David Irving

Sebastian Holsclaw is right: Holocust denier and Nazi sympathizer David Irving should not be sent to jail:

Obsidian Wings: Free Speech and Other Stuff : David Irving was recently sentenced to three years in prison for Holocaust denial. The man is a moral idiot. He is a Holocaust denier, racist and a modern Nazi sympathizer. But he ought not be in jail. I say that not because I respect his views in any way--they are intellectually and morally bankrupt. I say that not out of any personal sympathy for him--he is loathsome. I say that he ought not be in prison because speaking loathsome thoughts should not be a legal offense in a free society. The government of a free society should not police the loathsome expressions of its citizenry...

Comments

[Jean-Philippe Stijns]

... not to mention that making a martyr out of this Nazi idiot may turn out to be counter-productive with respect to keeping antisemitism at bay. This kind of judgement also makes the West sound highly hypocritical when we claim that publishing cartoons offensive to Muslims is protected under the right to free speech. (My opinion might differ if this kind of revisionist expression became more of a trend, but then again imprisonment may still not be the first best policy.)

[Steve Peterson]

Left2Right also has a post on this here:

http://left2right.typepad.com/main/2006/02/david_irving_re.html

[Matt]

I agree that Irving doesn't belong in jail... Arrested and deported as an undesirable alien, maybe. But maybe that's not an option, since both Austria and Britain are in the EU.

But why did he go to Austria, anyhow? He must have known that he was in legal jeopardy there.

[WDT]

Holocaust denial is used in central Europe as a rallying point and intimidation tool of the violent radical ultra-right political sphere.
Austria and Germany have a special history, and a special ultra-right wing extremest sub-culture.
I grew up there. I have been beaten, threatened and intimidated by them.
I understand where you are arguing from, Brad, but I politely beg to differ from your conclusions.
I very well believe, that a democracy has the right to defend itself from it's violent and sworn enemies.
There is no, and there cannot be free hate speech in central Europe. This is not some calcified, illogical intellectual who bumbled into askew reasoning "well, perhaps, not all the evidence supports the finding of an organized 'Holocaust'".
This is a very unsavory political agitator, a sworn enemy of democracy.
He very well belongs behind bars for the consequences of his well calculated actions, this is not about his ideas.
His words have meaning, and they have resulted in tangible effects. He has spoken on Nazi Skinhead gatherings. His views were widely published and circulated in these circles.
In my days over there, resultantly us "Punk Rockers" got attacked and heads bashed in with baseball bats. In the last decades, non-caucasian looking individuals got attacked, injured, even murdered - incited by hate-mongering, not lastly propagated by the despicable David Irving. He has caused, so very intentionally, much suffering.
He gets off way too lightly, if he was to even serve out the three years.

[wcw]

I'm generally a first-amendment absolutist, but I still think Irving should go to jail.

First, it's the law, he broke it, and he pled guilty. There are a lot of laws I don't like that put folks in jail. Is California's three-strikes law still on the books? Those people get life for being a lot less evil than Irving.

Second, Austria does have a special history. My father's father lost his civil service job (even the nazis mostly respected civil service protections) because as a policeman he'd enforced the prohibition against that party, and someone with a grudge remembered. My mother's father lost his job as a doctor because he was a slav in Slovenia, and the SS told my mother's mother it was her fault for marrying an 'untermensch'. And my family, need I remind you, was lucky.

Third, Irving and his ilk are not treated as cranks, a symptom of a still-unhealthy society. That Austria's response is to pass laws limiting free speech and association is defensible.

Even in the US, free speech is limited, often to the detriment of its people. Attacking this tiny, defensible restriction for finally hitting a truly evil man seems out of place.

[ogmb]

"But why did he go to Austria, anyhow? He must have known that he was in legal jeopardy there."

This bit from the Guardian might explain it:

Last night Irving's partner Bente Hogh said he had brought his imprisonment on himself by going to Austria despite the ban. She said: "He was not jailed just for his views but because he's banned from Austria and still went. David doesn't take advice from anyone. He thought it was a bit of fun, to provoke a little bit."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/farright/story/0,,1714403,00.html

[Hans]

defense of the right to free speech from the people who offend the right to live ?

[mds]

I appreciate Mr. Holsclaw's ardent free-speech arguments as pertains to Austria. Unlike many on the right, he has also railed against the US government's "free speech zones" and the prosecution of Brett Bursey for holding the wrong type of sign. Alas, far too often his peers are free-speech absolutists only when they think they can score points against "the left", be it inflammatory anti-Muslim cartoons or Holocaust deniers. Strangely, they also blame riots on Newsweek, suggest that those who criticize a President during "wartime" are guilty of treason, and stand idly by as the Pentagon attacks Tom Toles. If only more were like Mr. Holsclaw; we could find more common ground.

