's not the reason why they do it. Palestinian bombers, for example, do it because they are furious at the way they have been occupied, robbed of their land, humiliated, oppressed and their predicament ignored by the World at large, and they cannot fight back their Jewish overlords with equal weapons.

If a Palestinian can sneak into a crowded restaurant with explosives, why would he detonate the explosives while wearing them?

Why not just toss the explosives into the restaurant with a short-delay fuse (like a hand grenade), and attempt to flee? Even if the chance of escape is low, it is not zero. The chances improve with concealed explosives and longer fuse delays.

Asymmetrical warfare dates back to at least Roman times. See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy

More recently, T.E. Lawrence taught Arab partisans how to blow up the supply trains of the militarily superior Turks:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.E._Lawrence

In most cases, the weaker side in an asymmetrical conflict has a choice of many options which do not involve certain death. Accordingly, few people choose tactics which involve certain death, unless they have accepted the ideology of some sort of death cult.

There are some spontaneous tactical suicides in war, such as when a soldier dives onto a grenade to save his buddies in a foxhole, or when the pilot of a damaged airplane deliberately crashes into the enemy rather than bailing out.

However, spontaneous suicides, as well as high-risk missions, are quite different than premeditated suicides, before which the suicide warriors videorecord their last wills and testaments. Since even the most overmatched combatant still has some potentially survivable tactical options, choosing in advance to make a point of committing suicide requires some sort of ideology, over and above simple anger and resentment that could motivate someone to fight.

Consider the analogy with criminals going to jail. While many criminals eventually get caught, most of them behave as if getting caught is something they would rather avoid.

If a new cult arose in which members committed crimes in direct view of police for the express aim of getting caught and incarcerated, one could not coherently equate their motives to the motives of ordinary criminals who seek to avoid apprehension.

The risk of death has been part of combat throughout history, but it is unusual for combatants to pre-plan their deaths. It's not very convincing to claim the motives of suicide warriors are exactly the same as the motives of warriors who try to survive. Clearly, it takes some extra suicide cult ideology.

Granted, the suicide cult ideology may exploit the underlying resentment, but it is hardly the only way for people to express resentment.

Other Comments by Teratornis

130. Comment #176479 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 12:46 pm

Comment #176425 by ASMarques:

though unfortunately the air bombing was, of course, a Churchillian true holocaust (in the sense of an incineration of entire cities, not of really attempting to "exterminate the Germans." My point being we are dealing with what really happened, not what might have happened or some people might have wished had happened.

What is your evidence that these massive air bombings of European cities actually occurred, or if they did occur, that the casualty figures are accurate?

It seems to me the only available evidence is of the same quality, and from the same sources, as the evidence for the Holocaust which you reject.

The only things I know (or think I know) about the firebombing of Hamburg and Dresden, I learned from historians who in turn assembled data released by the same military agencies which also told us about the Holocaust.

If you think the military and historians are way off on the number of dead Jews, why do you trust the same people to tell you how many Germans died in Dresden?

Your whole argument against the Holocaust seems to hinge on casting doubts on the credibility of the governments, militaries, and historians who tell us what happened. If these institutions and people are so good at cooking up vast conspiracies to mislead the public, how do you know when to believe them?

I.e., how do you decide which historical evidence you will cherry-pick?

Other Comments by Teratornis

131. Comment #176486 by al-rawandi on May 7, 2008 at 1:04 pm

Teratornis,






That was awesome. Just awesome. That was the perfect response for ASMarques. Perfect. Well done. Now he can choke on his shitty argument.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

132. Comment #176487 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 1:04 pm

To ASMarques:

1. Do you believe the Apollo Moon landings were faked on a sound stage at NASA?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Moon_Landing_hoax_theories

2. Do you believe George W. Bush ordered airliners to crash into skyscrapers on 9/11 by remote control, and the story about the Islamic hijackers was a false cover story?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_conspiracy_theories

3. Do you accept the findings of the The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Commission

4. What do you make of the clever arguments which cast serious doubt on the belief that the Earth is spheroidal?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth_Society

I'm wondering if the Holocaust is the only one of our cherished belefs you would have us abandon.

Other Comments by Teratornis

133. Comment #176488 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 1:05 pm

Said ForestMist:

ASMarques - any chance of an answer?

Fear not, child, for I never leave the field without three suns having set in peace over the corpses.

But I do have a life. Back with you & the others soon, but you're first and foremost in my thoughts:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxIuIxqo2So

Other Comments by ASMarques

134. Comment #176490 by Podaar on May 7, 2008 at 1:14 pm

133. Comment #176479 by Teratornis

Thank you! Well said, sir.

