NilsGLindgren wrote:Cito di Pense wrote:People have started to think about history as a tool, rather than as a mere collection of facts.
Seriously, haven't people always used "history" as a tool?
Yes, they have. But we still see numbers of people insisting that history is about a set of facts. It is they to whom I am speaking.
Pointedly, to what fact are we referring when we write about 'The Holocaust'? Are we referring to the the way people in ghettoes and concentration camps behaved toward their peers? No, of course not. We are referring to an ideology without examining all the ways it was implemented in action. But yes, we cannot talk about those things if we deny the use of the term.
So, when we talk about 'Holocaust denial prohibition', we are talking about taking steps to ensure that we can talk about something else. 'Holocaust denial' is not actually threatening to silence that conversation; it is just a distraction, and we can decide that we have had enough distraction.
All these societies that cherish open discussion of 'The Holocaust' may still perish, and someday, historians may write about civilisations in which people declared that 'Holocaust denial' was undesirable, without having a clue about the causes.