Does the Holocaust refer to only the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany, or the murder of Romani, homosexuals, Slavs, etc. as well? I've seen it documented both ways, and I was wondering if there was a historical consensus on what exactly is considered the Holocaust. More details inside.

by [deleted]

I apologize in advance if this is too controversial of a question, but I was flipping through some photo books of WWII during my lunch break at the book store today, and different books had different statistics. Some had only the 6 million Jews, and others included the other ethnic groups and that total was closer to 12 million (can't remember the exact number). That got me wondering, what do historians consider the Holocaust, and is there any debate on which victims to include in it? I checked Wikipedia, and it said there is still debate on whether or not to include the Romani genocide in the Holocaust. It seems strange to me that those victims wouldn't be considered part of it as well, so I was hoping you guys could clear it up.

Also, were political prisoners considered part of the Holocaust, such as communists, or is that considered separate as well?

MikeOfThePalace

There's not any kind of official governing body to determine what is correct. Sometimes the term "Holocaust" is used to refer specifically to the Jewish genocide, sometimes it is used in a broader sense. It really depends on who is talking, and any decent historian will define the scope of what they're talking about. There are other terms that get uses as well; "Shoah" is the Hebrew name for the Jewish genocide, and "Porajmos" is the term for the Romani genocide.