 Many media voices noted that, while the book launched passionate national discussion about the Holocaust, this discussion was carried out civilly and respectfully.Goldhagen's book tour became, in the opinion of some German media voices, "a triumphant march", as "the open-mindedness that Goldhagen encountered in the land of the perpetrators" was "gratifying" and something of which Germans ought to be proud, even in the context of a book which sought, according to some critics, to "erase the distinction between Germans and Nazis".Goldhagen was awarded the Democracy Prize in 1997 by the German "Journal for German and International Politics", which asserted that "because of the penetrating quality and the moral power of his presentation, Daniel Goldhagen has greatly stirred the consciousness of the German public."