Imagine a decent fellow, moderate in his views, gentle in his interactions with humans, friendly to all members of the human race, not prejudiced against male or female, black or white, hetero or homo, Jew or Gentile, Christian or Pagan. A libertarian with a passion for the little, poor man.
Imagine this fellow finds evidence making him believe that the Nazis never had any gas chambers to mass murder people. Suddenly everybody calls this decent fellow a "Nazi," a "Racist," an "anti-Semite," an "Extremist," a "Bigot," a "hater," a "denier," although he hasn't changed his other views at all.

So before screaming "bloody murder" when somebody is called a "Holocaust Denier," it is more than appropriate to find out what this person really thinks about the Holocaust, because most people have a totally wrong concept of what Holocaust dissenters actually believe and what not. Using the derogatory term "Denier" is already indication of a biased approached, because it leads people to believe false and evil things about that dissenter. Click here for a brief listing of what Holocaust dissenters, also called Revisionists, consider to be fact and what they think is only a myth.

Hence, I would like to ask everybody to show basic human decency and simply also listen to what Germar Rudolf has to say in his defense.

On Tolerance

One of the first things that comes to mind when people think of "Nazis" and their alleged associates is that they are intolerant. Certainly, intolerance should not be tolerated. So we should be intolerant against intolerance. And because that makes us intolerant as well, we should be intolerant against ourselves, or should we not?
What exactly is tolerance, and where does it end? What kind of intolerance is necessary, which intolerable?
Tolerance is the agreed-upon, thus permissible deviation from an agreed-upon norm. And isn’t intolerance the necessary action to disallow activities deviating beyond what was agreed upon to be the maximum permissible deviation from the nom? Fact is, tolerance and intolerance make sense only if we first define a norm and then define what our maximum permissible deviation from this is, because that is the definition of tolerance.

So, let us assume we have several norms called “truth”, “freedom”, and “justice”, and there are only certain maximum deviations from these norms that we will accept without corrective action.

On Truth

Freedom and justice come in later, because “truth” – or what people consider to be “true” – is the primary object of the case at issue. There is a generally held belief in modern western societies that it is not possible to know the absolute, infallible, irrefutable truth about anything. Though we can reach a high degree of certainty in what we think is true, no human being should ever possess the hubris to think that he has found the absolute truth. Of course, in most situations of life we assume that we know the truth 100%. Yet would it be just to force others to believe in what we believe, just because we think we are 100% certain that we found the truth? This is another norm of modern societies: you cannot force anybody to believe in what you think is “true”.

Unemotional Examples

So here we go. Imagine an intelligent, diligent, peaceful, reasonable young scholar who, during his private scholarly activities, accidentally finds evidence leading him to believe that there were never any guillotines used during the French revolution; that the cruel accounts of mass-beheadings are an invention of the French Royalists who spread this atrocity propaganda as a part of their psychological warfare against the revolutionaries. After finishing his research, our fine fellow publishes his results, accompanied by a preface of a maverick politician accusing the world’s historians, politicians, and media to be incompetent fools for never having critically looked into these invented atrocity stories.

What would happen?

Well, probably not much. Those historians accused of incompetence would either ignore this work, or if it has any merits, they would have to either refute the evidence brought forward or accept it. No one would suggest to try to force that young fellow to believe in what everybody considers to be true.

Or imagine another scholar claiming that he managed to refute the mass killings perpetrated by Genghis Khan and his hordes. Is anybody calling for the public prosecutor for denial of a historical fact yet?

Same Thing, Different Reaction

Now imagine that our fine fellow, during his private scholarly activities, accidentally finds evidence leading him to believe that there were never any homicidal gas chambers used during World War II; that the cruel accounts of mass gassings are an invention of the Allied powers who spread this atrocity propaganda as a part of their psychological warfare against the Germans. After finishing his research, this fine fellow publishes his results, accompanied by a preface of a maverick politician accusing the world’s historians, politicians and media to be incompetent fools for never having critically looked into these invented atrocity stories.

What would happen? Well, I can tell you what would happen, if that fine young scholar happens to be a German citizen, and that is where freedom and justice come in: He goes to jail because “denying the Holocaust” is illegal in Germany, punishable with up to 5 years in prison.

Tolerance Put to the Test

Now we have a test case for our definition of tolerance. How was that about “nobody should be forced to believe in what others consider to be true”? But don’t we have an exception here? After all, Germany’s history shows to what atrocious extremes humans are capable, and therefore anything that could lead to a repetition of these most extreme atrocities has to be forestalled way in advance.

But does that statement make any sense at all? Read carefully what the premise of this claim is: It assumes that the stories about German WWII atrocities are true and that their extreme nature makes them so unique as to demand an exception from our rule of tolerance. Of course, most people do believe that what we are told about the Holocaust is indeed true. There is nothing immoral about believing it. But can the belief in the absolute veracity of a claim be a justification to outlaw doubts about its absolute veracity? Can the extreme nature of what is believed be a justification for this exception of the rule of tolerance as defined above? Do we have to believe, because the claim is so extreme? In defense of absurd, illogical, anti-rational dogmas of the Holy Church, Christian apologist Tertullian (200 aD) was accused of defending a thesis like this: „Credo, quia absurdum est/I believe, because it is absurd.“ Can we allow this to be replaced in the age of enlightenment by a slogan like  „Credendum est, quia extremum est/One has to believe, because it is extreme"? Did our society suffer a relapse of 1,800 years?

Let me use a different example, which nobody will be emotional about, to make everybody see how outrageous this logic is:

You have to believe that the earth is flat because the earth is so uniquely flat!

Remember: the rules we create have to be universally applicable, or they are worthless.

Also keep this in mind: revisionists claim that many accounts of Holocaust survivors are absurd, which is even partly conceded by mainstream historians today. So in revisionist eyes, modern societies today try to force people to believe following this slogan: "Credendum est, quia absurdum et extremum est/One has to believe, because it is both absurd and extreme"!

Germany's Duty to Make an Exception

In Germany and other European countries today, individuals who doubt the veracity of the “Holocaust” story to one degree or another, are labeled as “Nazis” merely because of their non-belief in one detail of history. They are fined or even imprisoned, and their books are outlawed and burned. Successfully branded as “Nazis”, nobody will dare assist them in their struggle for their civil rights. After all, Nazis don’t deserve rights -- or do they?

After Germans have perpetrated the Holocaust and all the other horrors of WWII, can’t we agree upon a somewhat different norm for them, a more tightly drawn line of tolerance, which goes as follows -- I phrase it in a way that everybody can see the total perversion of logic behind it:

After Germany persecuted minorities, jailed dissenters, and burned books in the past, Germany now has an obligation to persecute minorities, jail dissenters, and burn books!

Can anybody come up with a justification for such an outrage?

Intolerance and Prejudice

Which brings us back to Germar Rudolf. Since 1993 he has been treated as an outcast by the mass media and by Germany's legal system. This is so because the majority of people are so extremely prejudiced and intolerant against people who do not share their views on the Holocaust that they do not stop at anything to make them shut up.

Ok, Germar does not believe in the gas chamber story of World War II. Oh my God! Can it get any worse than that? Remember? No "bloody murder!" screams, please! Try to listen calmly!

Germar's main problem is indeed, that not many people know, what his views are and what kind of a person he his, and most people will never find out, because they are either so prejudiced by the horror picture of “Nazis” which was planted into their brains that they will rather run for cover than take a chance to try to find out, or because they have been told lies by the mass media.

The goal of this website is to change that by giving Germar a voice to be heard.

More about G. Rudolf | More about Rudolf's persecution | More about Rudolf's views | More about human rights violations in Germany