Letter to the Editor letters@smh.com.au

Study of Holocaust mandated for schools is an outrage and morally/intellectually dishonest

With interest I read Anna Patty’s report – SMH 8 December 2012 – stating that in NSW schools ‘Holocaust’ studies is to become a compulsory subject for all students in years 9 and 10.

At university level students are aware that this subject is taught as an orthodoxy where dissenting versions of any narrative is not tolerated.

I know of a lecturer in Adelaide who dismissed a student’s probing and critical questions with a rebuke such as: ‘Your question borders on the offensive’.

If teachers of ‘Holocaust’ studies retain the Socratic method within a given curriculum framework, then a study of ‘Holocaust’ will automatically question and challenge the pillars-premise-physical facts on which the narrative rests: Germans systematically exterminated six million European Jews mainly in homicidal gas chambers.

However,  strong evidence suggests gassings were never carried out and hence without the gassings claim Jewish suffering was no more or less than that experienced by other nations’ populations.  

A final point then also needs to be mentioned to the students that in a number of countries which claim to be ‘free and democratic’ it is a criminal offence to question fundamentals of the ‘Holocaust’ narrative.

In view of the above it seems rather farcical that Jewish Board of Deputies chief executive, Mr Vic Alhadeff, claims:

‘The Holocaust is a warning to every generation about the potential for evil, especially as a consequence of racial hatred, and about the inherent evil of totalitarian regimes,' Mr Alhadeff said. 'It teaches us that every generation owes it to itself and to future generations to cherish and, if necessary, fight to defend the sanctity of life, dignity and freedom.'

Tell that to the Palestinians who are still suffering unabated ethnic cleansing initiated by Jews emerging from their ‘Holocaust’.

Dr Fredrick Töben

Adelaide

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