Writing On Genocide Denial in General
Gregory H. Stanton, formerly of the US State Department and the founder of Genocide Watch, lists denial as the final stage of genocide development:
| “ | Denial is the eighth stage that always follows a genocide. It is among the surest indicators of further genocidal massacres. The perpetrators of genocide dig up the mass graves, burn the bodies, try to cover up the evidence and intimidate the witnesses. They deny that they committed any crimes, and often blame what happened on the victims. | ” |
George Orwell writes in 'Notes on Nationalism' that
| “ | The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. For quite six years the English admirers of Hitler contrived not to learn of the existence of Dachau and Buchenwald. And those who are loudest in denouncing the German concentration camps are often quite unaware, or only very dimly aware, that there are also concentration camps in Russia. Huge events like the Ukraine famine of 1933, involving the deaths of millions of people, have actually escaped the attention of the majority of English russophiles. Many English people have heard almost nothing about the extermination of German and Polish Jews during the present war. Their own antisemitism has caused this vast crime to bounce off their consciousness. In nationalist thought there are facts which are both true and untrue, known and unknown. A known fact may be so unbearable that it is habitually pushed aside and not allowed to enter into logical processes, or on the other hand it may enter into every calculation and yet never be admitted as a fact, even in one's own mind. | ” |
Israel Charney, Executive Director of the Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide in Israel, describes genocide denial by putting it into the following categories:
| “ | 1. Innocence-and-Self-Righteousness
The respondents claim that they only intend to ascertain the truth. Moreover, they do not believe that human beings could have been so evil as the descriptions of the genocide imply. Furthermore, even if many deaths took place a long time ago, it is important to put them aside now and forgive and forget. 2. Scientificism in the service of confusion The position taken is seemingly an innocent one that we do not know enough to know what the facts of history were, and rather than condemning anyone we should await the ultimate decision of research. This is a manipulative misuse of the valued principle in science that facts must be proven before they are accepted in order to obfuscate facts that are indeed known, and to confuse the minds of fair-minded people who do not want to fall prey to myths and propaganda. The very purpose of science, which is to know, is invoked in order to justify a form of know-nothingness. 3. Practicality, pragmatism and realpolitik Here the claim is made that dealing with ancient history is impractical, it will not bring peace to the world in which we live today. One must be realistic and live through realpolitik. 4. Idea linkage distortion and time-sequence confusion This is a dishonest linkage of different ideas, often out of time sequence, to excuse denials of the facts. Present needs, whether justified or not, are taken as a reasonable basis for censoring or changing the record of past history. 5. Indirection, definitionalism, and maddening These are responses which avoid the issue by failing to reply, or no less by going off on tangents about trivial details that avoid the essential issue whether genocide took place. The avoidance can also be done in a seductive manner of acknowledging that the issue should be discussed, but then it never is. |
” |
Read more about this topic: Genocide Denial
Famous quotes containing the words writing, denial and/or general:
“I can hardly bring myself to caution you against drinking, because I am persuaded that I am writing to a rational creature, a gentleman, and not to a swine. However, that you may not be insensibly drawn into that beastly custom of even sober drinking and sipping, as the sots call it, I advise you to be of no club whatsoever.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“One would think, that a deliberate and practical denial of its authority was the only offence never contemplated by government; else, why has it not assigned its definite, its suitable and proportionate, penalty?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)