Talk:Ukrainian Holocaust

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[edit] Usage of the term

I would like to raise the topic about the usage of this term to see the thoughts of others. Please look at the the Prussian Holocaust article's talk page, particularly the chapter Talk:Prussian_Holocaust#Making_it_more_of_an_article_about_the_TERM_itself and a couple of paragraphs above. Same reasons apply here. I would prefer this entry to be made about the usage of the term "the UH" for these events. The current way (redirect) implies not only the existing usage of the term, but its usage among the serious authors. If it is only used by fringe groups and fringe authors, the article should be about the usage, similarly to the current form of the Prussian Holocaust article. If I am mistaken, and the term is used in serious works as an alternative name for Holodomor, we can keep the redirect. But even in the latter case, I would prefer to see a separate article with a brief description of the usage of this less common term with a prominent link to Holodomor. I hope other editors won't find my comments offensive. Irpen 01:51, May 24, 2005 (UTC)

Since nothing was done after my entry to a talk page and I don't feel competent to write an article about the term, I feel it is appropriate to place a TitleDisputed tag on it. Please respond at this talk page if disagree. I do not mean at all to diminish the Holodomor tragedy itself as could be clear from my own edits to the Holodomor article. Irpen 02:41, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)
I think it's sufficient to redirect to Holodomor, and simply mention this term in that article. In fact, I'll do just that. Feel free to edit if you don't think I've covered it satisfactorily. —Michael Z. 2005-06-16 21:00 Z

I mostly agree with you. Mentioning it in Holodomor in neutral/critical context is appropriate. In the meanwhile, I made this article ("Ukrainian Holocaust") to say something about the usage of the term rather than being a simple redirect. Please correct my version as you see fit. Regards, --Irpen 22:16, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

Looks good; I was just being lazy by not starting this article. —Michael Z. 2005-06-17 01:03 Z

[edit] Restoring the redirect to Holodomor

Please do not restore the redirect to Holodomor without discussing this first. U.H. is not a legitimately used term for "Holodomor" and a redirect would imply that it might be. The existence of the U.H. article is questionable, I agree. But if there is a WP entry for it, it should make clear to the reader that it is not an acceptable alternative term, as a redirect might suggest. This term exists and is used mostly by Ukrainian nationalist groups, as can be confirmed by google test. This article in its current form is not an attempt to push it. It clearly says about the term being contoversial and the article could use some improvement to say this better. I would have voted support, for this article's VfD, but the experience tells me that such topics sail smoothly through VfD and remain undeleted. I wrote the article (was a redirect NOT created by me) as a workaround solution to the problem. The problem itself is that many users automatically vote keep on similar topics due to an understandable sentiment without actually trying to figure out the problem. --Irpen 00:19, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

OK. I got the idea. mikka (t) 00:40, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
Thanks, then I will delete the "TitleDisputed" tag. Feel free to restore if you think it's warranted. --Irpen 01:07, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Use of the term in mainstream history

FYI: in A History of Ukraine, Magocsi includes a three-page excerpt from the English translation of Wasyl Hryshko, The Ukrainian Holocaust of 1933 (1983). Magocsi titles this section in his book "Ukraine's Holocaust: The Great Famine of 1933" (page 559), although he generally refers to the Holodomor as the "Great Famine". It seems to me that he is using the phrase "Ukraine's Holocaust" as a simile to convey the enormity of this event's effect upon the Ukrainian nation, and not to minimize the tragedies of others. He specifically mentions the mainly-German Volga and mainly-Don Cossack Kuban’ in reference to the famine, but the book deals with the history of the territory of modern Ukraine (and quite intentionally not about Ukrainians per se). I'm not an expert on Ukrainian historiography, but it seems to me that Magocsi is a respected mainstream historian.

  • Paul Robert Magocsi. A History of Ukraine. Toronto: University of Toronto Press (1996) ISBN 0-8020-0830-5.

Thanks for the info. It is indeed interesting. However, you noted that Magocsi himself uses the "Famine" and "Holodomor" term as a main name. I do agree that "Holocaust" is sometimes used but it is not used as the name. So, the current solution (Holodomor as a name of the main article with U.H. being a term article) is the optimal one I think. It doesn't mean that my version cannot be imroved of course. Please also note, that the diaspora literature's view is stronger than that of other historians and may create a wrong impression of what't the mainstream and what's not. "Holocaust" clearly implies an ethnic genocide against Ukrainians. Recent expansion of Holodomor and discussion at its talk shows that the issue is far from being agreed despite the official statement of Verkhovna Rada on the issue. --Irpen 00:06, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Of course, and I'm not suggesting any changes to the current arrangement of these articles. Just adding a point to the pertinent information. I'm gradually working on my reading, in anticipation of contributing some more, as always. Cheers. —Michael Z. 2005-09-19 14:04 Z

