[6] The distinction between respectable academic historians and illegitimate historical negationists and revisionists, including genocide deniers, rests upon the techniques which are used in the writing of such histories.

Exposure of genocide denial and revisionism surged in the early 21st century, facilitated by the propagation of conspiracy theories and hate speech on social media.

"[7] David Tolbert, president of the International Center for Transitional Justice, states: Denial is the final fortress of those who commit genocide and other mass crimes.

Perpetrators hide the truth to avoid accountability and protect the political and economic advantages they sought to gain by mass killings and theft of the victims' property, and to cement the new reality by manufacturing an alternative history.

[34] On National Truth and Reconciliation Day in 2023, prime minister Justin Trudeau stating that denialism was on the rise after disputes regarding the conclusiveness of the evidence of Indian residential schools gravesite discoveries.

[36] Some still deny that children suffered physical, sexual, psychological, cultural, and spiritual abuses, despite the TRC’s indisputable evidence to the contrary.

Takashi Yoshida describes the Japanese debate over the Nanjing Massacre as "crystalliz[ing] a much larger conflict over what should constitute the ideal perception of the nation: Japan, as a nation, acknowledges its past and apologizes for its wartime wrongdoings; or ... stands firm against foreign pressures and teaches Japanese youth about the benevolent and courageous martyrs who fought a just war to save Asia from Western aggression.

[44] According to Donald W. Beachler, professor of political science at Ithaca College:[45] The government of Pakistan explicitly denied that there was genocide.

[48] According to Akçam, "Turkish denialism [of the genocide] is perhaps the most successful example of how the well-organised, deliberate, and systematic spreading of falsehoods can play an important role in the field of public debate" and that "fact-based truths have been discredited and relegated to the status of mere opinion".

[7] Turkey acknowledges that many Armenians residing in the Ottoman Empire were killed in conflicts with Ottoman forces during World War One, but disputes the statistics and claims that the killings were systematic and amounted to genocide.Measures recognising the Armenian genocide have languished in the US Congress for decades, and US presidents have refrained from labelling it such due to worries about relations with Turkey and intensive lobbying by Ankara.

[49] The government of the United States has been accused of denial of the genocide of its Indigenous peoples[50] by academics such as Benjamin Madley,[51] David Stannard[52] and Noam Chomsky.

[62] According to sociologist Daniel Feierstein, the genocide perpetrator implements a process of transforming the identity of any survivors and erasing the memory of the existence of the victim group.

[63] Societal effects of genocide denial Bhargava notes that "[m]ost calls to forget disguise the attempt to prevent victims from publicly remembering in the fear that 'there is a dragon living on the patio and we better not provoke it.

This is found in some states which have recently come out of minority rule, where the perpetrator group still controls most strategic resources and institutions, such as South Africa.

For example, atrocity denial and self-victimisation in Japanese historical textbooks has caused much diplomatic tension between Japan and neighbouring victim states, such as Korea and China, and bolstered domestic conservative or nationalist forces.

[62] Denial may be reduced by works of history, preservation of archives, documentation of records, investigation panels, search for missing persons, commemorations, official state apologies, development of truth commissions, educational programs, monuments, and museums.