Eager non-theist wrote:I don't deny the brutality that was met upon prisoners in concentration camps, nor do I deny the massacres commited by Nazis (in short the real holocaust). What I do deny is the trademarked version of the holocaust which includes, the exagerrated stories that A.F.(Allied Forces) soldiers came home with,

I'm not sure what you mean by "exaggerated stories" - the atrocities in the hundreds of camps were well documented in film, in numerous personal accounts and in the Nazi's own records. If by the "trademarked version of the holocaust" you mean a popular perception that the Holocaust was solely a Jewish affair, then, indeed, this is a common misperception. However, it is equally wrong to democratize the Holocaust and say that it was not primarily a Jewish persecution.

the numbers at Aushwitz (which were changed twice over the course of the 19th 20th century),

Citation? Reference?

and the religious status it's been given by Judaism and hippies alike,which makes questioning ANY detail an instant hate crime,

This is a problem in most ethnically imbued situations (colonialism, racism, etc.) - how does one arrive at reasonably objective conclusions about an event? Indeed, removing any historical persecution from the emotional context felt by the persecuted is a difficult if not impossible task. I'm not sure that if one were to question this or that detail of the Holocaust, one could be prosecuted for a hate crime (though the charge of anti-Semitism may indeed be leveled against him/her). I think what you're reacting against is the hyper-political correctness.

has anyone read the seminar by the way?

What is this?

In short I deny the fake holocaust, you know, the one that gives WWII a "good vs.evil" flavor.

That is something you would need to explain a bit more.

Tyrannical wrote:"Holocaust Guilt" is what allowed a mass migration of Jews into Palestine and allowed it to be changed into a Jewish State to the detriment of the Muslims already living there.

The British did not allow a "mass migration of Jews into Palestine;" indeed, they actively tried to prevent it, trying to appease their Arab subjects in the protectorate. Illegal immigration accounted for much of the influx of Jewish refugees after the war (though world opinion and sympathy did have a softening effect on British policy).

The Palestinian Arabs were not solely subjugated by the Jewish state, but also were the victims of their own leaders' deceptions and power plays. Indeed, many average folks were sold down the river by their own people. Many of the Arabs living in Palestine were tenant farmers: their landlords, who lived in cities throughout the mideast, willingly sold their land to Jews and evicted the tenants. During the partition, Arab leaders told their followers to leave their lands to make way for the invading Arab armies. That having failed on numerous occasions, Arab leaders have used the Palestinian refugees effectively as political tools for the last 60 years, while at the same time showing them little respect. Keeping them in refugee camps (rather than helping and assimilating them into their populations) is a valuable method of control and a perpetual reminder of their war against the Jews - staying focused on an external enemy keeps people from criticizing internal policies.

It would have been in the Jew's best interest to exagerate their mistreatment durring WWII as much as possible to garner sympathy.

I'm not sure why you say "exaggerate their mistreatment" - that seems a remarkably gross understatement. The atrocities against the Jews would hardly need any exaggeration, and to call this a "mistreatment" is absurd.

Federico wrote:

Federico wrote:
Are you aware of the existence of "Hate Laws and Hate Crime" in the US? I wasn't. I'll give you a couple of links link.
Quite an eye opener for those who believe in the existence of total freedom of speech in the US of A.

Shrunk wrote:..... completely irrelevant to my point. American Hate Crime legislation only mandates more severe sentencing if some one commits an act that would already be considered criminal which is felt to have been motivated by hatred of a particular protected group. It does not criminalize hate in and of itself.

Wrong!
"One version defines a hate crime as a discrete offense and provides stiff punishment for the offense. Under Ohio's statute, for example, any person who commits menacing, aggravated menacing, criminal damage or criminal endangerment, criminal mischief, or telephone harassment "by reason of the race, color, religion, or national origin of another person or group of persons" is guilty of the hate crime termed ethnic intimidation

Now you need to demonstrate that anyone who commits "menacing, aggravated menacing, criminal damage or criminal endangerment, criminal mischief, or telephone harassment" without race or ethnicity being a factor will not have committed a crime.

