an agreement to jail those who trivialize or deny genocide

In the interest of combatting hate-crimes, the EU agreed to punish those who deny or even trivialize the happenings of the holocaust and/or other genocides. This seems like such a dangerous step for Europe, and ultimately our country. This is a bandaid over the soon to be deepening gap of European racism. RIP free-speech

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/04/19/hate.crimes.ap/index.html

Post 1

Thursday, April 19, 2007 - 6:12pm

Yes, it is like when the Soviets jailed their citizens for saying anything that didn't fit the party line. Or the Islamic fundamentalist attempts to kill anyone that says bad things about their religion. Or the people stoned to death for uncorrect thought under Mao. It is criminalizing politically incorrect speech. Hello, thought police.

Post 2

Thursday, April 19, 2007 - 6:21pm

Personally, I think the holocaust/showa happened, pretty much the way it is typically depicted.

As to whether it was 6 million or 600 thousand, I don't have a clue. I don't much care, either. If it was ONE individual who was murdered because of his or her ethnicity or religion, that's one too many.

That said, it is precisely the NAZI sympathizers and skin heads and racist black-power gang-bangers who we need to defend. If we can defend THEIR rights to free speech, then OURS are safe. If ANYONE has lost the right of free speech, then everyone has. We don't NEED a right to say what everyone agrees with.

Here in the U.S., we now have thought crimes enshrined in law, in all the "hate-crime" enhancements, the "kiddie-porn" laws, etc. However, in addition, we see organizations such as the KKK or the Institute for Historical Review bankrupted by punitive lawsuits, based, not on actual torts, but on the idea that such groups "encourage" actual attacks. This may well be true. There are a LOT of organizations that stir up animousity against those with whom they disagree, and that animousity can erupt in actual attack.

However, people are responsible for their actions. No one is inside their heads but them. It's always the cheap shots - the heroine junkies, the serial killers, etc. - who are used to get that legal wedge in the door that ultimately leads straight to the real evil.

The NAZIs started with the incurable mental patients. However, they began euthanizing these unfortunates at the behest of the German Psychiatric Association, which had reasoned that these poor people were so utterly miserable and hopeless that death would be a mercy for them. Mental illness was thought to be largely genetic in origin, and so the Jews were just an extension of that principle.

And just where might you suppose the German Psychiatric Association got its idea and sanction?

How about the American Psychiatric Association, which, in the 1920's, passed a resolution advocating euthanasia for the incurable seriously mentally ill.

These wedges in the door are dangerous as hell. Look at what has happened with the "War on Drugs." First, under Nixon, the "No-Knock" rule, justified as a "practical" measure to prevent drugees from flushing the evidence. Then, the siezure laws, under which tens of billions of dollars worth of property were siezed on mere suspicion.

I could go on.

Thanks Audrey

Post 3

Thursday, April 19, 2007 - 6:36pm

Phil,

That said, it is precisely the NAZI sympathizers and skin heads and racist black-power gang-bangers who we need to defend. If we can defend THEIR rights to free speech, then OURS are safe. If ANYONE has lost the right of free speech, then everyone has. We don't NEED a right to say what everyone agrees with.

Well said! At 16 I was taken by my beloved German teacher Frau Felver to Dachau and it changed me forever. It is a true to life case of the old saying "I hate what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it."

Post 4

Thursday, April 19, 2007 - 8:42pm

I can�t remember the paper, but I read story once that really shocked me. A man had been convicted of molesting a child and served his time. He came up for parole and was set to be released. Nothing unusual so far (except the monster who touches children). Then a judge decides to up the ante. The judges new rung in this mans freedom ladder: place a device on his penis and show him child porn, or whatever kiddie porn the state had. If he got even the slightest erection it was do not pass go for him (do not collect $200).

While I am not for child molestation I am for the sanctuary of our minds. While his actions may be awful, his thoughts are his own.

Post 5

Saturday, April 21, 2007 - 1:06pm

If someone is an actual danger and says so or provides convincing evidence of such, then one acts appropriately to protect ones self or others. I don't have a problem with examining the mental state of a violent criminal to assess whether they are likely to commit further violence, whether it's child molestation or murder.

There's an interesting book that I was partially responsible for titled "The Truth Machine." It examines in novel form the impact on society if we had real lie detectors that actually worked almost 100% of the time. Similar to the techniques used and/or misused by scientology with their E-Meter, you could not only tell if someone was lying, but also ask them questions about their intent.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Truth_Machine (Free download of novel)

About a decade ago, there was a survey reported in the papers of college men, asking them if in the circumstance that they could with absolute certainty get away with raping a woman, would they do so? Allegedly about 25% of the men surveyed said that they would.

Imagine now that as a prerequisite of being enrolled in a university, you had to submit to an interrogation using a for real lie detector (the ones in current use are notoriously unreliable).

If you were asked the above question, you could:

A> attempt to lie, which would brand you as a potential rapist trying to conceal your real nature, thus compounding the offense,

B> simply tell the truth, which would prevent you from enrolling perhaps,

C> make an irrevokable decision in your own mind that you would NEVER rape a woman (or man, one hopes) under ANY circumstances,

D> refuse to answer, which might be used as grounds to reject your application.

This is reportedly how the actual E-Meter sessions go at Dianetics, according to a friend of mine who was an "auditor." The auditor forces the person to make a real commitment to changing their behavior or values, and, in theory, the commitment has to be real or the auditor can tell, by watching the meter. Refusal to make such a commitment ends the process.

Unfortunately, the Dianetics E-Meter only measures galvanic skin response, and we know that anyone can be trained to control their GSR in a matter of minutes of bio-feedback. Thus the commonly reported experience of Dianetics clients making huge gains in personal well being and rationality in the beginning and sometimes ending up worse than they started in the end. (Not that I'm a follower of the rest of the Dianetics philosophy, BTW.)