Other Comments by Podaar

135. Comment #176491 by al-rawandi on May 7, 2008 at 1:16 pm

ASMarques,






Hey, answer Teratornis. Why do you accept the history on Allied bombing, but not the Holocaust?


Thanks.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

136. Comment #176492 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 1:21 pm

Comment #176486 by al-rawandi:

Teratornis,

That was awesome. Just awesome. That was the perfect response for ASMarques. Perfect. Well done. Now he can choke on his shitty argument.

Thank you for recognizing my logic. It's the same logic I bring to all my writing, for example on the more important subject of peak oil (more important because the Holocaust, as horrible as it was, is history now, but the worst effects of peak oil are probably just ahead of us). However, in my experience, the thinking patterns and logical fallacies of Holocaust deniers srongly resemble those of these other groups of people:

1. Creationists

2. Cornucopians (who believe human population and resource consumption can grow exponentially forever, with no ill effects)

3. 9/11 conspiracy theorists

4. Apollo Moon landing conspiracy theorists

5. Conspiracy theorists in general

For example, the argument from ignorance (or from personal incredulity) resurfaces again and again. "I can't imagine how a monkey becomes a human, therefore humans did not evolve from monkeys." Or "I can't imagine the Germans rounding up and systematically exterminating six million Jews, therefore they did not." Or "People have incorrectly predicted that the world would run out of oil before - therefore the world can never run out." Etc.

And these arguments are always selective. The creationist, or Holocaust denier, invariably cherry-picks the claims of the orthodox position, considering some to be rock-solidly reliable, and others to be utter fabrication, without presenting a systematic method for telling which is which.

I haven't had much luck at changing anybody's mind on much of anything on which they had already formed strong emotional beliefs. But it's still fun to expose wrong thinking when I smell it.

As a general rule, when someone makes a whopping logical error such as creationism, Holocaust denial, etc., that is rarely the only error they make. So it's only a matter of time, if they keep talking long enough, for them to come up with other whoppers that are easier to refute.

Such as the ridiculous left-wing chestnut that when an Islamic suicide bomber looks into the camera before his final mission and says "We love death more than our enemies love life!" that cannot really be why he's doing it.

I've never met a conspiracy theorist who seemed truly comfortable with Occam's Razor.

Other Comments by Teratornis

137. Comment #176493 by MPhil on May 7, 2008 at 1:24 pm

Oh please, you're still here, ASMarques? The guy who accuses native Germans, who have (and have had) perhaps the most comprehensive exposure or the fullest access to the evidence, who say the holocaust did happen, of having been brainwashed... puh-leese. Teratornis posed some excellent questions there - I am anxious to read your answers.

Other Comments by MPhil

138. Comment #176494 by al-rawandi on May 7, 2008 at 1:28 pm

MPhil,



No answers he had "to go". Classic dogmatist. When confronted with insurmountable logic, shits himself and runs off.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

139. Comment #176495 by Star Spangled Eagle on May 7, 2008 at 1:30 pm

EDIT: Al, nice!:

shits himself and runs off.

The evidence is so clear!

we can use a metaphor:

Question: How can you tell if someone doesn't wipe after they use the bathroom?

Answer: Check their underwears for ASSMARQUES.



I think it's funny.

Other Comments by Star Spangled Eagle

140. Comment #176496 by Podaar on May 7, 2008 at 1:32 pm

140. Comment #176492 by Teratornis

Such as the ridiculous left-wing chestnut that when an Islamic suicide bomber looks into the camera before his final mission and says "We love death more than our enemies love life!" that cannot really be why he's doing it.

This reminds me of the poster who recently lamented the FLDS women in Texas. She characterized them as victims of the FLDS men and couldn't understand why others felt the women were culpible in the rape of the young. It seemed her arguement was, "I can't conceive of letting my husband do such a thing, therefore those women wouldn't either."

The whole thinking critically and not projecting motivations onto others is hard. I've struggled with it myself at different times of my life.

We should discourage it whenever possible.

Other Comments by Podaar

141. Comment #176497 by Podaar on May 7, 2008 at 1:35 pm

143. Comment #176495 by Star Spangled Eagle

I think it's funny.

*raises hand*

Guilty!

Other Comments by Podaar

142. Comment #176509 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 2:09 pm

Comment #176495 by Star Spangled Eagle:

Question: How can you tell if someone doesn't wipe after they use the bathroom?

