Has anyone else read Mein Kampf?

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

No, not that. I said, like Rosenberg, that the danger of labelling someone, anyone, evil is that you create enmity towards those people. Look at the Holocaust: Jews are evil, they are treacherous, they are dangerous. And cue what happened.

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There is a difference between ascribing an adjective to accurately describe an individual based on their actual actions and persecuting an entire ethnic-religious group based on stereotypes.

Calling Hitler evil in no way assigns said characteristics to all Germans, hence my previous comment who exactly is going to take offense to labeling Adolf Hitler evil? Neo-Nazis?

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Labelling anyone person evil is not going to do anything at all, in fact you are copying those you despise.

And let me guess, if we do not label this person evil, people will not find what he did despicable? Be honest with yourself. Is it absolutely necessary to brand him 'evil' to discern that what he did was wrong?

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Since we all agree that what he did was despicable I see no reason why we can't call it or him evil. It seems to me this is merely a quibbling over the choice of adjective. We don't need to label him evil to discern what he did was wrong, but once we realize what he did was wrong why is it so problematic to label him evil? It is merely an adjective like any other, which serves a purpose. Otherwise, we would have no need for adjectives in our languages. And yes, I do think in certain cases labeling someone brunette, blonde, fat, tall, short, petite, good-hearted, despicable, evil can be useful.

Drkshadow has stated what I would have stated in a clearer more rational way. Saved me the trouble.

Asking why we would bother to call someone a brunette is just a strange question to me. From evil I went to brunette and I could go from there to a thousand other adjectives which if removed from the language would erase or substantially cripple much of the poetry and novels and in general all the literature we read and love and write.

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Originally Posted by Drkshadow03

There is a difference between ascribing an adjective to accurately describe an individual based on their actual actions and persecuting an entire ethnic-religious group based on stereotypes.

Calling Hitler evil in no way assigns said characteristics to all Germans, hence my previous comment who exactly is going to take offense to labeling Adolf Hitler evil? Neo-Nazis?

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You have not understood his thesis, have you. Labelling him evil creates enmity towards him. And now you may say that is just, but as PaulClem said, you make him this cartoon figure who is not more than 'bad' or 'evil' and he becomes the very personification of it, which takes away the responsibility of all of us or all of those who out of 'free will' at that time kind of chose to do this. I put free will between speech marks because it was not really free, but all those who harrassed Jews in the 1920s and early 1930s and hence made it more acceptable, could have been anti-semitic in their own homes and did not necessarily have to bring it out into the street as well.

I say it again, in that, you become like those who you despise. It makes no difference whether this is one man or a group of people.

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Originally Posted by Drkshadow03

Since we all agree that what he did was despicable I see no reason why we can't call it or him evil. It seems to me this is merely a quibbling over the choice of adjective. We don't need to label him evil to discern what he did was wrong, but once we realize what he did was wrong why is it so problematic to label him evil? It is merely an adjective like any other, which serves a purpose. Otherwise, we would have no need for adjectives in our languages. And yes, I do think in certain cases labeling someone brunette, blonde, fat, tall, short, petite, good-hearted, despicable, evil can be useful.

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'Evil' as in 'that which is the opposite of good' is too absolute to call a man. Yes, even one like Hitler.

As I consider Himmler, upon reading some of his biography, even more dangerous than Hitler, certainly more deranged, I could not call those two the same adjective. I cannot call Hitler the same adjective as your average murderer who should also be labelled 'evil'.

It is too simplistic. If you cannot see that, then there is something wrong with you.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

Drkshadow has stated what I would have stated in a clearer more rational way. Saved me the trouble.

Asking why we would bother to call someone a brunette is just a strange question to me. From evil I went to brunette and I could go from there to a thousand other adjectives which if removed from the language would erase or substantially cripple much of the poetry and novels and in general all the literature we read and love and write.

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Look, if you use an analogy, I will build on it.

I asked you a question, but you did not answer it (again):

'Why should I call her a brunette?'

I will explain this question to you:

Why is it important for me to call her a brunette? Why can I not call her something else? Will it fulfil me more to call her brunette?

I.e. Why is it important for me to call Hitler evil? Why can I not call him something else? Will it fulfil me more to call Hitler evil?

