Why is Steiner not mentioned among the accepted causes of the Holocaust?

In this tread, Peter Staudenmaier claims that neither Rudolf Steiner nor anthroposophy had anything to do with the Holocaust. This position contradicts claims frequently heard made by Dan Dugan and others at the Waldorf Critics list.

Paulina (March 2nd, 2004):

Over at the Simon Wiesenthal Center there is an interesting article, copyright ©1997, "Hitler's Racial Ideology: Content and Occult Sources", by Jackson Spielvogel and David Redles.

It is an interesting artice because we have statements from the horse's mouth, so to speak, i.e., Hitler, on his anti-Semtic views and origin of those views in a 1931 interview with a Leipzig newspaper editor where he, "Adolf Hitler made a passionate declaration of the true significance
of his National Socialist movement".

The intersting thing is, Peter, this article, nor any article I can find at the Simon Wiesental site metions Steiner in the vein you so constantly promote.

Why is that, do you think?

I mean, who is more interested in getting to the heart of the matter on Anti-Semitism and what came about in Nazi Germany than people like Simon Wiesenthal?

Why do yo suppose he and so many others like him stand in opposition to the origins of the nazi ideas of Aryan Supremacy?

Oh, speaking of which, Blatvatsky is mentioned in this article. This, too is interesting. Here is what the authors have to say:

"It is important to observe that there are also some striking differences between Blavatsky's doctrine and Hitler's later racial ideas. Blavatsky herself did not identify the Aryan race with the Germanic peoples. And although her racial doctrine clearly entailed belief in superior and inferior races and hence could be easily misused, she placed no emphasis on the domination of one race over another."

Here is the url for the article:
http://motlc.wiesenthal.com/resources/books/annual3/chap09.html

Still waiting for you to provide the documentation for your claim that Pohl spoke in regard to Steiner and his influence at the Nuremberg Trials.

Peter Staudenmaier (March 2nd, 2004):
Hi Paulina, you wrote:

"Over at the Simon Wiesenthal Center there is an interesting article, copyright ©1997, "Hitler's Racial Ideology: Content and Occult Sources", by Jackson Spielvogel and David Redles."

A fine article. I cite it in my own work.

"The intersting thing is, Peter, this article, nor any article I can find at the Simon Wiesental site metions Steiner in the vein you so constantly promote. Why is that, do you think?"

Because it's an article about Blavatsky and Hitler, not about Steiner. Steiner wasn't the link between the two, the ariosophists were.

"I mean, who is more interested in getting to the heart of the matter on Anti-Semitism and what came about in Nazi Germany than people like Simon Wiesenthal?"

Wiesenthal didn't write the article, the journal it appeared in is named after him.

"Oh, speaking of which, Blatvatsky is mentioned in this article."

Mentioned in?

"It is important to observe that there are also some striking differences between Blavatsky's doctrine and Hitler's later racial ideas. Blavatsky herself did not identify the Aryan race with the Germanic peoples. And although her racial doctrine clearly entailed belief in superior and inferior races and hence could be easily misused, she placed no emphasis on the domination of one race over another."

Quite so. In this sense her position was very close to Steiner's.

"Still waiting for you to provide the documentation for your claim that Pohl spoke in regard to Steiner and his influence at the Nuremberg Trials."

That isn't what I claimed. Here is what I wrote to you about Pohl last week: "While people like Ohlendorf and Pohl, who had some admiration for Steiner, did play major roles in the holocaust, as far as I know their views on Steiner had nothing to do with their crimes against humanity. I do not know of any anthroposophists who actively took part in the genocide of European Jewry. Steiner's own views on Jews were very different from those of the architects of the holocaust."