Originally posted by debbiejo
🙁 .......But he was my buddy......bad bad Mel.
Originally posted by Sir Whirlysplat
Interestingly Hit and Miss raised an interesting point that our new hate crimes laws might be applicable in a similar way!!! How cool is that!!!! Double post from Gav, edit one to a smiley pal!
Smilies are stupid....anyone who does that should get a few decent hits to the head.
"I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz," David Irving
That's okay, we all make mistakes. But wait minute...
"Before entering the courtroom, Irving told reporters he now believes the Nazis slaughtered Jews during the war."
A great historian and it took him that long to learn that? WOW!
Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
"I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz," David IrvingThat's okay, we all make mistakes. But wait minute...
[B]"Before entering the courtroom, Irving told reporters he now believes the Nazis slaughtered Jews during the war."
A great historian and it took him that long to learn that? WOW! [/B]
Well he could have had his reasons to doubt the official accounts or doubt if it really happened in the way that others said it did, of course he's wrong but well people are allowed to make mistakes and be idiots. Don't really see how thats relevant to the topic however. Even if he didn't ever find out he still shouldn't have been thrown in jail.
Originally posted by Quiero Mota
Why did that ese even deny it in the first place? What was he trying to accomplish?
He probably wanted to bring out the truth, or what he believed was the truth. But what does that have to do with anything? The guy was wrong and an idiot but locking up people who have idiotic opinions isn't really a good thing.
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Europe has always been oddly strict on this. UK and US alike take a different tack- that if you want to make an idiot of yourself denying the Holocaust, then do so. Locking people up for it hardly solves any problems and only aggravates those who see a conspiracy behind it.David Irving is a very famous historian and big expert on the Nazi period- it was he who was the main voice in discrediting the Hitler diaries, for example.
His view on the Holocaust have been well known- he is not in agremeent that it happened. It is worth noting, though, that that's a hazy thing to say; he's not denying Germans killed Jews in large numbers, what he questions is the extent to which gas chambers were used to make it systematic. He is certain that far less died than is commonly said, and those that did die died mostly of old-fashioned murder and malnutrition; he thinks the gas chambers were only used in a limited sense and it is the systematic elimination he has denied.
Which is controversial and probably silly but not heinous. A few years ago, he tried to sue an American academic for attacking his views; he lost the case and at this time it was specifically pointed out that his views were not illegal in US or UK. His case was not helped because behind the veneer of the respectable historian trying to advance a radical view, the case revealed that he does actually have rather nasty facist/racist tendencies- clearly not illegal, but it didn't help his reputation at all.
However, this charge in Austria relates to a tour he made some fifteen years ago, at a time when his views were more extreme- he didn't think gas chambers were used at all back then. He contends his views have changed since then as the evidence has, from outirght denial to the view I outlined above. This in mind... he really wasn't expecting a jail sentence like this for it, so much later.
He pleaded guilty, btw. He said that it was an absurd law but as it is written he did indeed break it. He really didn't think he'd get jail time.
It does look silly.
This really thrusts my point across of the "government" being the "superme authourity" in a "secular" society...😉
Originally posted by Sir Whirlysplat
Because I've met people who were there. I've seen pictures of what happed and posted them here on this site. No matter how horrible it is. It happened. There was a "final solution".
Nobody is denying that...but if it involved as many people as usually claimed is the question.