Again, what I said is that the "hate crime laws" you are citing only apply to acts that would already be prohbited by law even if not committed against someone because of their ethnicity. You've just provided an example that supports my point.

Shrunk wrote: You also seem to have overlooked this part of your second link:

"The trial court dismissed the charge on the grounds that it was overbroad and unconstitutionally content-based. Specifically, the court ruled that the statute criminalized too much behavior and infringed on First Amendment rights of free speech. The city of St. Paul appealed to the Minnesota Supreme Court, which reversed the trial court's ruling. The teenagers then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The high court was unanimous in striking down the St. Paul ordinance. However, it was divided in its legal reasoning. According to the majority opinion, the ordinance violated the First Amendment.
According to the concurring justices, the statute was merely overbroad—that is, it legitimately regulated unprotected speech, but it also impermissibly prohibited speech that can cause only hurt feelings or resentment. With more careful wording, the concurring justices argued, hate-crime laws could pass constitutional muster. However, under the Court's majority opinion, this did not seem possible".

Do you think I'm so stupid I provide you with a link without reading it thouroughly before?
What you have selected for quoting demonstrates two things: you're biased, and the existence of a specific hate crime legislation in the US which in some cases limits your cherished total freedom of expression.
Examples drawn from the same link:
"One version [of hate crime legislation] defines a hate crime as a discrete offense and provides stiff punishment for the offense. Under Ohio's statute, for example, any person who commits menacing, aggravated menacing, criminal damage or criminal endangerment, criminal mischief, or telephone harassment "by reason of the race, color, religion, or national origin of another person or group of persons" is guilty of the hate crime termed ethnic intimidation

Already dealt with.

"Laws against hate crimes might conflict with rights under the FIRST AMENDMENT to the U.S. Constitution. Generally, the First Amendment protects a citizen's right to the free expression of thoughts. However, the courts have ruled that First Amendment rights may give way to the greater public good. For example, there is no First Amendment protection for someone who falsely yells "Fire!" in a crowded theater, because such speech endangers the safety of others.

A common misconception. The act of yelling "Fire" in a crowded theatre does not fall under protection of the First Amendment, because it is the action of falsely alarming the audience that is being criminalized, not the expression of an idea. You are still able to yell "Fire" in an empty theatre, or if you are an actor on stage in a crowded theatre and the script calls for your character to yell "Fire."

"The subject of cross burning returned to the U.S. Supreme Court again in Virginia. The Court, in a ruling aimed primarily at the Ku Klux Klan, upheld a Virginia statute that made it a felony to burn a cross "on the property of another, a highway or other public place…with the intent of intimidating any person or group." The 6-3 decision meant that the state could prosecute and convict two white men who had burned a four-foot-high cross in the backyard of an African-American family. The family moved away after the incident. Justice SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR, in her majority opinion, held that the context of the cross burning determined whether it could be protected as constitutionally protected political speech. The First Amendment would protect a cross burning at a political rally, but it would not protect what had occurred in this case, which was criminal intimidation.

I rest my case.

You really need to read your links more carefully. Did you notice this part?

"The First Amendment would protect a cross burning at a political rally..."

Again, it is not the speech (expression of an idea) that is being prohibited, but an action (criminal intimidation). This is the crucial distinction you are failing to realize. The burning of a cross only becomes criminal if it can be demonstrated that the act of doing so criminally intimidates someone.

This is very different from "holocaust denial" laws. There, the very expression of an idea is criminalized, regardless of whether it can be demonstrated to cause any direct harm to another person. It doesn't matter when you say it, where you say, to whom you say it, etc. It is illegal. And that is contrary to the principle of freedom of expression.

Freedom of expression does not meant that one is immune from consequences if one commits a crime that involves speech.

By your definition of freedom of expression, it would mean that a terrorist who detonates a bomb can be criminally charged, but the person who commanded him to detonate it could not be. Clearly that is a misunderstanding of what "freedom of expression" means.

