Was the Holocaust the first genocide?

Answer 1

To organize the debate those opinions that hold that the Holocaust was a genocide will be shown first and those that hold that it was not will be shown second. This order has no bearing on the correctness of any of the views.

PART 1: YES - It was a genocide or genocides

Answer 1

Of course the Holocaust is considered genocide! From 1941 onwards the Nazis tried to kill every Jew that they could find. The fact that others, in addition to the main taget were included, doesn't alter the fact. What more, the word genocide was specifically created in 1944 to describe what the Nazis were doing to the Jews.

Answer 2

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PART 2: NO - It was not a genocide or genocides

Answer 1

No because Hitler wanted to eliminate the Jews, Gypsies, and people suffering from mental or physical disorders or handicaps, and the definition of Genocide is the mass killing of a certain race or ethnicity.

Answer 2

Of course the Holocaust is not considered genocide! Though the Jews that the Nazis could find were made up of a dozen different kinds of Jews, there was no possibility or intention to eliminate the entire group as there were parts of those groups in countries that the Nazis could not extradite them from. Though the word genocide was created to describe what the Nazis did, language and that word has evolved since then.

This issue and many others in relation to the Holocaust are a matter of personal opinion, though one school may be adamant that one interpretation is accurate, another school may be equally convinced of the opposite.

[Further discussion of this view is in the Discussion Section.]

Answer 2

No, the greatest genocide took place in America, where an estimated 97% of the Native Americans of the North and South America were killed by European settlers, and their diseases. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- There is absolutely no doubt. The greatest genocidal holocaust in human history is in fact the quasi-total extermination of the Native Indians in the New World. Starting in 1492, Cristobal Colon (Christopher Columbus) and the Spaniards & Conquistadors, exterminated at 100%, all the Indians from the hundred of Caribbean Islands leaving no survivors behind. Then the holocaust reached South, Central & North America. They were burned alive, had their hands, feet, noses, ears, cut off. They were devored by large flesh eating war dogs called Perros de presa de Canario & Perros de presa Alano. European diseases also took their toil on a great many. The bore and inhuman Spaniards in the New World, took an immense pleasure in killing them for their entertainment. Many games were invented in the numerous ways of killing them for fun. The Catholic Spaniards looked down on them as if they were no more than mere animals of burden, or they were said to be the decendants of Cain, the biblical killer of his brother Abel, and their killing was therefore holy justified. The were enslaved and worked to death in silver & gold mines. An estimated 100 millions are said historically, to be have decimated, leaving today only 3% of this noble race. Some day, a producer/director will have enough gumption and temerity to put to film, the true horrific story of this unparalleled genocidal holocaust orchestrated by men who called themselves "Catholic and Christians." References: BOOKS - THE AMERICAN HOLOCAUST by Historian/Author: David Stannard / Oxford University - THE DOGS OF THE CONQUEST by Historian/Author: John Grier Varner / Oklahoma University You can either borrow these 2 books from your Local Universities or your Local Municipal Libraries. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Answer 3

No. The genocide of the indigenous peoples of North/South America during their settlement by Europeans was larger. However, it took place over a much longer period of time and comparisons are difficult.

In addition as concerns the genocide in North / South America, there is some controversy as to whether the massive decrease in population (the genocide was responsible for a 90% aboriginal population decrease) was intentional or not. Since genocide requires intentionality to be a genocide (i.e. the population did not just die in large numbers, but someone WANTED the population to die in massive numbers and PROVIDED conditions that would facilitate that).

Aside from the North / South America Genocide, there are many other genocides which were much more complete. That is to say that the Holocaust removed 1/3 or so of its intended targets, but other genocides have removed over 50% of their intended targets even though the actual numbers of dead are nowhere close to 6 million.

Answer 4

All genocide is horrific but the sheer scale and size of the holocaust as well as the industrial efficiency of killings of the Nazis makes it stand out. The Germans were very organised and had archives and infrastructure for the action, which has simplified proving the crime, although they tried to keep it secret for the general population and others outside the SS leadership. In the reports natural death causes were stated, or S.B. for "Sonderbehandlung".

There have been other large scale genocides, but less documented.

Also mass killings of people of the same ethnic group, which isn't a direct genocide, have occurred. Estimates suggest that Stalin was responsible for more killings than Hitler.

The genocide in Rwanda resulted in 300000 killed/month which is a much higher killing speed than the Nazis', and a much larger part of the population was involved in killing with their bare hands.

Genocide of Syriacs, Armenians, Greek, Kurds, and others are modern examples.

Historically there have been many genocides, and the stronger parties haven't had much interest to describe the details about their crimes.

The amount of native Americans that died as a result of European colonisation is many times more than the kills in the Holocaust, but there is no record of any "murder factory for Indians".

Answer 5

No, there have been many incidents of genocide, long before (thousands of years) the Holocaust took place.

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it was the first genocide because it was the first time that the word was used in that context. Of course other genocides took place earlier in time, but that is only relevent because we are looking back at all of the events from this point in time.

Answer 6

yess.

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There are many definitions of genocide, in a 2007 definition, it was defined as an effort to kill a certain group of people by eliminating the women and children (first). Though in the Holocaust the men were targeted first, because of various developments, the women and children were soon targeted for summary execution.

Answer 7

Yes! In fact, that was the whole point of it! The Nazis were trying desperately to wipe out all those whom the Nazi Party deemed inferior to the "Master Race." Especially the Jews. In fact, the Jews were the main focus of killing by the Nazis in the "Final Solution of the Jewish Problem."

(In fact, the word "genocide" was first coined to give a word to describe the horrible reality of the Holocaust. It came from Raphael Lemkin's 1944 work Axis Rule in Occupied Europe.)

Answer 8

The Holocaust was a number of distinct genocides operating in parallel. The definition of a genocide is the intentional extermination of a certain racial, ethnic, religious, physically different, or sexually identified group based on their status in that group. The Holocaust has that in spades. Jews, Romani, homosexuals, handicapped, etc. individuals were targeted precisely because of their being in one group or another. Further to the point, the word genocide was coined precisely to discuss the particular crimes committed in the Holocaust.

The arguments in the "NO" camp are laughable. (1) Just because the Jews were not the only subjects of genocide does not mean that the genocide did not occur, just that there was more than just one. Contrast the democides in China, where people were randomly targeted by either hunger or for "not following the rules" with the Holocaust where people were specifically targeted on account of the religions or ethnicities. (2) The failure to be complete in genocide does not stop it from being a genocide. There was clear intent to eliminate as many Jews, as many Romani, etc. as possible. The Nazis were also relatively successful in this. 65% of the pre-war Jewish population in Europe and 70% of the pre-war Romani population were annihilated. The fact that some Jews, Romani and others survived the killing does not stop it from being a genocide.

Answer 9

If you lived in Germany it would be considered terrorism but since it is not here in the united states than it would not be terrorism to us.

Answer 10

It is generally called the Holocaust.

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