[edit] Stub category

This article isn't about the history of the Holodomor, but how it's been treated by historians and lobby groups with differing points of view—its historiography (roughly, history of history). So I categorized it as a history stub, hoping that someone who is familiar with those categories may move it if there's a more specific, more appropriate category. —Michael Z. 2005-11-29 18:51 Z

Well, I didn't think it was a stub because it is an article about the term and it gives a reasonable amount of info about the term itself. Of course it can be expanded like any article, but it was compelte enough to call it stub. Perhaps, dab was not a bad idea. I am not sure myslef. --Irpen 18:57, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Of course it is a disambig page and not a stub. It refers the usage of the loaded term in two totally different meanings: for Ukr Holoc-1 we already have Holodomor article. For Ukr Holoc-1, if someone decides to write a specialized Holocaust (Ukraine) about Holocaust in the territory of Ukraine, no problemo. Still, this page must say nothing more than it says now. mikka (t) 19:07, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Wow, the things that get started by an innocent stub notice!
Anyway, this is not a Wikipedia:disambiguation page, since it contains encyclopedic content (although it may clarify ambiguity). A disambiguation page is just an interface element for finding an article, and ideally has no content except the links. —Michael Z. 2005-11-29 20:40 Z

[edit] Irpen's solution

Actually, the place of this text is in the Holodomor article: it mentions Ukrainian Genocide, whereas "Ukrainian Holocaust" is used even more often (by google (excluding 'pedia); still marginally as to compared to the main term "holodomor": 'caust: 874, 'cide: 687, 'mor: 42,000). So I suggest to move this piece into main article and put disambig back here. mikka (t) 20:07, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Let me respectfully disagree here. Irpen's solution works fine for me. --Ghirlandajo 20:09, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Mikka, this was discussed earlier here some months ago and you agreed, I think. I used a similar solution to end an edit war regarding the Prussian Holocaust article by making it an article about the term. Some terms by themselves deserve the articles on their own and, especially, such strong and controversial terms. You remember that there was an edit war about the Evacuation of East Prussia and Prussian Holocaust. People where pasting the content to one making the other a redirect and back and forth. You did an excellent job making a reasonable evacuation article on such a controvercial subject but the war was raging until I wrote a Prussian Holocaust term article. Similarly here, a redirect or a DAB may imply that this is just an alternative name for Holodomor. Now, we have an article about the term that simply explains its usage, a completely legitimate WP article. --Irpen 20:21, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

As for the google counts, little usage of Holodomor is only due to its being a non-English word. The ideal solution would be to have the article titled Ukrainian famine but moving it there would ignite to many oilfields, I think. --Irpen 20:58, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
You misread my google counts: holodimor is max usage, not min. mikka (t) 22:20, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
It would have to be more specific, like Ukrainian famine, 1932-33, Ukrainian Great Famine, or Great Famine of Ukraine. I've seen varieties of these used in respectable publications. But the proper noun Holodomor serves quite well enough that it's probably not worth changing at this time. —Michael Z. 2005-11-29 21:36 Z
No disagreement here. mikka (t) 22:20, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] How about Some References?

Russian historians tend to criticize this Ukrainian view for what they claim to be an attempt to appropriate the larger-scale tragedy of collectivization in the USSR as their own national terror-famine, thus exploiting it for political purposes.

Which Russian historians? And why only Russian? This seems to be not clear. Of course, Soviet historians denied everything. Otherwise they would learn about Holodomor first hand in labor camps. The sentence will be removed if no references are provided. Wikipedia forbids original research.--Andrew Alexander 05:59, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

There is no denial of "everything". And quite a few russian historians learned something in labor camps firsthand. Exactly for this reason "claim to be an attempt to appropriate". Russians had their own share, but poison-gassing of peasants during Tambov Rebellion supervised by Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko is not called Ukrainian-Bolshevik Russian Genocide. mikka (t) 06:24, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
Whatever. Please provide some references. Thanks.--Andrew Alexander 16:22, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Genocide

I've added this article to Category:Genocide, which was quickly removed by Ghirlandajo (talk • contribs). I added the category, because the concept of Ukrainian Holocaust treats the Holodomor as a genocide. Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 09:13, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

