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What Americans know about the Holocaust: Fewer than half can correctly answer multiple-choice questions about the number of Jews who were murdered or the way Adolf Hitler came to power
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- Title
- What Americans Know About the Holocaust
- Published
- Jan 22 2020
- Word count
- 2155 words
These numbers mean little without context. What do Americans know about other historical events? What percentage of Europeans could answer the questions correctly? I certainly wouldn't jump to the conclusion that Americans may be falling for Holocaust-denying conspiracy theories without answering some more questions.
That the plurality got every question right was surprising to me.
I agree. And maybe I'm insensitive but knowing the number of millions of jews killed reeks of high school level rote memorization. I've visited the Holocaust museums in DC and Chicago and I don't know what the number is off the top of my head. I don't think that necessarily makes me ignorant on the topic.
The "how many Jews were killed" question sucks, to be honest.
The options should be on different scales, like "6 million", or "60 million", "600 thousand".
It portrays Jews as the only or the most important group targeted back then. Nevermind the millions of Roma, gays (or suspected), disabled etc. Sure, Jews are the first thing that comes to mind, but to ask a question like that proves the ignorance of the person asking.
It's worth watching Lindybeige's video Forgetting the Holocaust on the subject of how the Nazi exterminations are sometimes talked about. It's not what it might sound like from the title, he is no way a Holocaust denier, but I had no idea just how many other groups were involved and often don't get counted.
Yeah, I in no way want to downplay the atrocities done to Jews, but rather bring up the other groups. I think it's just plain racism how different the treatment has been after WW2. Jews got their own nation with full support from the world's greatest military, very public apologies etc, whereas the Roma and other groups continue to be harassed to this day (of course, anti-Semitism is also still a thing, sadly. Even among world leaders!).
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiziganism)
This is how the US public education system portrays it in my experience. The other groups get lumped together in a passing mention, comparatively.
This reminded me of how, years ago, some comedy-reporters used to "ambush" politicians in Brazilia to ask tricky questions about geography and demographics. Most got it wrong, and the show framed that as an embarrassment for our political establishment.
I always found it silly to expect busy congressmen to know hundreds of facts and figures by heart. They have aides, libraries and computers, don't they? We have many reasons to hate our politicians, but a lack of memorization skills is not one of them.
What is RT?
RT.com Wikipedia page
I have watched numerous WWII documentaries and probably wouldn't get it right either.
You get similar results if you ask people in the UK. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47015184