BTW, I've already posted this in another related thread, but it belongs here as well. (The relevant bit starts at 3:50.)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1_Uz4H8zv0[/youtube]

I'm not sure what you mean by "exaggerated stories" - the atrocities in the hundreds of camps was well documented in film

Indeed, those are the massacres I was referring to.Examples of the exagerrated stories the soldiers brought home(big surprise ) include sope and lamps made out of Jews, the story that everyone was a walking skeleton, many were starved of course, but there are also photos of soldiers escorting seemingly well fed prisoners including Jews, and while it's not a story, the WWII death toll estimate of 54,000,000,000,000 (sarcasm) sounds beyond exagerrated.

in numerous personal accounts and in the Nazi's own records.

My answer is the same for the Nazi records, but the memoirs, remember that terror was the governing force in those camps and as such, rumors are bound to spread like wildfire.

If by the "trademarked version of the holocaust" you mean a popular perception that the Holocaust was solely a Jewish affair, then, indeed, this is a common misperception. However, it is equally wrong to democratize the Holocaust and say that it was not primarily a Jewish persecution.

Citation? Reference?

Seriously? There are photos of the change, a simple image search of the Aushwitz memorial should be enough.

This is a problem in most ethnically imbued situations (colonialism, racism, etc.) - how does one arrive at reasonably objective conclusions about an event? Indeed, removing any historical persecution from the emotional context felt by the persecuted is a difficult if not impossible task. I'm not sure that if one were to question this or that detail of the Holocaust, one could be prosecuted for a hate crime (though the charge of anti-Semitism may indeed be leveled against him/her). I think what you're reacting against is the hyper-political correctness.

That and the quasi-deification it's recieved, unlike other genocide attempts. And let's not forget the slogan "Never Again", I mean where's the slogan for the Indian Removal Act or the Armenian genocide, it's the hipocrisy of it all that bothers me.

What is this?

I was talking about the religious seminar I had already mentioned, it's called "Why the Jews?" and it's found in Aish.com. It makes my point as to how exagerrated (and falsely) the treatment Jews received during WWII Europe, is treated in Judaism.

In short I deny the fake holocaust, you know, the one that gives WWII a "good vs.evil" flavor.

That is something you would need to explain a bit more.

I don't understand, isn't it obvious?

Tyrannical wrote:"Holocaust Guilt" is what allowed a mass migration of Jews into Palestine and allowed it to be changed into a Jewish State to the detriment of the Muslims already living there.

The British did not allow a "mass migration of Jews into Palestine;" indeed, they actively tried to prevent it, trying to appease their Arab subjects in the protectorate. Illegal immigration accounted for much of the influx of Jewish refugees after the war (though world opinion and sympathy did have a softening effect on British policy).

The Palestinian Arabs were not solely subjugated by the Jewish state, but also were the victims of their own leaders' deceptions and power plays. Indeed, many average folks were sold down the river by their own people. Many of the Arabs living in Palestine were tenant farmers: their landlords, who lived in cities throughout the mideast, willingly sold their land to Jews and evicted the tenants. During the partition, Arab leaders told their followers to leave their lands to make way for the invading Arab armies. That having failed on numerous occasions, Arab leaders have used the Palestinian refugees effectively as political tools for the last 60 years, while at the same time showing them little respect. Keeping them in refugee camps (rather than helping and assimilating them into their populations) is a valuable method of control and a perpetual reminder of their war against the Jews - staying focused on an external enemy keeps people from criticizing internal policies.

It would have been in the Jew's best interest to exagerate their mistreatment durring WWII as much as possible to garner sympathy.

I'm not sure why you say "exaggerate their mistreatment" - that seems a remarkably gross understatement. The atrocities against the Jews would hardly need any exaggeration, and to call this a "mistreatment" is absurd.

The atrocities commited were nothing new in human history, and it is definitely absurd to simply call them mistreatments, but many stories are exagerrated.

One thing on the degree to which Hitler and his henchmen singled out the Jews has recently been dealt with in a book reviewed Sunday in the New York Times. Apparently, before the war and the genocide were in full swing, Hitler's overt plans were to massacre a substantially larger number of slavs than Jews were killed in the Shoah in the quest for the territorial expansion of Germany. Also, it bears mentioning, related to this, that nearly half of the Jews slaughtered died in the east without ever being moved to concentration camps.

