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Holocaust: can it happen again?

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I just watched a documentary about nazi death camps, and i was genuinely frightened and nearly to cry at the testimonies and the reveal that if about 7000 german officers worked only in Auschwitz-Bikernau,they just looked like everyone else and were in most case perfectly average german citizens and loving parents without a trace of cruelty on their daily lives (out of the massacre stuff). Could people nowadays being induced into a similar rampage of death and cruelty? are we just learned the lesson? Was Rousseau Right or Humans are bastards?

edited 1st Jan '12 12:18:32 PM by MrsRatched

stripesthezebra Since: Dec, 2011
#76: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:15:17 PM

[up][up][up]

If you think it's so fucking terrible, why don't you contribute and make it less terrible, instead of just trying and failing to spell "what" correctly?

[up][up]

You too, minus the "what".

edited 1st Jan '12 7:17:17 PM by stripesthezebra

Flyboy Decemberist from the United States Since: Dec, 2011
Decemberist
#77: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:18:21 PM

[up][up] I don't care to know if that's a compliment or an insult.

[up] Already did.

edited 1st Jan '12 7:19:43 PM by Flyboy

"Shit, our candidate is a psychopath. Better replace him with Newt Gingrich."
tropetown Since: Mar, 2011
#78: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:20:11 PM

Could the Holocaust happen again? Well, people are still people; America and Western Europe are no safer from the effects of racism, fanaticism, and extreme conditions than any other part of the world. All it would take would be for the wrong people to be in the wrong places at the wrong time, and it could quite feasibly happen again.

BlueNinja0 The Mod with the Migraine from Taking a left at Albuquerque Since: Dec, 2010 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
The Mod with the Migraine
#79: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:38:24 PM

The only thing I see as being a difficulty in pulling off another Holocaust is the wide-spread, institutionalized, size of it all. I mean, Germany put a decent percentage of their GDP into it, and AFAIK, even the other genocidal efforts done in the decades since then, none of them have been 1) government organized, 2) supported by the overwhelming majority of the population, and 3) a major draw on their economy.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw
Flyboy Decemberist from the United States Since: Dec, 2011
Decemberist
#80: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:41:34 PM

Unfortunately, it seems that a lot of the large-scale instances of mass murder in the last century since the original Holocaust have been on accident, such as the case with the Great Leap Forward or the shit in North Korea...

"Shit, our candidate is a psychopath. Better replace him with Newt Gingrich."
stripesthezebra Since: Dec, 2011
#81: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:42:46 PM

[up]

It's not really an accident if it's mass-MURDER. That's on purpose.

tropetown Since: Mar, 2011
#82: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:43:38 PM

Well, if you managed to convince the population that the targeted group was a significant threat, while keeping them in the dark about the actual extermination (remember, the Nazis didn't tell ordinary Germans they were shipping all the Jews off to death camps), someone could pass it off as the government "taking care" of these dangerous, undesirable elements, without mentioning exactly what that meant.

I think that they would have to leave the more overtly racist rhetoric out of their propaganda, but given a climate of enough fear and hatred, that might not even be necessary.

Flyboy Decemberist from the United States Since: Dec, 2011
Decemberist
#83: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:44:46 PM

Well, the Great Leap Forward, for example, or Stalin's modernization things before WWII, were intentional, but weren't really supposed to kill lots of people.

Granted, though, I should have said mass death...

"Shit, our candidate is a psychopath. Better replace him with Newt Gingrich."
tropetown Since: Mar, 2011
#84: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:47:50 PM

Well, Pol Pot's regime may have killed upwards of three million; nothing on the scale of the Great Leap Forward, but still a sizable chunk of the population.

stripesthezebra Since: Dec, 2011
#85: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:49:50 PM

[up][up]

Ah.

Well, when I think of genocides/mass murder I think of a concentrated effort to kill people, not the periphery effects of badly planned industrialisation campaigns.

You're right, though, it's pretty morbid the number of people stuff like famines kill.

[up]

The Cambodian genocide was remarkeable primarily for the portion of the population that died. A full fucking quarter (25%!) of Cambodians no longer existed at the end of the genocide.

edited 1st Jan '12 8:14:01 PM by stripesthezebra

Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#86: Jan 1st 2012 at 7:53:56 PM

If you think it's so fucking terrible, why don't you contribute and make it less terrible, instead of just trying and failing to spell "what" correctly?
Do I really need to explain why starting a derail on 'gendercide' in a topic about the holocaust is bad? Or why comparing domestic violence to any -cide is? And calling what the Khmer Rogue did "purges" must be the worst case of bowdlerization ever. The term you people are looking for is democide, btw. And really arguing whether what happened in Cambodia was genocide or not is really missing the point about why it was so horrible.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
tropetown Since: Mar, 2011
#87: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:06:04 PM

[up][up] Yeah, I heard about that. Pointless savagery.

