Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 46, No. 8, Ed. 1 Thursday, February 20, 1992 Page: 2 of 24
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Feature 2
TEXAS JEWISH POST, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY20, 1992-IN OUR 46tTH YEAR!
Promoting
Crackpot
Ideas1
By Alan Dershowitz
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (JT A)-A crack-
pot named Bradley Smith claims that the
Holocaust never happened, that there was
no Nazi "policy to exterminate the Jewish
people" and that the gas chambers were
"life-saving .. . fumigation" rooms
Every legitimate historian knows that
millions of Jews-infants, grandmothers,
men and women-were ingathered from
throughout Nazi-controlled Europe and
systematically murdered as part of Hitler's
genocidal final solution. Entire Jewish
communities and villages were extermi-
nated by machine gun squads, mobile gas
vans and large gas chambers.
Many members of my own family were
slaughtered in Poland. When I visited
Auschwitz-Birkenau, I saw the names of
my relatives on the list of those gassed and
cremated. I know survivors-like Nobel
Prize-winner Elie Weisel-who experi-
enced the death camps first hand. I have
spoken to American soldiers who liber-
ated death camps at the end of the war.
Despite the incontrovertible evidence
of the Holocaust-the Nazis themselves
documented many of the killings-there
are cruel bigots who are trying to persuade
naive people that the Holocaust is a "myth"
perpetuated by Jews "promulgating anti-
German hate propaganda.” By the use of
this double-speak-accusing the victims of
employing hate propaganda-Bradley
Smith and his ilk have been trying to tum
an incontestable historical fact into a "de-
batable issue."
The Holocaust deniers realize that they
cannot "win" the debate during this cen-
tury. They envision a two-step process: the
first is to make the truth of the Holocaust a
"debatable" issue; the second is to "win"
the debate in the next century, when the
victims and perpetrators of the Holocaust
will all be dead.
As part of this process, Smith has tried to
buy full-page advertisements in college news-
papers. These ads call for "open debate" on
whether the Holocaust occurred. Invoking
currently voguish language about "campus
thought police" and "political correctness,"
Smith says that students should be "encour-
aged to investigate the Holocaust story the
same way they are encouraged to investigate
every other historical event."
I agree with that formulation. The Holo-
caust should be studied in the same way that
"every other historical event" is studied.
American slavery is studied, but no one
"debates" whether there were slaves, be-
cause that is not a debatable issue. The
detention of Japanese-Americans during
World War II is studied, but there is no
debate about whether this historical event
occurred, because it is not debatable. Who
killed President Kennedy is debatable, but
not whether Kennedy is still alive, as some
tabloids have occasionally claimed.
The occurrence of non-occurrence of a
universally accepted historical event does
not become a legitimate issue for academic
debate just because some crackpot says it is
debatable. An initial burden of persuasions
must be satisfied before a ludicrous idea is
given the imprimatur of reasonable
debatability. Holocaust denial has not come
close to meeting the preliminary burden.
In addition to its demonstrable falsehood,
Holocaust denial is cruelly hurtful to survi-
vors. Just imagine how a man like Elie
Weisel must feel when he hears a call for
"open debate" about whether his family was
murdered by the Nazis.
For these reasons, many college newspa-
pers turned down Smith's dirty money and
refused to run his nasty ad. In doing so, they
followed their policy of being selective in
the advertising they will accept. Many refuse
ads for phone sex, quack medical cures or
Professor Alan Dershowitz
Professor Alan Dershowitz in Dallas last November
autographing copies of his best seller "Chutzpah."
racist, sexist or homophobic views.
Some college newspapers ran the ad. The
most questionable decision was made by the
Rutgers Targum, which turned down the ad
but then ran it as an "opinion" column-for
free. It also ran contrary opinions. The New
York Times praised this approach, arguing
that the "editors thus transformed revulsion
into education."
I wonder whether the Times considered
the implications for other crackpot ideas that
seek to become debatable. Will the New
York Times now run ads that are rejected for
their dishonesty and offensiveness as op-ed
articles? If so, it can expect an influx of ad
applications from advocates of racist, sexist,
homophobic and anti-Semitic views that are
not regarded as worthy of editorial coverage
by the mainstream press. Private newspa-
pers have a First Amendment right to pub-
lish or decline anything. Only the govern-
ment may not censor because of the con-
tent of expression. Our government has
never tried to censor Smith's garbage, nor
should it.
Recendy, Smith invited me to debate
whether the Holocause occurred. He knows
he cannot win, but he would like to be able
to say that Alan Dershowitz regards the
issue as worthy of debate. I have written
him that I will debate the Holocaust, but
only as part of a series of the following
subjects: 1) that slavery did not exist in
America, 2) that Elvis Presley is still alive,
and 3) that the earth is flat. That is the
company of crackpot "ideas" into which
Holocaust denial comfortable fits.
Alan Dershowitz is a professor of law at the
Harvard Law School.
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Wisch, J. A. & Wisch, Rene. Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 46, No. 8, Ed. 1 Thursday, February 20, 1992, newspaper, February 20, 1992; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth753859/m1/2/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .