Censorship Page II
what are they so afraid of?
'The Conference of the Persecuted' A Bulwark of Truth and Sanity Against the Enemies of Free Speech
To my fellow thought-criminals
Hungarian FM says gov't to make Holocaust denial a crime
13th IHR Conference Keynote Address
'The Conference of the Persecuted'
A Bulwark of Truth and Sanity Against the Enemies of Free Speech
Mark WeberIt was in September 1979, and also here in southern California, that the newly-organized Institute for Historical Review held its first "International Revisionist Conference." That we are meeting here this weekend, nearly 21 years later, and at the dawn of a new century, at this 13th IHR Conference, is not only an achievement, it is a tribute to the dedicated support of so many loyal men and women over the years. Several of those who are here this weekend were also at that first-ever IHR meeting, including Harvey Taylor, a good friend who has attended every single Conference -- as well as four of our speakers: Robert Faurisson, Arthur Butz, Ernst Zündel and John Bennett.
Our meeting this weekend is especially important because it's been nearly six years since the last full-scale IHR Conference, the 12th, in September 1994. Those years have often been very difficult ones, above all because of the great cost, in money, time and manpower, fighting a terrible legal battle caused by the embezzlement of millions of dollars from the IHR and its parent corporation -- a legal fight that, if we had lost, would have meant the end of the Institute.
This is not the time or place to name all those who have made possible, through their generosity and dedication, the Institute's survival. But this evening I do want to publicly express my appreciation for one particular person: Greg Raven, our MC. For some five years, often under very trying conditions, it was largely he and I alone who held the fort, keeping the IHR alive.
Now, I am glad to say, the Institute has weathered the terrible storm, and, thanks to the commitment of good friends and supporters -- including many of those here this weekend -- we are once again on solid ground, at last repairing and rebuilding. One expression of that endurance is the return to the staff of Ted O'Keefe, who is playing a major role in forging a revitalized IHR.
This get-together could well be called "the Conference of the Persecuted." Six of our speakers this weekend have been punished as "thought criminals" -- with imprisonment, court-ordered fines, or travel bans -- for publicly expressing dissident views on history. Several of the other speakers this weekend have suffered in their careers for likewise expressing views that run contrary to prevailing dogmas. Books written by six or seven of our speakers, and at least one or two attendees, have been banned, burned, or otherwise suppressed.
I, for one, feel privileged to stand together with men and women of such courage and idealism. These individuals have been victims of an awesome international power that, during the past 20th century, has greatly increased its impact and influence in the world.
We revisionists are often accused of "rewriting" history, and for this reason the term "revisionism" is frequently used in the media, often by writers who should know better, as a synonym for "historical distortion," or for deliberately misleading historical writing. In keeping with the definition of the term revisionism, and its Latin root, re-videre, that is, to "look again," we are dedicated, not to "rewriting" the past, but simply to promoting history that is written and presented in accord with facts and sound perspective.
To anyone who gives any real independent thought to the matter, it is obvious that the prevailing or official history has itself undergone a tremendous rewriting over the past 50-60 years. There is, of course, no more obvious expression of this than the social-cultural role that has come to be played by what is called "the Holocaust" -- a term that did not even come into popular usage until the 1970s.
In this drastic re-writing of history, the fate and role of Jews is a paramount consideration. Michael Berenbaum, one-time Research Director of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, and a Georgetown University theology professor, put it this way several years ago: "The Holocaust was [once] regarded as a side story of the much larger story of World War II. Now one thinks of World War II as a background story and the Holocaust as a foreground story." (note 1)
We are often asked why we seem obsessed with "the Holocaust." The answer is very simple. As any child can easily observe, it is not revisionists or the IHR who are fixated on the fate -- 55 or 60 years ago -- of a small minority of the population of a foreign continent. It is, rather, our own political, social and intellectual leaders who have made the fate of Europe's Jews during World War II a central icon of our age. We deal with the Holocaust as we do because it has come to play a major, even crucial role in our society.
If anyone in 1950 or even 1960 had predicted that by the end of this century political leaders of the United States and other major countries, even Germany, would routinely be honoring something called "the Holocaust" or "the Shoah," he would have been dismissed as delusional. But so swiftly and drastically have things changed that by 1992 Israeli Holocaust historian Yehuda Bauer, a professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, was moved to declare: (note 2)
Whether presented authentically or inauthentically, in accordance with the historical facts or in contradiction to them, with empathy and understanding or as monumental kitsch, the Holocaust has become a ruling symbol of our culture... Hardly a month goes by without a new TV production, a new film, a new drama, new books, prose or poetry, dealing with the subject, and the flood is increasing rather than abating.
Since 1993 we have even had, in Washington, DC, an official, taxpayer-funded United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, run by a federal government agency, the United States Holocaust Memorial Council -- a mighty expression of, and a monument to, Jewish power. (note 3) There is no comparable US museum dedicated, for example, to the vastly greater numbers of victims of Soviet tyranny, or to the victims of slavery.
Jewish scholar and rabbi Michael Goldberg, in his book Why Should Jews Survive?, wrote with insight about what he calls "the Holocaust cult," a cult with "its own tenets of faith, rites and shrines." (note 4) No less a figure than Abraham Foxman, national director of the Zionist Anti-Defamation League, has affirmed the iconic, even religious character of this cult. In a 1994 issue of the ADL newsletter, Foxman wrote: "The Holocaust is a singular event. It is not simply one example of genocide but a near successful attempt on the life of God's chosen children and thus, on God himself." (note 5) When one starts talking like this, one is no longer dealing with history, but rather has crossed over into dogmatic mysticism.
No comparable attention is given to the tens of millions of other World War II victims, including, for example, the many millions of Chinese who perished in the war. Largely forgotten in this cult of the Holocaust have been the tens of millions of victims of America's great wartime ally, Stalinist Russia, along with the tens of millions of victims of China's Maoist regime, as well as the 12 to 14 million Germans, victims of the flight and expulsion of 1944-1949, of whom some two million lost their lives.
