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Well then you have as much knowledge ("knowledge") as I do. We've both read things. We've both observed things. We've both watched films and heard eyewitness accounts. We've both drawn conclusions - different ones. Obviously, one or both of us can be wrong, but until you show me your independent research, your basis for believing what you do is no stronger or more credible than mine. You might be more well-read than me specifically about the Holocaust, and Jews (I'm sure @SecureSignals is), but you know that in itself is not a rhetorical trump.
If I say I "believe" that we landed on the moon, do you understand me to be saying that I have read history and watched footage and concluded it was real, or do you understand me to be saying that someone just told me people landed on the moon and I accepted it as an article of faith? Do you think I believe the Holocaust happened because some Jews told me it did and I never bothered to look at any evidence, even when I first became aware that there are revisionist historians who claim it's a hoax?
If you think I am not following the rules, report me (again). Yes, for all your disclaimers that you don't "feel" anything towards Jews, your... animation on the topic (every. single. thread) sure looks like some kind of feeling, and while you may not personally hate every Jew you meet or wish them harm, I think claiming that as an ethnic group, they are your enemies but you don't hate them is just redefining hate as something else. Like, you'd actually have to be trying to murder someone to hate them?
Okay, how would I disagree with you in a way that isn't "drinking the Kool-aid"? Am I supposed to pretend that my priors are not already heavily weighted towards "the Holocaust happened"?
Only half true. I did engage with your argument, but yes, I consider Holocaust critique akin to other conspiracy theories like faked moon landings and a missile hitting the Pentagon and JFK being killed by the CIA, etc. You may find that unfair and offensive because you think the Holocaust is different from those other conspiracies. Why should I view it differently beyond the fact that that's the one conspiracy you think is real (and therefore not a "conspiracy")? You don't get to privilege your personal beliefs as worthy of greater respect and consideration. If someone came here arguing for a flat Earth, they'd be allowed to do so, and personal insults would not be allowed, but other posters would not be required to pretend they don't think it's a stupid theory. Hey, maybe they'd have a really good argument that would convince someone! Maybe you can persuade me that I've been drinking Kool-aid and the Holocaust didn't happen. But until you achieve that, I am required to let you say your piece and not call you names, I am not required to "not associate your beliefs with low status."
I don't think you conclude anything about that which was never in contention in your mind in the first place. Nor do I believe you have ever been in a position to draw any conclusions about any of the topics you brought up given you say you don't engage much with the opposite view. It's very obviously hard to give anything which is presented as being true a fair critical shake.
I've reported you once, ever, I think? And when I do you bring it up and try to leverage it as some sort of thing? Seems like rather poor form. I mean, I can't see who reports me, right?
Why ask me for my view when you just ignore it and lie about it? I can scroll up and see exactly what I wrote. I did not write a "disclaimer". You asked me about my point of view.
My animation "looks" like some kind of feeling? Well it isn't. I just told you exactly what it was.
I specifically said the exact opposite of this. Why do you lie like this? What point is there for me to engage with someone who lies about a thing I wrote about just one reply ago?
You are supposed to engage with the argument. You didn't touch it. Even now you are doing exactly what I noted in my first post. Instead of looking at specific events and the evidence for those, you just rely on the whole thing existing as sum, and because the sum is true, no discrepancies of what makes up the sum can be changed. I am saying, don't look at the sum and assume it's holy, look at the parts.
I mean, that's just confirmation of everything I said about your position.
You don't care enough to evaluate the argument on its own merits and instead just throw everything under the same umbrella of 'bad'. There's no reasoning with someone like that since that person is not applying any reason to what's being said.
You don't mention anything specific about my argument, you just act out that if someone says that X amount of people less died in the holocaust than claimed, whatever the reason they might have, that they are like some low brow conspiracy thing.
I asked for the basic minimum of you actually engaging with the argument made and not lying about me and calling me hateful.
I give more than that when I comment here and I expect something similar in return. I'll adjust my priors with regards to you going forward.
In that spirit I can say that if I wanted to look at people say 'that thing is just like creationism' about things they don't like I could just go on /r/skeptic.