Surely, you can answer that. I do not care about the brunette and we are not talking about scrapping adjectives in poetry or novels or altogether here, we are talking about my opinion and yours. Do not involve other things in the debate.

When people build the case for Hitler's evil, a great deal of stress is placed upon his persecution and genocide of the Jews. The systematic destruction of 6 million people is pretty horrific, but not enough is made about the other 6 million Pols, homosexuals, communists, political dissidents, and handicapped that were murdered in the concentration camps with them. It's kind of weird how we divvy up, parse, and categorize his crimes into differing sections. Meanwhile, for sheer enormity of scale, the murder of 26 million Russians in the Eastern Front seems to trump everything, and from what I've read about what happened there it could be just as grim.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

You have not understood his thesis, have you. Labelling him evil creates enmity towards him. And now you may say that is just, but as PaulClem said, you make him this cartoon figure who is not more than 'bad' or 'evil' and he becomes the very personification of it, which takes away the responsibility of all of us or all of those who out of 'free will' at that time kind of chose to do this. I put free will between speech marks because it was not really free, but all those who harrassed Jews in the 1920s and early 1930s and hence made it more acceptable, could have been anti-semitic in their own homes and did not necessarily have to bring it out into the street as well.

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I read what PaulClem wrote, but the problem is no one is using that definition of evil, except for you and apparently him. The irony here is I began to write the same point a little while ago in an earlier post, but as an attack against your position; however, I decided to remove it before my final post. This suggests to me Paul hasn't read all the positions of those involved in this conversation very carefully.

Darcy offered a definition of evil as "conscious and deliberate wrongdoing, discrimination designed to harm others, humiliation of people designed to diminish their psychological well-being and dignity, destructiveness, motives of causing "unnecessary" pain or suffering and acts of unnecessary or indiscriminate violence." None of these paint a cartoon villain, but instead portrays the actions of the person as utterly human.

I would be more than happy to use a simpler dictionary definition:

1. Morally wrong or bad.

2. harmful; injurious.

4. Due to actual or imputed bad conduct or character.

None of these necessarily paint some cartoon villain. All of them I think can define Hitler and his actions.

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I say it again, in that, you become like those who you despise. It makes no difference whether this is one man or a group of people.

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Repeating it excessively doesn't make it correct. It's just a sign of obstinacy and a desire to be tiresome.

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'Evil' as in 'that which is the opposite of good' is too absolute to call a man. Yes, even one like Hitler.

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You're the only one using that definition.

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Originally Posted by mortalterror

When people build the case for Hitler's evil, a great deal of stress is placed upon his persecution and genocide of the Jews. The systematic destruction of 6 million people is pretty horrific, but not enough is made about the other 6 million Pols, homosexuals, communists, political dissidents, and handicapped that were murdered in the concentration camps with them. It's kind of weird how we divvy up, parse, and categorize his crimes into differing sections. Meanwhile, for sheer enormity of scale, the murder of 26 million Russians in the Eastern Front seems to trump everything, and from what I've read about what happened there it could be just as grim.

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I agree with everything you said.

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Originally Posted by Drkshadow03

Darcy offered a definition of evil as "conscious and deliberate wrongdoing, discrimination designed to harm others, humiliation of people designed to diminish their psychological well-being and dignity, destructiveness, motives of causing "unnecessary" pain or suffering and acts of unnecessary or indiscriminate violence." None of these paint a cartoon villain, but instead portrays the actions of the person as utterly human.

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That is the definition of the noun. I can agree with that, but I do not call a man the adjective. Again, I find it simplistic.

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Originally Posted by Drkshadow03

None of these necessarily paint some cartoon villain. All of them I think can define Hitler and his actions.

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As Rosenberg also said, the labelling of people mainly depends on the labellers' thoughts of what people are.

I personally consider people as people, also people who are deranged and people like him. Man is never 100% one or the other, hence he cannot be labelled 'good' or 'evil' because he is not wholly that.

As PaulClem said, he was loved by others (obviously) and he was not an obnoxious man, judging from videos, whatever he did when he put his signature under that extermination plan. You cannot hold him personally accountable for all that the army did as there were other people involved in this, not least Himmler. They were inspired by Hitler, but they were also acting independently. So who is responsible?