We are expected to look at US and world history from what, in truth, is a Jewish perspective.
One can tell the real values and priorities of a society by what it prohibits. As several of those here in this room this evening can attest from personal experience, what our society -- and by this I mean the United States and most of Europe, as well as Japan -- forbids is anything deemed to be anti-Semitic. What is particularly prohibited in our "new world order" is any questioning or playing down of what has become the most sacred icon of our age -- the Jewish "Holocaust" or "Shoah."
From the late 1940s until the 1970s, the official, or at least prevailing view was that the dreadful Nazi regime was more or less foisted on the basically decent people of Germany, Austria, and other European countries by Hitler and his evil henchmen. However, since the late 1970s, and especially during the past decade, this has changed drastically. Now the prevailing, socially-sanctioned view is that Nazism (or even less accurately, "fascism") -- by which we are supposed to understand, above all, the harsh suppression of Europe's Jews in the 1930s and 1940s -- was supported, or at least passively tolerated, by nearly the entire Western world.
The supposed "guilt" for what is often characterized as the most evil deed in history is now routinely ascribed to, not only the great majority of Germans (a view most outspokenly presented by Jewish academic Daniel Goldhagen in his hateful book Hitler's Willing Executioners) but to virtually all of non-Jewish humanity. Entire nations, we are now told, must acknowledge a collective responsibility, even a collective guilt or complicity, for this allegedly greatest of all human crimes. Excepting only a small number of such "righteous gentiles" as Oskar Schindler, the Germans, the Poles, the Hungarians, the Ukrainians, the French, and so forth, are held to be historically responsible for the "Shoah." In one of the most amazing re-writings of history, even Pope Pius XII and the leadership of the Roman Catholic Church are held to share in this common guilt.
History or historiography is, of course, an academic pursuit, a specialized field of scholarship. But it is also much more than that. How a society views history both reflects and greatly helps to determine its essential values and priorities. How we view the past is crucially important in determining how we view ourselves, our place in the world, and, more important, our future as a people or society. As Oswald Spengler put it "history lessons and the political education of the people are one and the same."
In this sense, "history" is not and cannot be "neutral." Different groups understandably look at the past from very different perspectives. In a valuable book published some years ago, America Revised, historian Frances Fitzgerald explained not only how our common perspective on American history has changed radically over the past half century, but how it is impossible to portray American history in a way that is "positive" and coherent for all of America's diverse population groups. (note 6)
The history books now being produced for use in American colleges and universities both reflect and help to shape the "politically correct" spirit of our age. Typical is a new book by Cornell University history professor Richard Polenberg, The Era Of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1933-1945. (note 7) Polenberg praises Roosevelt for his supposed commitment to moral principles and his "pragmatism." But he also criticizes FDR for his failure to do more "to advance the cause of racial justice," and for his wartime internment of West Coast Japanese. And, of course, Polenberg subjects Roosevelt to special criticism for his not doing more on behalf of Europe's Jews. While the book devotes five pages to what the index calls "Jews, government response to Holocaust," it contains just a single, neutral mention, and only in passing, to Stalin -- Roosevelt's important wartime ally. Readers of this all-too-typical book can easily be forgiven for failing to appreciate the crucially important historical role played at the time by Stalin and Soviet Russia. Polenberg similarly ignores Roosevelt's well-documented record of lying on a massive and routine scale to the American public, his covert, unconstitutional war-mongering, his friendship with the Soviet dictator, or the massive US material and military support for the Soviet war machine.
During the past 20th century, we have witnessed an unbelievably enormous increase in Jewish power and influence everywhere in the world. It was in 1896 that Theodor Herzl, the founder of the modern Zionist movement, published his seminal book Der Judenstaat ("The Jewish State"), in which he argued that Jews around the world constitute a Volk, that is, a people or nationality, with interests different than those of the non-Jews among whom they live. (Consistent with that, Israeli political figures and Jewish community leaders in the United States routinely speak of "the Jewish people.") And a year later, in 1897, Herzl convened the First Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland. Five decades later -- in May 1948 -- the Zionist state of Israel was proclaimed in Palestine. Today, armed even with nuclear weapons, Israel is one of the world's most important military powers. What an amazing expression of resolve, determination and power that achievement represents!
Just how important is this Jewish power and influence today? Well, as early as 1968 the renowned drama critic Walter Kerr could declare in The New York Times: (note 8)
What has happened since World War II is that the American mentality has become part Jewish, perhaps as much Jewish as anything else ... The literate American mind has come in some measure to think Jewishly. It has been taught to, and it was ready to. After the entertainers and novelists came the Jewish critics, politicians and theologians. Critics and politicians and theologians are by profession molders; they form ways of seeing.
As accurate as those words were when they were written more than 30 years ago, they are vastly more true today. In a book published in 1995, Jews and the New American Scene, two well-known Jewish writers, Seymour Martin Lipset and Earl Raab, noted: (note 9)
During the last three decades Jews [in the United States] have made up 50 percent of the top two hundred intellectuals ... 20 percent of professors at the leading universities ... 40 percent of partners in the leading law firms in New York and Washington ... 59 percent of the directors, writers, and producers of the 50 top-grossing motion pictures from 1965 to 1982, and 58 percent of directors, writers, and producers in two or more primetime television series.
And even more recently, the prominent French Jewish writer Alain Finkielkraut, writing in late 1998 in the prestigious Paris daily Le Monde, had this to say: (note 10)
Ah, how sweet it is to be Jewish at the end of this 20th century! We are no longer History's accused, but its darlings. The spirit of the times loves, honors, and defends us, watches over our interests; it even needs our imprimatur. Journalists draw up ruthless indictments against all that Europe still has in the way of Nazi collaborators or those nostalgic for the Nazi era. Churches repent, states do penance ...
