March 16, 1998

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

There are eight documents on the Zundelsite, indexed by the Government of Germany's Claudia Nolte, Minister for the Protection of Youth, Families and the Aged, as ". . . ethically disorienting to minors."

These documents have been indexed since August of 1997 and have been recently reaffirmed as still being ". . . harmful to minors." As far as we know, this was one of the first times ever that documents on a website had been indexed and thus censored by a government.

Since then, approximately 100 other pages or documents have been so targeted by the German censors.

Ernst Zundel's attorney, Jurgen Rieger, is fighting this variation of censorship by government decree in expensive court battles, which have already cost many thousands of dollars. Not one of these documents was written by Ernst Zundel, but still he has been charged with ". . . ethically disorienting minors", has to pay the endless legal bills and put up with the hassle.

Should this indexing not be overturned by higher courts, Ernst faces arrest for the "offence" next time he visits Germany, even though he did not write the material and does not own the website.

When I first reported this censorship act to the fight-censorship community, the response was a collective yawn. Now, according to Declan McCullough, one of the prime fight-censorship activists, a very similar bill to Germany's new media law is on the Governor of New Mexico''s desk, waiting for his signature.

You get a flavor for this bill from this letter of opposition to censorship, written by Diana Ayton-Shenker, Director, PEN Freedom-to-Write:

February 26, 1998

The Honorable Gary Johnson
Governor
State of New Mexico
State Capitol Building
Santa Fe, New Mexico 87503

Dear Governor Johnson,

On behalf of the 2,700 members of PEN American Center, the largest of 130 PEN Centers around the world, we write to express our deep concern about Senate Bill 127, as amended by the Public Affairs Committee and recently passed by the New Mexico Legislature. We believe that this legislation, which prohibits electronic dissemination of material deemed "harmful to minors," would infringe the First Amendment rights of your constituents and severely limit access to literature in New Mexico. We respectfully request you to protect free expression in New Mexico by vetoing SB 127.

While we support efforts to protect children from harm, we believe that this legislation would effectively deprive New Mexicans of ALL ages from constitutionally protected internet sites, many with serious literary content or educational value. As a literary organization, we support the unfettered flow of information on the Internet and oppose SB 12--and any legislation--which attempts to harness the electronic dissemination of free speech. Denying adult access to constitutionally protected material is impermissible in a society which values the freedom of expression so deeply.

As it is, SB 127 raises serious legal concerns in light of the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision (Reno v. ACLU, 1997) which struck down the Communications Decency Act (CDA), a federal law which criminalized electronic dissemination of material "harmful to minors," similar to the New Mexico Senate Bill 127. The Court found that Internet censorship, as legislated by the CDA, violated free speech rights of adults by limiting computer material exclusively to that which is suitable for children. By effectively suppressing "a large amount of speech that adults have a constitutional right to receive and to address to one another....," the broad scope of such legislation violates free speech protection as guaranteed under the First Amendment. On the state level, a similar statute to SB 127, the New York Internet Law, was also recently ruled as unconstitutional by a federal court, which concluded that "only Congress can legislate in this area..." (American Library Association v. Pataki, 1997.)

"Given its legal and moral flaws, we strongly urge you to veto Senate Bill 127, thereby protecting free expression in New Mexico. I welcome your comments and would appreciate the opportunity to discuss this matter with you further. Please do not hesitate to contact me at your convenience at (212) 334-1660."

The "protection of children" is the time-worn cloak the censor-tyrant wears in this case, as in so many other cases - can the Wiesenthalers be found protesting and censoring in other places - such as against the various pornography enterprises? Are they "protecting" the same children who are subjected to Playboy channel television and all the smut and freaks on Jerry Springer, Rikki Lake and Geraldo Rivera? Are they "protecting" them from filthy magazines on sale via most variety stores in the Western world, especially those in proximity to high schools in the inner cities?

What ***is*** so ethically disorienting about that so-called Holocaust?

Ingrid

Thought for the Day:

Titles of documents indexed on the Zundelsite as "ethicially disorienting to minors":

* The Leuchter Report - End of a Myth
* Auschwitz: Myths and Facts
* Inside the Auschwitz Gas Chambers
* A Prominent False Witness: Elie Wiesel
* What Is Holocaust Denial?
* Pressac's New Auschwitz-Book
* The Making of a Holocaust Revisionist
* "Judicial Notice of Unnassailable Fact" - Or Justice?

Comments? E-Mail: irimland@cts.com

Back to Table of Contents of the March 1998 ZGrams