Indeed, his actions could be called 'evil', but the man himself gave many people in Germany bread on their table and recreational activity (Kraft durch Freude). Cruises even. You may call that propaganda and disgusting, but the people themselves did not see it that way. Where they had been living in a violent society where socialists and extreme right groups literally lynched each other on the streets (hence The Night of the Long Knives, but that was the very worst and most notorious of it), they now got peace and tranquility. They did not realise what they voted for in 1933, only that this man could keep order and was going to bring change (as they all promise these days).

The Enabling Act was as much his party's doing as his own and the Christian Democrats' as the parliament achieved a 2/3 majority. They were maybe intimidated and socialists were on the run, but all those in the coalition who made up the 2/3 majority willfully signed away democracy. How someone who has been in the parliament for a considerable amount of time can vote for something like that is beyond me.

Calling Hitler evil would make him 'morally wrong or bad'; 'harmful and injurious'; 'of bad character'. I am sure all those in his direct environment did not think so.

I would maybe call him a bad man, but not evil.

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Originally Posted by Drkshadow03

You're the only one using that definition.

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Not the only one using that definition. Maybe here in this thread. Do not confuse it with the rest of the world.

originally posted by kiki
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I would maybe call him a bad man, but not evil.
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Well that's encouraging.

If I want to read a lunatic's work, I'll read Sade.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Look, if you use an analogy, I will build on it.

I asked you a question, but you did not answer it (again):

'Why should I call her a brunette?'

I will explain this question to you:

Why is it important for me to call her a brunette? Why can I not call her something else? Will it fulfil me more to call her brunette?

I.e. Why is it important for me to call Hitler evil? Why can I not call him something else? Will it fulfil me more to call Hitler evil?

Surely, you can answer that. I do not care about the brunette and we are not talking about scrapping adjectives in poetry or novels or altogether here, we are talking about my opinion and yours. Do not involve other things in the debate.

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What on God's earth does "fulfillment" have to do with correct description? Nothing, that's what. You apply an adjective to something in order to represent its qualities with words, not in order to "fulfill" yourself. Koo-koo.

Why can you not call him something else? You do, as do I. I call him a man because he was a man, I call him a passionate speaker because he was just that, and I call him an evil person because, and this is so painfully obvious my typewriter might explode now as I press its keys - HE WAS AN EVIL PERSON!

And you would scrap all adjectives. In scrapping evil and in scrapping brunette you open up the scrapping of all them all.

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Originally Posted by KCurtis

[COLOR="Navy"]originally posted by kiki

Well that's encouraging.

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No kidding. "Maybe a bad man?" :banghead:

My question was why it is necessary to call him evil. Obviously you despise me because I do not call people evil and most notably, do not wish to call Hitler evil. I ask you why and what your motivation is for calling a man evil.

I showed you that perceptions of evil can vary, so I showed you a person cannot be 'evil' for everyone and at any time. Yet you refuse to accept it.

Fulfilment comes in when it comes to the merits of knowledge and here of labelling. The question is that it is better to call someone evil and what I (or you) would get out of that as opposed to not calling him evil.

As there is no difference to us personally in all likelihood, your argument amounts to nothing but preference and is then essentially equal to mine.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

My question was why it is necessary to call him evil. Obviously you despise me because I do not call people evil and most notably, do not wish to call Hitler evil. I ask you why and what your motivation is for calling a man evil.

I showed you that perceptions of evil can vary, so I showed you a person cannot be 'evil' for everyone and at any time. Yet you refuse to accept it.

Fulfilment comes in when it comes to the merits of knowledge and here of labelling. The question is that it is better to call someone evil and what I (or you) would get out of that as opposed to not calling him evil.

As there is no difference to us personally in all likelihood, your argument amounts to nothing but preference and is then essentially equal to mine.

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After seeing you say you'd "maybe call Hitler a bad man" its really really hard to take what you say seriously. But you say someone is "evil" in order to accurately describe them. I get nothing personally from calling the sun bright, nor winter cold. They are simply descriptive facts. You don't like adjectives because they don't personally fulfill you. That's fine. I happen to find them USEFUL.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Calling Hitler evil would make him 'morally wrong or bad'; 'harmful and injurious'; 'of bad character'. I am sure all those in his direct environment did not think so.

