Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ideology of the SS


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. &mdash; Cirt (talk) 01:36, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Ideology of the SS

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This was a split off article from SS involving a large amount of material from a single source from 1968. I thought there might have been some hope for this, but there is no getting around that this is pretty much fringe research and a lot of opinion. The article relies entirely on a single source and deals with a very subjective subject, mainly the motivations and personal feelings of SS members. There is really nowhere to go with this and this will probably never be more than, at best, a research essay with numerous factual source issues, heavily burdened by OR OberRanks (talk) 21:24, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: Saying it is "fringe" is perhaps going a bit far. I am sure there are many scholarly works about the motivations and ideology of the SS, they just aren't represented. If they aren't soon, delete. ( Hohum  @ ) 22:32, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: With all due respect, the essay that I used was based upon the work introduced by the historians associated with the Institut für Zeitgeschichte that was presented as evidence at the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials; if that qualifies as "fringe research", then Wikipedia is in a lot of trouble. Indeed, one can take this further and if the essays in the book The Anatomy of the SS State are "fringe research", then presumably the people convicted at the trial at Frankfurt on the basis in part on the evidence introduced by the experts from the Institut were clearly wrongly convicted. I'll not saying that the essays from The Anatomy of the SS State are perfect, but they are based on documents that were meant to be used in court by the prosecution, which must had meant that they were written with the expectation that defence lawyers were going to try and take them apart. As it was, the court accepted for the most part the prosecution's arguements. But here in Wikipedia land, this is all fringe research that should be rejected. I think there is a misunderstanding here on the part of OberRanks, in that I was not trying to say that is all how SS men thought and acted in the manner proscribed by the SS ideals. Rather I was attempting to describe the ideals that the SS were supposed to live up to. In fact, most SS men did not live up to these ideals, but nonetheless these ideals did influence the behavior of the SS. For an example, the SS ideal was to be "hard" with no soft emotions like love was an ideal that SS men were supposed to live by, but clearly that was not the case as a great man SS men did love their wives, girlfriends, children, etc, etc. Having been accused in the past of adding too information, so I chose to omit the next paragraphs saying that this was an ideal only. I would not disagree that this is a somewhat subjective subject, but if that qualifies an article for deletion, then a great deal of Wikipedia articles really should be deleted. By the same logic, all of the articles explaining why for example the Jews were expelled from Spain or why people in early modern Europe liked to burn women as witches, both of which are dealing with similar subjective issues ought to be deleted. One of the major, if not the main reasons why the southern states secedeed from the Union in 1860-61 was the widespread belief that the incoming Lincoln administration was about to unleash hordes of John Brown-type abolitionists on the South to stir up slave uprisings. A totally erroneous belief, but a major cause of the American Civil War. If I were to add that, should that be deleted because it deals with a subjective issue? The fact is that the SS did have a distinct ideology, and that did influence the behavior of its members, at least some of the time, which is surely something germane to the topic. If one wishes for some sources, I can supply them, but since I'm somewhat busy at present, it might be best to give me a few weeks as I'm rather busy right now, and I'm not dropping everything just because somebody is accusing me of engaging in OR. The earliest I can to the library is next week, and then I'll bring in some more info from some additional sources. If somebody wishes to beat me to the punch, then check out The Order of the Death’s Head by Heinz Höhne, The Nazi Party : a Social Profile of Members and Leaders, 1919-1945 by Michael Kater (that deals with the N.S.D.A.P. in general, but has a lot of info on the SS), The SS, Alibi of a Nation by Gerald Reitlinger and some of the essays in The Holocaust and History The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed and the Reexamiend. Thank you all for your time.--A.S. Brown (talk) 00:23, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Point of order per AfD guidelines regarding article creators and major contributors. A.S. Brown is the main contributor to the original material for the article.  The material was removed from the main SS article into its own article after agreement on the SS article talk page. -OberRanks (talk) 03:19, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: My main point has always been that it relies too heavily on one historian's view and opinion. I did some edits which helped in that regard, however, as I said before, the article needs to be re-written, to be objective; it would be much better with additional info. from other reliable sources (especially more current research/books) to further confirm or add to the points being presented. Like others, I have not had the time to work on it more. I would concur with Hohum, above; if not improved very soon then it should be deleted. Kierzek (talk) 04:06, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep&mdash;Since this is a legitimate content fork from the SS article and is a sufficiently notable topic in its own right, I don't see a valid reason to delete it. The ideology of the SS seems an essential aspect in terms of understanding the historical motivations and behavior of this organization. The article is already tagged appropriately for the single source concern, which will warn future readers and encourage the issue to be addressed. Regards, RJH (talk) 17:12, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 19:35, 24 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep legitimate content fork. Having a whole book devoted to the subject indicates independant notability anyway. More sources would be nice. Content issues are not usually a reason to delete. Agathoclea (talk) 20:11, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep There are other sources out there that go into this to some degreen (Hohne's book has some coverage, as does Padfield's biography of Himmler).Intothatdarkness (talk) 15:35, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep And expand on why the SS viewed murder as essential part of its mission.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 10:12, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.