It's interesting that when we talk about evil the example that always comes to mind is Hitler. Who's to say that? There's the Holocaust, but Stalin would have likely targeted the Jews had he lived (there's evidence that supports this) - and neither of those two ever murdered someone himself a la Ted Bundy.
There are no "evil statistics" - it seems too hard to label someone the most evil the way we can say pretty accurately that Michael Jordan was the greatest basketball player ever.
People use Hitler because almost everyone has heard of him and he's an easy example to use, while Ted Bundy is well known as well, he's not as well known.
From: DeathChicken | #013 Wait, so indirectly ordering the deaths of six million people is less evil than directly killing 30? He's probably one of the most charismatic evil people ever, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who, given an army to command in that time period would have acted similarly. Just because a person doesn't have the means to carry out their evil plans doesn't mean that they aren't evil.
According to the logic in this topic, the most evil guy in the history of mankind is God. He killed the entire earth's population except like four people or something!
From: Takfloyd_mkII__ | #023 According to the logic in this topic, the most evil guy in the history of mankind is God. He killed the entire earth's population except like four people or something! God's not human and is not universally agreed upon as real. Freeza's probably more evil than Hitler or God since he caused the near extinction of two races on screen.
Wait, so indirectly ordering the deaths of six million people is less evil than directly killing 30?
Closer to 10 million actually. 6 million is just the number of Jews. He also had a particular dislike for black people, disabled people, and generally anyone that wasn't like him.
According to the logic in this topic, the most evil guy in the history of mankind is God. He killed the entire earth's population except like four people or something!
Hitler was the most recent and most recordable most evil person.
Many people before him (a la pre-1800) were much more evil. The further back you go I'd say the more evil people got, with there not being ways to catch most people.
A lot of the deaths under Mao resulted from incompetent policies rather than pure malice. Not to say there wasn't people killed on purpose, there was a lot, but if you are talking about purely evil intentions then not all of those would go under that umbrella.
I've always wondered what it'd be like to go to Germany and go through their school system from elementary to high school.
What kind of opinion do they teach their German children to have of Hitler? It can't be all that bad. Not as bad as the US teaches their children to have.
Impossible to say if he's the most evil person ever... He's probably not... He just the person among evil people in general that has been in the best position to cause the biggest amount of human suffering and general carnage in history so far... But I'm pretty sure there are people out there that in a similar position would be much worse...
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It didn't help that shortly after the war ended, Stalin yoinked the plans for the A-bomb, and then no one would be messing with him or Russia for a very long time. Before that, yeah
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I've always wondered what it'd be like to go to Germany and go through their school system from elementary to high school.
What kind of opinion do they teach their German children to have of Hitler? It can't be all that bad. Not as bad as the US teaches their children to have.
It's MUCH worse, actually.
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Hitler isn't just responsible for the Holocaust, but also the destruction of Germany, the European front of World War II and Communism's near take over of the continent.
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Like, as much as I don't want to be a holocaust denier or whatever, the whole thing just seems kind of "convenient".
I just feel like it's too..."movie-like", y'know? History is written by the victor as has been said in this topic, and it seems very convenient that in one of the greatest conflicts in human history, the guy who lost just so happened to also be the most evil person ever, or something. It makes the actions of the allies seem "right".
It's kind of a vague, unformed thought in my mind because I don't necessarily think Hitler didn't do these things, but the whole thing seems to have been painted like "the good guys won", and real-life is rarely ever that black-and-white.
Like, as much as I don't want to be a holocaust denier or whatever, the whole thing just seems kind of "convenient".
I just feel like it's too..."movie-like", y'know? History is written by the victor as has been said in this topic, and it seems very convenient that in one of the greatest conflicts in human history, the guy who lost just so happened to also be the most evil person ever, or something. It makes the actions of the allies seem "right".
It's kind of a vague, unformed thought in my mind because I don't necessarily think Hitler didn't do these things, but the whole thing seems to have been painted like "the good guys won", and real-life is rarely ever that black-and-white.
The Soviets committed many atrocities in Eastern Europe and the Western Allies have Dresden.
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Good post by XIII_rocks. I like it when people think for themselves.
"Most evil" is a dumb thing to say. It's not like comparing five apples you just ate. There are countless evil people history doesn't even keep a record of.
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Hell, Canada perfected the art of firebombing cities in the wars. Course, virtually nobody hears about Harris the Butcher, despite the very large number of civilians killed in his bombings. Thing is, even if every side of the war was evil to some degree, some were more so than others. We can't just write off our own atrocities, but all the evidence shows that theirs were worse. So yeah >_>
Like, as much as I don't want to be a holocaust denier or whatever, the whole thing just seems kind of "convenient".
I just feel like it's too..."movie-like", y'know? History is written by the victor as has been said in this topic, and it seems very convenient that in one of the greatest conflicts in human history, the guy who lost just so happened to also be the most evil person ever, or something. It makes the actions of the allies seem "right".
It's kind of a vague, unformed thought in my mind because I don't necessarily think Hitler didn't do these things, but the whole thing seems to have been painted like "the good guys won", and real-life is rarely ever that black-and-white.
Considering the allies with their "right" actions completely obliterated two cities right after they defeated "the most evil person" ever I wouldn't really call them angels or depicted as such in history
Sometimes things seem iffy and I'm a person that 'thinks for himself' (really who doesn't? just because you're a rational person doesn't give you the right to believe in far fetched conspiracy theories. not that I'm accusing you of this XIII, far from it even), but considering Hitler really didn't shy away from hating Jews and other "different" people and there's factual evidence all over the place this seems like a no-brainer
Like, as much as I don't want to be a holocaust denier or whatever, the whole thing just seems kind of "convenient".
I just feel like it's too..."movie-like", y'know? History is written by the victor as has been said in this topic, and it seems very convenient that in one of the greatest conflicts in human history, the guy who lost just so happened to also be the most evil person ever, or something. It makes the actions of the allies seem "right".
It's kind of a vague, unformed thought in my mind because I don't necessarily think Hitler didn't do these things, but the whole thing seems to have been painted like "the good guys won", and real-life is rarely ever that black-and-white. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Holocaust_denial
There's probably some exaggeration and demonization, but I wouldn't say there's any reason to believe that Hitler was not evil or that the Holocaust didn't happen.