[Emma Anne]

I am not sure I agree. Does every country have to have exactly the same set of rights we do? Some freedom of speech is necessary in a free country, but does it have to align precisely with our First Amendment? Western Europeans have rights we don't (health care, e.g.). Different countries can come at democracy from different angles, it seems to me.

[Dale]

Who knows what the right response to such dangerous idiocy is? What seems right to us may seem too costly for those who suffered from NAZI rule.

[NinjaPlease]

It sounds to me like Brad De Long is a Nazi sympathizer who gives comfort to terrorists, hates freedom and does not support our troops.

kidding...

Neo Conservatives are extremely Pro Israel. Good luck separating the two.

[marky]

I strongly disagree with hj that the Holocaust deniers would have less influence without the existence of the "holocaust industry", as he puts it.
Without the tireless effort to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive, Europe might become like Japan, where students are not even taught the history of their government's atrocities in WWII.

On the other hand, I do find it problematic that other classes of victims of the Nazi death camps are not given equal billing.
Yes, the damage to the Jewish culture was immense, but the difference is in scale, not intent: genocide is not new.
Why don't we hear more about the Gypsies, for example? They are certainly not well-treated in Europe, even today.

[Wombat]

The irony is that in Austria one can state that the Holocaust happened and praise the goals of the Holocaust; but if one denies it happened...

[Colin Danby]

For the record, hj's trolling just above is morally obtuse to the point of idiocy.

But on the larger point, I find the quality of the arguments for going after the content of speech, in the postings above, unimpressive. They all have an ad hoc quality, making gestures at history without spelling out the presumed connections between genocide and saying wrong things. There is also a deliberate refusal to spell out what freedom of speech means if at the same time you have a state authority putting you in jail if you affirm certain things. The same problems attach, of course, to the law against "glorification of terrorism" passed by the British House of Commons the other week.

Abhorring what someone says simply is not a good reason to put them in jail.

[Marky]

By the way, I have seen the argument made that the Gypsies need not be remembered along with the Jews because they have made no great contributions to Western society, hence there loss is not as important.
Now, the person who said this is a moral idiot (and not a Jew, btw), but I think his example shows why we need education about all victims of the Nazis.
"Yeah, the Jews weren't uentermenschen, but Gypsies and gays were" is a quite appalling stance.

[derrida derider]

"Abhorring what someone says simply is not a good reason to put them in jail" - Colin Danby

Absolutely true, but the Austrians will tell you that it is not abhorrence but hard-earned experience (Weimar Republic, anyone?) and their own peculiar issues (were Austrians Hitler's first victims or his most willing accomplices?) that justifies their particular law. In other words, fear of the practical consequences of Holocaust denial, rather than simple distaste, is what motivates them to have and enforce such a law. WDT's post makes this point.

FWIW, from this distance I think their judgement is wrong on this as they underestimate the evils of banning opinions - but then I don't live there.

[Frank Wilhoit]

"...The government of a free society should not police the loathsome expressions of its citizenry...."

Yes, it should. It is a stern and extremely painful duty and immense lengths ought to be gone to to prevent the occasion for it from arising; but the government that flinches from it when it is necessary demonstrates a depraved indifference (in the legal term of art) to the survival of the society whose steward it is. We have seen, very recently, the result of this neglect, and we shall soon see it again on a much grander scale. Who will have the face to say that the Rwandan government ought not to have shut down the campaign of incitement that led to the genocide there? And our own case is vastly worse, because here the ruling Party (I will not say the government, for we have none) is the sponsor and beneficiary of the incitement.

[robert waldmann]

I agree completely with Sebastian Holsclaw.

Also I continue to be impressed by the knowledge and insights of Snarky Marky. I guess you don't have a link for that appalling quote.

[NBarnes]

Shorter hj: Jews bring holocaust denial upon themselves.

[Dustin R. Ridgeway]

It always amazes me how easily people cave and compromise on essentials like freedom of speech.

[Common Sense]

Leaving aside the particularly odious Nazi issues involved in Holocaust denial, the heart of the matter is lying. Our devotion to free speech as an ideal is based on the Founder's devotion to truth and reason. I can't imagine they could conceive of a Karl Rove with his gutter-snipe campaign smears or the current administrations unwillingness to be candid about WMD, NSA wiretapping, or rendition. I'm not going to fold my free speech tent, but the media, or blogs, or collectively the voters are going to have to do a better job at retiring the liars that are polluting our nation's free speech with their corrupting lies.

