I posted before about free speech. It's a ticklish business. I don't think anyone has the 'right' to go into a crowded room and yell 'Fire!', just for fun. I do not think unlimited verbal diarrhea is wise to engage in, or wise to defend. I think scripture is quite clear that Christians do not have the freedom to say whatever we want to say, whenever we feel like saying it. Such a right would undoubtedly be the death of many a marriage.
Now, of course, this is not to say I do not think we should ever say controversial things, or even things that many people found offensive. My belief is that personal responsibility is vital.
But what of the law? The English historian who expressed extremely silly views about the realities of the WW2 holocaust has been imprisoned for expressing those views. I can't even begin to type the amount of spluttering that caused me last night.
I am happy to say that it is illegal to incite people to kill others. Causing public disturbances likely to lead to mass panic is also quite rightly, disallowed. Free speech doesn't go there, and rightly so.
But saying mass murder didn't happen? Not saying you weren't involved in mass murder when you were, I can understand being illegal. But saying you don't believe it happened? However patently ridiculous and offensive that is, how can it be a crime?
I don't believe the twin towers were knocked down by aeroplanes. I think they fell down due to a structural fault, and that actually, only twenty people were inside at the time.
I'm talking Swiftian nonsense, of course. But the simple fact is, that even if I did hold to such silly views, it wouldn't be a crime to do so.
The only way to defeat nonsense ideologies is to do so openly, not to make their expression illegal.
Still, in a world that has Tony Blair apologizing for the potato famine, and Rowan Williams apologizing for slavery, it only makes sense that those who refuse to apologize for something they weren't involved in should be imprisoned for it.
2/21/2006
Free speech has limits. Free thought doesn't.
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6 comments:
Libbie, I agree it was a bit silly to send the guy to prison.
However, rightly or wrongly, it has made me feel rather cheerful to think that he has been punished for sayign such an evil and insensitive thing. It may be a bad law, but he certainly deserved his punishment.
Or is this a wrong attitude on my part? We all deserve to God's wrath. I suppose he has been no more evil than I have been.
Every Blessing in Christ
Matthew
Matthew, it's a hard one when we feel someone got their just deserts. As long as we don't feel we are any more worthy, I think it's ok.
I think it's right that if he broke the law of the land, he should stand trial, I just think the law of the land is wrong in this instance.
The problem with thought crime is always that even though we might agree with this thought crime being wrong, it's a rather arbitrary business. Visions of the Khmer Rouge, Communist Regimes, or even Nazi Germany itself come to mind. Which is, needless to say, quite ironic.
Quite so.
I think it was a bad law and he should never have been tried for such a crime.
However, I think what he did was horrible and the thought of him going to jail for it makes me feel rather satisfied.
Spending 3 years in jail is nothing compared to the horror and degradation that he tried to deny and the misery he has caused those who lost loved ones in those events.
Every Blessing in Christ
Matthew
Being Jewish, I muct admit that I am torn by this decision -- One the (purely) physical and selfish side, I feel that he is getting his just desserts. My family were in the camps, and I have to say that I find this man INCREDIBLY offensive.
On the other (and correct) hand -- I am appalled that one can go to jail for their opinion. While I think that this man is a nuisance, I don't know that putting him in jail is the answer.
I also understand that in Austria they are VERY sensitive to this type of thing, but the difference between imprisoning one for their viewpoint, and cutting off their hands is one of degrees.
When one cannot question history, then it seems that we are on a slippery slope towards 'correct' thinking... As you stated Libbie; how different is that from (ironically) Fascism/Nazism?
What is interesting is that David Irving is actually a very good researcher.
It's what he does with the research that's the problem.
Dan Brown said: "Since the beginning of recorded time, history has been written by the "winners" (those societies and belief systems that conquered and survived). Despite an obvious bias in this accounting method, we still measure the "historical accuracy" of a given concept by examining how well it concurs with our existing historical record. Many historians now believe (as do I) that in gauging the historical accuracy of a given concept, we should first ask ourselves a far deeper question: How historically accurate is history itself?" and made a fortune. David Irving applied the method to the Holocaust and got bunged in jail.
I leave the moral for you to work out.
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