Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It? by Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman
Fascinating.
Published in 2000 by University of California Press.
Published in 2000 by University of California Press.
The title of Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It? pretty much tells it all - it is an academic exploration into the people who deny the Holocaust ever happened and their motivations for making this claim.
Of course, you may be wondering why someone would make a claim like this, despite the film footage of newly-liberated camps, eyewitness testimony from both victims and perpetrators, the population records that show that, indeed, some 6 million Jews did not survive World War II and damning circumstantial evidence from Hitler and members of his inner circle that alludes to a "Final Solution" to the "Jewish problem".
Well, the deniers are a motley lot. Some are educated and well-spoken and others are not. Some feel that Germany has become a martyred nation to the cause of eradicating racism. Others are pro-fascist in politics and want to get rid of the taint that Nazi-ism gives to fascism, so they try to exonerate the Nazis.
Others are just plain anti-Semites and sincerely believe the Jews somehow "cooked up" the population figures or even somehow managed to conspire to kill off 6 million of their own people in order to create sympathy for the creation of a Jewish country, namely, modern-day Israel.
It was a fascinating book, a little deep at the beginning and the end with the different theories on how to approach history, but the middle was quite informative.
I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.
This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Denying History.
Reviewed on February 11, 2005.
Of course, you may be wondering why someone would make a claim like this, despite the film footage of newly-liberated camps, eyewitness testimony from both victims and perpetrators, the population records that show that, indeed, some 6 million Jews did not survive World War II and damning circumstantial evidence from Hitler and members of his inner circle that alludes to a "Final Solution" to the "Jewish problem".
Well, the deniers are a motley lot. Some are educated and well-spoken and others are not. Some feel that Germany has become a martyred nation to the cause of eradicating racism. Others are pro-fascist in politics and want to get rid of the taint that Nazi-ism gives to fascism, so they try to exonerate the Nazis.
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| Auschwitz's infamous "Work sets you free" sign |
It was a fascinating book, a little deep at the beginning and the end with the different theories on how to approach history, but the middle was quite informative.
I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.
This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Denying History.
Reviewed on February 11, 2005.
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