-- At 07:51 PM 3/1/2001 -0600, Aimee Farr wrote:
the need to remember the gravity of what the Nazis did.
But those invoking Godwin's law seldom do so because the gravity of Nazi crimes is being depreciated by some comparison. Rather their objection is that because the nazi crimes were uniquely wicked, and X is not uniquely wicked, a comparison of nazis with X does not apply -- in other words that the evil of the nazis was unique, so we need learn no lessons from history. Of course the evil of the nazis was far from unique, it was merely one of the larger of many similar twentieth century crimes -- the armenians, the kulaks, and so on and so forth. The evil of the nazis is not unique. Over and over again the same causes led to the same consequences, and the only way we can stop it from happening again and again is to pay attention. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG 8rIOv31R23cArTvRP+H4laJZ238RGzPRQ2IRgEtB 4zcsqJRIcD4yw6m1CUsBQdve3IYrCPh0H5rin15wo