No John, it wasn't 'pretty low' or anything like it. Without making too much of a mouthful of it, BBruce was objecting to a person who was glad a staunch zionist had been prevented from giving a speech. The content of the speech would have been to excuse Israel's actions in Gaza, whitewash details about use of phosphorous shells and all the other stuff that's been talked about. Not to mention ideas that Hamas is solely responsible for what the levelling of Gaza and that the not so many Palestinians really died and so on.

Whatever your politics it would in short have been a load of propaganda. Now Bruce had a problem with this guy not being allowed to present his propaganda. Bruce has a point, I believe people should be allowed argue what they want - there are already plenty here on Mudcat doing just that. If you don't agree with them, fine, say so and say why. Don't try and shut them up (not you specifically, people generally!)

Bruce argued this was done to silence any other viewpoint except the one of the objector, hence his comment ""Yes, freedom of speech is far too dangerous to allow to those one disagrees with..." Bruce is being sarcastic here, and rightly making the point that blocking someone from presenting their views is wrong.

But Bruce, and yourself and many others then fall into the same trap: freedom of speech is ok as long as you agree with the content. It emerges if someone like Irving comes up. He just happens to be the best example I can think of. Do you know of anyone else who's gone to jail for their views in the West? Who's not allowed to present their views (however outlandish)? If you do, we can quote them as an example next time, Irving is just one of the best known.

Irving (apparently - I've never read any of his books, have no plans to either, thanks for the info about amazon, but I won't be buying them) should be free to argue the holocaust didn't happen, if that's what he thinks, without fear of jail. People who don't agree with him should be free to argue why and show how he's wrong. THAT'S how we progress forward. Instead he's been silenced in just the same way Bruce is complaining about.

But I've come to realize this is a topic full of double standards. In fact, Israel has been one of the foremost supporters of another episode of 'holocaust denial' - that of Turkey and Armenia. Turks carried ut a program of genocide in Armenia - killing over 2 million Armenians. At the time, it was the largest genocide in human history. Yet today, the official Turkish line is 'it didn't happen' 'if it did, it was an accident' 'the numbers were much smaller' 'they did it to themselves' - all the usual shit. Journalists who've tried to write about this in Turkey have been jailed, and few people would argue that Turkey doesn't have a long way to go in terms of human rights.

Surely, Israel, composed of people that had suffered in like manner, and have monuments to same all over the world, would be the first to object to Turkey's whitewash of its history? Au contraire, Israel has been Turkey's staunchest ally in all of this, objecting to any inclusion of Armenians in holocaust and genocide memorial days, as if there was only one genocide in all of history. All this because Turkey is a strong political ally of Israel. The icing on the cake came recently when Israel's government threatened to no longer support Turkey in its holocaust denail if Turkey didn't ease off on its criticism of Israeli actions in Gaza.

The double standards of this makes me want to vomit. What hope is there of genocides not occurring again and again if it is allowed to become a political football????

There are many 'crucifixion deniers' out there, such as the authors of the Holy Blood and Holy Grail who are trying to claim the crucifixion of Jesus never happened. Of course, were it true (and their thesis is shaky at best) it would mean the central tenet of Christianity - that Christ died and rose as a payment for the debt of our sins, would not be true. To me, that's far worse in some ways than arguing about 'how many died', since it goes beyond politics and humanity and messes with people's salvation. But, the world is big and not everyine shares my views. I would never dream of sending people to jail to silence them because they claimed the crucifixion didn't happen. Actually, it would just make me look suspicious, as if I had something to hide, something that wouldn't stand up to scrutiny. So I would rather let them have their say and argue it out with them, on the basis 'the truth will always out'. It is my view that people like Irving could easily been shown up to be charlatans if they were engaged with. Otherwise - we arrive at the point Bruce was making. The accusation of being (or being like) a holocaust denier - with the legal implications such an accusation carries - often raises its ugly head on these political threads, and I feel it necessary to point out that what Bruce is arguing is that all viewpoints should be listened to, even if they conflict with one's own. I just wish he, and those of a similar view - could see this applies both ways.