[Previous entry: ""] [Main Index] [Next entry: "One of the good ones."]

02/20/2006: ""

Occasionally, I stumble across a little gem of wisdom that just seems to tie together a whole bundle of strands of thought. This, from John Locke seems to relate to so much of what's been on the news the past few weeks:

For where is the man that has incontestable evidence of the truth of all that he holds, or of the falsehood of all he condemns; or can say that he has examined to the bottom all his own and other men's opinions? ('Essays concerning human understanding', (1690)

This relates not only to the cartoon controversy, and the utterly ludicrous 'glorifying terrorism' legislation, but also about the frankly bonkers decision of an Austrian court today to jail David Irving.

Let me make one thing clear: I don't for a minute seriously consider that the claims for which Irving received three years in the slammer have any merit. In fact, he doesn't even stand by them any more. What's more, I have very little sympathy for cries of 'free speech' from this hypocritical racist and anti-semite. I can call him a racist and anti-semite with impunity because Mr Justice Gray stated that he was such, after Irving tried to use English libel law to prevent the publication of a book in which he was labelled as such. And the fact that he wraps himself in the banner of free speech now, while he was perfectly willing to use the law to silence his detractors six years ago, is what makes him a hypocrite.

So, not much sympathy from this quarter, I'm afraid.

But ...

But what of the Austrian law itself? Three years in prison for arguing that the orthodox view of history is wrong? Well, that's what brings me back to Locke. Like Irving, I'm no expert on the Holocaust. But I've seen and read and heard enough to be pretty damn convinced that it happened, and that millions died. How many millions precisely, I couldn't definitively say. With regard to how I feel about Nazism, I'm not sure it matters greatly. Am I so utterly convinced, though, that I'd want to imprison those who disagree? Truthfully, no. Quite simply, there is no subject in the universe - even the one or two on which I can plausibly claim some expertise - on which I am so supremely, complacently, arrogantly sure that I am totally right, and those who disagree with me totally wrong, that I would sling them in jail for daring to dissent.

Should Irving be allowed to espouse his ludicrous, poisonous views without fear of the state locking him away for them? Yes, of course he should. Does it follow that he should be employed by universities, allowed time on the BBC to air them, or have his views contained in school books? No, of course not. There's a finite amount of time in the classroom and a finite amount of state-funded airtime, and it's patently absurd to waste a second of it on Holocaust deniers, flat earthers, 'scientific racists', the intelligent design charlatans, or any other proponents of lunatic views, benign or malevolent. Because, while I can't be 100% sure that they are wrong, I can be sufficiently sure to decide the time spent on them would be far better spent on plausible opinions that are amenable to evidence & argument. There just aren't enough hours in the day to consider every argument in the minutest detail, so let's prioritise those which look like they just might have something going for them.

But we can do that without absolutely shutting the door on the eccentric, the unorthodox, or the ostensibly implausible. I'm absolutely sure the gyst of Irving's claims (as opposed to the details) are utter rubbish. I'm equally sure, though, that somewhere in the world right now, there's someone espousing an opinion that we would all currently consider ludicrous, probably laughable, possibly even offensive - but who will turn out somewhere down the line to be (at last partially) right. It's through ugly memetic mutations that the evolution of ideas occurs.

To paraphrase Locke for modern times, if there's one thing I'm certain about, it's that some of my certainties will turn out to be wrong. And it's that absence of absolute certainty that makes me very, very uneasy about silencing even creatures like Irving.

Just don't ask me to send him any sympathy cards.