laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (04/12/85)
I know an anti-semite who is also an Arab. He lost a mother, father and 2 brothers in the 6 day war. I don't think that he can ever be legislated into liking Jews, all of whom he thinks are Zionists. I don't think that the Zionists are going to be legislated into liking him, either. Given that it is deplorable that such hatred exists -- what now? I fear that using legislation to combat hatred only passes the buck to the government while it is all citizens who should really have the responsibility to see that racism at least does not spread. Sending Zundel to jail may give a lot of people (including me) a lot of emotional satisfaction -- but does it really do anything to stop racism? Can *anything* except time stop racism? Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
cdshaw@watmum.UUCP (Chris Shaw) (04/13/85)
Laura says she knows an Arab person whose family died in the 6-day war, and as a consequence hates Zionism, and by extension all Jews. (or words to that effect). She then goes on to wonder about the possibility of being legislated into not hating Zionism/whatever. Another group of postings suggest banning/rewriting separate works as the Bible, certain movies, and so on. Both sets of postings widely miss the mark. The laws in question here (177 and the other one) have nothing to do with banning books, but with telling lies (in the face of readily and universally verifiable fact) to the purpose of harming the reputations/livelihoods of people being lied about. In no way can the laws be interpreted as acting on works produced more than (say) five years ago. Shirley Temple is safe, since the movies are 40 years old. The bible is safe for both reasons of age, and because the laws in question specifically don't apply to religion. In fact, the laws are reasonably safe, since one way to beat a conviction is to satisfy the jury that you acted in good faith. However, given the overwhelming amount of evidence (and a lack of conflicting evidence worth mentioning) about the holocaust, someone maintaining that it didn't happen is either mentally ill or is a viscious, criminal scum out to propogate mindless hate. Given the amount of concern expressed by nearly everyone about possible misuse of these laws, it is clear that the independent, impartial judiciary must be very careful and forthright. Many people have the fear that someday, the government will turn into a monster and use laws like this to hunt certain people down. I, for one, don't think this too likely for some rather obvious reasons: If the government is in this state, there are plenty of more powerful tools it can use (such as the war measures act) that it would simply be wasting its time otherwise. Chris Shaw University of Waterloo