We seem to have two parallel discussions going here, but to bring them together: Federico, to you think Eager non-theist should be criminally charged for the Holocause denying views he is expressing here? What do you think? Should the police track down his ISP address, hunt him down and arrest him? Should this whole site be closed down for allowing him to promote his views? Those would be the concrete consequences of the position you are advocating here.

Shrunk wrote:
Again, what I said is that the "hate crime laws" you are citing only apply to acts that would already be prohbited by law even if not committed against someone because of their ethnicity. You've just provided an example that supports my point.

Well, at least in the case of Germany, the same applies to holocaust denial. The special law against holocaust denial is from the 1990ies. Before, denying the holocaust had already been illegal (based on a law against "Verunglimpfung des Andenkens Verstorbener" / "Vilifying the remembrance of the deceased") and people had already been convicted for denying the holocaust based on this law before the special law against holocaust denial was introduced.

NineBerry wrote:

Shrunk wrote:
Again, what I said is that the "hate crime laws" you are citing only apply to acts that would already be prohbited by law even if not committed against someone because of their ethnicity. You've just provided an example that supports my point.

Well, at least in the case of Germany, the same applies to holocaust denial. The special law against holocaust denial is from the 1990ies. Before, denying the holocaust had already been illegal (based on a law against "Verunglimpfung des Andenkens Verstorbener" / "Vilifying the remembrance of the deceased") and people had already been convicted for denying the holocaust based on this law before the special law against holocaust denial was introduced.

That's interesting. I'm not sure I understand how the earlier law is defined, but does that meant that in Germany the dead are afforded more protection by the law than the living?

Shrunk wrote:
That's interesting. I'm not sure I understand how the earlier law is defined, but does that meant that in Germany the dead are afforded more protection by the law than the living?

No, it doesn't. The living are also granted protection. There are altogether five different criminal laws that are meant to protect the honour and reputation of persons:

• Insult (Up to two years prison)
• Slander(Up to two years prison)
• Defamation (Up to five years prison)
• Vilifying the remembrance of the deceased (Up to two years prison)
• Defamation of politically active persons (Up to five years prison)

Shrunk wrote:We seem to have two parallel discussions going here, but to bring them together: Federico, to you think Eager non-theist should be criminally charged for the Holocaust denying views he is expressing here? What do you think? Should the police track down his ISP address, hunt him down and arrest him? Should this whole site be closed down for allowing him to promote his views? Those would be the concrete consequences of the position you are advocating here.

I don't like your sarcasm Shrunk, particularly when misplaced.
First of all, Eager non-theist didn't actually deny the Holocaust ever happened: "Eager non-theist wrote:
I don't deny the brutality that was met upon prisoners in concentration camps, nor do I deny the massacres committed by Nazis (in short the real holocaust). What I do deny is the trademarked version of the holocaust which includes, the exaggerated stories that A.F.(Allied Forces) soldiers came home with". At most, he repeated some of the usual browbeating used by people who don't care very much for Jews (pleonasm) such as: They exaggerated the dimensions of the massacre as well as the atrocities committed in the concentrations camps to further their own interests.
In addition, it is not up to me to denounce someone who's clearly an anti-Semite since I believe such a person would be banned from the Forum.

Now, I will address your rebuttal of my arguments about the inexistence of total freedom of expression even in the US based upon the description of "Hate Crimes" Laws found in the Statutes of several American States and sustained by various levels of Jurisprudence going up to the Supreme Court which, under special circumstances, found in favor of Hate Crime Laws thus bypassing the freedom of speech First Amendment of the Constitution.