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If you do not think Hitler was all of those things in spades then I don't know what to say to you. Worse than my head-splitting hangover is reading such lame, absurd, almost depressing opinions. And you are obviously hinting that he wasn't, since you would only "maybe" call him a "bad" man.

And in that larger post you said Hitler cannot be held "personally accountable for all that his army did." You ask the question "who was responsible?" That's what I'm talking about. You confirm my suspicion that you Kiki do not hold Hitler responsible. A reverse Nuremburg defence. I suppose you would argue that those beneath Hitler weren't responsible because they were only following orders.

Here it is in all its shining glory:

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As PaulClem said, he was loved by others (obviously) and he was not an obnoxious man, judging from videos, whatever he did when he put his signature under that extermination plan. You cannot hold him personally accountable for all that the army did as there were other people involved in this, not least Himmler. They were inspired by Hitler, but they were also acting independently. So who is responsible?

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

'Evil' as in 'that which is the opposite of good' is too absolute to call a man . . . It is too simplistic.

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No it's not.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

I.e. Why is it important for me to call Hitler evil? Why can I not call him something else? Will it fulfil me more to call Hitler evil?

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So, why is it so important to you that we don't call Hitler evil? How does that fulfill you?

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Not the only one using that definition. Maybe here in this thread. Do not confuse it with the rest of the world.

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Possibly the most inane statement in this thread so far. As if anyone suggested, or even thought, otherwise.

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Originally Posted by Mutatis-Mutandi

Possibly the most inane statement in this thread so far. As if anyone suggested, or even thought, otherwise.

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To be fair, I recall saying it earlier somewhere. I believe her definition of evil is a very strange uncommon one. She may not be the only person to hold it, but its rare and its rare because it makes no sense.

It's kind of funny when you think about it. This whole time you've been using different definitions for what evil means, so of course you're going to disagree. :lol:

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No, not that. I said, like Rosenberg, that the danger of labelling someone, anyone, evil is that you create enmity towards those people. Look at the Holocaust: Jews are evil, they are treacherous, they are dangerous. And cue what happened.

Labelling anyone person evil is not going to do anything at all, in fact you are copying those you despise. - Kiki

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For some reason this reminds me of the story of the man who killed his mother and father with an axe, and then pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan. :lol:

I have read parts of Das Kapital, and that is as boring.http://www.infoocean.info/avatar2.jpg

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

After seeing you say you'd "maybe call Hitler a bad man" its really really hard to take what you say seriously. But you say someone is "evil" in order to accurately describe them. I get nothing personally from calling the sun bright, nor winter cold. They are simply descriptive facts. You don't like adjectives because they don't personally fulfill you. That's fine. I happen to find them USEFUL.

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Oh, and that accurately describes the Wirtschaftswunder and Kraft durch Freude, does it? That describes the fact that he was the brains behind the Volkswagen (literally 'the people's car') concept, a car which is still doing good business these days. That accurately describes that he stopped hyper inflation in the mid twenties. It also accurately describes that he 'unlocked' Germany by all the motorways he built, does it?

I said we were not talking about adjectives in general here, keep with the discussion you started.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

If you do not think Hitler was all of those things in spades then I don't know what to say to you. Worse than my head-splitting hangover is reading such lame, absurd, almost depressing opinions. And you are obviously hinting that he wasn't, since you would only "maybe" call him a "bad" man.

And in that larger post you said Hitler cannot be held "personally accountable for all that his army did." You ask the question "who was responsible?" That's what I'm talking about. You confirm my suspicion that you Kiki do not hold Hitler responsible. A reverse Nuremburg defence. I suppose you would argue that those beneath Hitler weren't responsible because they were only following orders.

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I despair at your reading skills sometimes...

It has nothing to do with 'not being responsible' ultimately. It has to do with that he did not, cannot, have personally planned it all. For the simple reason that there is not enough time in the day to plan such futile details (as they must have been for them).

