On facebook, I've had the most entertaining exchange with a gun nut who made the mistake of trying to argue that because for a time after WW I Germany had strict gun control, Hitler had strict gun control - he didn't - and that strict gun control was responsible for the Holocaust, and who knows what other ills.
He ascribes - or ascribed (he may have become persuaded otherwise) - to the notion that gun control by Hitler directly brought about the Holocaust and the deaths of millions on millions of people, and that it was synonymous with dictatorship and tyranny.
Here's the thing; according to the United States Holocaust museum, there were less than 500,000 Jews in Germany in 1933 when Hitler came to power, comprising 0.78% of the population. That number declined, with the widespread emigration of Jews who fled Germany when Hitler came to power, with estimates putting the number in the second half of that decade at 0.5% or less of the German population.
Had those few adults who were capable of fighting against the Germans wanted to be armed - and there is no evidence that they sought or desired firearms in 1938 in any appreciable numbers - in order to prevent the Holocaust, that 0.5% would have had to successfully defeated the German military. Because the overwhelming number of those who were killed as part of the Holocaust comprised 6 million Jews from 35 countries, and another roughly 11 million political prisoners, prisoners of war, etc.
Clearly, having allowed Jews to have access to firearms under the 1938 gun control policy of Adolf Hitler would not have prevented the Holocaust, and would not have changed any aspect of WW II. In fact it was strongly contrary to the culture of the German Jews to take direct violent action, as noted in the work of arguably the leading scholar of the Third Reich in this regard, Raul Hilberg wrote in "The Destruction of the European Jews":
No one reasonably identifies those nations, like Norway, Germany - yes, Germany, the UK, Spain, or the Netherlands or most of the rest of Europe, Australia, New Zealand or Canada.
Israel has very strict gun control, which is more strict than the policy of more lenient gun control implemented by Adolf Hitler in 1938, although that gun control policy did exclude Jews from firearms as prohibited people. Raise your hand if you believe that Jews can acquire guns more easily than say.......Palestinians.Clearly, some people are 'more equal' than others, and not everyone can possess a firearm. No one unless they are actively serving in the military can possess an assault weapon, like the AR-15 'Bushmaster' or the expanded capacity magazine that permits spray firing, and people are limited to buying 50 rounds of ammunition a year.
Should we compare the Israelis to Hitler and the Nazis? Are they dictators, fascists, engaged in tyranny, or not? How about Canada? Australia? any of those many other countries which have gun control as strict or more strict than Hitler, but no evidence of human rights abuses, and which clearly have well established free populations that hold honest elections on a regular basis to elect their governments.
Strict gun control has NOTHING whatsoever to do with restricting real freedom of people, it only ensures safety. The equation of gun control with tyranny, fascism, despotism, dictatorship or authoritarian government is wrong, false, dishonest and stupid. The two, gun control, and dictatorship, are completely unrelated.
He ascribes - or ascribed (he may have become persuaded otherwise) - to the notion that gun control by Hitler directly brought about the Holocaust and the deaths of millions on millions of people, and that it was synonymous with dictatorship and tyranny.
Here's the thing; according to the United States Holocaust museum, there were less than 500,000 Jews in Germany in 1933 when Hitler came to power, comprising 0.78% of the population. That number declined, with the widespread emigration of Jews who fled Germany when Hitler came to power, with estimates putting the number in the second half of that decade at 0.5% or less of the German population.
Had those few adults who were capable of fighting against the Germans wanted to be armed - and there is no evidence that they sought or desired firearms in 1938 in any appreciable numbers - in order to prevent the Holocaust, that 0.5% would have had to successfully defeated the German military. Because the overwhelming number of those who were killed as part of the Holocaust comprised 6 million Jews from 35 countries, and another roughly 11 million political prisoners, prisoners of war, etc.
Clearly, having allowed Jews to have access to firearms under the 1938 gun control policy of Adolf Hitler would not have prevented the Holocaust, and would not have changed any aspect of WW II. In fact it was strongly contrary to the culture of the German Jews to take direct violent action, as noted in the work of arguably the leading scholar of the Third Reich in this regard, Raul Hilberg wrote in "The Destruction of the European Jews":
The reaction pattern of the Jews is characterized by almost complete lack of resistance. In marked contrast to German propaganda, the documentary evidence of Jewish resistance, overt or submerged, is very slight. On a European-wide scale the Jews had no resistance organization, no blueprint for armed action, no plan even for psychological warfare. They were completely unprepared. . . . Measured in German casualties, Jewish armed opposition shrinks into insignificance. . . . A large component of the entire [destruction] process depended on Jewish participation, from the simple acts of individuals to the organized activity in councils. . . . Jewish resistance organizations attempting to reverse the mass inertia spoke the words: "Do not be led like sheep to slaughter."and Israeli Defense fighter and Brown University historian and scholar of the Third Reich noted, the right wing version of the Warsaw uprising in 1943 is wrong. The chances that Jews armed with civilian weapons could have opposed not their fellow civilians, but the German military is a farce:
...Omer Bartov, a historian at Brown University who studies the Third Reich, notes that the Jews probably wouldn’t have had much success fighting back. “Just imagine the Jews of Germany exercising the right to bear arms and fighting the SA, SS and the Wehrmacht. The [Russian] Red Army lost 7 million men fighting the Wehrmacht, despite its tanks and planes and artillery. The Jews with pistols and shotguns would have done better?” he told Salon. [note, Bartov has served as part of the Israeli military forces]
Proponents of the theory sometimes point to the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising as evidence that, as Fox News’ Judge Andrew Napolitano put it, “those able to hold onto their arms and their basic right to self-defense were much more successful in resisting the Nazi genocide.” But as the Tablet’s Michael Moynihan points out, Napolitano’s history (curiously based on a citation of work by French Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson) is a bit off. In reality, only about 20 Germans were killed, while some 13,000 Jews were massacred. The remaining 50,000 who survived were promptly sent off to concentration camps.Here is the reality. ALL of the 23 wealthy, developed 'first world' nations which are similar to the United States, and with whom we can reasonably be compared, have very strict gun control, in most cases STRICTER THAN HITLER and the Nazis.
No one reasonably identifies those nations, like Norway, Germany - yes, Germany, the UK, Spain, or the Netherlands or most of the rest of Europe, Australia, New Zealand or Canada.
Israel has very strict gun control, which is more strict than the policy of more lenient gun control implemented by Adolf Hitler in 1938, although that gun control policy did exclude Jews from firearms as prohibited people. Raise your hand if you believe that Jews can acquire guns more easily than say.......Palestinians.Clearly, some people are 'more equal' than others, and not everyone can possess a firearm. No one unless they are actively serving in the military can possess an assault weapon, like the AR-15 'Bushmaster' or the expanded capacity magazine that permits spray firing, and people are limited to buying 50 rounds of ammunition a year.
Should we compare the Israelis to Hitler and the Nazis? Are they dictators, fascists, engaged in tyranny, or not? How about Canada? Australia? any of those many other countries which have gun control as strict or more strict than Hitler, but no evidence of human rights abuses, and which clearly have well established free populations that hold honest elections on a regular basis to elect their governments.
Strict gun control has NOTHING whatsoever to do with restricting real freedom of people, it only ensures safety. The equation of gun control with tyranny, fascism, despotism, dictatorship or authoritarian government is wrong, false, dishonest and stupid. The two, gun control, and dictatorship, are completely unrelated.
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