So no freedom of speech for fascists?
This article raises an important point and one that is particularly pertinent to our being here on this forum. Once again, I don't wish to dwell on personalities but the fact is that there was an apparently irreconcilable difference of opinion on the UK Commentator over how much freedom of speech should be given to the BNP. This raises an important point generally. Are there people who should not be permitted to have freedom of speech? Is it acceptable to debate issues with some but not others? From The Irish Independent So no freedom of speech for fascists? By Ian O'Doherty Friday February 29 2008 There's no question that notorious Holocaust denier David Irving is a nasty, vicious little man with serious issues. Lots of them. Let's be honest, when the courts decide that it is okay to refer to you as a Holocaust denier, a falsifier, a liar and a bigot, then you may need to take a long look at yourself. But the news that he is to take part in a debate in UCC next month has sent some people around the bend. Irving has been invited to speak at Irish colleges before, but those useful idiots of the far Left have always managed to censor him and already there are plans to organise a mass pro-*test*-('") and block him from talking. According to their argument, Irving should not be allowed to talk because he is a fascist, and therefore must be muzzled. It's an interesting argument, but a rather inconsistent one. After all, Muslim extremist Anjem Choudhary, a man who has called for the destruction of the West, the execution of gays and adulterers and wants to destroy Israel and kill all Jews, was allowed to attend a debate in Trinity College a while back. How many of these brave anti-fascist campaigners were there? Not one. So, it's okay to campaign against a discredited gobshite who thinks the Holocaust never happened but they couldn't be bothered pro-*test*-('")ing against a dangerous man who actually wants to start another Holocaust? You gotta love the Left. And what's the debate in UCC about? Free speech, of course. Maybe someone could explain the word "irony" to them...

First question: is Irving actually a "fascist"?

To be honest, I don't care either way. I'm more interested in a debate along the lines: Are there people who should not be permitted to have freedom of speech?

No!

Two comments. First, which authority has the power and discretion of defining "Fascists"? Second, quite obviously, certain issues are socially and morally reprehensible: for example, some years back a British group campaigned for the age of sexual permission to be dropped to something like 8! As did a Dutch group. Personally, I believe such people ought not only be denied the right of free speech but ought properly to be shot! Otherwise, any political or neo-political group ought to enjoy full rights to try and publicise their views: no matter how arcane. To accept anything less, simply means that Big Government and more critically, its supporters, hiding in the prototypical Tammanay Hall lookalike "Smoke Filled Rooms" adopt the Orwellian guise of thought police. With the criminalisation of so-called Hate Crimes, British society is already well along that rocky path! :roll:

No!

...so you'd be quite happy to allow the Dutch pro child-sex political party equal airtime with any other party? :shock:

And how many votes do they get?

According to this blog they didn't get a single one - which is as one might hope!!! A Dutch political party that failed to qualify to participate in the country's general election last Wednesday has blamed harassment from "far right" elements that took issue with its pro-pedophilia platform. The PNVD was forced to end its campaign recently after it was unable to obtain the signatures required for it to con-*test*-('") the election. Although the party only needed 570 signatures - 30 from each of the Netherlands' 19 regions - and had failed to reach even that modest target, Still, that's not the point. I was asking whether you supported their 'right' to be heard at all - or are there some views that have to be censored for the good of the rest of society?

One further point, Sir P. Your example of Thatcher's distaste of Sien Fein is excellent. When I first went to what we then called Eire in 1979 to work on a major project I had the pleasure to discover that my client was a self-taught historian, if Irish history. I learnt much. After many trips and time spent in that charming country amongst its charming and so hospitable people, I wondered how they could be so pleasant to a visiting Brit! Thereafter, I made it my business to study the particular history of Ireland and England and Scotland and was totally horrified to discover how Britain had treated the Irish race. Some years ago, I was in touch with Tony Benn, after he had appeared on BBC's Question Time and was the only panellist to make any sense! The question was about the Tory government talking to Sein Fein and the IRA. As Benn stated, he'd met most dissidents of British colonial and protectorate states, including Jomo Kenyata, Archbishop Makarios, and etc. Talking enabled the comprehension of their views, objectives and ambitions, first hand, rather than relying on the invariably muddled and warped Ministry Speek which tends to eminate from such as the FCO. Earlier I mentioned arcane subjects: I now add perspectives. One of the core problems with institutional censorship, surely, is that it becomes very difficult for citizens to access cogent data from which to form an opinion! Hitler and his gang succeeded - thanks to the founder of propoganda Dr Joseph Goebells - in effectively brainwashing many German citizens with untruth and bias. So did Thatcher as Tim Bell and the Saatchi bros bent reality. Surely right thinking and logical people need access to views like those expressed by the Nazi apologist in order to reach balanced perspective? Let's face it, post WW II Germany and Germans as well as Japan and Japanese were demonised: and the USA and Britain beatified! Those of us with a brain and a bent for history realised after some study that the probable truth lay somewhere in the middle: and that the rank and file non-SS German serving and conscripted soldier, sailor and airman was no worse and no better than his British and US equivalent. Today, we suffer from politically motivated revisionists, desperate to change history for their own narrow and selfish objectives. At the moment, this country is headed towards a state wherein perhaps we might soon expect to see the Little Red Book of Chairman Brown! :roll:

...so you'd be quite happy to allow the Dutch pro child-sex political party equal airtime with any other party? Political parties generally are given airtime commensurate with their support level. The kiddy-fiddlers wouldn't have a lot of overt support and so wouldn't get much airtime anyway.

I’m not sure you can ever set parameters on free speech: if you say someone isn’t allowed to argue a point it would seem to suggest you probably haven’t got a coherent argument to level against them. Although having said that, such an approach might create organizational problems.

Quite. There would be times when someone could say something so outrageous that they'd need protection. I suppose that it's up to the government of the day to decide whether to provide it and at what level. For example, someone who had caused a stampede in a crowded place by shouting "fire" as a joke could not expect to have their freedom of speech protected - could they?