Editing Reductio ad Hitlerum

{{Short description|Logical fallacy}}
{{italic title}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2023}}
{{Use American English|date=November 2023}}
{{for|the general concept|Nazi analogies}}
[[File:Portrait Photo of Adolf Hitler.jpg|thumb|[[Adolf Hitler]], the dictator of [[Nazi Germany]] from 1933 to 1945]]
'''{{lang|la|Reductio ad Hitlerum}}''' ([[Latin]] for "reduction to Hitler"), also known as '''playing the Nazi card''',<ref>{{cite news |last=Solomon |first=Zachary |date=2015-09-03 |title=Godwin's Law, or Playing the Nazi Card |url=https://www.jta.org/jewniverse/2015/godwins-law-or-playing-the-nazi-card |access-date=21 April 2020 |work=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |archive-date=6 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200606174658/https://www.jta.org/jewniverse/2015/godwins-law-or-playing-the-nazi-card |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Lederman |first=Noah |date=1 March 2010 |title=Playing the Nazi Card |url=https://fair.org/home/playing-the-nazi-card/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200324214658/https://fair.org/home/playing-the-nazi-card/ |archive-date=2020-03-24 |access-date=21 April 2020 |website=FAIR}}</ref> is an attempt to invalidate someone else's argument on the basis that the same idea was promoted or practised by [[Adolf Hitler]] or the [[Nazi Party]].<ref name="University of Oklahoma"/> Arguments can be termed {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} if they are fallacious (e.g., arguing that because [[Adolf Hitler and vegetarianism|Hitler abstained from eating meat]] or [[Anti-tobacco movement in Nazi Germany|was against smoking]], anyone else who does so is a Nazi). Contrarily, straightforward arguments critiquing specifically fascist components of [[Nazism]] like ''[[Führerprinzip]]'' are not part of the [[association fallacy]]. 

Formulated by [[Leo Strauss]] in 1953, {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} takes its name from the term used in logic called {{lang|la|[[reductio ad absurdum]]}} ("reduction to the absurdity").<ref>Leo Strauss, ''[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Natural_Right_and_History/UwOHDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0 Natural Right and History]''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965 [1953], p. 42.</ref> According to Strauss, {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} is a type of {{lang|la|[[ad hominem]]}}, {{lang|la|[[argumentum ad misericordiam|ad misericordiam]]}}, or a [[fallacy of irrelevance]]. The suggested rationale is one of [[association fallacy|guilt by association]]. It is a tactic often used to derail arguments because [[Nazi comparison|such comparisons]] tend to distract and anger the opponent.<ref name="FallacyFiles1">{{cite web |url=http://www.fallacyfiles.org/adnazium.html |title=Logical Fallacy: The Hitler Card |work=Fallacy Files |year=2004 |last=Curtis |first=Gary N. |access-date=2007-10-08 |archive-date=10 May 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120510003443/http://fallacyfiles.org/adnazium.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

== Definition ==
{{lang|la|Reductio ad Hitlerum}} is a type of [[association fallacy]].<ref name="FallacyFiles1" /><ref name="FallacyFiles2">{{cite web |last=Curtis |first=Gary N. |year=2004 |title=Logical Fallacy: Guilt by Association |url=http://www.fallacyfiles.org/guiltbya.html |access-date=2007-10-08 |work=Fallacy Files |archive-date=5 June 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190605091022/http://www.fallacyfiles.org/guiltbya.html |url-status=live }}</ref>{{BSN|reason=The current sources are insufficiently reliable ([[WP:NOTRS]]). [[WP:USERG]]|date=April 2025}} The argument is that a policy leads to—or is the same as—one advocated or implemented by [[Adolf Hitler]] or [[Nazi Germany]] and so "proves" that the original policy is undesirable. Another type of {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} is asking a question of the form "You know who else...?" with the deliberate intent of impugning a certain idea or action by implying Hitler had that idea or performed such an action.<ref>{{cite web |title=You know who else ___? Origin? – catchphrase meme |url=http://ask.metafilter.com/71925/You-know-who-else-Origin |access-date=2013-01-10 |publisher=Ask MetaFilter |archive-date=8 June 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130608054207/http://ask.metafilter.com/71925/You-know-who-else-Origin |url-status=live }}</ref>

