Reddit reviews The Good Old Days: The Holocaust as Seen by Its Perpetrators and Bystanders

The Good Old Days

If you haven’t read it, this was by far the most powerful book I read regarding the holocaust in regards to relaying it’s true horror. It’s terrible reading but powerful nonetheless:
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators-Bystanders/dp/1568521332

This too: https://www.amazon.com/Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators-Bystanders/dp/1568521332/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1523721960&sr=1-1&keywords=the+good+old+days

Turns out the whole "I was just following orders or I would have been punished!" thing is complete bullshit. They knew what they were doing, and they did it with gusto. Not all of them wanted to take part (obviously), but those that did absolutely had a choice.

>Not a single German who refused to kill a Jew was demoted, sent to concentration camp, assigned to a suicide mission or sentenced to death.

>On the contrary: such orders commonly included an offer that "anyone who did not feel up to the upcoming task could come forward." Nevertheless, this occurred only in exceptional cases. Those who did opt out were neither taunted nor pressured, but treated with consideration. They were given different duties, often back home. There were always others willing to take over the murders--the "proven pragmatist" Himmler could be sure of that. Men were generally eager for the job ,as, for example, on a November evening in 1942 in Lukow, Poland, when musicians and performers from the Berlin police department came to entertain Police Battalion 101: "They also learned of the forthcoming shooting," according to witnesses, "and offered, even pleaded emphatically for permission to participate in the execution of these Jews. This strange request was granted by the battalion."(page 395). This means that voluntary mass murder was seen as a social pastime and a thrill - without the necessity of orders.

>The book shows concretely how good the perpetrators felt before, during and after their "operations"; how they humiliated, beat, and tortured defenseless people and then shot them in the back of the neck without the slightest hesitation; how the men posed before their living or dead victims, laughing into the camera - bloodthirsty, sadistic, lascivious. After they had done their day's work, they celebrated with a "death banquet" for the Jews, went to bed with their lovers, or wrote home faithfully that these snapshots and extermination anecdotes would someday be "extremely interesting to our children."

--götz aly, the famous german historian
http://www.yadvashem.org/download/about_holocaust/studies/aly_full.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6tz_Aly


Some reccomeneded reading:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators/dp/1568521332

http://www.amazon.com/Hitlers-Beneficiaries-Plunder-Racial-Welfare/dp/0805087265/ref=pd_sim_14_7?ie=UTF8&dpID=514AHPryUJL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR105%2C160_&refRID=05Y7VNBGT0ENBSGJ0Y3B

http://www.amazon.com/World-Without-Jews-Imagination-Persecution/dp/0300212518/ref=pd_sim_14_8?ie=UTF8&dpID=51Ecr%2BivaDL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR107%2C160_&refRID=08WPD7EPW7WHM64VTB04

You seem enamored of a great myth, that germans were ignorant victims, forced into murdering millions of women and children by a small cabal of evil nazis. All the evidence suggests that's a lie, they gladly supported hitler and wanted "the germ of humanity" (jews in hitler's words) dead.

https://www.amazon.com/Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators-Bystanders/dp/1568521332

This book describes a system where the political system hid what it was doing from the people and even most soldiers. This is the real lesson of the Nazi tragedy. A lesson that the rest of the nations are trying to forget.

The Good Old Days?

[This is more accurate than you think] (http://www.amazon.com/Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators-Bystanders/dp/1568521332/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1419186631&sr=1-1&keywords=the+good+old+days+the+holocaust+as+seen+by+its+perpetrators+and+bystanders)

There are plenty of books about the German populace's complicity in the Holocaust and many do make some controversial and arguable claims, but I think the book that stays closest to historical fact is this one. I understand you're not going to just order this book and read it because I disagree with your claims, but if you really want to understand how the Holocaust happened and why the Germans did it, read this. The book basically documents how the Nazis persuaded the German populace to along with its genocidal ideology. Thuggery, scapegoating, and good old fear were the main tools the party used.

This is also a fascinating read: The Good Old Days: The Holocaust as Seen by Its Perpetrators and Bystanders

You know who you fucking sound like? The people in this book:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Good-Old-Days-Perpetrators/dp/1568521332