Clearly, such a system as described in "The Truth Machine" could suffer massive abuse, although the book postulates that, since the rulers in the society would have to take the tests repeatedly and publically, such chance of abuse would be minimized.

So, what would be the problem for objectivists of a society of total transparency?

An additional reference of worth: David Brin's "The Transparent Society."

http://www.davidbrin.com/tschp1.html

Post 6

Sunday, April 22, 2007 - 7:05pm

How about an interrogation just to live close to a college or university? Why not an interrogation to live near a school or a day care? Maybe an interrogation should be imposed on those who walk near a university.

I wonder how far this should go Phil.

Post 7

Monday, April 23, 2007 - 7:45am

About a decade ago, there was a survey reported in the papers of college men, asking them if in the circumstance that they could with absolute certainty get away with raping a woman, would they do so? Allegedly about 25% of the men surveyed said that they would.

Phil-
I do not think I would feel significantly safer. I think that the decision to rape is not alway pre-meditated and the knowledge of one's capability for rape is not always foreseen. It seems very "Minority Report", and as you mentioned the test can easily be duped. I wonder how the numbers would change if those same men knew that at least 25% of women carried a gun or some other means of protection? My problem with a society of total transparency is that we are individuals, and by forcing members of society to commit to total transparency we are using them as a means to our own peace of mind. Any system with any margin for error that results in the punishment of innocent people is a system in favor of sacrifice. It hope that our science continues to advance our understanding of a criminal mind, thereby giving us the tools to recognize (and possibly treat) people who could be a danger to any innocent person.

Post 8

Monday, April 23, 2007 - 11:26am

Careful - ye might end up in Ira Levin's Perfect World

Post 9

Monday, April 23, 2007 - 8:18pm

Actually "This Perfect Day," not "Perfect World"...

I once again suggest that anyone seriously interested in the issue of transparency take a look at the two references I gave for "The Truth Machine," and "The Transparent Society." I am well aware of the dangers of a state that knows everything, as in "1984."

However, a society that allows things to be hidden also runs certain risks. In the late '70's I used to regularly see Conrad Shneiker (sp?), one of the dozen or so people who were responsible for the conceptualization and early research in the field of nano-technology. He and I were both customers (I assume) of Anthony L. Hargis & Co., an OC firm that served as a free-market bank of sorts, and a gold depository.

Hargis, for several years, would throw a monthly party at his office for local libertarians, and most of the local luminaries showed up off and on to schmooze and play Risk or other board games. Anyway, Conrad and I got into a discussion of the Fermi Paradox and Conrad pointed out that one obvious possible explanation is that every intelligent species self-destructs past a certain point of technological development, because the growth in destructive power per individual or per dollar grows exponentially faster than the growth in defensive technology.

This seemed pretty likely to me on hearing his explanation, so I naturally asked if he had a solution. His reponse was that obviously the only possible solution would be a society of total surviellance, as ultimately - and fairly soon at that - we would be at the point that any individual with moderate means could engineer a binary virus, for example, that could wipt out the entire species.

So, I responded that clearly he couldn't expect the STATE to do the job... Who guards the guards, etc.... Especially as I knew that Conrad was another anarcho-capitalist...

No, he told me, it would require a competitive, bounty-driven sort of system, in which everyone would have to carry insurance and the insurance companies would post huge bounties for finding would-be terrorists, etc.

Post 10

Monday, April 23, 2007 - 8:53pm

Very well said, Audrey.

Ed

Post 11

Tuesday, April 24, 2007 - 3:16pm

I've always wondered about laws that try to limit speech. It seems that if you really wanted to know who your enemies were you would want them to run their ignorant mouths as much as possible. Simply telling people what they can and can not say simply creates silent monsters. They will then bottle up their hostilities and release their hate in violent means. Not that allowing them to talk about it will control their violence but at least we would have received some warning signals. If someone hates who I am I want to know this before I rent an apartment from them or enter in to an agreement with them. If they've been muzzled there may be little or no warning of their bias.

You would think the left would see this. But they never see things on an individual basis. The bigot with a microphone is making the public feel bad, we must pass a law to stop him. Its for the 'public good'.

Post 12

Tuesday, April 24, 2007 - 7:52pm

Good thought, John. I've seen so many examples of this. There was this old guy and his son who used to be regulars at a computer club I belonged to. The old guy was always kind and considerate and got into animated discussions with this Jewish lady who had survived Auswitz or one of the other death camps and had the tatoo to prove it.

I got to know this guy further, due to our both being clients of a local gold depository, and used to eat Thanksgiving dinner with him at his house. Eventually, I discovered that he was himself a neo-NAZI, with all kinds of literature he was eager to show me, some of it his own writing, and his son had meanwhile become a rabid rascist skinhead. They both assured me that the holacaust had never happened and anyone who claimed to be a victim was just another member of the Zionist conspiracy to take over the world.

When I tried to alert the Jewish lady, of course, suddenly it was I who was accused of bigotry. No one could believe that such a nice old man could be a hate-filled bigot.

Post 13

Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 7:07am

No one could believe that such a nice old man could be a hate-filled bigot.

Philosophy is powerful, overarching (or underpinning) even.

Ed

Post 14

Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 11:53am

Then a judge decides to up the ante. The judges new rung in this mans freedom ladder: place a device on his penis and show him child porn, or whatever kiddie porn the state had. If he got even the slightest erection it was do not pass go for him (do not collect $200).

I'd modify this just aslightly, to make it acceptable.

The device in question would be the business end of an Evinrude, and he'd be free to leave with his thoughts.

regards,
Fred

Post 15

Sunday, April 29, 2007 - 7:10pm