Consistent with this, Jewish power enforces a pervasive double standard in our political and cultural life. While Jews are encouraged to cultivate and promote their peoplehood and particular group interests, Westerners are expected to accept, even embrace, their own collective racial-cultural dispossession. Thus, while Jewish leaders routinely express alarm that so many Jews are marrying non-Jews, a comparable attitude if expressed by non-Jews is swiftly denounced as "racist." (Just recently, for example, a professor at Bar-Ilan University in Israel bluntly declared that intermarriage "violates the most basic norms of Judaism [and] threatens Jewish survival.") (note 11)
Benjamin Netanyahu, until recently Israel's prime minister, just last February addressed a gathering of nearly a thousand Jews here in southern California, in which he said: "If Israel had not come into existence after World War II then I am certain the Jewish race wouldn't have survived." (note 12) The Israeli leader went on to exhort his audience: "I stand before you and say you must strengthen your commitment to Israel. You must become leaders and stand up as Jews. We must be proud of our past to be confident of our future." Similarly forthright appeals by non-Jews to racial-ethnic pride are, of course, routinely condemned as "racist" or "neo-Nazi." As a matter of basic state policy, Israel actively encourages immigration of Jews -- defined by ancestry -- from around the world, while at the same time discouraging settlement by non-Jews, even forbidding immigration of non-Jews who were born in what is now Israel.
Can this awesome Jewish power become any greater than it already is? Unfortunately, there are signs that the situation can get even worse.
During the recent libel trial in London, David Irving performed a great public service by presenting to the world details of just how international Jewish organizations work together to silence and ruin those who, like Irving, are perceived, because of their writings, to threaten Jewish interests. One of the most ominous consequences of Judge Gray's April 11 ruling in the Irving-Lipstadt trial, I think, is that it has greatly emboldened these powerful enemies of free speech, strengthening their resolve to destroy their intellectual adversaries. For example, one high-level Zionist official, in the aftermath of the ruling, called for what amounts to a worldwide ban on travel by those who dispute Holocaust extermination claims. Israel's ambassador to Britain, Dror Zeigerman, called on Australia and other countries to bar Irving and "other members of the Holocaust denial movement." (note 13)
The recent Irving-Lipstadt trial also showed, once again and with clarity, that behind this ruthless international Jewish campaign is a deep-seated, implacable hatred. At a recent meeting in Los Angeles, Deborah Lipstadt herself called David Irving "a contemporary Amalek," referring to the traditional biblical foe of the Jews. (note 14) Similarly, in an essay about the trial distributed worldwide by a major Jewish news agency, a Jewish academic who teaches at Gratz College near Philadelphia wrote: "Deborah Lipstadt's work reminds us, as the Torah does in its passage about Amalek, of the importance of memory. In my opinion, it is David Irving and his ilk who should beware." (note 15)
For devout Jews, such words are very serious. According to the Torah, (note 16) the Jewish god called on the ancient Hebrews to "smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and women, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass." Accordingly, we are told, the early Jews "utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword." Even today, Jews are admonished never to forget their emblematic enemy, and to wage "war with Amalek from generation to generation" -- that is, forever. The obvious inference here is that Irving and "his ilk" deserve to be killed.
In this same spirit, a high-ranking Israeli government official publicly suggested, in the wake of Judge Gray's April 11 ruling, that those whom he calls "Holocaust deniers" deserve to be put to death. Rabbi Michael Melchior, Israel's Minister "for Israeli Society and World Jewish Communities," said that Judge Gray's ruling "delivered the message that Holocaust deniers should be regarded alongside the worst of the Nazis." (note 17) As the world knows, of course, "the worst of the Nazis" were shot or hanged.
The Institute for Historical Review and our supporters openly declare our defiance of the ADL, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the World Jewish Congress, and so forth -- and all their non-Jewish helpers. Against their power the IHR stands, and will continue to stand, as a beacon and a bulwark, not only for truth and reason in understanding the past, but for sanity in tackling the challenges of the future.
While we are confident that the march of revisionist scholarship is ultimately unstoppable, we are also encouraged by the knowledge that our adversaries' power is artificial and unrooted. It is built on an inherently unstable foundation of deceit and hypocrisy -- something that is acknowledged, if only indirectly, by their constant expressions of anxiety that their power can and may be suddenly swept away.
To stand against this power is often thankless and disheartening work, but it is absolutely necessary. Our adversaries are enemies not only of freedom of speech and free historical inquiry, they also strive relentlessly to belittle and break down the cultural, religious, racial and ethnic integrity and cohesion of all groups other than their own. And because it attacks traits of our being that make us human, this insidious power harms all of non-Jewish humanity.
Exposing this insidious power -- in its many manifestations -- will continue to be a major task of the IHR. In this new century as well, we pledge to carry on -- with greater clarity and sense of purpose than ever -- our educational work of truth in history, for the sake not only of our own nation and heritage, but for all humanity.
Notes
1. The Washington Times, Jan. 10, 1991. Quoted in The Journal of Historical Review, May-June 1994, p. 44.
2. From a 1992 lecture, published in: David Cesarani, ed., The Final Solution: Origins and Implementation (London and New York: Routledge, 1994), pp. 305, 306. Also, quoted in The Journal of Historical Review, Sept.-Dec. 1999, p. 56.
3. On the occasion of the opening of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, Jewish author and critic Melvin Jules Bukeit wrote: "It's not Jewish tragedy that's remembered on the Mall this week; it's Jewish power to which homage is paid." Melvin Jules Bukiet, "The Museum vs. Memory: The Taming of the Holocaust," The Washington Post, April 18, 1993, p. C3.
4. Michael
Goldberg, Why Should Jews Survive?: Looking Past the Holocaust Toward a Jewish
Future (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1995), p. 41.
See also: Tim Cole, Selling the Holocaust: From Auschwitz to Schindler: How
History is Bought, Packaged and Sold (New York: Routledge, 1999), and, Peter
Novick, The Holocaust in American Life (Houghton Mifflin, 1999).
5. Abraham Foxman, "Director's Corner: Schindler's List -- The Meaning of Spielberg's Film," On the Frontline (ADL newsletter), Jan. 1994, p. 2. Also quoted in The Journal of Historical Review, March-April 1994, p. 41.
