Talk:Denial of the genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia/Archive 1

Archive 1

Removal

@Mikola22: You can discuss the issues you are having here, on the talk page. ty, Sadkσ (talk is cheap) 21:26, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Deleting information which has nothing to do with Denial of genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia

I gave my reasons for each edit. We can discuss each edit you just say which. Mikola22 (talk) 21:30, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

What content do you think should be deleted? Since the article was just created, any content that does not have consensus should be removed. You should also explain your rationale. Ktrimi991 (talk) 21:51, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

@Ktrimi991:I stated my reasons as an editor and here I can concretize it.

• Hate speech and the rehabilitation of fascist ideology: According to the 2018 European Commission against Racism and Intolerance report, racist and intolerant hate speech in public discourse is escalating in Croatia; and the main targets are Serbs, LGBT persons and Roma. What does the statement or conclusion of the European Commission have to do with the denial of genocide? It is not information which spoke of denying something.
• Hate speech and the rehabilitation of fascist ideology: Furthermore, there is a growing rise of nationalism, particularly among the youth, which primarily takes the form of praising the fascist Ustaše regime. The responses of the Croatian authorities to these incidents cannot be considered fully adequate. In every country we have some forms of fascism among young people, does that mean they deny someone’s genocide in every country? Nor did this fact speak of any denial of genocide.
• Hate speech and the rehabilitation of fascist ideology: In November 2016 in Jasenovac a plaque commemorating members of Croatian Defence Forces killed in action 1991-2 was unveiled, containing emblem with the Ustaše salute "Za dom spremni". Unfortunately it is the official salute of a Croatian military unit on a coat of arms that is officially recognized(in Croatia). Memorial plaque with this salute was placed in Jasenovac and has nathing with "Hate speech and the rehabilitation of fascist ideology" and especially with Denial of genocide of Serbs. The flag with that coat of arms is on various anniversaries every year and that does not mean that this fact denial something.
• Hate speech and the rehabilitation of fascist ideology: The Thompson, a popular Croatian rock band has garnered controversy for its purported glorification of Ustaše regime in their songs and concerts, and the most famous such song is Jasenovac i Gradiška Stara that promotes executions in camps of the same name.This information is for an article about that singer. Whether he sang that song or not we don't know because he doesn't talk about it but in that song crimes etc are glorified and it is not denied genocide of Serbs.
• Croatian Wikipedia section. Croatian wikipedia can be edited by anyone and the same is in change every day. We cannot, on the basis of a medium for which we do not know who edits it and which is subject to change draw conclusions that the Croatian wikipedia denies of genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia. Source which is there does not speak about denial of genocide of Serbs. Draw big conclusions based on editeds of individuals and anonymous I think makes no sense.
• Revisionism in the Croat diaspora: In 2008, in Melbourne, Australia, a Croat restaurant held a celebration to honor Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić. The event was an "outrageous affront both to his victims and to any persons of morality and conscience who oppose racism and genocide", Dr. Efraim Zuroff, of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, stated. According to local press reports, a large photograph of Pavelić was hung in the restaurant, T-shirts with his picture and pictures of two other commanders who served in the 1941–45 Ustaše government were offered for sale at the bar, and the establishment of the Independent State of Croatia was celebrated. Zuroff noted that this was not the first time in which Croatian émigrés in Australia had openly defended Croat Nazi war criminals. What this event have to do with Denial of genocide of Serbs. These people(in some restaurant) celebrate the fascist movement and its peoples. I guess we won't put every birthday and its participants and songs where they glorify fascism in the article as Denial of genocide of Serbs. It is information for newspapers and black chronicles.
• Condemnation: On 17 April 2011, in a commemoration ceremony, Croatian President Ivo Josipović warned that there were "attempts to drastically reduce or decrease the number of Jasenovac victims", adding, "faced with the devastating truth here that certain members of the Croatian people were capable of committing the cruelest of crimes." At the same ceremony, then Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor said, "there is no excuse for the crimes and therefore the Croatian government decisively rejects and condemns every attempt at historical revisionism and rehabilitation of the fascist ideology, every form of totalitarianism, extremism and radicalism... Pavelić's regime was a regime of evil, hatred and intolerance, in which people were abused and killed because of their race, religion, nationality, their political beliefs and because they were the others and were different." Genocide can be committed over 5 thousand peoples, if some groups (I don't know which ones) reduce that number from 700 thousand, 500 thousand or 300 thousand to 200 thousand, what does this have to do with denial of Genocide. Genocid is genocid. And whether someone disputes the numbers of killed does not mean that someone denies genocide, this has been the case since the time of Yugoslavia, always some historians or scientists has his numbers, claims and conclusions but this does not mean that they deny genocide. Serbian historians report higher numbers of those killed, but this does not mean that they deny genocide.
• Condemnation: Since 2016, anti-fascist groups, leaders of Croatia's Serb, Roma and Jewish communities and former top Croat officials have boycotted the official state commemoration for the victims of the Jasenovac concentration camp because, as they said, Croatian authorities refused to denounce the Ustaše legacy explicitly and they downplayed and revitalized crimes committed by Ustaše. Croatian state institutions the not deny genocide. These were political problems, and this is not happen because Croatian state deny genocide nor does the source say so.
• In any case these are more informations from daily politics and black chronicles than they would concern the article itself. I think this whole article is a promotion of something(I don't know what) without the basics reliable sources. For this reason I suggest that this article be proposed for deletion. Mikola22 (talk) 06:25, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

