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Politics & Power Quote by Tim Holden

"The Holocaust also shows us how a combination of events and attitudes can erode a society's democratic values"

About this Quote

Invoking the Holocaust as a warning label for democracy is a risky rhetorical move, and that risk is part of Tim Holden's intent. As a politician, he is not primarily litigating history; he is staking out a moral perimeter around the present. The line is engineered to make "democratic values" feel less like an inherited trait and more like a fragile ecosystem - something that can be contaminated slowly, then collapse all at once.

The key phrase is "combination of events and attitudes". Holden avoids the comforting story of a single villain or a sudden coup. "Events" points to crisis politics: economic shocks, war, institutional gridlock, opportunistic lawmaking. "Attitudes" points to the quieter infrastructure of catastrophe: dehumanization, scapegoating, cynicism about elections, the normalization of "emergency" logic. The subtext is accusatory without naming names: if you think you're immune because you have a constitution and courts, you're already halfway into the trap.

Contextually, this kind of phrasing sits in the post-1990s civic script where Holocaust memory is mobilized not only to honor victims but to teach "how it happened". Holden positions genocide not as an alien aberration but as a downstream outcome of democratic backsliding. That framing is meant to collapse distance: We are not looking at a sealed-off European past; we are looking at a pattern. The rhetorical power comes from that unsettling implication - that ordinary political complacency can be one of history's active ingredients.

Quote Details

TopicHuman Rights
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APA Style (7th ed.)
Holden, Tim. (2026, January 16). The Holocaust also shows us how a combination of events and attitudes can erode a society's democratic values. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-holocaust-also-shows-us-how-a-combination-of-99595/

Chicago Style
Holden, Tim. "The Holocaust also shows us how a combination of events and attitudes can erode a society's democratic values." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-holocaust-also-shows-us-how-a-combination-of-99595/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The Holocaust also shows us how a combination of events and attitudes can erode a society's democratic values." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-holocaust-also-shows-us-how-a-combination-of-99595/. Accessed 9 Feb. 2026.

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How Events and Attitudes Erode Democratic Values: Tim Holden on the Holocaust
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About the Author

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Tim Holden (born March 5, 1957) is a Politician from USA.

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