This is incorrect. Although I may not "engage with the opposite view" to your satisfaction, I told you I've read books, I've watched documentaries and interviews (including with deniers).
Observing that your words do not match your posting history is not a lie. It may be an incorrect conclusion, but I'm not lying about what you said, I'm saying what you say is not congruent with your behavior.
Again, no lie. Repeatedly saying "liar liar" because you don't like my conclusions is not the effective weapon you think it is.
I see. You want me to specifically debate the total number of Jews killed, how many were killed at Auschwitz, whether or not Nazi testimony is credible or whether it was extracted under torture, whether we can take Hitler and Goering's statements about wanting to remove all the Jews at face value, all those things? And if I don't play that game, debating each and every denier talking point, but say "I think the Holocaust happened," I am not "engaging with the argument"? The problem here is that there are many arguments here which you try to bundle as one argument. The argument is "Did the Holocaust happen?" The fine details might be relevant for someone genuinely interested in historical details, but I am saying "The weight of the evidence is that the Holocaust happened?" and you are saying "You are not engaging with the argument because somethingsomething overestimates at Auschwitz."
Only if you are claiming I believe those things without evidence. Which you can assert, but again, my stating I believe things to be true is not a statement about how I came to that belief.
I am applying reasoning to what's being said. I'm not indulging in your rhetorical diversions.
I don't believe you based on your inability to entertain a simple argument made by me.
What I said is congruent with my behavior. But it's not congruent with what you need me to be to justify your actions, so you make stuff up.
When your conclusions are the exact opposite of what I wrote, they can't be drawn from believing what I said. So why ask me to explain myself if you already have a view of me that you wont change?
No. I just wanted you to engage with what I said, given you replied to me.
If you bother replying to each and every denier argument, but never address any of the arguments specifically, but always just assert that you think the holocaust happened, and that holocaust denial is like low brow conspiracy theories, then your replies are not serious and instead just exemplifying the typical attitude I described in my first comment.
I did no such thing. I made a single argument relating to the holocaust in specific based on the problem of Dachau and eyewitness testimony.
That's not the argument I made. But you would need that to be the case for your position to make any sense, so you just make this stuff up. I know you are saying that, in total, the holocaust happened. And I'm saying, I don't care what you believe in total. It's not relevant at all to the argument I made. I already mentioned that most people don't evaluate the evidence, but instead just accept the entire narrative and then reinforce their belief based on the idea that all of it must be true. You obviously do that, you obviously don't look at individual pieces of evidence, instead relying on the historical narrative as a narrative rather than an investigation into reality. I think that's very obviously uncritical and faulty reasoning but whatever.
I find that your position is based on not engaging with specific pieces of evidence but instead on believing that the narrative is true. If you can point me to any part of your comments in this chain which doesn't do that, feel free. You can certainly say you believe in the thing because this and that, but in practice and word you have not done it here.
After maintaining you have engaged with the argument, you now admit you have not.
Somehow, in your mind, insinuating that eyewitness testimony is not a great piece of evidence, supported by an instance where a lot of people in a concentration camp lied about intentional killings after being liberated, is just a rhetorical diversion. But maintaining that, actually, the argument was all along whether or not the entire holocaust happened is "the argument" is not a rhetorical diversion...
This looks like transparent projection. Your frame for this topic always needs to be the entire holocaust, the sum. Because your principle for belief is that it's already all true. If you can't point to it all being true to support your belief you have nothing.
This is typical of your argumentation, taking one statement in response to one thing ("I'm not indulging in your rhetorical diversions") and trying to misapply it ("Hah! See! You just admitted you don't even engage with my arguments!")
Basically, most of your posts, when I bother to respond to you, are a bunch of "Nuh uhs!" and "No yous" and projection. Hell, you even throw "projection" at me after engaging in massive projection - which is par for the course. You're verbose enough to write like you're making cold hard arguments, but it's all "Nuh uh" and "No you." Not impressive for someone who objects to his views being treated as low-status.
You haven't responded to the original contention made, instead you go through this pointless rigamarole of sneering and insinuations and then try to leverage those as a thing when it's just the longest form of ad hom possible.
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