A comparison to Hitler or [[Nazism]] is not a {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} if it illuminates an argument instead of causing distraction from it.<ref>{{aut|Gabriel H. Teninbaum}}, [https://ssrn.com/abstract=1445423 ''Reduction ad Hitlerum'': Trumping the Judicial Nazi Card]. ''[[Michigan State Law Review]]'', Vol. 2009, pp. 541–578, 2009</ref> Straightforward comparisons can be used to criticize fascist components of Nazism such as the [[Führerprinzip]]. However, one could argue fallaciously that because [[Adolf Hitler and vegetarianism|Hitler abstained from eating meat]] or was [[Anti-tobacco movement in Nazi Germany|opposed to smoking]], anyone else who has these opinions so is a Nazi.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Curtis |first=Gary N. |title=Logical Fallacy: The Hitler Card |url=https://www.fallacyfiles.org/adnazium.html |access-date=2022-08-04 |website=Fallacy Files |archive-date=12 August 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220812183559/http://fallacyfiles.org/adnazium.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

== History ==
The phrase {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} is first known to have been used in an article written by [[University of Chicago]] professor [[Leo Strauss]] for ''Measure: A Critical Journal'' in spring 1951,<ref name="Hutchins1951">{{cite book|last=Hutchins|first=Robert Maynard|title=Measure: A Critical Journal|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6z3WAAAAMAAJ|access-date=5 February 2014|year=1951|publisher=H. Regnery Company}}</ref> although it was made famous in a book by Strauss published in 1953<ref name="University of Oklahoma">{{cite web|url=http://www.ou.edu/cas/psc/bookstrauss.htm|title=Natural Right and History|work=University of Oklahoma|year=2008|access-date=2008-08-11|archive-date=2010-02-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100224172232/http://www.ou.edu/cas/psc/bookstrauss.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref> ''Natural Right and History'', Chapter II:

<blockquote>
In following this movement towards its end we shall inevitably reach a point beyond which the scene is darkened by the shadow of Hitler. Unfortunately, it does not go without saying that in our examination we must avoid the fallacy that in the last decades has frequently been used as a substitute for the {{lang|la|reductio ad absurdum}}: the {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}}. A view is not refuted by the fact that it happens to have been shared by Hitler.
</blockquote>

The phrase was derived from the [[logical argument]] termed [[Reductio ad absurdum]]. The {{lang|la|argumentum}} variant takes its form from the names of many classic fallacies such as {{lang|la|argumentum ad hominem}}. The {{lang|la|ad Nazium}} variant may be further humorously derived from {{lang|la|[[Ad nauseam|argumentum ad nauseam]]}}.

== Limits to classification as a fallacy ==
Historian [[Daniel Goldhagen]], who had written about [[the Holocaust]], argues that not all comparisons to Hitler and Nazism are logical fallacies since if they all were, there would be nothing to learn from the events that resulted in the Holocaust. He argues in his book ''[[Hitler's Willing Executioners]]'' that many people who were complicit or active participants in the Holocaust and subsequently in [[fascist]] and [[neo-Nazi]] movements have manipulated the historical narrative to escape blame or to deny aspects of the Holocaust.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Miller |first=Mark J. |title=Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust |url=https://www.proquest.com/openview/8690dfba45e051dab6cbf8b92ef45f3b/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=589 |journal=IMR: International Immigration Review |publisher=[[Center for Migration Studies]] |publication-place=Staten Island, N.Y. |publication-date=Fall 1997 |volume=31 |issue=3 |pages=752–754 |url-access=subscription |id={{ProQuest| }} |archive-date=21 January 2025 |access-date=24 December 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250121161841/https://www.proquest.com/openview/8690dfba45e051dab6cbf8b92ef45f3b/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=589 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>"Eichmann was Outrageously Stupid". Hannah Arendt: The Last Interview: And Other Conversations. November 9, 1964.</ref>{{Better source needed|reason=The current sources are insufficiently reliable ([[WP:NOTRS]]). "Ourtageous" and "funny" do not appear in transcript of hannah arendt's last interview. IMR source had wrong author listed prior to today. "No PDF available" means no way to verify accuracy.|date=April 2025}} Claims that allegations of [[antisemitism]] are ''reductio ad Hitlerum'' have also been employed by [[David Irving]], a British [[Holocaust denier]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-irving-holocaust-denial-neo-nazi-alt-right-london-forum-meeting-auschwitz-hitler-revisionist-a7719291.html |title=Undercover at a secret 'neo-Nazi' meeting with Holocaust denier David Irving |date=7 May 2017 |first=Matt |last=Broomfield |newspaper=[[The Independent]] |publisher=Independent News |access-date=22 Nov 2019 |archive-date=30 January 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200130164118/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-irving-holocaust-denial-neo-nazi-alt-right-london-forum-meeting-auschwitz-hitler-revisionist-a7719291.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 2000, [[Thomas Fleming (political writer)|Thomas Fleming]] claimed that ''reductio ad Hitlerum'' was being used by his opponents against his values:
<blockquote>
Leo Strauss called it the {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}}. If Hitler liked neoclassical art, that means that classicism in every form is Nazi; if Hitler wanted to strengthen the German family, that makes the traditional family (and its defenders) Nazi; if Hitler spoke of the "nation" or the "folk", then any invocation of nationality, ethnicity, or even folkishness is Nazi ...<ref>Thomas Fleming, editor, ''Chronicles'' (Rockford, Illinois), May 2000, p. 11.</ref>
</blockquote>

