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At least some of it has to be to do with culture, doesn't it?
Comparison: why don't forums like this get tiresome New-Atheist-style religion-bashing any more? It's not because that particular type of obnoxious atheist doesn't exist any more. They're out there, and likely much more widely prevalent than Holocaust deniers. I think it's just culture. If you jump on that soapbox now, you don't get a sympathetic ear, or even that much real controversy. Everyone just rolls their eyes at you and calls you boring. Or why don't we get the opposite - devout fundamentalists here to proselytise? I've been on forums that had intelligent, well-spoken fundamentalists who signed up to do that, and did so articulately even in the face of tremendous criticism, and obviously that demographic is still out there.
If the dominant response to Holocaust denial and anti-semitism here was collective eye-rolling, of the sort that indicated that nobody is interested in hearing about it or even arguing with it, I think it would probably fade. But for better or for worse, people go where they think they might have audiences.
The Motte is currently in that sweet spot where 1) Holocaust denial is allowed, which is what most of the comments so far have been alluding to, and 2) Holocaust denial is listened to. It causes controversy. It appears that there is at least a chance that some posters are convinceable, or at least, are open to engage on the topic. The latter point concerns culture, and can't be reduced to rules or mod strategies.
It's telling that far and away the most active threads this week were this thread, and Kulak's post about Indians.
You are the forum. If you think we talk about race too much, then write more posts and comments that aren't about race.
I am conscious of the fact, actually, that I probably engage in too much meta-posting. I fear that's a consequence of spending most of my time reading the Motte, rather than writing new posts, which I usually only do when I feel like I have particular knowledge to contribute. I think my biggest contributions were on the Australian Voice to Parliament, which was an issue where I thought I had a lot to add. That's not always the case.
But I am probably guilty of being one of those posters who does spend more time talking about what I want to see in terms of curation than I do actually providing what I want to see. I should make an effort to work on improving the ratio, I guess.
Sorry, I was using the royal "you" there, I didn't mean to give the impression that I was singling out you in particular. It was a message for everybody.
Personally I enjoy meta-posting.
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The topic of this thread isn't "the evidence we have about the history of World War II", it's "internal discussion and navel gazing about what norms we want to have in this community", which is a topic of endless interest on this site. A similar thing happens on any thread that mentions Aella.
I meant SS's top level post and all its replies, most of which are directly related to Holocaust discussion, not just this particular sub-thread where we're discussing meta issues.
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