4 ms·

>They didn't care about the death camps, until after they defeated Germany and then decided to punish them for those. The allies didn't know about the death ca

by learc83 10y ago

>They didn't care about the death camps, until after they defeated Germany and then decided to punish them for those. The allies didn't know about the death camps until 1942. They were already at war with Germany in 1942, and they issued a public condemnation of Hitler's attempt to exterminate the Jewish race at the end of that year. >Hitler was democratically elected. He wasn't elected, he was appointed Chancellor then used violence and intimidation to rise to power. Only about 1/3 of the population supported the Nazis in the elections before 1933. Later after the Reichstag fire, the government enacted emergency measures limiting left wing opposition parties and arrested many communist leaders. You can't call anything that happened after that a free and open election.

avar 10y ago
The death camps also targeted e.g homosexuals, which the allies were fine with. The allies didn't have any moral objection to the death camps, only against them being used for certain classes of people (e.g. jews).
- cafard 10y ago
  What evidence do you have for the "[no] moral objection" statement?
- learc83 10y ago
  The allies weren't "fine with it". Homosexuals made up a small percentage of the total people in death camps, and the vast majority of the allies weren't even aware of them until the liberation. Homosexual survivors were treated horribly because homosexuality was still a crime in Germany and most of the Allied countries after WWII. But the western allies weren't "fine" with systematically exterminating homosexuals or any other group--as evidenced by the fact that they ended the practice.
  - avar 10y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paragraph_175#Historical_overview https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paragraph_175#Historical_overv... The allies discovered a bunch of gays locked up in concentration camps under a 1935 Nazi-enacted law, didn't repel that article similarly to e.g. laws against Jews when WWII ended and supported their re-imprisonment, nor did they make their times in the concentration camps count against their "crimes". Granted saying they were "fine with it" might be a bit of an exaggeration. But I don't think it's unreasonable in the face of historical evidence to think that the concentration camps would have been treated vastly differently by the allies if the only prisoners were homosexuals, given how the allies treated those prisoners upon their release. Which I think goes to show that the allied forces didn't have an intrinsic objection to what went on in the concentration camps, they just minded the target audience the Nazis picked.
    - learc83 10y ago
      Not legalizing homosexuality isn't the same having no intrinsic objection to exterminating homosexuals. >they just minded the target audience the Nazis picked This makes no sense. Most of the allied countries had a long history of antisemitism. If anything, targeting the Jews should have made it less objectionable. No, I think they objected to killing millions of men, women, and children, using a horrific modern factory style process. No normal human (who wasn't slowly conditioned to accept it) who saw the result of those concentration camp could possibly have no intrinsic objection. The visceral reaction to seeing the bodies and the emaciated survivors would be the same whether the victims were Jewish or homosexual.
Grishnakh 10y ago
Hitler was democratically elected in the 1933 election with 43.9% of the vote (higher than the other 5 candidates). It doesn't matter if only 1/3 of the population supports a candidate; if your elections are first-past-the-post, then whoever wins the most votes wins the election. That's how democracy works. The US elections work much the same way now, with George W Bush winning the 2000 election with less than 50% of the vote (and if you believe Gore should have won, he again won less than 50% of the popular vote). The simple fact is that Hitler did win the 1933 elections in a democratic system. And unlike sham elections like Saddam's where he won 99.9% of the vote, this isn't so obviously rigged.
- learc83 10y ago
  This has nothing to do with first-past-the-post voting. The vote that you are talking about happened after the Reichstag fire and Hitler was appointed (not elected) Chancellor. Opposition parties were suppressed, and the Nazi party "monitored" the election. Thousands of opposition party members were arrested before the election. In Prussia, 50,000 Nazis were appointed as auxcillary-police to monitor the elections and to intimidate voters. >this isn't so obviously rigged. If you don't think the March 1933 elections were rigged you haven't read enough about them.

by learc83 10y ago

avar 10y ago

The death camps also targeted e.g homosexuals, which the allies were fine with. The allies didn't have any moral objection to the death camps, only against them being used for certain classes of people (e.g. jews).

cafard 10y ago
What evidence do you have for the "[no] moral objection" statement?
learc83 10y ago
The allies weren't "fine with it". Homosexuals made up a small percentage of the total people in death camps, and the vast majority of the allies weren't even aware of them until the liberation. Homosexual survivors were treated horribly because homosexuality was still a crime in Germany and most of the Allied countries after WWII. But the western allies weren't "fine" with systematically exterminating homosexuals or any other group--as evidenced by the fact that they ended the practice.
- avar 10y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paragraph_175#Historical_overview https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paragraph_175#Historical_overv... The allies discovered a bunch of gays locked up in concentration camps under a 1935 Nazi-enacted law, didn't repel that article similarly to e.g. laws against Jews when WWII ended and supported their re-imprisonment, nor did they make their times in the concentration camps count against their "crimes". Granted saying they were "fine with it" might be a bit of an exaggeration. But I don't think it's unreasonable in the face of historical evidence to think that the concentration camps would have been treated vastly differently by the allies if the only prisoners were homosexuals, given how the allies treated those prisoners upon their release. Which I think goes to show that the allied forces didn't have an intrinsic objection to what went on in the concentration camps, they just minded the target audience the Nazis picked.
  - learc83 10y ago
    Not legalizing homosexuality isn't the same having no intrinsic objection to exterminating homosexuals. >they just minded the target audience the Nazis picked This makes no sense. Most of the allied countries had a long history of antisemitism. If anything, targeting the Jews should have made it less objectionable. No, I think they objected to killing millions of men, women, and children, using a horrific modern factory style process. No normal human (who wasn't slowly conditioned to accept it) who saw the result of those concentration camp could possibly have no intrinsic objection. The visceral reaction to seeing the bodies and the emaciated survivors would be the same whether the victims were Jewish or homosexual.

Grishnakh 10y ago

Hitler was democratically elected in the 1933 election with 43.9% of the vote (higher than the other 5 candidates). It doesn't matter if only 1/3 of the population supports a candidate; if your elections are first-past-the-post, then whoever wins the most votes wins the election. That's how democracy works. The US elections work much the same way now, with George W Bush winning the 2000 election with less than 50% of the vote (and if you believe Gore should have won, he again won less than 50% of the popular vote). The simple fact is that Hitler did win the 1933 elections in a democratic system. And unlike sham elections like Saddam's where he won 99.9% of the vote, this isn't so obviously rigged.

learc83 10y ago
This has nothing to do with first-past-the-post voting. The vote that you are talking about happened after the Reichstag fire and Hitler was appointed (not elected) Chancellor. Opposition parties were suppressed, and the Nazi party "monitored" the election. Thousands of opposition party members were arrested before the election. In Prussia, 50,000 Nazis were appointed as auxcillary-police to monitor the elections and to intimidate voters. >this isn't so obviously rigged. If you don't think the March 1933 elections were rigged you haven't read enough about them.