== Antecedents ==
Although named for Hitler, the logical fallacy existed before [[World War II]]. Other individuals from history were used as stand-ins for evil.<ref name="palmer">{{cite web |author=Brian Palmer |date=October 4, 2011 |title=Before Hitler, Who Was the Stand-In for Pure Evil? |url=http://www.slate.com/articles/briefing/explainer/2011/10/hank_williams_jr_firing_who_was_the_rhetorical_worst_person_in_h.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231126113321/https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/10/hank-williams-jr-firing-who-was-the-rhetorical-worst-person-in-history-before-hitler.html |archive-date=2023-11-26 |access-date=November 27, 2014 |work=Slate}}</ref> Author [[Tom Holland (author)|Tom Holland]] compares the use of Hitler as the standard of evil with earlier invocations of the [[Devil]] (such as the phrase '[[Deal with the Devil]]').<ref>{{Citation |title=Does God Exist? A Conversation with Tom Holland, Stephen Meyer, and Douglas Murray |date=2022-10-17 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2u54a1FL28 |access-date=2023-01-22 |at=26 minutes |publisher=[[Hoover Institution]] |language=en |via=[[YouTube]]}}</ref> During the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries, the [[Pharaoh of the Exodus|Pharaoh of the Book of Exodus]] was commonly considered the most villainous person in history.<ref name=palmer/> During the years prior to the [[American Civil War]], [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolitionists]] referred to enslavers as modern-day Pharaohs. After [[VE Day]], Pharaoh continued to appear in the speeches of social reformers like [[Martin Luther King Jr.]] [[Judas Iscariot]] and [[Pontius Pilate]] were also commonly held up as pure evil. However, there was no universal Hitler-like person, and different regions and times used different stand-ins.<ref name="palmer" /> In the years after the [[American Revolution]], [[King George III]] was often vilified in the United States. "King George" comparison was publicly used as recently as 1992 by [[Pat Buchanan]] when referring to president [[George H. W. Bush]], in the course of the [[1992 United States presidential election|U.S. presidential campaign]].<ref>{{Cite news |date=2024-02-26 |title=Campaign Notebook |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1992/02/19/campaign-notebook/133a25fe-8ace-4244-9997-d7ebe9d81b67/ |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250424222501/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1992/02/19/campaign-notebook/133a25fe-8ace-4244-9997-d7ebe9d81b67/ |archive-date=2025-04-24 |access-date=2024-03-17 |newspaper=[[Washington Post]] |language=en-US |issn=0190-8286}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Cooper |first=Matthew |last2=Carney |first2=James |title=Will Pat Stay Put? – September 20, 1999 |url=https://edition.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/1999/09/13/buchanan.gop.html |access-date=2024-03-17 |website=CNN |archive-date=17 March 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240317191511/https://edition.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/1999/09/13/buchanan.gop.html |url-status=live }}</ref> During the American Civil War, some [[Confederate States of America|Confederates]] called Lincoln a "modern Pharaoh".<ref name=palmer/>

