EXCLUSIVE: Holocaust denied by students in Rialto school assignment

San Bernadino Sun ^ | July 11, 2014 | Beau Yarbrough

[blueplum]

Dozens of Rialto eighth-graders questioned whether the Holocaust occurred in essays written for an in-class assignment this spring.

Rialto Unified School District administrators, besieged by criticism after the assignment became public in May, claimed at the time that none of the students who completed the assignment questioned or denied the Holocaust, but a survey of the students’ work by this news organization found numerous examples of students expressing doubt or flatly denying that the Holocaust occurred. :snip:

“Students got high praise and grades for writing that the Holocaust was a hoax. I’m sick about that, I’m sick about that,” said Rabbi Suzanne Singer of Temple Beth El in Riverside. “It’s worse than I thought it was.”

In May, Associate Superintendent for Educational Services Susan Levine said her office hadn’t found any student essays that denied the Holocaust: Director of Secondary Curriculum “Andres Luna hasn’t found any yet, but he still has hundreds to go,” she said on May 8.

:snip:

The complete archive of the essays was provided to the Los Angeles News Group in the form of 45 PDF files, some of which contain hundreds of pages of student assignments. An examination of the essays by newsroom staff found that at least 50 essays denied or doubted the Holocaust occurred. Even many students who agreed the Holocaust occurred said there were good reasons to believe it had not or that elements of the historical record were actually hoaxes.

:snip: To write the in-class essay, students were given printouts from About.com, History.com and Holocaust denial site BibleBelievers.org.au.

[Tammy8]

This is what happens when you do not teach the facts; dates, names, documents, photos, etc. and instead give students handouts with handpicked items presented as an overview or direct them to selected websites and then have the students do “critical thinking” analysis of the topic.

Educators decided the way history was taught for so many years was just wrong and didn’t teach them to think. They don’t expect students to learn facts because that is “learning by rote” and it worked for so long it has to be wrong.

Next time you see someone ask people on the street about something basic in history and they don’t have a clue, remind yourself to be happy that person learned to think critically about things they know nothing about.

[luvbach1]

They would not deny the Holocaust after such a visit.

Oh, but yes they would.No disrespect to you intended, but intended for the deniers.

[driftless2]

There’s plenty on the right that deny it too. Or say the death totals were exaggerated. Plenty of anti-Semites on websites like Taki’s Mag and a few others.

[Salvation]

I just looked through it again. It would be so much better if I would have had my own pictures.

[Salvation]

Have you been there?

[Sasparilla]

American Jews have learned nothing at this point about liberals and liberalism.Many don’t understand the significance of the words “Never again.” It is truly sad.

[patriot08]

That’s why Eisenhower insisted on photographs being taken of the atrocities. He understood that there must be a record, first-hand evidence and incontrovertible answers to those who would deny the Holocaust.

How do the deniers explain the photographs?

[redgolum]

I met a guy at the range who was part of the group that first liberated a death camp. He was watching his grandson shoot a Mauser that he borrowed from Goring. Soon all the witnesses will be gone

[EinNYC]

My father’s barber had a concentration camp tattoo. My father refused to tell me what it was, because I was just a little girl, perhaps 7 years old or so.

[luvbach1]

Have I been to the death camps? No. But the deniers, if they were to go there, would fabricate some elaborate explanation for them and remain deniers. I;m sure they were perfectly aware of those camps when they became deniers of the Holocaust.

[righttackle44]

I've said this before here: I went to high school with quite a few Jewish kids who lost their entire European families. In a few instances, my classmate or schoolmate and his or her immediate family were the only survivors of an entire extended family. In another faux pas that simply went over the heads of everyone, I guess, our Latin club was named Legio Decima. It means Tenth Legion.

The Legio X Fretensis ("Tenth legion of the sea strait") was the legion, along with four others, that destroyed Jerusalem and eventually conquered Masada.

[Frank_2001]

Not only that, but how do you get from Spain to America except by Iberia Airlines, and they did not exist in 1492. Case closed! /s;)

[Ace's Dad]

I saw actual raw, 35 mm shots acquired by an OSS operative that lived in our town. He “liberated” them directly from the Nazis as his squad liberated one of the camps. The negs and prints never left his possession from the end of the war until I saw them in about 1960. Yes, it happened.

[Norm Lenhart]

There is one thing more evil than a Democrat.

Someone who helps empower them.

[USNBandit]

I count my son lucky because a vet in our local area was a P-38 pilot who got shot down and was thrown into Buchenwald. He wrote a book about it and is treated like a celebrity around these parts, He can't go anywhere in town without people yelling "Hey Joe!" at him. Even my son, who is pretty quiet, will say "look Dad, it's Joe Moser."

I know my son wouldn't buy that denier crap if it was forced on him at school because of the stories Mr, Moser told his class.

[kingcanuteus]

Actually a better assignment would be to debate whether Mohammed was a murdering child molester or not.