The following is an excerpt from Michael Hoffman's Campaign for Radical Truth in History, to be found and well worth checking out at http://www.hoffman-info.com :
"In view of the on-going repression of Canadian revisionist dissident Ernst Zündel, who is being prosecuted for his alleged ties to a California website operated by German-American Ingrid Rimland, the following conference should take up the Zündel case as one of the most pressing examples of the obstruction of freedom of Internet expression by government.
Here is the press release concerning the Ottawa conference:
The Global Liberty Internet Campaign (GILC) will sponsor "The Public Voice in the Development of Internet Policy" in Ottawa, Canada on Wednesday, October 7. The meeting is scheduled to coincide with the Ministerial meeting of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that begins in Ottawa on October 8.
The Public Voice conference is a public meeting on the role of the citizen in the development of the information society. The meeting will hear from consumer groups, human rights organizations and civil liberties advocates on such issues as privacy, access, consumer protection and human rights in the 21st century.
John Manley, the Canadian Minister of Industry will be the opening speaker. Mr. Manley will be followed by David Johnston, the former Chair of the Canadian Information Highway Advisory Council and former Provost of McGill University.
Stephen Lau, the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data in Hong Kong, will address the group in the afternoon. Experts from Belgium, Canada, Norway, Britain, Germany, Austria, Australia, and the United States will discuss a range of important issues affecting consumers and citizens in the on-line world.
The GILC meeting is being organized by EPIC in cooperation with Federation Nationale des Associations de Consommateurs du Quebec (Montreal), the Public Interest Advocacy Center (Ottawa), and Electronic Frontiers Canada.
More information about the GILC Public Voice conference, including registration information, is available at:
http://www.gilc.org/events/ottawa98/
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To which I say: Don't hold your breath that there will be support forthcoming from these people. Ernst tells me that he knew about the conference and had offered participation, especially on the topic "Human Rights in the 21st Century, subtitled: What is the next generation of "rights"? How are the current "rights" enshrined in the UN Declaration of Human Rights and other international agreements going to apply to the electronic world?"
You guessed it: With the largest Internet Human Rights Tribunal Internet trial going on and running into its third year - and Ernst being right in the middle - his offer was ignored. These so-called "freedom fighters" all dance happily around the Golden Calf - with very little comprehension that freedom of speech can't be had for anybody on this globe if it is denied Revisionists. ***Especially*** if it is denied Revisionists.
The recent Le Pen development ought to illustrate that nicely.
Le Pen is, of course, France's controversial nationalist leader who spoke of the "Holocaust" as a "mere footnote in history", thereby incurring the ire of the Holocaust Enforcers who are now moving in their heaviest guns against this leader even as we speak. I understand that for his "belittling" of the "Holocaust," Le Pen has now been stripped of his immunity status and will, supposedly, be tried in Germany or by Germany.
To which the avid Jewish "Freedom on the Internet" armchair activist "Lizard", had these insights to offer - with most of which we would fully agree:
"This is deeply distrubing (sic) to anyone who is concerned about free speech.
"First off, presumably, Le Pen made these comments while in France. Why, then, is he being tried under a German law? If I say, in America, 'Charles de Gaulle was a jerk!', shall I be extradited to Paris to be tried under some French law regarding revealing state secrets?
"Secondly, the idea of a law which bans *opinions* about something, no matter how wrong-headed or idiotic, is even worse than a law banning 'false statements' -- at least such a law has objective boundaries, and truth remains a defense (save, it seems, in Canada). But a law banning opinions is simply a weapon which can be used to snare anyone at anytime.
"Yes yes yes, we all know how repellent the Revisionist crowd is, and, indeed, they've been getting worse of late. I have no sympathy for their cause, or for them personally (and significant antipathy for some), but that is still as irrelevant as it ever was. Quite simply, this German law is even more offensive. Bad ideas can be fought with better ideas. Bad laws can only be fought with guns, and, frankly, I prefer duelling with words.
"The idea that one can be fined for 'belittling' something is profoundly WRONG. Opinions are inherently unobjective and cannot be the subject of law. (While I am no fan of law in general, at least an objective law can be lived with -- you know what you can and cannot do. A subjective law, such as laws barring 'pornography' or 'belittlement', is simply an open invitation to any overzealous prosecuter (sic) to arrest anyone he doesn't like.)"
End of Lizard Wisdom. Start of mine in reply to the post above:
"What have I been telling all and sundry for almost three years? Revisionism isn't just about Revisionists whom you feel compelled to disdain at every opportunity. It is about ***you*** and your freedom."
Lizard:
"I don't recall ever denying that a threat to one persons freedom of speech is a threat to everyone's. As soon as it becomes socially acceptable to ban one idea, any idea becomes risky.
I disdain revisionism for the same reason I disdain communism: It's a bad idea, factually incorrect and based on invalid morality. So what? It is still an idea, and those who believe in it have every right to espouse it.
It also makes a useful bellweather (sic) -- attacks on freedom of speech always begin with the ideas which have the fewest defenders."
In the wake of which comes your Experienced Internet Shrieker, a guy named Phillip Hallam-Baker, also from the same list, emitting those tried-and-true wallops that always keep the troops in line:
"I am opposed to capital punishment. That does not mean that I have anything but disdain for Jeffrey Dahmer, George Mason or any other murderer.
"Similarly I can oppose sending Le Pen to jail for his beliefs whilst still believing that he represents the absolute dregs of humanity along with Dahmer, Mason and his hero Aldolf (sic) Hitler."
Can you imagine the howls that would be sent to highest heaven if Ingrid Rimland had equated Itzak Rabin or Menachim Begin, all former Israeli prime ministers and one-time terrorists, with the cannibalist and serial killer of homosexual partners, Jeffrey Dahmer?
And yet, this is done to Revisionists, unopposed, all the time.
Just who is defaming whom?
Ingrid
Thought for the Day:
"He who defines - controls!"
(Marshall McLuhan, Canadian media guru of the 1960s)