6. Frances Fitzgerald, America Revised: History Schoolbooks in the Twentieth Century (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979 [and, New York: 1980]).
7. Richard
D. Polenberg, The Era Of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1933-1945: A Brief History With
Documents (New York: St. Martin's Press, [March] 2000). Polenberg is a professor
of American history at Cornell University. He is the author of several books,
and was once a visiting professor at Hebrew University in Israel.
In April 1996 St. Martin's Press, with much fanfare and in response to
tremendous Jewish pressure, cancelled its publication of David Irving's
biography Goebbels: Mastermind Of The Third Reich.
8. Walter Kerr, "Skin Deep is not Good Enough," The New York Times, April 14, 1968, pp. D1, D3. Quoted in: Kevin MacDonald, The Culture of Critique (Praeger, 1998), p. 243. (Cited in the Sept.-Dec. 1999 Journal of Historical Review, p. 49.) Walter Kerr (1913-1996) was a playwright and Pulitzer prize-winning drama critic, for years with the New York Herald Tribune and then The New York Times.
9. Seymour
Martin Lipset and Earl Raab, Jews And The New American Scene (Harvard Univ.
Press, 1995), pp. 26-27. (Quoted in the Sept.-Dec. 1999 Journal of Historical
Review, p. 56.)
A 1985 study written by Lipset and Raab, "The Political Future of American
Jews," found that Jews are effectively the single most influential ethnic
or religious group in American political life. According to the study, which was
sponsored by the American Jewish Congress, Jews contribute to political parties
disproportionately to their numbers in the US population: Jews give more than
half the money collected by the Democratic Party and up to a quarter of
Republican funds. K. Sawyer, "Jews Cautioned on Narrow Issues," The
Washington Post, March 6, 1985, p. A5.
The influence of American Jewry in Washington is "far disproportionate to
the size of the community, Jewish leaders and US official acknowledge. But so is
the amount of money they contribute to [political] campaigns." One member
of the influential Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations "estimated Jews alone had contributed 50 percent of the funds
for Clinton's 1996 re-election campaign." Janine Zacharia, "The
Unofficial Ambassadors of the Jewish State," The Jerusalem Post (Israel),
April 2, 2000. Reprinted in "Other Voices," June 2000, a supplement to
The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, June 2000, p. OV-4.
10. Alain Finkielkraut, "Mgr Stepinac et les deux douleurs de l'Europe," Le Monde, Oct. 7, 1998, p. 14. Quoted by Robert Faurisson in his essay in The Journal of Historical Review, Nov.-Dec. 1998, pp. 11-12.
11. Los
Angeles Times, April 17, 2000, p. A14 R. The Bar-Ilan university professor is
Charles S. Liebman.
"...Policy recently handed down by the Conservative [Jewish] movement's
rabbinical authorities" holds that "Judaism has, from its earliest
roots, been concerned about the issue of intermarriage. Statements found in
early sources are unequivocal in their prohibition of intermarriage." Fears
that sharing food and drink with non-Jews could lead to intermarriage prompted
prohibitions against drinking the wine of non-Jews or eating their bread.
Source: E. Gootman, "Conservative Jewry...," Forward (New York), Oct.
16, 1998, pp. 1, 13.
12. "'Strengthen your commitment'," Daily Pilot (Newport Beach/ Costa Mesa, Calif.), Feb. 28, 2000, p. 1.
13. AAP dispatch, The Australian, April 13, 2000.
14. Tom Tugend, "Lipstadt Recounts Battle With 'Amalek'," The Jerusalem Post, May 2, 2000.
15. Rela Mintz Geffen, "First Person FOD (Friend of Deborah) exits trial believing Irving is one to 'beware'," Jewish Telegraphic Agency, March 21, 2000.
16. Exodus 17:16, Deuteronomy 25:17, 1 Samuel 15:3-20.
17. "Racist Who Twisted the Truth," The Times (London), Wed., April 12, 2000.
About the Author
Mark Weber, Director of the Institute for Historical Review and editor of the IHR's Journal of Historical Review, was born in 1951 in Portland, Oregon, where he was also raised. He studied at the University of Illinois (Chicago), the University of Munich (Germany), and Portland State University, from where he received a Bachelor's degree in history (with high honors). He did graduate work in history at Indiana University (Bloomington), where he served as a history instructor and received a Master's degree in European history in 1977. In March 1988 he testified for five days in Toronto District Court as an expert witness on the "Final Solution" and the Holocaust issue. He has worked full time for the IHR since January 1991.
This essay is adapted from the keynote address, delivered May 27, 2000, at the 13th IHR Conference, Irvine, California.
To my fellow thought-criminals
I'm glad to see by some of the email lists and other Internet sources that there are a lot of people who share my concern about the crackdown on dissent and the de facto repeal of civil liberties in the massive backwash of the undeclared war against a phantom enemy. I hope someone is keeping a file somewhere on the flood of cases in the USA where people are getting harassed, arrested, suspended from school, visited by the FBI, etc., etc., not only for performing Constitutionally-protected acts of dissent or publically expressing the newly-forbidden views, but sometimes simply because they are known to hold those views or have performed such acts in the past. Thus a woman was mobbed by armed soldiers and refused passage on an airline for no other reason than that she had been identified as an "anti-war activist". Another person was bounced from a flight simply for carrying a book by the respected author Edward Albee, who happens to be an anarchist.
But the most disturbing report to me was the story that the Czech Republic passed a law which permits the prosecution of people expressing sympathy for the attacks on New York, and also of those who criticize the new law! The report said that one journalist has already been arrested and charged as a *supporter of terrorism* for criticising this law in a story he wrote. Is this outrage against civil liberties merely a product of an ex-communist country with no tradition of freedom of speech or of the press? The fact is that some of the reports from the USA are even more disturbing, viz. of official action being taken against people who do NOT express sympathy for the attackers, but who assert that neither are they in sympathy with the actions of the U.S. government in waging a war of vengeance against millions of people who were not even involved in the attacks.