DomaDoma Three-Puppet Saluter Since: Jan, 2001
Three-Puppet Saluter
#88: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:06:54 PM

Everyone knows that a "purge" is a paranoid dictator killing a lot of people. See, look. Nothing Bowdler about it.

Hail Martin Septim!
Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#89: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:09:34 PM

Okay, I can understand people linking to Wikipedia to back up their terminology claims. But to a TV Tropes page? The thing is, if you make a single person disappear, then that already is a purge. In fact, compared to -cides, purges are all very lowkey and small, and very often targeted at specific people instead of entire groups of people.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
stripesthezebra Since: Dec, 2011
#90: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:13:18 PM

[up]

I'm going to ignore everything else, and instead ask about what's the problem with the phrase "small scale genocides". Some genocides are just smaller, meaning they kill fewer people, that's nothing to "wat" at.

[up][up][up]

Indeed.

edited 1st Jan '12 8:14:52 PM by stripesthezebra

johnnyfog Actual Wrestling Legend from the Zocalo Since: Apr, 2010 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Actual Wrestling Legend
#91: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:14:25 PM

Purges apply to people in government — not simply people the government wants to remove.

I'm a skeptical squirrel
Octo Prince of Dorne from Germany Since: Mar, 2011
Prince of Dorne
#92: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:17:21 PM

Well, granted you can compare the Holocaust to what Tom has described. To me that seems like missing the point, though. A gencoide is by definition big, since it's a mass killing. That is what is terrible about them. The rest is just a matter of scale - hell, if Cambodia were larger we'd have had something the size of the Holocaust!

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic
johnnyfog Actual Wrestling Legend from the Zocalo Since: Apr, 2010 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Actual Wrestling Legend
#93: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:20:34 PM

Octo, I think you're being contrary, but the reasoning behind it is hazy.

I'm a skeptical squirrel
TuefelHundenIV Night Clerk of the Apocalypse from Doomsday Facility Corner Store. Since: Aug, 2009 Relationship Status: I'd need a PowerPoint presentation
Night Clerk of the Apocalypse
#94: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:24:21 PM

I think part of the grand horror of the holocaust specifically, was the industrial method applied to mass murder.

A purge is not just one person. A purge is usually associated with large numbers of people that a political entity deems a threat. See Purges by Stalin. Horrible in their own right but they still do not compare to an act of genocide.

As for the OP yes it is possible for a Holocaust scenario to happen again. How and where is a matter of speculation. Let us hope it never happens again on a such a scale with such methods employed.

edited 1st Jan '12 8:30:16 PM by TuefelHundenIV

Who watches the watchmen?
johnnyfog Actual Wrestling Legend from the Zocalo Since: Apr, 2010 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Actual Wrestling Legend
#95: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:27:56 PM

[up] Word. Everyone's got their own 'favorite' thing about the holocaust, I imagine. The stuff that worms into your brain. What chilled me to the bone (and I didn't discover this until a couple years ago) is the part about the fake train stations and flowerbeds.

I'm a skeptical squirrel
Gwirion Since: Jan, 2011
#96: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:55:25 PM

A purge is not just one person. A purge is usually associated with large numbers of people that a political entity deems a threat. See Purges by Stalin. Horrible in their own right but they still do not compare to an act of genocide.

Stalin is estimated to have killed upwards of 50 million people, where less than 4 million deaths were attributed to famine. What doesn't compare here, exactly?

You are a blowfish.
stripesthezebra Since: Dec, 2011
#97: Jan 1st 2012 at 8:57:40 PM

[up]

I'd like to see sources for that that aren't Atlas Shrugged.

My numbers say 6-8 million, and that's from a guy who's book is titled "Stalin's Genocides".

PS they weren't genocides, genocide is something else.

edited 1st Jan '12 8:58:59 PM by stripesthezebra

Gwirion Since: Jan, 2011
#98: Jan 1st 2012 at 9:01:00 PM

http://necrometrics.com/20c5m.htm#Stalin

The heading states 20 million as the most conservative estimate, but, as you can see, plenty of the scholars cited offer higher numbers.

I don't read Rand. There's no reason to insult me.

edited 1st Jan '12 9:01:35 PM by Gwirion

You are a blowfish.
TuefelHundenIV Night Clerk of the Apocalypse from Doomsday Facility Corner Store. Since: Aug, 2009 Relationship Status: I'd need a PowerPoint presentation
Night Clerk of the Apocalypse
#99: Jan 1st 2012 at 9:22:07 PM

That is funny the numbers of the great purge are only about 1.2 million at the high end. Including executions, death from imprisonment, and maltreatment from the gulags. The whole point of the purge was to get rid of anyone who could challenge the ruling political entity.

Still nothing compared to the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a very systematic industrial extermination designed to effeciently kill as many people possible as quickly as possible period.

Who watches the watchmen?
Gwirion Since: Jan, 2011
#100: Jan 1st 2012 at 9:23:53 PM

Would you like to provide some sources, considering that what you're saying refutes everything nearly everyone knows about Stalin's regime?

You are a blowfish.

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