Answer: Check their underwears for ASSMARQUES.

If I were the referee of RDF, I would flag you 15 yards for unsportsmanlike conduct.

While I understand your hate, I don't think expressing it does much to elevate the discussion here. If someone makes an error, it's enough to point out the error and let the readers decide who to like and who to hate. It's not as if anyone needs to be told.

It's always tempting to do a goal line dance and fire AK-47s into the air and urinate on the graves of our enemies, but we must guard against lapsing into emotional thinking.

If we are not gracious in victory, we can hardly expect to be treated graciously in defeat.

When I see people on RDF dishing out the ad homs when they are right about something, I assume they want exactly the same treatment when they are wrong.

And I have a long memory about such things. So as a general warning to name-callers, don't make any mistakes on my watch. I assume everyone is prepared to take what they dish out.

A more constructive way to respond to the wrong thinking we see in others is to reflect more carefully on our own thinking. Do we really have all our logical ducks in a row, on every subject?

I have direct personal experience with having made some mistakes in my past thinking, easily on par with any mistakes I see other people making. I try to keep that in mind when I write - although I don't always manage to.

The take-home lesson is, it's all too easy to be really sure and really wrong at the same time. Anybody who thinks they've never done it, or will never do it again, is probably doing it right now.

Other Comments by Teratornis

143. Comment #176512 by ForestMist on May 7, 2008 at 2:12 pm

ASMarques - most amusing!
But I did pose some of those questions on the 23rd April back on the Interviews with Richard Dawksins and Michael Shermer thread, so somehow I don't think I'm first in your thoughts!!

Other Comments by ForestMist

144. Comment #176517 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 2:23 pm

Comment #176496 by Podaar:

The whole thinking critically and not projecting motivations onto others is hard. I've struggled with it myself at different times of my life.

At least you are consciously aware of the struggle. That puts you light-years ahead of the generally oblivious masses, for whom emotions are reality.

As I'm sure I've already written here, since I endlessly repeat myself, critical thinking becomes especially important during times of crisis, i.e. times of rapid change.

Most logical fallacies and cognitive biases seem to be, or to have been, actually pretty good heuristics. For example, argumentum ad hominem can be a pretty reliable rule of thumb in some cases, such as: Hitler had no problems with killing people, so perhaps he wouldn't have minded telling some lies now and then. You'd want to scrutinize a claim by Hitler a bit harder than you'd scrutinize a claim by someone who appears to value honesty. Of course ideally you would logically analyze every claim the same way, but in real life there isn't time to do that. You invariably have to trust some people who you don't have time to personally check out yourself.

Similarly, appeal to tradition is a pretty good heuristic in a stable, traditional society. A society that has had thousands of years to figure out what works in its stable environment has probably settled on at least a locally optimal code of behavior by now. In a sufficiently stable society, imitating everybody else is probably a better strategy for most people than attempting to think everything through from scratch, even if there wasn't pressure from the society to conform.

But when things are not stable, and game rules are changing rapidly, then we cannot trust our emotions as much. Our emotions typically look backwards, to what worked in the past, maybe even millions of years in the past.

Responding intelligently to change demands a fresh look at new data.

I won't bother to mention the new data I have in mind just now, because my faithful readers already know the example I would give.

Other Comments by Teratornis

145. Comment #176521 by Goldy on May 7, 2008 at 2:35 pm

Comment #176509 by Teratornis
Took the words right out of my mouth there :-)

Other Comments by Goldy

146. Comment #176530 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 2:43 pm

Comment #176493 by MPhil:

Oh please, you're still here, ASMarques? The guy who accuses native Germans, who have (and have had) perhaps the most comprehensive exposure or the fullest access to the evidence, who say the holocaust did happen, of having been brainwashed... puh-leese. Teratornis posed some excellent questions there - I am anxious to read your answers.

While you're waiting, this article is a good read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denialism

See how many of the denialist strategies you can identify in ASMarques' writing. For a harder challenge, see if you can find whether he has written something else.

Always remember - you are not alone! Nearly every argument we have is a repeat of previous arguments, and some people have used the power of collaborative editing ("we are smarter than me") to write down some pretty good arguments. That is no substitute for thinking, but part of thinking is remembering to look things up.

Other Comments by Teratornis

147. Comment #176534 by MPhil on May 7, 2008 at 2:48 pm

Thanks, Teratornis... Actually, that article is quite basic... I think all rational people who have ever encountered someone employing these strategies can identify them...

