This is a bit long, but it shows a real life case of why our opposition cannot and will not open up this topic to scrutiny and debate.
The person who engaged in this e-mail dialogue is Dennis Shaw, and the person on the other end of this citizen's one-man operation is Canada's Globe and Mail's Anthony Keller.
Mr. Shaw, introducing his blueprint:
I recently invited a Jewish editor of the Globe and Mail to convert me into a holocaust believer who could convert others.
He made the usual big statements about "the holocaust", and about showing up doubters, and believing in free speech, until I asked him for his definition of "the holocaust", then I never heard from him again.
This exchange is now at an end and, as far as I am concerned, can be passed on to others.
The ten emails are below.
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Shaw to Keller:
Mon, 11 Jan 1999 1
Good editorial on 11 Jan 99. We need more like this to awaken the slumbering masses. (W)e all feel uncomfortable when people go on about jews, but this is an important principle, and we need to speak up.
Today I got the latest "list of material reviewed by the Prohibited Importations Unit at Headquarters in Ottawa", to which unit all hate material is sent for a decision. From a close look (nothing that would stand up in court), a figure stuck out.
There were no books (or materials) banned because they were hateful to Moslems. There were no materials banned because they were hateful to Christians. There were no materials banned because they were hateful to "all other religions".
There were 30 materials banned because they referred to jews, and were presumably hateful. Not scientific, but interesting.
I have never understood why jews are the only people throughout time and throughout Europe who have been deported as a group. Over all these years and in all these countries, have the natives been wrong and the jews right every time ? Interesting.
I admit I don't know any answers to this. Could you publish a study or history of these people who hold this unique record ? I know what your reaction will be, and that's interesting too.
I am open-minded because I have read both sides of the question.
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Keller to Shaw:
Tue, 12 Jan 99
Dear Mr. Shaw,
The unique history of Jews in European society is due to their unique position. Basically, there were no other non-European/non-Christians in any significant and noticeable numbers living in Europe prior to this century. The few exceptions -- like Gypsies and Muslims in Spain in the middle ages -- fared just as badly as jews did during the last 2000 years, and one might even argue that they got a worse deal from their European neighbours in the pre-modern era.
The reason we've got a history of 2000 years worth of on-again, off-again persecution against european jews is that the jews really were the only outsiders living in europe. Everyone else was a christian. The muslims were "outside" europe, and when conquered by europeans, as in spain in the 14th and 15th centuries, were either expelled or converted. So the only "other" living in the bosom of european society for two millenia, a society that was exclusively christian, was the jew. It's not so much that jews were singled out over other groups to discriminate against -- there really were NO other people to discriminate against. It's only since the mid-20th century that you have any significant number of non-europeans living in europe, thanks to immigration from africa, india, turkey, the caribbean, etc.
Mix in the idea that jews killed christ, the fact that until the late middle ages christians were not allowed to lend money at interest (so they had to have non-Christian bankers), the religious fanaticism of the crusades era, the general fear of outsiders that marks most of human history in most places at most times, the idea that non-Christians are a threat to the state (hence the Inquisition, to find those secretly practicing the dangerous religion), the idea that outsiders are not just religiously impure but impure by their very biological nature (nazism), the association of jews with (and this is somewhat confusing, since these next two contradict one another) unmasculine behaviour and superior sexual prowess and .... well, it all adds up, depressingly and with a sort of very logical illogic.
By the way, Mr. Shaw, I'm Jewish (and as my ancestors in Germany discovered, that's how the Nuremberg Race Laws defined them). But as you've noticed from my columns, I don't think neo-Nazi hate-mongers pose a threat to me. I'd rather meet their arguments and show them up in a free society than prevent them from speaking. The best defence is open minds, and the best way to build them is in an open, tolerant society.
Thanks for writing,
Tony Keller
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Shaw to Keller:
Wed, 13 Jan 1999
Mr Keller
Thank you for the above. Most editors don't make time to answer. Your knowledge of European history surprised me until your last paragraph - "I'm Jewish". Most of the jews I have met have been like your Encyclopedia Judaica (sp?), very strong on history. (...)