This article is not about the events that were or were not a Genocide. This article is about the term usage. Events of the Famine and whether the Famine was a Genocide or not are discussed at length in Holodomor. There is even a separate section there on this very issue. --Irpen 09:15, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
And in what way is the term used? To describe whether or not what happened constitutes a genocide. So why shouldn't it be in Category:Genocide? Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 09:18, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Because there is no consensus on the issue. Pushing consensus in mainspace is a mark of disruptive editing. Take care, Ghirla -трёп- 09:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Because this is not an article about a Genocide. It is an article about the term. --Irpen 09:32, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Where does it say that Category:Genocide should only contain articles about genocides? If it did, it would have been called Category:Genocides, not Category:Genocide. The category contains many articles, all somehow relating to the concept of genocide. Some on actual genocides, some for instance on notable books. Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 09:36, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Holodomor is not a genocide because a) It affected non-Ukrainian territories and is thus not base on ethnic considerations, b) because it is not recognized as genocide by the UN. Ukraine tried to recognize it as genocide (last time just a couple of weeks ago), but was AFAIK unsuccessful (and rightly so, ибо нех). -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 12:15, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps it's not a genocide. But this article deals with the view that it was a genocide. Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 12:19, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Of course it does, but that does not deserve a category:geno in my opinion. An example: if I write a book about an American president, would the article go into Category:American presidents? Probably not. The same kind of stuff applies here. -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 13:29, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
But if you write a book about a genocide, it would go in Category:Genocide ("A Problem from Hell": America and the Age of Genocide). If you were to establish a notable organization, it would go in (Human Rights First). If you would be a prominent thinker about genocide, you would go in (Raphael Lemkin). If you were to commit a genocide, you would go in (Lothar von Trotha and Lord's Resistance Army). So why can't this go in? Please also not that the category is called Category:Genocide, not Category:Genocides. In the latter case, your comparison to Category:Presidents of the United States (note the plural here) would have been correct. In this case it isn't. Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 14:51, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Grafikm, yours is a silly claim: Holodomor is not genocide b/c non-Ukrainian territories were targeted hence (according to you) ethnic considerations were not the basis, and therefore Holodomor is not genocide. This line of reasoning ignores the numbers of those killed, which even by conservative estimates are around 4.5 million dead. With the majority starved to death being Ukrainians, ethnicity was a factor (81.3% of the victims were ethnic Ukrainians, 4.5% Russians, 1.4% Jews and 1.1% were Poles). Regarding the UN's failure to recognize Holodomor as genocide, I can assure you -- the UN will never pass such a resolution, not because it denies that Holodomor is genocide, but simply because of the veto power held by Russia. When it comes to accepting responsibility for the Soviet crimes, Moscow is less than forthcoming. Afterall, the last stage of genocide is denial.
Definition from Genocide: Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. --Riurik (discuss) 05:08, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Some corrections.

First, the UN resolution on recognition of the Holodomor as Genocide, if ever passed, will be voted by the General Assembly, not the Security Council. Russia has no veto power over the GA resolutions. As an example, GA has passed plenty of anti-Israel resolutions, which would have never made its way through the Security Council for an obvious reason. The other side of the medal is that GA resolutions, unlike those of the SC, are not enforceable.

Second, percentage-wise, the nation whose largest share perished in 1932-33 Soviet Famine were the Kazakhs, not the Ukrainians. That the issue of Kazakh Holocaust is never raised owes to the lesser vocality and influence of the Kazakh emigre community.

And finally, Grafik's, mine, Riurik's or Aecis' view of the issue belongs to the talk page where we exchange them. Not only there is no consensus of the international community on the issue, there isn't also a consensus among the scholarly community within the mainstream. What is agreed upon, except fringe denialists, is the catastrophic scale of events. More or less agreed too is the fact the Soviet government is largely responsible for the Famine (bad weather theories now slowly moved to the fringe too). There is no agreement at all about the genocidal intent of the authorities, whose policies are responsible for the Famine. All the evidence that support this theory is circumstantial. Documental evidence is abundant about the criminal orders of grain confiscation, but not a single document surfaced since the archive's opening, about the intent to target the Ukrainians specifically for the extinction. This has been discussed at length before. The question remains unresolved. Both views need to be presented and they are presented in Holodomor. Categorizing the articles to the Cat:Genocide prejudges the conclusion of this discussion.

It is sad that most of editing of these two articles is POV-pushing easy edits (add cat Genocide, rm cat Genocide). Several editors, myself included, spent hours on writing the actual text and sourcing it. I suggest anyone interested in the horrors of that famine being well covered in Wikipedia, to spend some time studying the sources, abundantly cited, and help developing the article. This Genociding/unGenociding category changes is exactly the easy politicization of the real and true catastrophe, the phenomenon Himka so excellently commented on (see article for his quote). --Irpen 05:39, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