First of all, a recrimination on my part for your usual and annoying behavior of first categorically denying that something I had advanced was true or had ever happened, only to back down when provided with written proof of my assertions and try to weasel out of your predicament by legalistic, jesuitic disquisitions as e.g. in the case of US Laws prohibiting menacing speeches made against the President.
Now we have a "dejà vu" attitude on your part for the "Hate Crime" Laws that obviously limit the First Amendment of the Constitution protecting freedom of speech.
I must concede that much confusion reigns in the application of these laws which are in the Statutes of 30 US States as well as of the Supreme Court, and which may change and have changed according to the composition of the Court and whether conservative or liberal Justices prevail in the final opinion.
The crucial part seems to be (IMHO) that Supreme Court Justices are prepared to bypass the First Amendment if the speech or the word expressing hate for a number of reasons, is potentially causing physical and/or psychologicalharm.

"Laws against hate crimes might conflict with rights under the FIRST AMENDMENT to the U.S. Constitution. Generally, the First Amendment protects a citizen's right to the free expression of thoughts. However, the courts have ruled that First Amendment rights may give way to the greater public good. For example, there is no First Amendment protection for someone who falsely yells "Fire!" in a crowded theater, because such speech endangers the safety of others. Such expression might give rise to a DISORDERLY CONDUCT charge or similar charge. In determining the constitutionality of hate-crime legislation, one primary question is whether the prohibited speech deserves First Amendment protection".
As I wrote, it's all matter of interpretation, which may change, but, in any case, all this proves my initial point: Total freedom of expression is an impossibility in any Democracy.
Ditto for Negationism: It's all matter of interpretation and of Zeitgeist and of the History of the Country which is mulling the
decision to declare Negationism a crime.
All the rest is BS.

Some background on the history of the German law against holocaust denial:

http://beyondyourken.com/phoenix/Pages/ ... l#p2035145
http://beyondyourken.com/phoenix/Pages/ ... l#p2036516
http://beyondyourken.com/phoenix/Pages/ ... l#p2042027

Thanks, Shrunk, for the Hitch vid. I'd forgotten about Milton's Areopagitica and Mill's On Liberty, which should be required reading in any democracy.

Someone wrote:One thing on the degree to which Hitler and his henchmen singled out the Jews has recently been dealt with in a book reviewed Sunday in the New York Times.

Reference?

Apparently, before the war and the genocide were in full swing, Hitler's overt plans were to massacre a substantially larger number of slavs than Jews were killed in the Shoah in the quest for the territorial expansion of Germany.

Well, not quite right. In his fulfillment of the age-old German quest for Lebensraum, Hitler sought to colonize the east and forcibly remove large numbers of Slavs from their lands to make way for an expanding German population. While some would be massacred, for the Nazis it would be more economically beneficial to enslave the populations to cook, clean, and pick the cotton for the colonizers.

This was partially realized in the Nazi work/death camps (see Richard L. Rubenstein's The Cunning of History for an excellent and concise treatment of the history of slavery and Nazi racial policy), where "unfit" Jews and Slavs were sent immediately to the death camps, while "fit" and useful ones were sent to the work camps. The economics of this slavery were calculated down to the finest detail - how little food to give each person, when the person would be expendable, etc. (calculations which have a strong correspondence to the economic thinking of slave owners in the West Indies in the era of the Triangular Trade and massive sugar production to feed Europe's sweet tooth - slaves were worked to death because it was cheaper to replace them than feed or clothe them properly).

Also, it bears mentioning, related to this, that nearly half of the Jews slaughtered died in the east without ever being moved to concentration camps.

Yes, the SS Einsatzgruppen were tasked with the elimination of "undesireables" - when it was not economically or logistically feasible to move the populations, they simply killed them in their own villages. I believe I need to repeat that the policy was primarily aimed at wiping out European Jewry, with the slaughter of Slavs as a secondary concern. If there were two people left in a village, one Jew and one Slav, and an SS captain had one bullet left in his gun, guess whom he'd execute.

Eager non-theist wrote:~snip~

You really should learn to use the quote and preview functions properly. You're making it look as if my words are yours (but that's okay, because I missed that subject/verb agreement problem in that first sentence - problem fixed in my post), and your words are others quotes. Mucho confusion, amigo.

