This whole hate crime business leaves a bad taste in the mouth though. Why should it be a crime to say that the holocaust did not happen? Why not just ignore it? Why not just ridicule it? How is a law against holocaust denial any different than a law against denying Mohammed?
What would we say if Muslim countries had laws against crusade denial?Unless someone is also inciting to crime, which I don't think was proved in Zuendel's Canadian case (but going by memory here), I don't see that the denial itself should be a criminal matter at all. Ursula
basking in the sun(through double-glazed windows -- baby it's cold outside --39 C w/wind chill)
Chris Bruce wrote:
Members of this list will be undoubtedly interested (I deliberately use a rather 'neutral' term here - the reader may substitute others as s/he wishes) to learn that Ernst Zuendel has just been sentenced by a German court to a 5-year prison term (the stiifest possible sentence under current German law) for Holocaust denial.For several years Zuendel spread the poison of his anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial in my native Canada and in the U.S. He was finally extradited from Canada to Germany in the Spring of 2005.(Zuendel also co-authored a book which put forth the theory that supposed UFO's which people reported sighting were in fact secret nazi weapons emerging from a hollow earth through a hole somewhere in the Antarctic - perhaps the best illustration of the seriousness with which material put forth by supporters of Holocaust denial and revisionism should be taken. It is comforting to note that the ridiculous of the claims is in no way seen as mitigating the seriousness of the crime.)Chris Bruce Kiel, Germany
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