dj_stick

As a preface, I would like to note that I do not mean any offence to anyone of Jewish background, I am not an anti-semitist


Today for a school trip, my class visited the Holocaust museum in Caulfield of Melbourne (Australia)
I heard stories from survivors and saw pictures of horrific conditions and torture of the Jewish people.

Yet when i looked at the tiney section in the very corner titled "Non-Jewish Deaths" i saw the total number of people killed by the Nazis was between 35 and 50 million. Compared to this the six million Jews were between 1/6th and 1/8th of the total people killed.

In Poland, 3 million Christians were killed. In one country alone, the death toll was half that of the total toll of Jewish people in the whole of Europe.

What i cannot understand is why it is the death of the Jews that is so publicised STILL today, when the total losses were far greater, and other nationalities and religions suffered greatly.

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The_Neon_Cowboy

Maybe because they were rounded up like cattle and shipped to work and death camps and they were singled out.


A bit off topic but did anyone know that Hitler’s mom was Jewish, there for that would make him Jewish? Growing up in a Jewish family?

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dj_stick

its not just the jews that were rounded up in to the camps… it was people of all nationalities including Germans

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raid517

There was a rumor that Hitler's mother was part Jewish. (As in her mother was Jewish, but her father wasn't). But I think you will find if you read any half decent history book, rather than depend on Goggle as the source of all your information you will find that a very hard claim to back up.

As for why the focus on what happened to the Jews - I think you will find that 50 million is the estimate for everyone who died during the war - including in the battlefield too.

The Jews were singled out more than any other race, laws were enacted specifically against them, more of them died than any other one single group, so really if you want to look at it in perspective the Jews have a bloody good reason to be as upset as they are.

We focus most on the Jews as this is a primary example of exactly where racism and bigotry can lead us. We ignored Hitler and his vitriol against the Jews for a long time - and later as you noted, the price for our appeasement and inability to act was a collective disaster for everyone.

But as a people - and as a nation, you cannot simply discount the suffering that the Jews endured. Other races did suffer - but none as horribly and in such concerted numbers as the Jews.

GJ

malkor

It is the cold, calculated precision of the Holocaust which haunts. Bolshevism (Lenin and Stalin) killed far more, but in a less precise and focused manner. Bolshevism used thugs, Nazism used doctors. Bolshevism was born of the Enlightenment, Nazism of the reptile brain. It's not solely the numbers which makes one shudder, but rather the intent and method.

Falstaff

The jews have suffered at the hands of equally vicious attempts to exterminate them, it is true, but without the support of the United States, the Jewish state would not have survived

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The_Neon_Cowboy

I am just going on what was being taught by professors and in the books at Vincennes University.

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raid517

Which professors and which books?

GJ

TyrionX

The intent of the Holocaust wasn't for evil reasons in my opinion, it was much more caused by ignorance. I have a feeling that Hitler was in his heart good, but the method in which he tried to rid the world of evil was ironically evil in itself. Hitler was probably a twisted and ignorant man, however he must've felt what he was doing was good for mankind.

On topic, the Jews had been branded for total racial extermination, I think that might be a reason why it's still talked about today...

raid517

Well I doubt there was very much about Hitler that was good. I think if you're looking for a definition of the term 'monster', he more than admirably fits the bill.

GJ

blade5545

Thank you Thank you Thank you DJ Stick you are one of the few intelligent people which hasnt been brainwashed and thank you for noticeing, I was born in Poland and I lived there for 10 years and I AM SICK AND TIRED OF LISTENING ABOUT THE FUCKING HOLOCAUST, i am sorry but the jews got the educational system so brainwashed that everybody is taught that the jews are the only ones which paid the price when so many of my countryman paid the price and paid the price for protecting the jews and what thanks do we get, the thanks that we get is that i been called a nazi just for being Polish, I actually walked out of history classes when I was high school beacuse all they were teaching about was the god damn holocaust and my people were completly forgotten, more Poles and Russians died in that war than the jews, my entire country was completly destroyed. And now the jews say that the Poles were out to get them along with the Germans, i'm sorry but Poland had the biggest Jewish population in the world 10 millon before the war, why would we want to kill off half of our population that right there flies right in the face of that accusation.

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Unknown
"The problem with America is stupidity. I'm not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself."

Nacht

woe to the time in which one must have a disclaimer about anti-semitism before posting his opinions. Those are your opinions, and we will not flame you for them...infact i'm sure most of us agree. The world has tried to become too politically correct...always watching out so they dont make mistakes and call somebody a 'mexican' god forbid. Want a nice peice of irony in this type of situation? Jesse Jackson and his crew, insist that they not be called blacks, or black people, because they find it offensive. They wish to be african-americans. So, might I ask why I am deemed as white? does the 'white' race make a fuss about it? no. Why arent we "European Americans", or "Anglo-Americans"? So hypocritical.

raid517

There wasn't many left after the bloody war now was there?

The poles suffered too yes, as did the many of the other Slavonic races - but the point that is correctly made is that none were as directly and systematically singled out for extermination as were the Jews.

I still don't think that gives anyone a reason not to empathize. Why can't you just identify with the Jewish people and admit to your own common suffering? Why would you wish to lessen or invalidate the impact of that suffering on any one? The Jews suffered what could be termed as a common fate, whereas the rest of Europe suffered what is best described as a collective fate. The Jews were systematically targeted - whereas most of the rest of the people Hitler killed pretty much just got in the way.

If you have no respect or empathy for what happened to the Jews, I don't see how you can claim to have any genuine respect or sympathy for what happened to your own countrymen - because clearly the concept of genuine empathy itself is something that escapes you. If you can walk out on history lessons on what happened to the Jews and feel only resentment to them and their plight, then might I suggest that any of the supposed empathy you profess towards your own countrymen might not be quite as deep and as genuine as you imply?

This can of course all be cleared up by asking one simple question.

And that is this...

Do you feel that despite what happened to your own countrymen, the Jews, deserved the fate that befell them more than anyone else - and if so why?

And beyond simply resenting the act of calculating numbers (which seems a somewhat odd and trivial thing to get upset over given the circumstances and the subject under discussion) what really is it about the story of the Jews that annoys you most? I think merely counting numbers is a bit of a cop out - so what is it behind this that makes you feel the way you do?

GJ

TyrionX

To all of us, yes he was a monster. To himself, he probably was a hero.

JavaFox

Who cares what Hitler thought of himself? If "hero" can mean both "a man who selflessly protects others" and "a man who killed millions of people and plunged a world into war," then the word "hero" is utterly useless. It either means something, or it does not.