"With the start of World War II in September 1939, Hitler soon occupied a large part of Poland. But he did not immediately engage in genocide against the Jews. It's true that ghettos were constructed in Warsaw and Lodz, and that tens of thousands of Polish Jews perished from random shootings, exposure and disease. Still, this was not yet the Holocaust. At the time, Hitler had in mind the extermination of a good many Poles: 'The educated, the clergy, the politically active.' Such a plan would probably have killed more than the three million Polish Jews that the Nazis eventually murdered. And there was an even broader goal--Generalplan Ost--that was designed to eliminate somewhere between 31 million and 45 million Slavs to give the Germans living space in the East. Snyder cannot help concluding 'the Germans intended worse than they achieved.' But once Hitler invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941--'the beginning of a calamity that defies description', Snyder writes--he turned his full attention to the Jews."
--From 'The Devil's Playground' by Joshua Rubenstein, a review of Timothy Snyder's Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (New York Times Book Review section, November 28, 2010)

Still, I have no question (and I didn't mean to imply the contrary) that Hitler placed Jews lower than Slavs on the sub-human totem pole.

NineBerry wrote:

Shrunk wrote:
That's interesting. I'm not sure I understand how the earlier law is defined, but does that meant that in Germany the dead are afforded more protection by the law than the living?

No, it doesn't. The living are also granted protection. There are altogether five different criminal laws that are meant to protect the honour and reputation of persons:

• Insult (Up to two years prison)
• Slander(Up to two years prison)
• Defamation (Up to five years prison)
• Vilifying the remembrance of the deceased (Up to two years prison)
• Defamation of politically active persons (Up to five years prison)

OK, thanks for that, and for your other links.

Federico wrote:

Shrunk wrote:We seem to have two parallel discussions going here, but to bring them together: Federico, to you think Eager non-theist should be criminally charged for the Holocaust denying views he is expressing here? What do you think? Should the police track down his ISP address, hunt him down and arrest him? Should this whole site be closed down for allowing him to promote his views? Those would be the concrete consequences of the position you are advocating here.

I don't like your sarcasm Shrunk, particularly when misplaced.
First of all, Eager non-theist didn't actually deny the Holocaust ever happened: "Eager non-theist wrote:
I don't deny the brutality that was met upon prisoners in concentration camps, nor do I deny the massacres committed by Nazis (in short the real holocaust). What I do deny is the trademarked version of the holocaust which includes, the exaggerated stories that A.F.(Allied Forces) soldiers came home with". At most, he repeated some of the usual browbeating used by people who don't care very much for Jews (pleonasm) such as: They exaggerated the dimensions of the massacre as well as the atrocities committed in the concentrations camps to further their own interests.
In addition, it is not up to me to denounce someone who's clearly an anti-Semite since I believe such a person would be banned from the Forum.

Now, I will address your rebuttal of my arguments about the inexistence of total freedom of expression even in the US based upon the description of "Hate Crimes" Laws found in the Statutes of several American States and sustained by various levels of Jurisprudence going up to the Supreme Court which, under special circumstances, found in favor of Hate Crime Laws thus bypassing the freedom of speech First Amendment of the Constitution.

First of all, a recrimination on my part for your usual and annoying behavior of first categorically denying that something I had advanced was true or had ever happened, only to back down when provided with written proof of my assertions and try to weasel out of your predicament by legalistic, jesuitic disquisitions as e.g. in the case of US Laws prohibiting menacing speeches made against the President.
Now we have a "dejà vu" attitude on your part for the "Hate Crime" Laws that obviously limit the First Amendment of the Constitution protecting freedom of speech.
I must concede that much confusion reigns in the application of these laws which are in the Statutes of 30 US States as well as of the Supreme Court, and which may change and have changed according to the composition of the Court and whether conservative or liberal Justices prevail in the final opinion.
The crucial part seems to be (IMHO) that Supreme Court Justices are prepared to bypass the First Amendment if the speech or the word expressing hate for a number of reasons, is potentially causing physical and/or psychologicalharm.