[piotr]

NBarnes, elementary knowledge of history would inform you that appalling abuse of the Palestinian has driven Tsarist Okhrana to concoct "Protocols of Elders of Zion".

That said, some custodians of the memory of Holocaust are incredibly obtuse. As long as Turkey had good relations with Israel denying Holocaust was OK -- if it was Armenian Holocaust.

Various countries profess their belief in the freedom of speach, but with exceptions. In many European countries, you cannot advocate Nazism or deny Holocaust. In Turkey, you HAVE to deny Armenian holocaust. In US, you are not allowed to watch child pornography even if it is not child pornography but it merely looks like one. Folks are busted in sting operations and send to prison. And in England you are not supposed to offend the Queen.

I think that anti-denial laws are close in spirit to libel laws. Lies form the weakest category of protected speach. Even more, lies that are malicious and malignant.

[SqueakyRat]

NBarnes, elementary knowledge of history would inform you that appalling abuse of the Palestinian has driven Tsarist Okhrana to concoct "Protocols of Elders of Zion".

That's the funniest unintentionally funny thing I've read in a month.

[Marky]

Piotr,
I like your argument.
A Holocaust denier is defaming an entire class of people, quite viciously. Why should such speech not be subject to some legal sanction?

[Bruce Webb]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/irving/0,2759,181044,00.html

David Irving should rot in jail. For God's sake he started a hugely expensive libel case in England against an American academic who accused him of being a Hitler apologist. He lost that case but deserved to be sent to jail for years on the basis of fraud alone. This is not a free speech issue, this man tried to use the courts to suppress free speech, he gets zero sympathy from me. He is a con man, if he was selling siding a jury of his peers would have no hesitation throwing him in jail. Free speech does not cover conscious conspiracy to sell manufactured propoganda. Free speech does not imply the right to lie.

[Oskar Shapley]

" Bla, bla, bla, FREE SPEECH IS AN ABSOLUTE VALUE, MUST BE PROTECTED BY LAW. "

Sorry, dude. Many laws are there to protect the society from things that are defined as being evil.

The German and Austrian societies decided that denying the Holocaust is the first step to repeating it, equals Evil.

If you disagree, you can write a flaming libertarian critique to their Constitutional Courts. That will teach them how to write their laws!

Verfassungsgerichtshof Österreich
Judenplatz 11, 1010 Wien
Tel +43 (1) 531 22 - 0 vfgh@vfgh.gv.at

[Colin Danby]

David Velleman adds a nice point: http://left2right.typepad.com/main/2006/02/david_irving_re.html#trackback

[Arun Khanna]

What happened to the student group that invited him to speak? If he is jailed and nothing is done about them, it is quite odd. Fines and penalties is probably is way to go in these cases (though I personally don't mind if this guy is jailed for three years for distorting history).

[ent lord]

These anti Nazi laws are a relic of the Allies' reconstruction of Germany and Austria. A year or so ago, a WWE wrestler ran afoul of these laws as he strutted about the ring in his "persona" of a skinhead. Unfortunately, he gave a "Heil" salute and, I think, found himself unemployed and deported.
Given the bone deep antisemitism and general hostility to foreigners inherent in most European countries' histories and cultures, I do not think they are capable of a justice system styled after the English model.
For those who have forgotten, Ernest Angely the evangelist and faith healer was jailed years ago in Austria under their "anti Gypsy" laws which ban panhandling and street preaching.

[remo williams]

"Without the tireless effort to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive, Europe might become like Japan, where students are not even taught the history of their government's atrocities in WWII."

Simply false. Quit spewing.

[Jill Henry]

Is Irving a racist? A racist is simply a white person who would, for example, keep Italy a white, traditionally Catholic society.

So why imprison those who dispute an historical event? When I look back in history and see authority imprisoning people because of their view on history, theology or science -- I don't give credibility to those who advocate terrorism, but rather to their victims.

[Ari]

"Shorter hj: Jews bring holocaust denial upon themselves."

hj

Not quite; rather incessant harping on the issue (turning it into an 'industry') has created a feeling of "enough" that opens the way for deniers to find an audience.

The is complete nonsense and offensive at that.

[Ari]

Remo Williams

There is no reason to respond to trolls, but you are remarkably offensive even for a troll.

[Elroy]

If the germans are able to stop themselves from becoming nazi again only by showing themselves their "history" again and again and by laws that sentence people to inprisonment that do not follow the currents, this after 60 years of democracy, then their race represents a danger for the whole mankind and they should sentence themselves to inprisonment, instead of Irving.