The politicization is not in adding or removing a category. The politicization is in ripping comments and actions completely out of their context into something that was neither said nor done. Let me ask you two things:
Does the term Ukrainian Holocaust cover a belief that Holodomor was a genocide?
Is the Category:Genocide for such articles?
The answer to both questions is yes. Have I ever said or done anything that implied that I myself felt that the Holodomor either was or wasn't a genocide? I haven't, because I'm not in a position to tell. All I can say is that the term "Ukrainian Holocaust" relates to a set of beliefs and opinions, that view the Holodomor as a deliberate act of genocide. Whether this view is correct is irrelevant. But as such, this article is related to other articles about genocide. Simply because it's about genocide, not necessarily about a genocide. Aecis I'm too busy acting like I'm not naive. 07:56, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Irpen, true, I was wrong: veto only in the SC. However, Russia still exercises tremendous influence over other member states who would rather not piss it off by voting for a recognition of an event that happened a long time ago and from which they have nothing to gain. In such a resolution, Russia would vote NO together with its puppet states. It is also unfortunate and tragic that Kazakhs suffered from Moscow's crime as well, but when the Holodomor is denied with its magnitude then other crimes committed by the totalitarian regime will never be recognized either. --Riurik (discuss) 19:59, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

To Aecis, this article is not about the POV whether the Holodomor was the Genocide. This and the opposing POV are presented in Holodomor. This article is an article about the term. This is all the article is about, not the events but the term only. It grew out of the former redirect to Holodomor. I would not have created this redirect since the sole purpose of the redirects is to take the user to the article he is likely looking for. Highly unlikely anyone would have entered the "UH" into the search string, meaning to get to the events we are talking about. Ukrainian famine, Famine in Ukraine are likely strings, along with the Holodomor. The term Ukrainian Holocaust may actually be used for someone looking for the info on the Holocaust events in Ukraine. When I saw the redirect to the Holodomor already there, I saw it wrong to just leave it as is, as this would imply that UH is the sufficiently accepted and legitimate alternative name for the Holodomor while it is not. Because the term is occasionally used in this meaning, I wrote this short article about the term and the Ukrainian Holocaust (disambiguation) page to minimize the confusion. As such, this is nothing but the article about the term. All discussion on the events themselves belongs to Holodomor and I invite you to help us further develop that article.

To Riurik, you cannot seriously argue that Russia has more international influence than the US. Nevertheless, GA resolutions on the situation in the Middle East highly critical of Israel pass almost yearly despite the US opposition.

I refer you to the opinion of Stanislav Kulchytsky, one of the leading authorities on the issue who studied in extensively. BTW, his personal opinion is that Holodomor was a Genocide. He blames the lack of headway in Ukrainian attempts to gain the international recognition of the fact of Genocide to the undue politicization of the issue that substitutes the objective scholarly approach. See "Голодомор як геноцид" chapter of his article in Mirror Weekly. John-Paul Himka, another respected Ukrainian historians, raises similar concerns in his paper cited in this article.

To your second point about "denial". No, Holodomor is not denied by any serious scholar these days, neither by any country. The scale or the reasons are not disputed. Please do not confuse the disagreement of the applicability of the Genocide classification to these events with the denial of their existence. The applicability question reduces to a difficult issue of proving the Genocidal intent of the Stalinist government to target the Ukrainians, as a nation, for extinction. This is a difficult thing to prove if the entire proof has to be based on the circumstantial evidence. We have to leave this to scholars and watch their debate summarizing its developments in Wikipedia articles. This is exactly what I am trying to do. Help would be appreciated. --Irpen 20:52, 11 October 2006 (UTC)


Irpen, the denial comment was about the denial of Holodomor as genocide. Holodomor was genocide (IMO and those of many others) The fact that millions of people died at the hand of the communists is not challenged, although it was covered up by the Soviet Union. Whether Russia has more influence than the U.S. was never part of the discussion. Russia, however, is opposed to have Holodomor recognized as genocide, and potential states who may disagree with it opt not to because there is nothing to gain by this recognition, and everything to gain by supporting Russia. Comparing anti-Israel GA resolutions to Holodomor is not applicable, as the former is a current issue with many vested interests and the latter is lost in the annals of history (long suppressed AND denied by Kremlin). Finally, to this day, Russia has not declassified files about Holodomor. As yourself, I too welcome critical work on Holodomor and other articles.--Riurik (discuss) 23:56, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

That Holodomor was a Genocide in your opinion and those of many others by itself would justify such categorizing only if those others would have meant the concensus or near-concensus of the international scholarship. This is not the case. You are incorrect about files' de-classification . I've seen some reviewes of works by Kulchytsky and Weatcroft where their articles/books are commended as extremely valuable specifically because they appeared after the opening of the archives (a fundamental work of Conquest was published while the archives were still closed) (see this link). How much influence Russia has on the votes of other UN members is the matter of opinion. Yours, mine or any Wikipedian's opinion on the matter has little sway. At the same time, respected scholars (see above) blame the non-recognition not on the Russian influence but on the undue politicization of the issue. Unlike ours, their opinions are both notable and valuable. --Irpen 00:13, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rotten article

This has to be one of the worst articles regarding the Ukrainian Holocaust I have ever seen. The person who made this Holocaust possible, Stalin, isn't even mentioned in this article. You've got to be joking. Those of you who know about this topic have an obligation to add to this article. I'm disgusted. Jtpaladin 21:07, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

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