Ernst does not deny the Jewish Holocaust; he denies certain claims, but finds he cannot present his view through the media.
Dennis
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Keller to Shaw:
Thu, 14 Jan 99
Dear Mr. Shaw,
One of the basic principles of a liberal society, along with the right to speak, is the right to ignore, to not listen, to avoid. There's no right to be heard, there's no obligation to listen. Ernst Zundel has the right to speak, and I have the right to listen to him and read him -- but I also have every right to pay no attention to him whatsoever if I decide that his ideas aren't worth my time. And in the case of Mr. Zundel, his ideas aren't worth anyone's time.
A debate between a knowledgable historian and Mr. Zundel would be, as columnist David Frum once put it in a different context, like a debate between the Regus professor and an astronomer on the topic "do the stars control our future?" Mr. Zundel has nothing to say that's worth listening to, not on the Holocaust.
That said, I will defend until the end Mr. Zundel's right to speak. But I will defend until the end my right to ignore everything he is saying, and the right of newspapers to refrain from showing interest in his views. And that's precisely what the Toronto Star case before the Human Rights Commission is all about.
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Shaw to Keller:
22 Jan 99
Mr Keller
May I ask three questions about your last email to me (below, and with which I basically agree) ?
A debate in detail has already taken place, under the strictly controlled conditions of a courtroom, and historian Hillberg, among others, seems to me to have been so discredited that he declined to appear at the second Zundel trial. Have you read the complete trial transcript ?
You probably agree that you are two persons. First, you are an ordinary jewish member of the public. But also you are an editor of the country's largest paper. As a citizen it is your right to ignore Mr Zundel. As an editor (if "free speech" means anything at all) you have a duty to present the gentile point of view to a predominantly gentile readership, without using your position as a filter. Is the management of the Toronto Star also jewish ?
Lastly, I am intensely interested to know your definition of the holocaust. Can you put it in a few words, so that I know we were both discussing the same thing ?
Dennis
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Keller to Shaw:
26 Jan 99
But Mr. Shaw, as you well know, the "gentile" position of the Holocaust, as you call it, is no different from the "Jewish" position on the Holocaust. The "Allied" position on the Holocaust is no different from the "German."
Everyone, save for a few cranks, is entirely convinced that 6 million jews, along with a large number of political undesirables and other minority peoples, were systematically murdered by the Nazis, a very large number of them in death camps, in ghettos or in transit between those points. (At the same time, several million Polish, Russian and other eastern european civilians and prisoners of war were shot, worked to death or starved to death). There are monuments to this horror all over Germany, erected by the post-war West German government as an act of rememberance and atonement. (You'd find it interesting to note that the only Germans who ever tried to minimize and reshape the truth of the Holocaust were the Communists of East Germany.... once again, as Orwell argued in Animal Farm, the extreme-right and the extreme-left are really the same thing... Ernst Zundel and Erich Honecker, united in their views.....)
Try going to Germany and talking this nonsense about the Holocaust never happening or how nobody killed any Jews and see what sort of reaction you get. Even in Germany, your position would be considered absurd by the overwhelming majority of the population. Why do you think Jean Chretien was laying a wreath at Auschwitz? Are you saying those people never died? So where did they go to if they never died? Are they still alive? Have they been hiding all these years?
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Shaw to Keller:
28 Jan 99
Mr Keller
You are the first Jewish person who has tried to clear up my confusion on the Jewish Holocaust (there were other holocausts in ww2) and I want to keep our intellectually honest discussion on track. You did not reply to my question "have you read the transcripts of the first zundel trial ?", so I assume you have not, and so we will drop the question of how a proper debate between Mr Zundel and a bona fide historian would turn out.
If you replied to my question of your definition of "the holocaust" I think it is contained in the following paragraph that you wrote: "... 6 million jews, along with a large number of political undesirables and other minority peoples, were systematically murdered by the Nazis, a very large number of them in death camps, in ghettos or in transit between those points. (At the same time, several million Polish, Russian and other eastern european civilians and prisoners of war were shot, worked to death or starved to death)."
