For years, a few decades at the least, there have been plenty of individuals who have actively denied that the Holocaust during World War II happened. That being said, holocaust denial is essentially any attempt to negate or avoid any facts about the genocide that was the holocaust. Holocaust deniers usually share the belief that the Holocaust was exaggerated or invented by Jews to “advance Jewish interests” because of their antisemetic views, or hatred towards Jewish people.
In 2019, the Palm Beach County School Board fired a Florida high school principal for refusing to recognize the Holocaust as a “factual, historic event.” Cases similar to this have brought forward many critical questions such as the following: Should holocaust denial be treated as a crime? Should freedom of speech protect/allow holocaust denial? Why are there holocaust deniers? Should holocaust denial be considered hate speech? Why and where is holocaust denial active today? Middle Eastern countries like Germany, Belgium, and Israel have criminalized holocaust denial.
When making an attempt to answer the question if holocaust denial should be treated as a crime, there are two main viewpoints: Yes, because it is a form of hate speech and causes much harm. The opposing opinion says no, because it violates freedom of speech. Because there is a protection over freedom of speech, many companies, schools, businesses, and other institutes can’t justly punish someone for antisemitism or for denying the Holocaust. The circumstances of those punishments are different for each institute. For example, Rutgers University could not fire or otherwise punish Michael Chikindas for frequently posting antisemetic, racist, homophobic, and islamaphobic things on his Facebook page because of Rutgers’ freedom of speech policy and because he did not spread his beliefs in school or in any class. Many people would’ve preferred if he was punished for his bigotry - intolerance towards those who have different opinions than oneself - but it would be, according to some, unjust to fire a professor for having a “controversial opinion.
It is acknowledged, however, that “their [anti-semites] poisonous ideology must still be recognized as truly dangerous, and never discounted as simply ‘uncomfortable.’” To end his argument for the punishment of holocaust denial (according to SIRS.com), Steven Lubet said, “Those who encourage anti-Jewish terror are racists, not idiots; and they are motivated by hatred; not personal opinions.” Additionally, Robert Singer made an urgent statement saying that, “Amazon needs to prioritize the removal of all items that blatantly ‘promote or glorify hatred, violence, racial, sexual, or religious intolerance.’” He made this statement after noticing that Amazon had plenty of antisemetic and holocaust denial titles in stock.
Similarly, Donald Trump’s Press Secretary Sean Spicer stated in 2017, “Someone who is despicable as Hitler who didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons.” He said this in an attempt to compare Adolf Hitler and Syria’s president Bashar Assad. Afterwards, Spicer was met with much criticism because of this comparison. He later stated that he, “mistakenly made an inappropriate and insensitive reference to the Holocaust, for which there is no comparison.” When he was president, George W. Bush said something similar when addressing Sadam Hussein, former President of Iraq, seeming to defend Hitler in saying that he at least, “respected the legitimacy of the embassies.” Essentially, because of their failure to understand the Holocaust, they experienced much backlash.
These uneducated statements along with how the Holocaust is educated throughout the U.S. have contributed to misleading beliefs of the horrible genocide. To finalize his argument, Seth Frantzman stated, “It seems every day there is some abuse of Holocaust memory. We are coming to the point in history where any responsibility for the Holocaust will be whitewashed away… we will lose all understanding of it.”
With these arguments, the question of “Should holocaust denial and antisemitism be treated as a legal crime?” is not easily answered. What it does do, however, is encourage not only the education, but the accurate education of the Holocaust to make sure that it is not forgotten. Many stress the importance of making sure that it is not seen as an event isolated from the rest of World War II, which is important for the next generations and how they view the unfortunate events of the past wars.
https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2257695893?searchid=1579108171&accountid=65642
https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2267348986?accountid=65642
https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2262112473?accountid=65642
https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2266149781?accountid=65642
https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2265961413?accountid=65642
https://www.ushmm.org/antisemitism/holocaust-denial-and-distortion
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