I'll address a few points. "Za Dom Spremni" is a fascist salute and there is no historical document proving it was used as such prior to the Ustashe. Having a plaque with that salute in Jasenovac is the equivalent of having "Sieg Heil" in the vicinity of Auschwitz. Whether or not it relates to the topic is another thing.

The Croatian Wikipedia is a special case. Normally Wikipedia wouldn't be notable enough for inclusion in an article but the Croatian Wikipedia has received significant media attention for its whitewashing and denial of Ustashe crimes. To the point where the country's Minister of Science, Education and Sports had to address the controversy. Given that there are enough publications that deal with this issue and as it relates to the topic, it makes sense to include it. Although I don't think it should be mentioned in the lead.

The part about Serb, Jewish and Roma community boycotting Holocaust/Jasenovac commemorations is relevant. Holocaust/Genocide denial is a major issue in Croatia. These communities don't feel that enough is being done on the part of authorities to condemn and ban denial, revisionism, whitewashing, downplaying and so on, including the use of Ustashe symbols. Likewise, the whole point of reducing the number of deaths at Jasenovac is to downplay or to deny genocide, particularly against Serbs. This is not merely an attempt to discredit old Yugoslav numbers that have since been refuted by all serious scholars anyway. It goes drastically further, usually hand-in-hand with the theory that it was a labour camp for political prisoners.

I agree that some of the other parts of the article that aren't specifically related to the topic might not belong. Although it is important to point out the relationship between advocating display and tolerance of Ustashe songs, chants, symbols, ect. and denial of their crimes, if possible. The main problem is that the topic is usually always manifested through Jasenovac revisionism and there's a lack of sources that talk about a general denial of the genocide against Serbs without this. I'm not totally convinced that a standalone article is due. --Griboski (talk) 20:35, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Genocide denial is the attempt to deny or minimize statements of the scale and severity of genocide. That definition definitely includes donwplaying of number of victims, as well as the “labour camp” theory. Similar to the Holocaust denial.--WEBDuB (talk) 22:18, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• @Mikola22: I agree that any event should be on the article only if reliable sources explicitly link it with denial. Otherwise all might be OR. I do not have the time to check the entire article, but you interested editors might remove anything that might not be properly sourced. This is my opinion on this. Ktrimi991 (talk) 22:34, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

