Why is it a crime to deny the Holocaust?
 

Some countries like France make it a crime to deny the holocaust...just curious as where you guys stand on this...

let me clarify...I'm not asking whether you believe it happened or not...I'm asking whether you think its proper for a government to make it a crime to deny it?

I believe it happened but I don't think its right for a government to imprison someone who believes otherwise...

cuz its pretty much a dick move

It's because Nazi's should only have limited rights, because they are limited people.

appropriate for the time that the laws were put in place

Partly to cover the guilt of countries who allowed or even helped it to happen.

If I'm right Vichy France was collaborating with the Nazis to round up Jews. This also happened in other countries. Switzerland must have known where all the gold was coming from but still took it.

Did the allies do enough to bomb railway lines taking people to the camps, or did they think the Nazis were wasting valuable resources in carrying out the Holocaust?

Don't know the detail of the law, but doubt any law prohibits "believing" the holocaust never existed. Laws can never change a person's beliefs.

The "crime" is prob more along the lines of groups, writers etc making claims that the holocaust never existed.

There is a reason for these laws - people have abused a scenario - and legislators step in to stop it. Sure, there is no doubt of the holocaust and it is offensive to survivors and their families when idiots attempt to deny it's existence - usually for their own warped agenda.

Only my :2 cents: but yes, lock the trash up or create a special concentration camp for them to appreciate the finer points of history :pimp

So if a person says in public that there was no such thing as the holocaust they should be deemed a criminal and put in jail?

I agree that these people are idiots and that their actions/words offend the families but do you not consider this a freedom of speech? If everyone who said anything hateful and offensive was held to the same standards then we would prob have more than half the population of the world behind bars. Or is this a case of it's ok to offend as long as you don't offend a certian group.

Because Humans are the stupidest animals on the planet and we need laws, otherwise we'll destroy ourselves with dumbness.

Isn't it odd how other animals exist without laws?

You have to keep in mind that in places like post war Germany that most of those laws were probably put in force to stop the Nazi movement coming back from 'the dead'. Now, perhaps they are outdated but I can see why heavy handed laws were needed in exceptional times.

there are laws in the animal kingdom. Two male lions will fight for the right to rule a pride, when one loses he is banished from the area....just because we don't understand all of what happens in nature doesn't mean that there isn't an order of things.

Probably because it is very inflammatory and could incite Nazism or violence.

http://www.topshit.com/rare-holocaust-footage-288.html

http://www.topshit.com/rare-holocaust-footage-289.html

Religion is also very inflammatory - but they haven't locked up Pat Robertson's sorry ass yet. :(

The law was made in Germany in 1994 that it is a felony to deny the existence of the Holocaust. I read it in a book titled "The Hidden Life of Otto Frank" by Carol Ann Lee.

That's correct.

No.

It might be possible that some younger people of today just don't fully understand or grasp just how horribly huge that war was, and still is. Like Webby said there are millions of families who to this day show the scars of that war, dead husbands, fathers, uncles, brothers, grandfathers etc. And the loss of life to the Jewish people, staggering.

You think allowing idiots to stand on a soapbox and publicly decry/deny the holocast is something that should be allowed? Sorry, it falls directly under the umbrella of "hate crime" in certain countries, probably for it's potential to incite trouble, more hatred and real violence. A lot of people don't take kindly to that kind of talk.

Not to mention the fact that there are other idiots, large in numbers, who are limited in their thinking enough that they might buy into the foolishness these folks are spouting.

Personally I don't mind a law like this. Individuals who have nothing better to do with their time than peddle outright lies that are so hateful and hurtful to others like this one is really do deserve some reward for their efforts. A little jailtime sounds like just the ticket.

Well said. I feel the same way. 6,000,000 Jews (1,500,000 of them children) among multitudes more of other minorities anihilated cuz some fruity-ass crazy guy with a fucked up mustache decided it should be so? I think they've earned their right to have any law they want.

Wow I can just imagine the crying you would do if they made it illegal to disagree with the goverments official story of 911. Good God you are a hypocrite. I support free speech no matter if I disagree with it or not.

Even the US and Canada have hate crimes units that deal with written materials and spoken words that fall outside the bounds of "free speech".

I can't recall ever reading or hearing of an instance in which "denying the Holocaust" wasn't part of a hate agenda. It is an extremely obtuse implication that anyone is going to be punished for doing nothing worse than merely distorting a fairly recent bit of history.

I heard that schools in Germany have mandatory classes strictly dedicated to teaching German students about their horrific and tainted history of the 30's and 40's. Im not talking about 1-2 chapters in our history books like we study here in the US, I've heard that they have to take 2-3 full classes about this era which includes films, holocaust survivors, etc.

I've also heard that it's not only a crime to deny the Holocaust, it's a crime to do the Third Reich/Nazi salute.

Can anyone confirm or shed more light on this?

So very few of us understand the impact of WWII. My grandmother's entire family was killed by the Nazi Germans in Poland, and my Grandfather on my other side died in the Pacific. But it was more than just personal loss. Europe was destroyed, millions of Jews killed, the entire cold war, the trillions of dollars it cost the US, all the way down to the problems in the Middle East.

There have been two crimes against humanity in recent years. The first was slavery, and the second was the Holocaust. It's pretty silly to belive that either never happened.

I'm not sure on the particulars, but German schools do have more elaborate classes regarding WWII and the Holocaust. That, along with the law made in 1994 is, I believe, their way of saying "Sorry, and we won't do that again." Very serious business over there, as it should be.

Not sure on the salute.