The trend is clear, and terrifying: anyone who is NOT IN SYMPATHY with the bloody new crusade is in danger of having bad things happen to him -- not only from his fellow citizens whose passions may be inflamed to mob action by the unchecked media frenzy in support of the government, but even by the government itself. The situation goes beyond public acts and outward expression, and intrudes into what we feel in our heart of hearts. If I don't feel the same way about these issues as do my neighbors or the majority of people, then I am in danger of being called a criminal -- a "supporter of terrorism". To find an accurate label for such a thing, we would have to turn to Orwell's *1984*, where the all-pervasive all-intrusive government rigorously monitors the citizens for THOUGHT-CRIME.
I think that in such dangerous times, it's vital for people to speak out and share the views they hold which buck the momentum of the mass stampede to death and disaster. In other Internet posts, I've noticed that some Americans who were once unambiguously proud of their country have now recoiled with horror at the actions of its government and begun to speak of it as an EMPIRE. This rings a bell with me, because I have seen it that way for many years. I share some of the views of those who are aware that the hidden elite are pushing for a massive centralization of power and money in a New World Order -- except that I've always preferred to call it the New World Empire. And there is no doubt that this global Empire has its financial headquarters in the Wall Street complex of New York City, and that the armed forces of the United States are the backbone of its arsenal.
I think the worst thing that could happen to the human race would be if the New World Empire achieved a final consolidation of its power such that no one could ever oppose it. The result would be a worldwide totalitarian state like none the planet has ever known -- unless perhaps you believe in the legends of Atlantis. So it was that I experienced the events of September 11, 2001 with profound ambivalence: the shock at the magnitude of the event, the horror at the deaths of so many people, compassion for all the victims -- yet at the same time I had a feeling of exultation that someone, as yet unknown, had finally struck a decisive blow against the Empire.
So there it is -- I actually felt SYMPATHY for the 911 attack and its perpetrators! Will the Thought Police show up at my door? If they do, I would hope that other people might speak out on my behalf, just as I am trying to speak out on behalf of all those who have already felt the heel of the new oppressor. The new form of tyranny is incredibly insidious, for the high tech not only lends great force and accuracy to its actual weaponry, but also to the instruments of mind control, namely the mass media, which enslave people from the inside and make them believe that they freely choose their oppression.
But my hope is that the small and ever-shrinking minority still capable of thinking for ourselves will find some common ground to resist the tide of Empire and help each other to remain free enough to speak our minds.
Against the fall of night, Joseph MilkyWave7@aol.com Imbolg/Brigid/Candlemas , 2002
P.S. Suggestion to avoid congestion in the "Send To" box: subscribe to the Wangus List! It's easy: just send a blank email to:
Wangus-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
Here's the Wangus List description:
Reality as you know it is a hoax. The task of liberation has always been to overturn the world. This is easier to do in challenging times when "normal" life is disrupted. People are forced to choose between the dangerous path to transcendence or blind reaction in defense of the crumbling status quo. The basic meaning of the "911" attack on the U.S. is that the somnolent, decadent postmodern world got popped by the Reality Police. You have the right to remain silent, and anything you say may be held against you -- but if you want to sound off anyway, this is the place to do it!
Reproduced gratefully from: http://reportersnotebook.com/newforum/indexforum.html
Draft additional Protocol to the Convention on Cybercrime concerning the criminalisation of acts of a racist and xenophobic nature committed through computer systems [1]
Doc. 9538
5 September 2002
Report
Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Rapporteur: Mr Ignasi Guardans, Spain, Liberal, Democratic and Reformers' Group
Summary
The report recommends to the Committee of Ministers the adoption of the draft protocol, which is the result of a compromise between differing legal and cultural traditions.
The report nevertheless reiterates the request previously made by the Assembly in its opinion on the draft parent-Convention, namely to introduce the concept of "unlawful hosting" in the text of the protocol.
The report also calls for the deletion of an abusive reservation permitting a Contracting State to opt out of the obligation to impose penal liability or to set up other efficient remedies to the dissemination of racist and xenophobic material through a computer system.
Finally, the report asks for the broadening of the definition of acts constituting genocide or crimes against humanity, where these are denied, minimised, approved or justified in material disseminated through a computer system.
I. Draft opinion
1. The Assembly refers to its Opinion No. 226 (2001) on the draft Convention on Cybercrime and its Recommendation 1543 (2001) on racism and xenophobia in cyberspace. It believes that the arguments expounded in those two texts concerning the dissemination of racist propaganda and the unlawful hosting of hateful messages remain relevant.
2. It welcomes the large number of signatures of the Convention on Cybercrime (thirty-three signatures and one ratification), to which it gave its political support, and trusts that it will soon enter into force.
3. It salutes the speedy action by the Committee of Experts on the Criminalisation of Acts of a Racist or Xenophobic Nature committed through Computer Networks (PC-RX). The Committee has worked efficiently and in line with the Assembly's general recommendations. The Assembly accordingly believes that the final protocol could be opened for signature in the year following the opening for signature of its parent Convention.
4. It realises that the text adopted by the European Committee on Crime Problems is a compromise between differing legal and cultural traditions, which strikes a broadly satisfactory balance between combating racism and freedom of expression.
5. However, the Assembly cannot go along with the Committee's refusal to include unlawful hosting, a concept which it defended in its opinion and repeated in its recommendation. The opposition of a single non-member state of the Council of Europe cannot override the defence of the European continent's common values when the states that share them join together in drafting an instrument of such importance, even if that state threatens not to accede to the instrument in question.
6. It is gratified that the protocol, if the current version is confirmed, will be the first international instrument to penalise negationism.