There are very few sources in the article that specifically mention "genocide denial": the Mirjana Kasapović (2018) journal, a Balkan Insight article (possibly an op-ed?), and perhaps the German language source (Osteuropa-Institut) which is a review of Josip Jurčević's book. Most of the content seems just copied from other articles (Stjepan Mesić, Zlatko Hasanbegović, Croatian Wikipedia...) and largely off topic. So there are many WP:COATRACK and WP:OFFTOPIC issues, tags that were promptly removed after I added them. Tezwoo (talk) 18:49, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Which "many" issues? C/p from other articles, when done properly, is not bad at all. What is exactly off topic here? Sadkσ (talk is cheap) 19:39, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

The lack of reliable sources that mention "genocide denial" and WP:COATRACK of unrelated topics, such as which cap Hasanbegović wore in 1990s, or a video of Stjepan Mesić's speech, none of which talk about denying genocide. Plus what Mikola22 wrote. See Bosnian genocide denial as an example of an article which deals with its main topic, genocide denial. Tezwoo (talk) 20:30, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Maybe another AfD is the best solution to another Serbian ultranationalist WP:POVFORK like Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Demonization of the Serbs. Destruction of books in post-independence Croatia should also be filed for deletion.--Maleschreiber (talk) 21:42, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

How about no? Did you seriously label a notable topic about genocide denial which is very prominent in Croatia as "ultranationalistic"? That is extremely ignorant (and something else as well), as the article is great per WP:Notability. Comparing this article to "Demonization of the Serbs" is not very intelligent. Sadkσ (talk is cheap) 13:22, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Genocide denial in ISC is not a subject in this article, which is a collection of various subtopics of Croatian nationalism and/or Croat-Serbian conflict. An example is the following: By 1989, the future President of Croatia, Franjo Tuđman (who had been a Partisan during World War II), had embraced Croatian nationalism, and published Horrors of War: Historical Reality and Philosophy, in which he questioned the official number of victims killed by the Ustaše during the Second World War. In his book, Tuđman claimed that between 30,000 and 40,000 died at Jasenovac.[2] Some scholars and observers accused Tuđman of racist statements, “flirting with ideas associated with the Ustaše movement”, appointment of former Ustaše officials to political and military positions, as well as downplaying the number of victims in the Independent State of Croatia.[3][4][5][6][7] Nonetheless, in his book, he did confirm that genocide happened: "It is a historical fact that the Ustaše regime of NDH, in its implementation of the plan to reduce the 'hostile Serb Orthodox people in Croatian lands', committed a large genocidal crime over the Serbs, and proportionately even higher over the Roma and Jews, in the implementation of Nazi racial politics" The use of nonetheless is POV, because the first part doesn't necessarily contrast the second one. To not accept the Serbian nationalist narrative about how many people died in Jasenovac, doesn't mean that one denies that it was part of a genocidal campaign against the Serb people. The quote itself doesn't call Tudjman's claim a "genocide denial". Serbian editors don't understand that by creating overblown POVFORKs that always get tag-bombed, they are actually contributing to the relativization of what genocide and genocide denial is. If readers are led to read that in Croatian society, there is substantial "genocide denial" throughout many articles, whose status is disputed, it won't take long for the readers to think that the events of Jasenovac itself are a matter of "dispute".--Maleschreiber (talk) 14:48, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Not really, when a notable academic like Josip P. writes books and has a little cult of his which is spreading the "latest findings", it is textbook Denial and considering that there are more "notable" cases it is more than obvious that there is strong denial taking place, which takes many forms, one of the latest is "let's count all the victims by name". I appreciate your honest opinion but I do not fully agree with it. There is no doubt that the article topic is notable. You can further discuss that FT's statement here, which would be beneficial for the article and the project. Sadkσ (talk is cheap) 15:27, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

• The article might have a notable topic and, if that is the case, it just needs work to be improved. But to make a conclusion on the notablity, all of the content that might not be properly sourced should removed. Then a conclusion can be made. Otherwise, all the discussion here is a waste of time and energy. Ktrimi991 (talk) 09:24, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