== Invocations ==
{{see also|Nazi gun control argument}}

In 1991, Michael André Bernstein alleged {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} over a full-page advertisement placed in ''[[The New York Times]]'' by the [[Lubavitch]] community after the [[Crown Heights riot]] under the heading "This Year ''[[Kristallnacht]]'' Took Place on August 19th Right Here in Crown Heights". [[Henry Schwarzschild]], who had witnessed ''Kristallnacht'', wrote to ''The New York Times'' that "however ugly were the anti-Semitic slogans and the assaultive behavior of people in the streets [during the Crown Heights riots] ... one thing that clearly did not take place was a ''Kristallnacht''".<ref>{{cite web |last=Bernstein |first=Michael André |year=1994 |title=Foregone Conclusions |url=http://www.escholarship.org/editions/view?docId=ft3x0nb2ns |access-date=2011-07-07 |website=[[University of California Press]] |publisher=Escholarship.org |quote=The Lubavitcher community itself, in the form of the 'Crown Heights Emergency Fund,' placed a full-page advertisement in ''The New York Times'' on September 20, 1991, under the heading 'This Year Kristallnacht Took Place on August 19th Right Here in Crown Heights.' Their version of Leo Strauss's {{lang|la|reductio ad Hitlerum}} was rightly perceived by those who had been in Germany on Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938) as an outrageous comparison. |archive-date=13 May 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200513193731/https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft3x0nb2ns |url-status=live }}</ref>

Since [[Anti-tobacco movement in Nazi Germany|Hitler was against smoking]], some in the tobacco industry invoked the argument to compare those who are [[Anti-smoking|against smoking]] to Nazis.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Schneider |first1=N. K |last2=Glantz |first2=S. A |title='Nicotine Nazis strike again': a brief analysis of the use of Nazi rhetoric in attacking tobacco control advocacy |journal=Tobacco Control |date=1 October 2008 |volume=17 |issue=5 |pages=291–296 |doi=10.1136/tc.2007.024653|pmid=18818222 |pmc=2736555 }}</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Donald Trump and fascism]]
* [[Godwin's law]]
* [[List of fallacies]]
* [[Red-baiting]] (''reductio ad Stalinum'')
* [[Weaponization of antisemitism]]

== References ==
{{reflist|30em}}

== External links ==
* {{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10618638|title=Is it ever OK to call someone a Nazi?|publisher=BBC News|date=14 July 2010}}
* [http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/fotostrecke-60763.html Toying with Hitler and History] – slideshow by ''[[Der Spiegel]]''
* [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lincoln-mitchell/mike-huckabees-ireducto-a_b_3033369.html Mike Huckabee's reductio ad Hitlerum, Lincoln Mitchell, April 7, 2013]
* {{cite journal|last1=Harris|first1=Adam J. L.|last2=Hsu|first2=Anne S.|last3=Madsen|first3=Jens K.|title=Because Hitler did it! Quantitative tests of Bayesian argumentation using ad hominem|url=http://www.ucl.ac.uk/lagnado-lab/publications/harris/Harris_Hsu_Madsen_2012.pdf|journal=Thinking & Reasoning|volume=18|issue=3|pages=311–343|publisher=Psychology Press|access-date=14 January 2015|location=London|doi=10.1080/13546783.2012.670753|date=11 June 2012|s2cid=15921519}}
* {{cite book|last1=Scalambrino|first1=Frank|chapter=Reductio ad Hitlerum|title=Bad Arguments|year=2018|pages=212–214|doi=10.1002/9781119165811.ch44|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=9781119165811|s2cid=171609352}}

{{fallacies}}
{{Leo Strauss}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reductio ad Hitlerum}}
[[Category:1950s neologisms]]
[[Category:1953 quotations]]
[[Category:Dog Latin words and phrases]]
[[Category:Genetic fallacies]]
[[Category:Informal fallacies]]
[[Category:Nazi analogies]]
[[Category:Relevance fallacies]]
[[Category:Adolf Hitler]]
[[Category:Leo Strauss]]