2/3rds of Millennials & Gen-Zers don't know what the Holocaust was

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

-- George Santayana, Reason in Common Sense

Almost two-thirds of millennials, Gen Z don’t know that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, survey finds

Almost two-thirds of millennials and Gen Zers don’t know that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, and almost half can’t name a single concentration camp, an alarming new survey on Holocaust knowledge has found.

The survey demonstrated wide gaps in younger American’s knowledge of the genocide while also showing a concerning 15% of millennials and Gen Zers thought holding neo-Nazi views was acceptable.

“How much of that is based on genuine understanding of neo-Nazis principles and how much is based on ignorance is hard to tell. Either of them is very disturbing,” said Gideon Taylor, president of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, which commissioned the survey.

“If people can’t name Auschwitz … that’s something that’s deeply concerning. I don’t think there is any greater symbol of man’s depravity in recent history than Auschwitz,” he added.

The survey is the fifth in a series that looks at people’s knowledge of Holocaust history worldwide as well as education around the genocide.

The survey of 1,000 18- to 39-year-olds in all 50 states also provided the first state-by-state breakdown of Holocaust knowledge in the U.S. In New York, for example, which ranked among the bottom 10 states in an analysis of Holocaust knowledge, nearly 20% of millennials and Gen Zers incorrectly believe that Jews caused the Holocaust.

That sort of denial and distortion around the causes of the Holocaust “is a form of anti-Semitism,” said Gretchen Skidmore, the director of education initiatives for the Levine Family Institute for Holocaust Education at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The results come amid a rise in anti-Semitic incidents around the U.S. in recent years. The Anti-Defamation League said in May that it had recorded an all-time high of anti-Semitic incidents in 2019 since it tracking of such events began in 1979.

Another concerning finding in the Claims Conference survey: Almost half of respondents had seen social media posts denying or distorting facts about the Holocaust, and more than half said they had seen Nazi symbols in their community or online.

Taylor said these results demonstrate how the internet “has given a voice to and amplified Holocaust denial in a way that was unimaginable just a few years ago.”...