As I said, the definition says that genocide denial encompasses the attempt to deny or minimize statements of the scale and severity of genocide. That definition definitely includes downplaying of a number of victims, as well as the “labor camp” theory. Similar to the Holocaust denial. Croatian historian Mirjana Kasapović described the strategy. Everything covered by these claims is de facto genocide denial and does not stray from the topic of the article. Most of the article is well-sourced and talk about genocide denial, by definition. Anyone can remove those parts they think are in dispute and not properly sourced, but it is not Ok to discretize the entire article and the work of other editors (WP:IDONTLIKEIT), especially on such an important and sensitive topic. The part about the Croatian Wikipedia was often disputed, but it directly covers the main topic. I would like everyone to suggest how to correct and improve the article, but deleting the claims is not in accordance with the sources, mainstream views and rules of Wikipedia. Unfortunately, I have to say this again on the Balkans pages, we really need to work together to improve the article, rather than labeling each other’s work. “Maybe another AfD is the best solution to another Serbian ultranationalist WP:POVFORK...” Such a statement violates one of Wikipedia's five pillars. Respect your fellow Wikipedians, even when you disagree, and do not engage in personal attacks. (WP:CIVIL, WP:AVOIDABUSE, WP:NPA). It seems that a group of editors is following all the articles about the crimes against Serbs (even in the case of one of the deadliest and most barbaric genocides in history) and trying to remove them, mark them as biased and undue weight, describe the crimes as revenge or something like that, as well as to declare other editors ultranationalists. Personally, I am already used to being declared both a “Serbian traitor” and a “Serbian ultranationalist” because I add parts that criticize nationalisms and authoritarian regimes. However, we should strive to include on Wikipedia what the sources claim, no matter how much someone liked it.--WEBDuB (talk) 14:44, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

The sources should explicitly mention "genocide denial". Otherwise it counters with WP:OR. I too have been accused of being "pro-Albanian" and "anti-Albanian". I received death threats ony talk page twice, once by an apparently Serb editor and once by an Albanian editor after I supported a Serb editor in a content dispute. Accusations are common in some Balkan topics. Ktrimi991 (talk) 15:33, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

I know that accusations are common in Balkan topics, but we should not accept it as normal and we should all unequivocally condemn it. The sources should explicitly mention "genocide denial". Otherwise it counters with WP:OR. - Sources do not have to literally mention certain words, there are also synonyms. Also, when an event is characterized as a genocide denial, that same event can be more broadly described by other sources. That's how it's always done and that is not a violation of any policy. --WEBDuB (talk) 15:53, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree with editor @Ktrimi991 and this was my intention in deleting information from the article. However, if my edits are correct then it is obvious that two or three sentences will probably remain in the article. Most information ie RS doesn't talk about "Denial of genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia" and I don’t know how this can be if we follow Wikipedia rules. This article is a set of political informations and informations from the black chronicles which are presented as "Denial of genocide..." Mikola22 (talk) 10:12, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback from New Page Review process

I left the following feedback for the creator/future reviewers while reviewing this article: Article has significant problems and is already tagged for some of those. Also it seems to be a coatrack for other material, some essay-like. IMO the topic meets criteria for existences as a separate article and I'm marking it as reviewed..

North8000 (talk) 16:23, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Copied (in part) from their talk page by North8000: : @North8000: Thanks for the messages. I would like you to emphasize the specific problems and suggestions for improvement.......I'm always open for cooperation and joint improvement of the articles' quality. All the best.--WEBDuB (talk) 22:46, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Sure thing. I might make a few edits and leave more thorough-than-normal explanations in the edit summaries. North8000 (talk) 00:59, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! I have also made some changes. Is the article better now? Do all parts now cover the topic directly? Can the templates be removed now? --WEBDuB (talk) 07:46, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Looks good, ty WEBDuB. Sadkσ (talk is cheap) 08:44, 2 July 2020 (UTC)