7. Accordingly, the Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers make the following amendments to the draft protocol:
i. add the notion of unlawful hosting and make any reservation in respect of the criminal and civil offences it provides for subject to the recognition of this notion in domestic law;
ii. add the word "language" between "colour" and "descent" in Articles 2(1), 4, 5(1) and 6(2);
iii. delete paragraph 3 from Article 3 of the draft protocol, because it would represent an abusive reservation;
iv. replace, in Article 4, the words " threatening, through a computer system, with the commission of a serious criminal offence" by the words "disseminating or otherwise making available to the public through a computer system, threats to commit a serious criminal offence (.)";
v. replace, in paragraph 1 of Article 5, the words "insulting publicly, through a computer system" by the words "disseminating or otherwise making available to the public through a computer system, insults to (.)";
vi. replace, in paragraph 1 of Article 6, the words "as defined by international law and recognised as such by final and binding decisions of the International Military Tribunal, established by the London Agreement of 8 April 1945, or any other international court established by relevant international instruments and whose jurisdiction is recognised by that Party" by the following text:
"as defined by international law and/or any other international court established by relevant international instruments".
II. Explanatory memorandum
by Mr Guardans, Rapporteur
1. The Committee of Ministers set up the Committee of Experts on the Criminalisation of Acts or a Racist or Xenophobic Nature committed through Computer Networks (PC-RX) with instructions to draft by 30 April 2002 a Protocol to the Convention on Cybercrime opened for signature on 23 November 2001, which has been signed by 34 states (30 member and 4 non-member states), to deal with the criminalisation of conduct consisting in the dissemination of messages or material of a racist or xenophobic nature by computerised means. This subject had been kept out of the parent convention owing to opposition from certain delegations on freedom-of-expression grounds. Twenty-five member and non-member states who had participated in the drafting of the Convention on Cybercrime took part in the negotiations.
2. The protocol does not in any way alter the parent convention, but supplements it by widening its scope to include the offences of racist and xenophobic propaganda. On 22 July 2002, the Parliamentary Assembly was asked by the Committee of Ministers for an opinion on the text approved by the European Committee on Crime Problems (CDPC) on 22 June 2002.
3. During the preparatory work on the Convention on Cybercrime, the question of criminalising hate speech on the Internet and other computer media was left aside at the insistence of certain delegations who wished at all costs to protect freedom of speech, despite the insistence of members of the Parliamentary Assembly when the latter was asked for its opinion on a virtually final draft. In the Assembly, there was an impassioned debate between defenders of the principle and the protagonists of a more pragmatic line, including myself, arguing that too wide a convention would not have been endorsed by the United States and that, without signature and ratification by the US government, the convention would have carried little weight.
4. The Committee of Ministers responded to the expectations of the majority of parliamentarians by setting up this committee of experts, which has worked with commendable speed. It was right to draft a strict protocol, which adheres to the principle. The draft has been prepared with the active participation of American experts, which explains why it is so worded as not to infringe that country's fundamental constitutional principles, particularly freedom of speech (First Amendment to the American Constitution, forming part of the Bill of Rights[2]). A delicate balance has been struck in the wording of the draft between the tradition common to the English-speaking and Scandinavian countries and that of countries which have adopted legislation to combat racist discourse. In view of this balance, we believe that there should be no reservations in the protocol enabling countries to ratify it wthout applying its content, ie without incorporating its main provisions in their domestic law. For a distinction will be made in the eyes of the "global" world in which we live between states that want to combat racism in the 21st century with all the legal means at their disposal, and those that do not really wish to do so.
5. The Convention on Cybercrime (hereinafter, "the Comvention") makes a clear distinction between offences relating to content and other offences. And offences relating to content include only child pornography. In addition to the reasons already mentioned, the basic reason for this restriction must not be lost sight of. It would be wrong to impose more prohibitions on the Internet than on other means of expression and communication in our society. Any restriction of freedom to express ideas, ideologies, sentiments and principles must be quite exceptional, however much they may be confined to a minority or contrary to the majority sentiment in the society in which they are expressed. Statements cannot be banned on the Internet if they are not banned in other media. The principle of the restrictive nature of criminal law must always be preserved.
6. Racism and xenophobia cannot be regarded as opinions freely expressed in a democratic society: at least, that was the tenor of discussion in the Committee when the draft report in racism and xenophobia in cyberspace was adopted. Gradually, but very widely, social and occupational discrimination of all kinds based on racist or xenophobic considerations have been outlawed in European countries. Some have gone on to make racist speech a separate criminal or civil offence. These laws are usually so neutrally worded as to be perfectly applicable to racist speech on the Internet and other electronic media. One cannot speak of a legal vacuum as regards racism on the Internet, as Mr Tallo noted in his report.
7. However, it is also true that racist discourse on the Internet is on the increase and needs to be specifically addressed by the criminal law. The Internet permits a degree of trivialisation of racist and xenophobic discourse, particularly among the young, that would virtually never be achieved through more conventional media. At the same time, the Internet enables veritable racist and xenophobic communities to be formed which cannot be tolerated in its midst by a democratic society. Lastly, the instruments of police, judicial and technological co-operation established by the Convention need to be extended to include combating racism and xenophobia.
8. The first racist websites appeared in the 1990s. There are now 4,000, including 2,500 in the United States (there were only 160 in 1995). Despite the proliferation of racist sites in the United States, the amount of racist activity there is not considerable. Messages are circulated on websites or via kiosks, forums or e-mail (the latter being regarded as private correspondence). Books, records, revisionist songs and journals are also available to all and sundry. The sites are easy to access and free of charge.
9. Differing views of the limits to freedom of speech have produced different legal reponses to racist and xenophobic discourse in the United States and in Europe. According to the case law of the US Supreme Court, hate speech is punishable only if there is an imminent threat to a specific person (see Brandenburg v Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969) and Watts v United States, 394 U.S. 705 (1969)[3]; R.A.V. v St Paul[4]; Chaplinsky v New Hampshire (1942)[5]; Wisconsin v Mitchell (1992) and Ohio v Wyant)[6]. At a hearing organised by the Committee in Paris on 6 March 2001, an expert from the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law showed that this case law did not afford the protection of the American courts to racist messages posted on the site of an American server intended exclusively for a foreign audience as a way of circumventing another country's legislation. But sites containing racist or xenophobic messages are frequently placed on American servers with the aim of avoiding prosecution.