Sad nevertheless.
I'm just really pissed off by ASMarques, me being a native German who shares no responsibility, and feels no guilt, but acknowledges the responsibility of Germany as a nation (and every other nation as well) to never let such a thing happen again - to remind people to be cautious about nationalism, patriotism, discrimination, marginalisation of non-violent groups etc.

I know of the importance of combined effort, and of the value of "knowing where to look" - I'm a student of philosophy after all :)

Other Comments by MPhil

148. Comment #176549 by Teratornis on May 7, 2008 at 3:07 pm

Comment #176534 by MPhil:

Thanks, Teratornis... Actually, that article is quite basic... I think all rational people who have ever encountered someone employing these strategies can identify them...

Well, a refresher rarely hurts. Especially if we find ourselves getting emotional during a disagreement. I can't be the only person who becomes stupider when I become angrier.

Sad nevertheless.
I'm just really pissed off by ASMarques, me being a native German who shares no responsibility, and feels no guilt, but acknowledges the responsibility of Germany as a nation (and every other nation as well) to never let such a thing happen again - to remind people to be cautious about nationalism, patriotism, discrimination, marginalisation of non-violent groups etc.

I experience at least a normal human allotment of anger so I understand the emotion all too well. Anger is the productive emotion when a cave bear wanders into "your" cave, but it is precisely the wrong emotion to bring to the Internet.

That's another example of the emotional brain looking to the past. The rather distant past in this case.

On the Internet, we do not use brute physical force. Instead, we push with the flimsy rope of logic. Imagine trying to push objects around on the other side of the room by pushing on a rope. That's what reasoned debate is like on the Internet - it takes superhuman patience and sangfroid. As I am still working on merely getting up to subhuman, I have some way to go with those.

I suggest looking on any online discussion group as an exercise in emotional desensitization. Even we atheists have our sacred beliefs, and we get upset when someone tramples them.

But let's remember we like to trample on other people's sacred beliefs. If we expect religious people to remain calm while we logically eviscerate their cherished hopes, then we might try showing them that's how we roll.

I get the idea that Sam Harris rolls that way. It's rather embarrassing that he seems to have learned his emotional control from a religious tradition rather than from a secular/scientific tradition.

I know of the importance of combined effort, and of the value of "knowing where to look" - I'm a student of philosophy after all :)

I apologize for unintentionally condescending then - I redirect my advice to anyone else reading here who might learn something from the article.

The article itself is basic, but the links therein are dense and rich.

Other Comments by Teratornis

149. Comment #176550 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 3:07 pm

Said SaviorPilate:

What the hell.. all you crazy mofos talking about the Holocaust...

If people put as much effort into debating the present as they do the past, I think our planet would be a pretty cool place to live.

Here is what escapes you: the "Holocaust" is the present. Intelligent people who avoid it are like the sophisticated old Areopagites politely smiling at the antics of the crazy Jew who had bumped his head on a tree on the road to Damascus.

Other Comments by ASMarques

150. Comment #176553 by ASMarques on May 7, 2008 at 3:09 pm

Said AllanW:

ASMarques;

I've read your posts for the last month or so, read the links you have provided and tried to understand your point of view. Yet I'm absolutely flummoxed by why you want to believe that no mass deaths of Jews occurred.

If that's what you think, then you've not even read what I've written on this same page.

Quoting myself:
_______________________________

It's naturally difficult to come up with precise statistics after so much obfuscation, with no real official investigation ever done on the subject, but I would consider a probable figure of around 1 million (most certainly less than 2 million) for the total of Jewish dead of all causes during the War in Europe, including those fighting as partisans at the side of, or integrated in, the Soviet army. And a figure no larger than 500.000, probably something between 200.000 and 360.000 for all Jews dead in the concentration camps from 1934 to 1945.
_______________________________

You position (cutting-through the obvious paranoia) is summarised as;

1. Some Jews still live who were at the camps or were interred by the Nazis therefore they didn't all die.

True, but irrelevant as you present it. It's not a qualitative only argument, it's a quantitative one. It's not some, it's vast numbers of Jews were there as children or elderly people and were not exterminated at all in spite of not being useful as labour. How do you integrate that with an extermination program? Have you ever read Elie Wiesel? Do you believe he is telling you the truth about the truckloads of children being thrown into burning pits or not? If not, what's he telling you, a truth or a lie?

Have you ever gone to the "Holocaust Memorial Museum"? Why don't they show you a scale model of the alleged Birkenau gas chamber where at least hun