I've always been fascinated by people who subscribe to "denialist" philosophies, such as the holocaust denialists with whom Fred A. Leuchter falls in with after examining the grounds of Auschwitz for traces of cyanide as portrayed in Errol Morris' Mr. Death. By "fascinated", I must clarify that I do not mean "agree with" or "admire"; I emphatically do not, in either case. I find that such philosophies make for, at the very least, disingenuous and negligent historiography and, at worst, propaganda for unsavory political viewpoints. The fascination I have stems from the fact many, many pieces of evidence that counter these oft-outrageous claims are so obviously, crushingly there, practically staring historians in the face (as a lot of much-agreed-upon, repeatedly-recorded and factually verifiable pieces of information are), and yet anything can be so easily dismissed. Clearly, this piece of evidence was doctored, anyone can tell that this is the product of a vast conspiracy, etc. etc.
On the flipside, a search for "truth" can be informed by these same principles as well. To take a non-filmic example, the 9/11 "truther" movement seems largely to be founded not so much on the establishment of facts that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that 9/11 was an inside job, but rather on demolishing the arguments of those who believe the official line that it was the result of careful planning and orchestration perpetrated by Al Qaeda operatives. This "defense attorney" approach to history, to paraphrase a term that the journalist Matt Taibbi used to refer to the 9/11 truth movement*, constitutes a number of historical fallacies. The idea that history happens as a series of small back room negotiations by conniving parties represents David Hackett Fischer's furtive fallacy; stretches to attempt that something did or did not happen by establishing that it possibly happened constitutes his fallacy of the possible proof. This is not history as reinterpretation, but history as reaction, as counter-testimony rather than deliberation and dialogue. "Denialist" and "truther" are really just two sides of the same coin: the rewriting of history to accommodate one's preconceived notions of an event (some, but by no means all, people who rally for these causes tend to be "single-issue" historians, as it were). While it's good and healthy to call into question the official line every so often, there is a decided difference between a healthy skepticism towards the official record in the service of accuracy and accountability on the one hand and a Parallax View-type suspicion that a thorny, intricate web of governments/banks/chemtrails/whathaveyou are conspiring against you and your loved ones on the other.
Morris' strategy in Mr. Death is to present both sides of the argument on whether the Nazis used gas chambers at Auschwitz. We can think of Leuchter as the defense demolishing the prosecution's stance that condemns the Third Reich for the atrocities committed at the concentration camp, and Morris does bring in WWII historians armed with reams of evidence indicating that this was indeed the case. Morris' documentary becomes a sort of larger rumination on the idea of expertise dictating the truth. Leuchter is brought in by Ernst Zundel for his years for his experience on execution methods, and this is enough to establish a credible defense for the Holocaust denialists. Naturally, the question arises of what exactly Leuchter, by the film's account a nebbishy, ordinarily unassuming sort of fellow, stands to gain by aligning himself with the revisionists. His quest for the "truth" does not seem to be informed by anti-governmental paranoia, and given what we know of his character, his gas-chamber denial does not appear to be informed by thinly-veiled racism/anti-Semitism, either. While never probing too deeply into Leuchter's psyche, the film does suggest that he fancies himself a sort of historical defense attorney, where it suffices to attack the other side's credibility rather than to establish plausibility on one's own side. Unfortunately for Leuchter, for whom the consequences of this fancy prove largely disastrous, this is not just an inadequate approach to history, it's a fallacious and ultimately reckless one.
-Joseph Gallucci
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