Holocaust Deniers Gather in Iran

A stupid debate in the Palace? Surprise surprise, and I wondered why nobody posts here any more.

You guys do know that this meeting is being attended by anti-Zionist Jews, right? Basically the biggest motive behind holocaust denial is to establish that the actual impact of the Holocaust doesn't justify Zionist agendas and the continued support of Israel. More specifically for Ahmadinejad, as Ulysses has pointed out, it's to raise the ire of Westerners, and it's worked well enough to start this retarded thread over a :whocares: event. I mean, christ, David Duke, former Grand Wizard of the KKK and Louisiana politician attended the convention, and CNN is reporting it as if it's some kind of big deal. David Duke a Holocaust denier? I would've never thought!

Nevermind here, that Rock is German, and attempting to atone for the sins of his Jew-gassing grandpa by convincing us very loudly that the Holocaust happened, or that several Western countries have strong Zionist lobbies which regardless of any central organization are nonetheless loud enough to get measures like the French censorship laws put into place.

When Devo said "Your rights stop where my feelings begin" (go spacemoose), it was quite poignant, because I don't think you guys understand just how many "hurtful" opinions regarding the past there are to minority groups. If Radical Feminists controlled the country they'd probably outlaw any assertion of Universal Patriarchy, or if say, blacks became a vocal censorship lobby, then you could say bye-bye to Gone With the Wind and The North and South for their portrayal of the Plantation Myth.

Nobody has the right to dictate what is and what isn't open for discussion, irregardless of how much imperical evidence is stacked against an opinion. It's the same reason I'm not closing this thread instantaneously for sheer retardedness, because it's more beneficial for the community to see you guys weep from your vaginas for all the poor Jews and Gypsies and Fags and Rubber Duckies that might get their feelings hurt because of what a couple of douchebags in Iran said about the Holocaust.

There should never be limits to freedom of speech, period. Limiting one's entitlement to an opinion works sort of like the point/counterpoints to abortion. If you abort a baby you could be aborting the guy who cures cancer, consequently you could also be aborting the guy who kills 15 families with a bayonet in their homes. Draconian infringements on free expression didn't work forever for the Church, and there's nothing to suggest that outlawing Holocaust-denial actually suppresses discourse regarding the subject in any clear way. In fact, eliminating its discussion in the public sphere does more to help its survival, since there's no intellectual discourse that can use the imperical evidence you jerks keep yelling about against Holocaust-denial literature. Instead you've got sub-cultures sharing their views on the internet and festering outside the scrutiny of society at large. Has it ever occurred to you filthy Germans that outlawing the Nazi Party is the very reason Germany has such a problem with Neo-Nazism? Of course not, though, because prohibition works for drugs, right?

Dumbasses.

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Weren't governments made to protect the rights of the minority?

According to Locke, governments were made to protect people in exchange for their freedom. Constitutions are made to protect minority rights. (usually)

Jam it back in, in the dark.

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niki sounded like that meeting in Iran was some sort of a good and objective thing that should have been allowed to take place in Europe.

And why shouldn't it have been? If they had the money to support the thing, and could find an institution willing to host the convention, there shouldn't be any good reason to stop the convention from taking place in Europe. Do you really think they're going to be able to convince more people than what have already been drawn to the movement that the Holocaust didn't really happen? If the prospect of Holocaust denial is so impossible to fathom to Europeans, then how does it justify legislating against it?

I forget, of course, that Libertine values don't apply to Europe, just the populist ones.

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According to German law, these people are charged with slander or libel or something like that. I think it's only fair.

But it's not fair. Holocaust denial doesn't damagingly misrepresent anybody, because the character of Holocaust survivors aren't being called into question. What is being called into question, is whether or not the Holocaust actually happened, or was severe enough to justify the creation of a Jewish nation-state and its continued support. The only affront Holocaust denial perpetrates is the assault on your white guilt and Zionist interests. Surely Holocaust survivors have nothing to prove.

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Interestingly, the "Nazi Party" (NPD) isn't even outlawed in Germany.

The Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei is outlawed in Germany. The Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands can only be considered an ideological predecessor to the outlawed organization, which is the very reason you morons have tried to outlaw the thing for decades and turn it into a counter-culture.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

The logical conclusion to Holocaust denial is that Holocaust survivors are either liars or wrong. Holocaust denial doesn't represent survivors, however. Holocaust denial is an opinion regarding an historical event, and doesn't constitute libel or slander unless the claim is being made that Holocaust survivors are dirty liars.

I am, of course, making this value judgement based on American laws where the Supreme Court established that the plaintiffs must prove malicious intent, and that no states accept libel cases on the behalf of groups. It may be ethnocentric, but then we're the country that respects freedom of expression the most on this planet, despite the hiccups, so I feel confident in saying that American perspective of libel is the most respectful of the freedom of expression.

If Holocaust denial counts as libel in Germany, then it stands to reason that the same would apply to anti-semitism and political radicalism, since making derogatory remarks about Jews or SPD voters could constitute untruthful malicious statements concerning a group of people.

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The NSDAP doesn't even exist anymore, Brady. And what sense would it make to form such a party if you can just join the NPD instead?

That doesn't change the fact that the Nazi Party is illegal, and that it is impossible for any kind of Nazi movement to acquire political legitimacy. You can effectively remove Neo-Nazism from members of the NPD, because at the time of its destruction, the Nazi Party was a cult of personality centered around Hitler, and Neo-Nazis tend to emulate the late Nazi period and deify Hitler.

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Also, most Germans agree that outlawing them is wrong. So don't sound like "we" Germans are to blame for it.

You elected the government that attempted the ban, therefore by extension people like Shcroeder who have proposed the possibility of another ban represent their constituents, being German voters.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

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shouting fire in a theater, slander/libel, etc.

Shouting fire in a theater falls in line with inciting riots, and could constitute conspiracy to commit manslaughter. We have no criminal slander or libel laws. Libel suits are made in order to extract compensation for damages caused by malicious misrepresentation.

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Well, there you go, then.

Yeah, if you edit my post that way it falls into line real easy like, however what one can conclude from Holocaust denial, and what is being claimed in Holocaust denial literature are seperate. People could conclude that Republicans are all a bunch of corrupt pedo-protectors after the page leaks, but it didn't make every reporter in the country guilty of libel against the Republican Party.

That's the precise problem that comes up when libel and slander apply to groups of people. There's no danger of misrepresentation because being a holocaust survivor isn't like wearing a yellow star or purple rectangle.

By enforcing criminal libel you're making a form of expression illegal, and that doesn't fly with me at the very least.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

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Either you have limits on free speech or you do not. You cannot have it both ways.

I've just given you legal definitions of inciting public unrest and the actual function of libel and slander.

Without criminal prosecution of slander and libel, there is no limitation to the freedom of speech at the governmental level.

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There is no just sayin' in genocide.

Like the disputes concerning the Armenian Genocide, which are causing debate in France because of Armenian lobbies, or the reluctance of Western Powers and the UN to intervene in Rwanda because "it's not like we don't want to help, I'm just sayin we don't know if there's a genocide or not yet."

Bitch please.

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That's because although people could conclude that, most people did not, because that is not a reasonable logical leap. I'm sorry you can't tell the difference.

You could've fooled me considering everything I heard from people I see at school and from my own family.

Irregardless of any logical leap, if a party isn't directly being misrepresented in a literature, then you have no grounds for a libel case, and no, body tattoos aren't like wearing the yellow stars, because Holocaust survivors wear the very long-sleeved clothing the fellow in your picture wear to hide them, in order to live normal lives without people pitying them all the time.

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Then vote someone in to change the laws.

I couldn't. I'm not German. So what if I'm making ethnocentric value judgements? I'm the one advocating freedom of expression here.

I was speaking idiomatically.

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Again, inciting riots due to speech is still a control on freedom of speech. Just because it isn't a very large one doesn't negate its existance.

Speech is only a method seperated from the actual crime being commited, which is conspiracy to cause public unrest. The speech, shouting "fire" is only a method being used to commit the infraction.

If you wanted to point out legitimate limitations to the freedom of speech in the United States, then you could talk about the use of the Miller test for obscenity by the FCC to censor broadcast media or the use of the DMCA to silence criticism by offended minorities claiming their primary literature as intellectual property.

