Nazis and Jews

[Shycte]

Let me start by asking you a question. Was Hitler evil or was he just a man who followed his beliefs?

We all know what terrible things happened in the concentration camps. Women, men and children were all executed is brutal ways. But Hitler didn?t design the concentration camps so is he to blame? He gave SS the assignment, that there to be no Jews what so ever in Germany and in the countries that they had captured.

Is the smith who created a knife to blame if that knife is then used to kill a kinder garden full of children? If he hadn?t forged that knife those children would still be alive.

Another question. If Barack Obama were a Nazi, would he be evil? Would he, just like Hitler, done what he thought was right?
As always we see history through the eyes of the winner. History makes Hitler evil. He killed people who thought different than him.

But didn?t the Jews do that 2000 years ago? In Jerusalem, people would get crucified if they said something the priests didn?t like. If a woman were as much as accused of cheating she would be stoned to death. Isn?t just as evil?

And what about the Pope 1400 years later? He sent millions of men to die in crusades to the holy land. Killing both Muslims and Christians. Wasn?t that an act of selfishness and ?evil??

And while we are talking about Muslims. Shia Islam, is that evil? If you go there and say that you think Mohammed was a real f*ckhead I doubt you?ll live to see another day. If a woman refuses to wear her veil she can get sentenced to death. Just because she did not want to wear a stupid piece of clothing? That if something has to be evil right? Right?

I say no, and yes. Because I don?t think evil exists. I think good and evil depends on where we were born. I think that Shia Islam is terrible. To treat another human being like that sickness me. The same goes, of course, for Nazism. But if I were born in Iraq or Azerbaijan Shia Islam wouldn?t be anything special.

To put it simple, if Hitler had won World War II, we would all be Nazis. If he had won, none of us would consider Hitler evil, he would be a Hero, a saint. But again, history is seen through the eyes of the winner.

What do you think? I?ll end this little rant by asking you the same question I started this with. Was Hitler evil or was he just a man who followed his beliefs?

PS. I apologize if anyone feels insulted. I do not mean to point fingers and harass anyone. I mean no offence to anyone with this post.

 

[darkorion69]

Hitler was a nationalist and he put the needs of his nation before the needs of all others. He fixed the German economy by drastically increasing funding for wartime industry. He was the ultimate patriot who wished to spread his ideology over the entire world. He chose an ethnicity to blame and launched military assaults on nations.

George Bush Jr was "America First". He tripled the defense budget to protect America. He was a Texas patriot who desired to sprinkle Magical Freedom Dust on Iraq and Afghanistan. He picked Arabs (those wacky terrorists) instead of Jews as his justification for his war efforts.

Which one is evil? Probably neither if you look at them rationally, neutrally, and without bias. But good and evil are creatures of judgmental minds and as you said history is inevitable written by the victor. So with that equation...Germany lost = EVIL. America won = GOOD.

 

[Tech Team FTW!]

Nobody who defends their actions with their beleifs is ever right. I'm looking at you, gay-bashing, Muslim hating, contraceptive banning current pope*.

*note that names have been excluded where appropriate to protect the anachronistic.

 

[Shycte]

Which one is evil? Probably neither if you look at them rationally, neutrally, and without bias. But good and evil are creatures of judgmental minds and as you said history is inevitable written by the victor. So with that equation...Germany lost = EVIL. America won = GOOD.

My point is

 

[October Country]

I don't believe in some kind of universal good or evil, but from a functional definition of evil, then yes, Hitler was evil, or at least comitted evil acts.
As for your question "Was Hitler evil or was he just a man who followed his beliefs?" Those two options are not mutually exclusive. His beliefs differ from ours and they resulted in mass killings based on racism, so of course we see nazism as evil. Evil is relative, and a persons actions cannot be justified on the base of their beliefs.

 

[Lord George]

See what Hitler should have done was rounded up all the Jews, gypsies ect. but instead of sending them to a gas chamber he could have used them as expandable front line troops, rather then wasting time and resources in killing them all. So I'd say the fact he used so much time and money to commit genocide means he must have definitely stuck to his beliefs and convictions. I don't believe in good and evil anyway as they are subjective to an individuals perspective as there is nothing which is universally seen as good or evil.

 

[Scobie]

DELETED

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Hitler was evil. He wiped out millions of people. What people do is what is important, not what they say or what they think.

 

[traceur_]

Good and evil are matters of opinion, Hitler didn't see himself as evil and neither did thousands of nazis, osama bin laden thinks his work is holy. I don't know Hitler's reasons for hating Jews, blacks etc but I read somewhere that he got syphilis from a Jewish prostitute and he often referred to the Jews as a "disease", maybe there was a connection I don't know. We have come to a general conclusion that things that cause suffering, pain etc are evil and things that bring joy and happiness are good but since there are two sides to it there is no clear case of good or evil. Hitler's murdering of the Jews brought some degree of happiness to anti-semites but it also brought unimaginable suffering and pain to the Jewish community. I think Hitler was a man who followed his beliefs but since those beliefs and the actions he performed while following them caused much more suffering than happiness, I think that Hitler was evil.