Holocaust Revisionism and Censorship
Holocaust revisionism refers to the movement that seeks to deny or distort established historical facts about the Holocaust, the systematic extermination of six million Jews by the Nazis during World War II. This phenomenon often involves claims that the Holocaust was exaggerated or fabricated, promoting the idea that the events were misrepresented for political ends. Key figures in this movement emerged in the late 20th century, notably with the establishment of The Journal of Historical Review, which published arguments that dismissed critical aspects of the Holocaust, such as the use of gas chambers and the intent to exterminate Jews.
Censorship plays a significant role in the discourse surrounding Holocaust revisionism. Governments in various countries, particularly in Europe, have enacted laws that ban Holocaust denial literature and penalize individuals who promote such views, citing the need to combat hate speech and misinformation. This tension raises questions about the balance between free speech and the responsibility to prevent hate-driven narratives. The topic remains sensitive, with ongoing debates about the implications of both revisionism and censorship in historical scholarship, as well as in contemporary societal contexts. Understanding this complex issue requires a nuanced approach, considering the historical evidence and the perspectives of different stakeholders involved in the discussion.
Holocaust Revisionism and Censorship
Date: 1939–1945
Place: Germany and Europe
Significance: Various powers have censored information about the Holocaust; revisionists have denied that it happened
During World War II, millions of European Jews were exterminated by the Nazis. The German leaders attempted to restrict information about the mass killings by locating major extermination camps (such as Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzec, Maidanek, and Auschwitz) in occupied Poland. The Nazis wanted to prevent any repetition of the public criticism that had greeted the euthanasia program in Germany between 1939 and 1941. In public and private meetings euphemisms of “resettlement” and “special treatment” were used to describe plans for mass murder. Even the mass shootings by special execution units in Russia were described as antipartisan measures. The Nazis could not censor all news, however, and by the autumn of 1942, the Allies knew about the death camps.
The Press and the Holocaust
After 1942 Soviet authorities began to censor press information about mass killings of Jews. For example, in September 1944, Soviet officials informed reporters in Maidanek that Germans had killed Poles, Russian prisoners of war, political prisoners, and Jews despite the fact that they knew that Maidanek was a death camp that targeted primarily Jews. In early 1945 the American reporter Bill Lawrence posted a story to The New York Times describing the massacre of Jews at Maidanek. The word “Jew” never reached New York because the Russians had struck the word from the story. The Soviets explained that they were afraid that too much emphasis on the plight of the Jews would fuel the flames of anti-Semitism. After the war, the official history of the Soviet campaigns in 1944 and 1945 by I. Konev et al., The Great Campaign of Liberation by the Soviet Army (1975), refers to Auschwitz’s extermination factories but does not mention Jews.
At times, American officials also censored reports about the mass murder of Jews in Nazi extermination camps. Like Soviet officials, American spokesmen claimed that they did not want to emphasize the plight of the Jews because it would enflame anti-Semitism. In October, 1944, John Pehle, who worked for the War Refugee Board, obtained an eyewitness account of the atrocities in Auschwitz. Many American newspapers published this report in November, 1944, even though Elmer Davis, the head of the Office of War Information office, attempted to block publication of this story. The military censors did prevent the story from appearing in Yank, the Armed Forces magazine. When Richard Paul submitted a story based on Pehle’s report to Yank, his superiors urged him to write “a less Jewish story.” As a result, Yank did not publish the story and Jews were not mentioned when articles in the magazine described the Maidanek extermination camp.
Postwar Historical Revisionism
Even though the Nuremberg Trials clearly, abundantly, and thoroughly documented (including survivor testimony and ample physical evidence) Nazi efforts to exterminate Europe’s Jews, the 1970s saw the appearance of organized efforts to deny the Holocaust. The most extreme revisionism appeared in 1980 with the founding of The Journal of Historical Review, which was published in Torrance, California. The journal was supported financially by conservative figure Willis A. Carto’s Liberty Lobby. The first issue of this journal included papers presented at the first Revisionist Convention in Los Angeles, California, in September, 1979. The two most important editors and contributors were Arthur Butz and Austin App. Butz was an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at Northwestern University and App was an instructor of English literature at various colleges. These anti-Semitic authors attributed the origins of what they called the Holocaust hoax to Zionists, who allegedly utilized the Holocaust to obtain funds and support for Israel. In the leading article of the first issue of The Journal of Historical Review, “The International ’Holocaust’ Controversy,” Butz accepts Nazi euphemisms for the Holocaust and argues that “final solution” meant deportation, not extermination. He denies that gas chambers were used to murder Jews, and he contends that the poison gas that the Nazis used was a disinfectant. In addition, he echoes Nazi claims that the special SS execution units that killed more than one million Jews in Russia were only used to combat partisans.