"Laws against hate crimes might conflict with rights under the FIRST AMENDMENT to the U.S. Constitution. Generally, the First Amendment protects a citizen's right to the free expression of thoughts. However, the courts have ruled that First Amendment rights may give way to the greater public good. For example, there is no First Amendment protection for someone who falsely yells "Fire!" in a crowded theater, because such speech endangers the safety of others. Such expression might give rise to a DISORDERLY CONDUCT charge or similar charge. In determining the constitutionality of hate-crime legislation, one primary question is whether the prohibited speech deserves First Amendment protection".
As I wrote, it's all matter of interpretation, which may change, but, in any case, all this proves my initial point: Total freedom of expression is an impossibility in any Democracy.
Ditto for Negationism: It's all matter of interpretation and of Zeitgeist and of the History of the Country which is mulling the
decision to declare Negationism a crime.
All the rest is BS.

I realize English may not be your first language, so I'll excuse the fact that you have failed to understand my point. I'll admit it's not an obvious one and easily misunderstood. However, you should realize that simply repeating the same quotations to which I have already responded is not an effective way to make an argument. You should also realize that, even if you had understood the website that you are referring to (which you have not, in parts), simply pointing to a website that shares the same misunderstandings that you have does not constitute an argument.

Perhaps an analogy, which I have used elsewhere, might help illustrate my point:

Suppose a person attacks someone else with a rolling pin. They are charged and convicted of assault with a weapon, the weapon here being the rolling pin.

Would it now be correct to say that possession of rolling pins is no longer permissable? That the freedom to possess and use a rolling pin is now restricted by the law? No, rolling pins remain completely legal. It is only certain acts, in which the rolling pin may be incidentally involved, that are forbidden by law.

A less absurd example: Even the most vociferous supporters of the right to bear arms in America do not object to laws criminalizing someone who uses a gun to commit a crime. They understand that laws which prohibit certain acts commited with a gun is not a restriction on the right to possess and use a gun.

Similarly, to prohibit certain actions, in which speech may be incidentally involved, does not mean that speech itself is restricted. Laws against libel, defamation, incitement to violence, harassment, etc. can all exist without posing limits to freedom of expression.

BTW, Federico, did you watch the Hitchens video in which he gave the context from which the oft-quoted example of "shouting 'Fire' in a crowded theatre" originated? It's right at the beginning. I didn't know about it, and it's quite illuminating.

Someone wrote:"With the start of World War II in September 1939...

Thanks for the quotation. Interesting. It's been a while since I've read up on the latest historical data and interpretations.

First of all, Eager non-theist didn't actually deny the Holocaust ever happened: "Eager non-theist wrote:
I don't deny the brutality that was met upon prisoners in concentration camps, nor do I deny the massacres committed by Nazis (in short the real holocaust). What I do deny is the trademarked version of the holocaust which includes, the exaggerated stories that A.F.(Allied Forces) soldiers came home with". At most, he repeated some of the usual browbeating used by people who don't care very much for Jews (pleonasm) such as: They exaggerated the dimensions of the massacre as well as the atrocities committed in the concentrations camps to further their own interests.
In addition, it is not up to me to denounce someone who's clearly an anti-Semite since I believe such a person would be banned from the Forum.

[/quote] Of course I'm "anti-Semite", I'd change my mind though if you were to show me evidence that proved this mythical creature called Sem ever existed . I eschew the use of political correctness in ALL cases, so I can understand why the accusation of hating Judeans would come from adorable little you so easily. Now is it really that hard for you to concieve the image of a victim exagerrating his already terrible experience as a way of demanding special treatment? !! Evil Jews !! don't do this, PEOPLE do this.

On the other hand, people are usually smart enough to just counsel each other when they've been massive historical victims, "Let us be sure we don't exaggerate things lest the people who say we are be given some basis with which to argue it." The Jews as a people have had no intelligent reason to exaggerate. It would be more likely you'd find a non-Jew pretending to be Jewish in order to make use of the victim status. That is, it would make sense if that status actually benefited the random Jew very much. That's not to say it's impossible to find a Jew who has exaggerated what happened to his or her own family. That may well be possible. It wouldn't have any bearing on the facts being exaggerated as far as his or her co-religionists are concerned, though. You really can't go very far down from absolute bottom.