10. I cannot subscribe to the point of view expressed in the Tallo[7] report, to the effect that the United States cannot be asked to sign up to a general rule making hate speech on the Internet an offence. The principle must be stated with all clarity, as Europe has done in other cases of profound disagreement between our legal conceptions and those of the United States, for example concerning the death penalty. However, it might be appropriate to allow for reservations, subject to the condition of introducing a mechanism to prevent recourse to American legislation and case-law for the purpose of circumventing the stricter legislation of another country.
11. That is the basis of the proposals made by the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, which suggests instituting the "unlawful hosting" which already exists in Article 16 of the European Convention on Transfrontier Television[8]. Only if such a mechanism is introduced can it be justified to permit a state to enter a reservation concerning the application of a criminal or civil penalty as provided for in the draft protocol.
12. Paragraph 8 ii. of Recommendation 1543 (2001) proposed specifically mentioning "unlawful hosting" in the terms of reference of the Committee of Experts responsible for the protocol. Unfortunately, this has not been taken into account in the draft protocol and, since no explanation is given in the explanatory report accompanying the draft, there is no way of knowing whether this important issue was discussed by the experts and for what reasons they did not include it in the text. It may be assumed that certain states had a decisive influence in keeping the issue out of the Committee's preparatory discussions.
13. It is therefore important that the Assembly re-state its position and recommend that the Committee of Ministers introduce the notion of unlawful hosting into the protocol and make any reservation concerning the criminal and civil offences it provides for subject to the recognition of this notion in domestic law. Otherwise, the protocol, even if ratified by the United States, would be of limited effectiveness.
14. It is important to note that the Protocol affects neither the procedural principles of the Convention nor international co-operation, which will apply directly, or mutatis mutandis, as the case may be, to the new offences. In particular, there will be no change in the definition of what constitutes aiding and abetting the racist and xenophobic offences provided for in the Convention. This means that service providers will be liable only where their complicity is willing and intentional ("when committed intentionally"). This does not prevent states from adopting more restrictive measures based on strict liability, as Spain has done in a law recently enacted by Parliament[9].
15. With regard to more detailed amendments to the draft Protocol, I suggest the following.
16. The definition of what is meant by "racist and xenophobic material" (Article 2, paragraph 1) is obviously one of the most substantial and most difficult aspects of the draft protocol. In our view, the draft explanatory report justifies the proposed definition fairly well, even though it relies on legal concepts contained in international treaties and lacking in sufficient legal foundation, as in the case of "descent" and "national origin", which may give rise to problems of interpretation.
17. However, the inclusion in the same paragraph of the phrase " as well as religion if used as a pretext for any of these factors" is quite unjustified. This reference to religion, where it conceals racist or xenophobic motives, may cause more problems than it sets out to resolve. The experience of conflicting perspectives surrounding the publication of Salman Rushdie's "Satanic Verses" is a perfect example of how freedom of expression must be preserved, even if one community may legitimately take offence, and of how in any case this debate must be kept quite separate from the debate on racism and xenophobia. I accordingly suggest deleting the references to religion in Articles 2, 4, 5 and 6 of the draft Protocol.
18. Paragraph 3 of Article 3 should be deleted in order not to empty the draft Protocol of all substance. Any reservation in respect of the principle stated in paragraph 1 of this Article and of the effective remedies provided for in paragraph 2 cannot be justified unless the notion of "unlawful hosting" is introduced, as explained above..
19. Article 4 is so worded as to include not only public, but also private threats. This is confirmed by the explanatory report. The whole of the Convention and the other provisions of this draft Protocol do not cover offences between individuals, but only public offences. The definition of the offence proposed by the draft protocol must therefore be restricted to threats made in public or, to use similar terminology to Article 3, to " disseminating, or otherwise making available to the public, through a computer system threats to commit a serious criminal offence (.)".
20. The wording of Article 5 paragraph 1 could likewise be aligned on the description of other offences, using the following text: "disseminating or otherwise making available to the public via a computer system, public insults . ".
21. Article 6 deals, for the first time in an international treaty, with denial, minimisation, approval or justification of genocide or crimes against humanity. This form of racist discourse, which takes the devious course of belittling crimes against humanity whose memory we have a duty to preserve for future generations, is probably among the most dangerous because of its subtlety and one of the most contemptible because it constitutes an additional affront to the victims' memory. I would remind my colleagues of the names Violeta Friedman[10] or Mel Mermelstein[11] who were among those who courageously succeeded through in thwarting attempts at negation.
22. However, the conversion of this principle into positive law has not met with a positive response in comparative law, either as to its precise definition, or as to the possible legal (criminal or civil) response. But while it may be appropriate to allow for the reservations mentioned in Article 6.2 of the draft protocol, it is much more questionable to limit the definition of negation to cases of genocide or crimes against humanity recognised by the Nuremberg Military Tribunal or other international tribunals with established jurisdiction (as for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia or Rwanda). That could be interpreted as requiring documentary proof and justification, which would in fact diminish the protection at present provided in many countries. It should be for the trial judge to interpret whether there is approval or justification of genocide or crimes against humanity, without it being necessary to produce in court the "official verdict" of an international tribunal. My suggestion is therefore to delete from paragraph 1 of Article 6 the words "and recognised as such by final and binding decisions of the International Military Tribunal, established by the London Agreement of 8 April 1945, or of any other international court established by relevant international instruments and whose jurisdiction is recognised by that Party".
23. We are pleased to note that the Committee of Experts on the Criminalisation of Acts of a Racist or Xenophobic Nature committed through Computer Networks (PC-RX) has worked rapidly and efficiently, thus filling the gap which was left in the Convention for practical reasons and of compromise, and thus enabling the final protocol to be opened for signature in the year following the opening for signature of the parent-Convention.
24. It is therefore necessary and logical that this new international instrument be solid in its principles and efficient in its content, even at the risk indeed avoided on the occasion of the drafting of the parent-Convention that some States do not take up the fight by refusing to implement all the legal instruments at their disposal to fight against racism and xenophobia.