Look at that last disaster in Afghanistan where that soldier shot 16 innocent civilians because he went potty (rightly so, the military should not have sent him there so many times and in such a short space of time). Can you hold Mr Obama personally accountable for that? I hope you are going to say 'no', but I fear the simplistic answer will be 'yes', though.

Granted they can court martial if they find it necessary, however, was he, if he had disapproved of the Einsatzgruppen going to put them all in prison? Really?

I repeat it again, for the umpteenth time, he is responsible like a minister is responsible for what happens in his ministery or like a president is responsible for what his civilians in their official functions do in cases of violence. he is not personally accountable.

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Originally Posted by Mutatis-Mutandi

So, why is it so important to you that we don't call Hitler evil? How does that fulfill you?

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That does not fulfil me, no. That was not my purpose when I came to this discussion. I was attacked (as that often happens when you talk about people like this) and I retalliated.

The only thing I have been trying to do is show that calling people names (whoever they are) is useless. It does not resolve anything as JuniperWoolf said.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

To be fair, I recall saying it earlier somewhere. I believe her definition of evil is a very strange uncommon one. She may not be the only person to hold it, but its rare and its rare because it makes no sense.

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Uncommon? Approximately 2.2 billion people should hold this definition and I should hope that there are many more (depending on what they believe in).

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Originally Posted by Mutatis-Mutandi

It's kind of funny when you think about it. This whole time you've been using different definitions for what evil means, so of course you're going to disagree. :lol:

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:lol:

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Originally Posted by mona amon

For some reason this reminds me of the story of the man who killed his mother and father with an axe, and then pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan.

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Tell me where you read that. I said no such thing.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

I despair at your reading skills sometimes...

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Hey! Look at that! You accused Darcy of having bad reading skills again! :smilielol5: It never gets old.

Look, he continuously misreads what I say. If you choose to do so too, by all means do so, but it does not make it more right.

How the army executes orders can significantly differ from the order in itself. Only look at the differences in what Hitler's own orders were for the Einsatzgruppen in the Soviet Union and what the final direct orders were. Over-zealous anti-semitism that is. The fact that he did not punish them for it or in the wake of the atrocities in Poland made them only answerable to an independant Himmler (so not answerable to himself even!), makes him responsible, but not personally accountable.

Think about it. It doesn't exhonerate, but it emphasises the personal responsibility of the commanders on the ground who actually did it. They were not (all) 'following orders', but basically satisfied their own despicable feelings of hatred and encouraged them in the civilian population.

Making Hitler personally accountable for everything that happened is not only a simplistic intentionalist view (criticised many times over by now) and perfectly impossible to maintain, it is exhonerating everyone else who contributed and thought out the plans in the first place. Essentially, such a defence was also tried at Nuremberg, but had no effect.

I still don't see why someone can't agree with all that and still see the man as an evil person.

Because the Third Reich was not only the killing and he as a man was not only the orderer/authoriser of it, but also the man of Volkswagen and the man of Nazi holiday camps. We may call it creepy, but the people back then did not think so, they thought it was wonderful.

It is not because his acts were evil that the man himself is evil.

To take a very very stark analogy: if the muslims believe everything comes from their God (whom I am not allowed to name, I think), is He 'evil'? He definitely sends evil unto the human race in the shape of disease and natural disasters (or so they believe). Is He, then, evil? No, surely.

And in case Darcy comes back, no I am not, I repeat, not comparing Hitler with God.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Oh, and that accurately describes the Wirtschaftswunder and Kraft durch Freude, does it? That describes the fact that he was the brains behind the Volkswagen (literally 'the people's car') concept, a car which is still doing good business these days. That accurately describes that he stopped hyper inflation in the mid twenties. It also accurately describes that he 'unlocked' Germany by all the motorways he built, does it?

I said we were not talking about adjectives in general here, keep with the discussion you started.

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We are talking about adjective in general. Evil is no different than any adjective. Someone who is grumpy 80 percent of the time is a grumpy person despite 20 percent of the time being affable and of good cheer. A brunette is not defined, not in her entirety represented, by the fact that she is a brunette - but she is a brunette. Brunette does not convey that she is a mother or a collector of stamps, but it does represent a certain aspect of her physical being accurately and well. Hitler was not 100 percent evil. But he did enough evil that in the final summation we can say with confidence - Hitler was evil.