No historian of any reputation accepted the arguments of the California revisionists. Archival material and the testimonies of survivors make it clear that there was a Nazi plan to exterminate Jews. Some German academic historians contributed to the dispute by attempting to relativize the Holocaust. Andreas Hillgruber published a book in 1985 in which he equates the Holocaust with the suffering of Germans on the Eastern Front in 1944 and 1945. Another effort to relativize the Holocaust was attempted by the Berlin historian Ernst Nolte. He argued that the Holocaust was only one of many genocides which include the Armenian genocide and the murder of kulaks in the Soviet Union. Nolte has maintained that the Holocaust was not a product of Nazi ideology but rather represented a preventive measure against Bolshevik threats of extermination. Although aware of other genocides, most professional historians have rejected the attempt to relativize the Holocaust.
While holocaust revisionism can be a form of censorship, the perspective itself has also been subject to censorship. Many countries, and particularly Germany, have banned literature denying the Holocaust. In addition, authors of such works have been prosecuted and imprisoned. Beginning in 1978 West Germany used a law dealing with “youth-menacing” literature to ban works by Arthur Butz. Butz was also prevented from speaking in Munich, Germany, in September, 1977. A legal case against a revisionist author occurred in Canada in 1985. Ernst Zundel, a German “landed immigrant” in Canada, was tried and convicted in a court in Toronto for publishing pamphlets that denied the Holocaust. Like Butz, Zundel called the Holocaust a hoax, and he praised Hitler as a great leader. Zundel was tried for violating section 177 of the Criminal Code of Canada, which prohibits anyone from wilfully publishing material that is known to be false and is likely to cause injury to the public interest. Canada also prosecuted another denier of the Holocaust, James Keegstra, in Red Deer, Alberta, for violating section 28l of the Canadian criminal code, which prohibits hate literature.
Because the issue of Holocaust denial often involves complex and overlapping themes such as freedom of speech vs. hate speech and historical accuracy vs. open scholarship, some individuals and organizations have been opposed to both Holocaust revisionism and the censorship of such views. For example, Internet activist Kenneth McVay became notable for his efforts to expose the flaws of Holocaust revisionism by openly confronting the subject rather than censoring it. Outspoken anti-Holocaust revisionist author Deborah Lipstadt also spoke out against efforts to censor and persecute Holocaust deniers.
The twenty-first century saw an increasing trend of Holocaust revisionism worldwide, but most drastically in Middle Eastern countries. In 2006 Iran sponsored the International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the Holocaust, which was widely labeled a Holocaust denial event and condemned by Western media. In 2009 the Palestinian group Hamas criticized the United Nations (UN) for allegedly planning to discuss the Holocaust in UN-run schools in the Gaza Strip. A survey by the Anti-Defamation League's First International Resources Branch released in 2015 found that only 38 percent of respondents in the Middle East and North Africa were even aware of the Holocaust, while only 8 percent knew of it and believed standard historical accounts. Worldwide, 54 percent had heard of the Holocaust and 33 percent thought the historical record was accurate.
Bibliography
Fathi, Nazila. "Holocaust Deniers and Skeptics Gather in Iran." New York Times. New York Times, 11 Dec. 2006. Web. 19 Nov. 2015.
Lewy, Guenter. Outlawing Genocide Denial: The Dilemmas of Official Historical Truth. Salt Lake City: U of Utah P, 2014. Print.
Lipstadt, Deborah E. Beyond Belief: The American Press and the Coming of the Holocaust 1933–1945. New York: Free, 1993. Print.
Lipstadt, Deborah E. Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory. New York: Free, 1994. Print.
Taft, Victoria. "A New Worldwide Poll Reveals a Stunning Number of People Don't Believe Holocaust Actually Happened." Independent Journal. IJ.com, 1 Mar. 2015. Web. 19 Nov. 2015.