25. Some of the other amendments proposed could improve the draft protocol, by specifying its field of application and the definition of the offences which are foreseen therein.
Reporting committee: Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Reference to committee: Doc. 9530 and Reference No. 2763 of 3 September 2002
Draft opinion unanimously adopted by the committee on 2 September 2002
Members of the committee: Mr Lintner (Chairperson), Mr Magnusson, Mrs Gülek, Mr Marty (Vice-Chairpersons), Mr Akçali, Mr G. Aliyev, Mr Andican, Mr Arabadjiev, Mrs van Ardenne-van der Hoeven, Mr Attard Montalto, Mr Barquero Vázquez, Mr Bindig, Mr Brejc, Mr Bruce, Mr Bulavinov (alternate: Mr Khripel), Mr Chaklein (alternate: Mr Shishlov), Mrs Christmas-Mřller, Mr Clerfayt, Mr Contestabile, Mr Davis, Mr Dimas, Mrs Domingues, Mr Engeset, Mr Enright, Mrs Err, Mr Fedorov (alternate: Mr Zavgayev), Mrs Frimansdóttir, Mr Frunda, Mr Guardans, Mr Gustafsson, Mrs Hajiyeva, Mr Holovaty (alternate: Mr Shybko), Mr Jansson, Mr Jaskiernia, Mr Jurgens, Mr Kastanidis, Mr Kelemen, Mr S. Kovalev, Mr Kresák, Mr Kroll, Mr Kroupa, Mrs Libane (alternate: Mr Cilevics), Mr Lippelt, Mr Manzella, Mrs Markovic-Dimova, Mr Martins, Mr Mas Torres, Mr McNamara, Mr Meelak, Mr Michel, Mr Mitterrand, Mrs Nabholz-Haidegger, Mr Nachbar, Mr Olteanu, Mrs Pasternak, Mr Pellicini (alternate: Mr Budin), Mr Penchez, Mr Piscitello, Mr Poroshenko, Mrs Postoica, Mr Pourgourides, Mrs Roudy, Mr Rustamyan, Mr Skrabalo, Mr Solé Tura (alternate: Mrs Lopez Gonzalez) Mr Spindelegger (alternate: Mr Jung), Mr Stankevic, Mr Stoica (alternate: Mr Coifan), Mrs Stoisits, Mrs Süssmuth, Mr Svoboda, Mr Symonenko, Mr Tabajdi, Mr Tepshi, Mrs Tevdoradze, Mr Tokic', Mr Vanoost (alternate: Mr Goris), Mr Volpinari, Mr Wilkinson (alternate: Mr Lloyd), Mrs Wohlwend
N.B. The names of those members who were present at the meeting are printed in italics.
Secretaries to the committee: Ms Coin, Mr Sich, Ms Kleinsorge, Mr C'upina, Mr Milner
[1] See Doc 9530.
[2] "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".
[3] cf. "Report of the expert seminar on the role of the Internet in the light of the provisions of the International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination" (54th session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, 6 January 1998).
[4] cf. "Human Rights: Group Defamation, Freedom of Expression and the Law of Nations", T.D. Jones, Kluwer Law International 1998.
[5] cf. "Freedom of Speech and Incitement against Democracy", ed. Kertzmer and Kershman Hazan, Kluwer Law International.
[6] cf. "Freedom of Speech and Incitement against Democracy", ed. Kertzmer and Kershman Hazan, Kluwer Law International.
[7] See Doc. 9263, para. 17 of the explanatory memorandum.
[8] Article 16 Advertising specifically intended for a single Party, § 1: " In order to avoid distortions in competition and endangering the television system of a Party, advertising and tele-shopping which are specifically and with some frequency directed to audiences in a single Party other than the transmitting Party shall not circumvent the television advertising and tele-shopping rules in that particular Party.".
[9] cf. Law 34/2002 of 11 July 2002, on information society and electronic commerce services », BOE 12/07/2002 [BOE 06/08/2002].
[10] Survivor of Auschwitz (May 1944-early 1945).
[11] Survivor of Auschwitz (May-July 1944).
http://assembly.coe.int//Documents/WorkingDocs/doc02/EDOC9538.htm
-- "Yet life is war. Can we dismiss its meaning and yet retain it? That is what the craving for the peace of fellahdom, for protection against everything that disturbs the daily routine, against destiny in every form, would seem to intimate: a sort of protective mimicry vis ŕ vis world history, human insects feigning death in the face of danger, the "happy ending" of an empty existence, the boredom of which has brought in jazz music and Negro dancing to perform the Dead March for a great culture." (Oswald Spengler: The Hour of Decision, 1933)
Hungarian FM says gov't to make Holocaust denial a crime
BUDAPEST, Hungary - Hungary plans to make denial of the Holocaust a crime, the foreign minister said Monday.
The proposal is part of a wider government review of the penal code in an effort to make laws against hate crimes and racially motivated crimes more effective.
"The objective of the modification is to close the legal loopholes used by those making anti-Semitic statements," Foreign Minister Laszlo Kovacs told a news conference.
Details of the law would be revealed after the government presents its draft in Parliament for general debate, likely at the end of the month.
The proposed changes would also make it possible for the state to take people to court for hate speech. Such speech already is illegal in Hungary, but the state can as of now only act if someone reports the crime to authorities.
"This is also against anti-Gypsy and xenophobic expressions. I would like Hungarian democracy not to be distorted by such statements," Kovacs added.
Last week, the Association of Hungarian Journalists reprehended the producers of "Big Brother," a commercial television reality show for broadcasting a segment during which a participant made racist statements about former Prime Minister Viktor Orban. The segment was broadcast only on the Internet.
Police regularly confiscate signs with racist slogans held by soccer fans during matches in the local league.
Kovacs said he first announced the government's intentions during a meeting last week in New York with international Jewish organizations.
Kovacs said Germany and Austria have laws which make denial of the Holocaust a crime.
"So maybe it is not a coincidence that Hungary is in the range of countries, where even today there is a need for" such a law, Kovacs said.
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