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I despair at your reading skills sometimes...

It has nothing to do with 'not being responsible' ultimately. It has to do with that he did not, cannot, have personally planned it all. For the simple reason that there is not enough time in the day to plan such futile details (as they must have been for them).

Look at that last disaster in Afghanistan where that soldier shot 16 innocent civilians because he went potty (rightly so, the military should not have sent him there so many times and in such a short space of time). Can you hold Mr Obama personally accountable for that? I hope you are going to say 'no', but I fear the simplistic answer will be 'yes', though.

Granted they can court martial if they find it necessary, however, was he, if he had disapproved of the Einsatzgruppen going to put them all in prison? Really?

I repeat it again, for the umpteenth time, he is responsible like a minister is responsible for what happens in his ministery or like a president is responsible for what his civilians in their official functions do in cases of violence. he is not personally accountable.

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So you say its not about being "ultimately responsible," but then you say he is not "personally accountable." That Kiki is double-think. You are holding two contrary things as true simultaneously inside your mind. Its quite fascinating really.

But I am afraid that comparing the 16 year old soldier in Afghanistan to the young German guard at Auschwitz who does the actual dirty business of killing Jews is quite possibly, and I mean this genuinely, not as an insult - is quite possibly the stupidest, most agonizingly and fantastically asinine analogy that I myself have in all my 23 years on this planet ever heard. It just really might be.

The Holocaust was a government POLICY. It was ORDERED. It was ORCHESTRATED FROM THE TOP. It was not a host of scattered acts of independently arisen atrocities. It was a government policy. Hitler and the rest of the Nazis were not personally accountable for the holocaust in the same way Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper is not personally accountable for the billions of dollars that since the recession have gone into building roads and other public works projects. Is he totally responsible? No, not at all. But is he responsible and does his responsibility make him evil - YES, YES, YES, YES A MILLION YESES HE WAS, IS.

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The only thing I have been trying to do is show that calling people names (whoever they are) is useless. It does not resolve anything as JuniperWoolf said.

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Aww, I call poor little Adolf names. I'm sorry Kiki. I know I'm such a big mean bully. Kiki never again call anyone smart nor stupid, nor fat, nor skinny, nor anything, because you are making the same error calling anyone any adjective in any circumstance that I am apparently making calling Hitler evil here.


Really though, the way you write about Hitler, even though I know you think the holocaust was horrible and wrong, just the way you alleviate his awfulness and evil and attribute everything to other causes makes me think that as a German in 1945 you might have voted for him had his name been miraculously on the ballot in an election.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

We are talking about adjective in general. Evil is no different than any adjective. Someone who is grumpy 80 percent of the time is a grumpy person despite 20 percent of the time being affable and of good cheer. A brunette is not defined, not in her entirety represented, by the fact that she is a brunette - but she is a brunette. Brunette does not convey that she is a mother or a collector of stamps, but it does represent a certain aspect of her physical being accurately and well. Hitler was not 100 percent evil. But he did enough evil that in the final summation we can say with confidence - Hitler was evil.

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We were not talking of trivial adjectives, the discussion was about the word 'evil'. As such, I regard it as an adjective that is quite distinct from the rest like 'brunette'. If the analogy doesn't work, there is something wrong with it.

Again, is the God Muslims believe in evil because he sends them evil (or so they believe)? The answer is clearly no. Yet you would call Him evil. That does not work, that is all there is to it.

Is the Christian God evil because ultimately Satan is a fallen angel, hence made by Him? No, surely.

Well then. No man is evil, but he has the potential to do evil things. That is a marked difference.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

So you say its not about being "ultimately responsible," but then you say he is not "personally accountable." That Kiki is double-think. You are holding two contrary things as true simultaneously inside your mind. Its quite fascinating really.

But I am afraid that comparing the 16 year old soldier in Afghanistan to the young German guard at Auschwitz who does the actual dirty business of killing Jews is quite possibly, and I mean this genuinely, not as an insult - is quite possibly the stupidest, most agonizingly and fantastically asinine analogy that I myself have in all my 23 years on this planet ever heard. It just really might be.

