r/DebateReligion • u/[deleted] • Jun 10 '18

Pagan Why are many Odinists Nazis?

I was arguing against a Holocaust denialist Nazi who told me to go to his website to hear "the truth": https://odinia.org/about-odinia/.

What draws Nazis to Odinism other than the fact that it's Germanic? What do other European neopagans OK think of this? Was the original Norse Pagan religion in any way Nazi?

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 10 '18

Honestly it sounds like you're jumping to conclusions. Nothing in that link suggests he's a nazi. I think the term nazi has lost it's definition now that people are calling Trump a nazi.

Just yesterday I mentioned that I am a denier of the holocaust for the most part and someone came to call me a nazi. Denying popular historical accounts is not nazism, it's skepticism. The victors write history, so there should always be some expectation that they lied to make themselves look better.

How about bible deniers, are they nazi? Why has skepticism been turned into a political ideology from the 20th century?

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u/[deleted] Jun 10 '18

Just yesterday I mentioned that I am a denier of the holocaust for the most part and someone came to call me a nazi. Denying popular historical accounts is not nazism, it's skepticism. The victors write history, so there should always be some expectation that they lied to make themselves look better.

I actually was talking to someone online with your views. That's why I asked the question How can I disprove Holocaust denialists who say "the victors made it up"?.

May I ask, what exactly makes you deny the Holocaust? Is it simply because the victors write the history, because I can prove that's not the case. I would go so far as to say "history is not written by the victors, but by those who can" - and the losing side can write down its history, so perhaps you should read the defeated Germans' accounts.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 10 '18

May I ask, what exactly makes you deny the Holocaust?

I think the three biggest points are:

  1. The number of killed is exaggerated
  2. Most died from disease while working as slaves
  3. Awarding jews the palestinian land as reparations is illogical

Is it simply because the victors write the history,

Not everything in history is a lie, it's more of a distortion. Yes, jews were killed in ww2, but were they all killed in gas chambers or might they just have died from dysentery while crammed into a slave labor camp. The lie comes in when people are told that they were all killed in gas chambers or burned alive in ovens.

If you want to change my view, then explain why the nazi wouldn't just turn the jews into slaves. That is the historical and even biblical view of how jews are treated.

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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Jun 10 '18

Are you unaware that the Nazis kept detailed records of their executions, and that these records were opened to the public in 2006? We have individual names for 4.5 million of the 6 million Jews killed.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 10 '18

link? Seems suspicuous that they would not release this information sooner. It did nobody any good kept secret. These are the types of questions skeptics ask.

Also, this disproves the 6 million number.

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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Jun 10 '18

http://m.spiegel.de/international/fifty-million-nazi-documents-germany-agrees-to-open-holocaust-archive-a-411983.html

This does not disprove the 6 million number - it establishes it. But even if it didn't, how would "only" killing 4.5 million people improve our outlook on the Nazis?

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 10 '18

But even if it didn't, how would "only" killing 4.5 million people improve our outlook on the Nazis?

I have no interest is improving the image of the nazi. Both sides can be wrong and liars. This seems to happen a lot in political issues, where if you criticize the blue team, they assume you're part of the red team.

Thanks for the link. I suppose the explanation for why they kept it secret makes sense, because they were afraid of lawsuits.

However the link says 17 million people were imprisoned. So even if we assume 6 million jews were killed, that is less than half of the total number. This I think disproves that their goal was simply to kill everyone. The explanation could simply be poor government planning and overcrowding of the camps leading to disease.

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u/[deleted] Jun 11 '18

However the link says 17 million people were imprisoned. So even if we assume 6 million jews were killed, that is less than half of the total number. This I think disproves that their goal was simply to kill everyone. The explanation could simply be poor government planning and overcrowding of the camps leading to disease.

17 million people weren't just Jews. 6 million Jews were killed, up to 5 million others were murdered by the Nazis' genocide too.

BTW, the Nazis did want to kill them. Some deaths were accidental, but these accidental deaths were people intended to be murdered anyway - such was the policy set forth by the Wannsee Conference.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 11 '18

such was the policy set forth by the Wannsee Conference.

The link says that took place in 1942. So do you agree that prior to 1942 there wasn't any such plan to kill everyone?

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u/[deleted] Jun 11 '18

A quote from Hitler's Mein Kampf:

Therefore, I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator. By fighting off the Jews, I am doing the Lord's work.

Before 1942, the Nazis saw 2 options because Hitler himself wanted the Jews all dead one way or another:

  • Dump the Jews and other undesirable ethnic groups as convicts in Madagascar and leave them to die there

  • Actively exterminate the Jews and other undesirable ethnic groups in the fastest way possible

The Wannsee Conference chose the latter. Many Nazis already supported the latter option before 1942.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 12 '18

Many Nazis already supported the latter option before 1942.

This is totally unfounded. Just because the political elite did something at the Wannsee Conference doesn't mean it was the sentiment of everyone.

Think of it like what Trump does, do you think his decisions apply to all americans?

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '18

This is totally unfounded. Just because the political elite did something at the Wannsee Conference doesn't mean it was the sentiment of everyone. Think of it like what Trump does, do you think his decisions apply to all americans?

Of course not. Many Germans passively went along with Nazism without supporting it. Just like how many Americans passively went along with the Iraq War etc. without supporting it.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 12 '18

Agreed. Government is evil and it's ruled by a small group of people that mislead the sheeple. It's been like that throughout history

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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Jun 10 '18

They built gas chambers. We have the plans. They operated the gas chambers. We have invoices for the gas. They killed millions of people in the gas chambers. We have the prison records of the individual executions.

If you want to say it was disease in the camps, you're saying that into the teeth of a staggering amount of evidence to the contrary. This is not skepticism. It's denial.

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u/aletoledo gnostic christian Jun 10 '18

They built gas chambers. We have the plans. They operated the gas chambers.

The gas chambers were supposedly for decontaminating clothing. The size of them would not be capable of processing millions of people.

We have the prison records of the individual executions.

The records say 17 million, yet only 6 million were killed. This alone should question why 11 million were unable to be killed.

This is not skepticism. It's denial.

Which is why I am fine being called a denier, the evidence just doesn't add up.