That's what I have a beef with concerning freedom of speech in this country.

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Like to see you point out where I said any of that was good or dandy, nigger.

It doesn't have to be. That's the whole point of freedom of expression. "Good" and "bad" are subjective judgements, and determining whether or not an opinion is good, bad, harmful, or even proper is dependant on perspective.

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Personal ancedotes aren't very good statistical evidence.

Of course not, but then Holocaust denial literature doesn't cause logical conclusions that Holocaust survivors are liars, it simply means that Holocaust survivors are wrong, something that is, believe it or not, debateable.

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wow

Yeah, wow, Holocaust survivors don't turn their ordeal into their primary status.

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That's really tough titties that you can't do anything about another country's laws.

Shaking my fist makes me feel good enough.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

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That's not what I'm saying, and that argument makes no sense when what I"m saying is that there is no just sayin' in genocide. Why don't you show me some other groups of people who just say re: genocide so I can tell them that they are wrong to as well?

Now I'm not sure what you mean by "just sayin'."

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You would be comfortable saying that all holocaust denial accuses jews of merely being mistaken, and not accusing them of any wrongdoing?

No, only that the nature of Holocaust denial: that a Holocaust didn't really happen, doesn't implicate Jews in any wrongdoing, only that they are mistaken. A writer of Holocaust literature would have to expressly accuse Jews of wrongdoing in order to make a case of it, yet even then I've already established why accepting cases of libel on behalf of groups is unsound law.

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Are you suggesting that only black people can be libeled, I'm not sure where exactly you're going with this yellow star argument.

That concerning this specific case, claiming that Holocaust survivors are wrong, doesn't cause damages concerning libel or slander. One could argue emotional damages for certain individuals, but you can't accept cases like that on behalf of a group of people, or even if a judge would even accept a case based on emotional damages concerning a statement that applies to a group and not the individual in question.

It's really immaterial, though, because the French and German laws are cases of criminal libel, where any opinion on the matter other than the one that is state-sanctioned is considered illegal.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Thomas

Blah Blah Existentialism.

The First Ammendment exists in the Bill of Rights as a means of protecting minority rights. It's because value judgements can never be objective that expression of those values require protection. Unpopular sentiments should not be silenced by a majority, because it disenfranchises minorities and harms our social and governmental institutions.

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Perhaps this discussion would go better if we came to a common definition of what 'free speech' refers to.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Freedom of speech here is ill-defined, but is generally interpreted as the right to say whatever you want without consequence. However, one can be penalized for the consequences of said speech, which is the danger of manslaughter and public unrest involved in yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, and the damages caused to an individual in cases of libel or slander.

The government does not have the right to limit what can be said or printed, but can prosecute for crimes commited with the use of speech.

I.E., people are held accountable for the consequences of their actions, but not censured.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

From what I know of cases involving the Turner Diaries, and rock & roll censorship cases, there's never been a long-standing legislation against "indirect harm" because the writer is not considered responsible for the actions of the consumer of their literature or art.

Unlike "freedom of speech," freedom of press is fairly self-evident.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Niki never said that Holocaust denial was an objective view, only that suppressing the opinion eliminates the possibility of perceiving it objectively.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

The way the law is, is reflected in the spirit of the law. The spirit being, one is entitled to say or print whatever they want.

There shouldn't be government-endorsed censorship in either America or Germany and France, irregardless of content.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Would you care to tell us what Evelyn Hall said, or just sit there and tell us nothing?

No matter, I've done it for you:

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She wrote the phrase, which is often mis-attributed to Voltaire, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it," as an illustration of Voltaire's beliefs.

Namedropping doesn't suffice when dealing with an audience that may be full of neophytes.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Why do Freedom of Speech detractors always have more strawmen than Kansas?

Death threats fall under harassment, which can be met with restraining orders. I have to apply for an order, of course, and you're not actually going to be put in jail for what you've said unless you're violating a court-ordered mandate, e.g. the aforementioned restraining order.

You are punished for your actions, not for your words.

Stop being a dipshit.

I was speaking idiomatically.