Are there any similarities between the Holocaust and slavery?

Answer 1

A great deal, actually.. and some differences, of course. The practice of slavery, and the program against the Jews (and others) during WWII, are both predicated upon thinking that some races (or classes, or groups) of people are of lesser value than others. To put a low value on a group of people, either for the purpose of forced labor or extermination, is indeed a Holocaust. History has provided strong lessons, many times over, that both slavery and genocide are not only evil, but doomed to fail, and to bring to pass the end of the persecutors.

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It has become fashionable to say that the two were similiar in some ways, but it is misleading to compare the two. The main purpose of the Holocaust was genocide, that is to try to kill a whole race. The key purpose of slavery was very cheap (and obedient) labour. During the Holocaust the Nazis used able-bodied adults as cheap labour that could be worked to death. A slave in the literal sense is an asset and no rational owner works a slave to death.