The Holocaust was a government POLICY. It was ORDERED. It was ORCHESTRATED FROM THE TOP. It was not a host of scattered acts of independently arisen atrocities. It was a government policy. Hitler and the rest of the Nazis were not personally accountable for the holocaust in the same way Prime Minister of Canada Stephen Harper is not personally accountable for the billions of dollars that since the recession have gone into building roads and other public works projects. Is he totally responsible? No, not at all. But is he responsible and does his responsibility make him evil - YES, YES, YES, YES A MILLION YESES HE WAS, IS.

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It is not the same. One can be ultimately responsible, but not personally the perpetrator.

The soldier in question is 38. Do you watch the news at all, actually? Again: is Obama personally accountable for those 16 poor Afghan people? No, surely. The soldier is, and his commander should also learn from this as he should be aware of how his soldiers are feeling (he shouldn't be punished, though, because he has not 'done' anything).

The Nazi ideology came from the top, the actual killing orders came from further down the ladder. You can rave and rant all you like, documents show that the orders given by Hitler for the Soviet Union Einsatzgruppen were very distinct from the direct orders that were given to them and which explicitly authorised killing Jewish men, women and children (probably I would say because of the combination of Jewish Bolshevism and the words 'potential enimy'). At that point they were not even answerable to Hitler anymore, so he was frankly not interested. Holding him personally accountable for all of it is clearly simplistic and that intentionalist view has been criticised.

Functionalists (I turn out to be one) have argued that there was in fact no plan directly. The Armenian quote was dismissed from the Nurmberg trials as disputed. Heydrich changed the explicit task of these troops from 'liquidating any party that was deemed hostile to Germany' (ad thus putting up and securing an occupational administration) into 'killing anyone who those commanders deemed hostile.' You can see where the problem lies. Where in Holland and Belgium Einsatzgruppen also operated but did not commit any crimes directly like in Poland for example, in the east they committed gruesome things. If you let a bunch of fired up SS indoctrinated ideologists whom you have blown up with 'Poles are inferior' loose on the population with carte blanche then what do you expect?
Einsatzgruppe D committed far worse crimes than any other in the Baltics. Just because they were free to do as they pleased.
The Wehrmacht was outraged because they saw it, not as wrong, but as bad for discipline (which it is - how to stop it if you wish?).

After the military had tried to court martial these people, Hitler diverted any answerability from the Wehrmacht to Himmler to have done with it. And then of course, you can guess it, the real problems started. They were just wild animals let loose.

The question can be asked who actually gave the order to do those things? Good question.

You can argue that Hitler voluntarily let it happen by not punishing these people (and so indirectly approved it), but you cannot argue that he explicitly ordered it.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

Aww, I call poor little Adolf names. I'm sorry Kiki. I know I'm such a big mean bully. Kiki never again call anyone smart nor stupid, nor fat, nor skinny, nor anything, because you are making the same error calling anyone any adjective in any circumstance that I am apparently making calling Hitler evil here.

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No, not a bully. A simplistic mind who thinks someone like Hitler had more minutes and seconds in the day than any other person and could plan these details.

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Originally Posted by Darcy88

Really though, the way you write about Hitler, even though I know you think the holocaust was horrible and wrong, just the way you alleviate his awfulness and evil and attribute everything to other causes makes me think that as a German in 1945 you might have voted for him had his name been miraculously on the ballot in an election.

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If you read that in what I have written...

ok... I see this thread has wandered a bit off the topic of Mein Kampf..

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Has anyone else read Mein Kampf?
I am re-reading it right now and I am having difficulty trying to find people to discuss it with without the fear of them being like "OMG! NAZI!"

Uhm, no. Not going to turn me into a Nazi. I just want to discuss it.

Obviously it's a political text. It has a lot of hate-speech in it. Interesting autobiographical narratives that are probably more than a bit slanted. Nontheless, I find it interesting.

Yes I know this book has been a favorite of a few school-shooters. Yes I know the author has killed a lot of people.

Why is it then, such a crime to find it interesting?

Anyway, what do you think of this book?

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If you again want to try to discuss good versus evil or Mein Kampf, or perhaps The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds ??? please start another thread sans negative personal comments directed towards oneanother :)

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