This is an analysis of the Breaking The Cycle programme developed and delivered at the UK’s National Holocaust Museum. The programme uses the example of the Holocaust to influence the behaviour and attitudes of contemporary hate crime perpetrators, who are referred to the Museum by Nottinghamshire Police. We have recently revised the programme to draw more authentic links between attitudes that facilitated the Holocaust and the motivations behind the behaviour of individuals who participate in the programme. The revised programme focuses on individual perpetrators, rather than macro-history, and chooses a historical period which is indicative of the process of individual and societal radicalisation, rather than the final genocidal result. Our approach is based less on ‘lessons from’ history, and more on using history to encourage critical thinking about individual behaviour in the present. This paper uses this example to suggest lessons for other programmes which seek to use the past to influence the present.