The Holocaust question must keep its full weight and horror

Evidence

It is to our interest that the great historical and social question … how could this happen?… should retain all its weight, all its stark nakedness, all its horror. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 4

Categorization

• APHORISMS: A methodological directive: resist explaining away the horror of historical atrocity with smooth causal narratives.
• XREF: connects to: Normalizing the Holocaust as one genocide among many also defuses its challenge to sociology — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 39; The Holocaust’s moral categories grew more contested after consensus about the facts settled — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 657; The Holocaust is a possibility modernity contains, not its paradigm — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 49 (+2 more)

Related

• The Holocaust is a possibility modernity contains, not its paradigm (similarity 0.90)
• All Holocaust scholarship is ultimately a debate over modernity’s self-image. (similarity 0.89)
• The Holocaust must be read as integral to modernity, not as its aberration. (similarity 0.88)
• The Holocaust’s moral categories grew more contested after consensus about the facts settled (similarity 0.87)
• The Holocaust reveals sociology’s inadequacy more than sociology explains the Holocaust (similarity 0.87)
• Normalizing the Holocaust as one genocide among many also defuses its challenge to sociology (similarity 0.87)
• Both dominant readings of the Holocaust leave sociology’s theory of modernity unchallenged (similarity 0.86)
• The Holocaust rendered Western civilization itself incomprehensible, not just the event. (similarity 0.85)
• Comprehending the Holocaust requires breaking its own unfamiliar code (similarity 0.85)
• Modern civilization was a necessary but not sufficient condition of the Holocaust. (similarity 0.85)
• Exceptionalist Holocaust readings let the rest of the world off the hook. (similarity 0.84)
• The Holocaust failed to transform sociology’s self-understanding of modern civilization. (similarity 0.84)
• The Holocaust was a product of modern civilization, not merely its failure (similarity 0.84)
• Every ingredient enabling the Holocaust was normal for modern civilization (similarity 0.84)
• The Holocaust resulted from distinctly modern social and political conditions (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• Normalizing the Holocaust as one genocide among many also defuses its challenge to sociology #corroborates (0.85) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 39
• The Holocaust’s moral categories grew more contested after consensus about the facts settled #expands (0.75) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 657
• The Holocaust is a possibility modernity contains, not its paradigm #qualifies (0.70) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 49