I agree with most of the above, so now I am only puzzled by one or two parts of all the conflicting stories I have heard. Can you clear up a few numbers for me ?
Ever since the end of ww2 and the Nurnberg trials, I have heard that 6 million jews died, including 4 million in Auschwitz. Like the rest of the world I have seen the Pope praying for the souls of the 4 million names carved in the concrete plaques, and yet I now hear that the concrete plaques have been chiselled clean, and the Auschwitz sign now reads "One million died here". I am glad that the numbers seem to have been wrong by 3 million, but why am I still told that 6 million jews were murdered ? Should your definition of the jewish holocaust not be three million now ? How can 6 - 3 = 6 ?
And finally for today, can you put me straight about the stories of jewish soap, the lampshades, the 4 million gassed and cremated at Auschwitz ? Are these just stories, or are they included by you in your definition of the jewish holocaust, as definite happenings ?
As you can see, you have me on your side on most main points. I wouldn't think of going to Germany today saying that the jewish holocaust didn't happen. I think it unfortunately did, but I want to know what I am really referring to when I agree it happened. I appreciate your decision to continue with this discussion.
Dennis
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Shaw to Keller:
Subject: Re: Globe: Best ignore Doug Collins Date: Fri, 05 Feb 1999 08:53:35 -0800
From: Dennis Shaw <dshaw@bc.sympatico.ca> To: akeller@globeandmail.ca
Ignore him | Toronto Globe and Mail editorial - Friday, February 5, 1999
Mr Keller
You have been too busy to answer the questions in my last email yet, on 28 Jan 99, but now I wonder if you are the editor who wrote the above editorial ? I don't think so, because you would "rather meet their arguments and show them up in a free society, than prevent them from speaking".
It is refreshing to exchange opinions with someone who will debate a position point by point, relying on a superior argument, instead of falling back on a gag. I watch my email daily, hoping for your next reply. I need you to give me some ammunition to answer people who ask "how can 6-3=6", and "all the soap and lampshade stuff is BS", and "no one was gassed at Auschwitz". Can you give me some statements from Yad Vashem, or other authoritative Jewish sources ?
Dennis
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Shaw to Keller:
10 Feb 99
Mr Keller
When you wrote to me in Jan 99 that "I'd rather meet their arguments and show them up in a free society than prevent them from speaking. The best defence is open minds", I started to admire your stand on free speech.
However, since I asked you for hard facts about the jewish holocaust you have not replied to me. How can I counter the holocaust deniers if I can't get help from one of the most erudite jews in Canada (editor of the Globe and Mail) ?
You are placing me in an untenable position because the holocaust deniers show me scientific facts and point out contradictions in the jewish version of events to which I have no answers.
Please make the time to give me answers to the questions in my email of 28 Jan 99, and quote me authoritative jewish sources such as Yad Vashem. This is important if the deniers are to be silenced in debate. The alternative is less and less credibility for the jewish figures, leading to widespread denial.
Dennis
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Shaw to Keller:
15 Feb 99
Mr Keller
Your silence for almost three weeks now, forces me to accept what one doubter of the jewish holocaust told me recently. He told me that if I discussed the jewish holocaust with a jew I would hear grand statements and claims, but no proof of what really happened.
As I said earlier to you, if you can't provide me with believeable answers, then you put me in an untenable position. But more than that, I think that you have put the entire jewish position on the jewish holocaust in an untenable position.
You are a jewish editor of this country's largest newspaper, with access to the Canadian Jewish Congress, the ADL, the Bnai Brith, Yad Vashem, and the Wiesental Center, and you can't convince me, a person who was wanting to make sense out of it all and who wanted to support you.
Sadly, you have forced me to conclude that you don't have much of a case, and that I should now be wary of any jewish claims, including jewish holocaust claims. Sorry.
Dennis
Thought for the Day:
"Hain't we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain't that a big enough majority in any town?"
(Mark Twain)
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