I realize Damien Thompson's blog is tough to beat but...
My Google alert for Bishop Williamson picked this up this morning. I've been watching this "blogger" going by the handle "Orac" vulgarly pretending to be an intellectual in his attack against Bishop Williamson. (Actually he's pretty ignorant of Bp. Williamson but is using him as a launching platform to stir up sentiment against any questioning of the Holocaust )
He rather cleverly says others are going about it in the wrong way by making it a crime as in Germany. But then he contradicts his stance on free speech by trying to incite ridicule, shunning and whatever other little intolerant tactics he can think of. The irony is rich. He proclaims the value of free speech, but in this he means free from government interference. He's not for free speech free of mob interference. The government exacting a price for thought crimes is intolerable. But this guy believes he and his ilk should be the ones who exact the price. Yeah. That's "free" speech, you know the kind, with a price attached. One so high, that you are loathe to pay the price for that free speech if they have their way.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/11/combatting_holocaust_denial_ur_doing_it.php?utm_source=sbhomepage&utm_medium=link&utm_content=channellinkThe comments have been absolutely laughable. He quotes one person he agrees with "So, then, if Holocaust revisionism is an intellectually honest endeavor, where are the revisionists who aren't neo-Nazis or anti-Semites?" and then adds, "I have never found such a Holocaust "revisionist."
Of course a few people have taken the bait and gone in seeking honest discussion. And he has summarily ruled out any refutations of his assertions that they have provided.
"Oh, goody. We have Holocaust deniers to play with! You know, I should make another corollary to Scopie's law and point out that if anyone involved in a discussion of the Holocaust cites Robert Faurisson (an arch Holocaust denier), the Institute for Historical Review (an infamous Holocaust denier organization), CODOH, David Irving, or VHO, as "evidence" in support of his arguments, he loses the argument immediately and should be laughed off the discussion forum.
Posted by: Orac | November 12, 2009 8:39 PM"
I immediately was reminded of one of my favorite quotes from Chesterton.
"I remember once arguing with an honest young atheist, who was very much shocked at my disputing some of the assumptions which were absolute sanctities to him (such as the quite unproved proposition of the independence of matter and the quite improbable proposition of its power to originate mind), and he at length fell back upon this question, which he delivered with an honourable heat of defiance and indignation: "Well, can you tell me any man of intellect, great in science or philosophy, who accepted the miraculous?" I said, "With pleasure. Descartes, Dr. Johnson, Newton, Faraday, Newman, Gladstone, Pasteur, Browning, Brunetiere - as many more as you please." To which that quite admirable and idealistic young man made this astonishing reply - "Oh, but of course they had to say that; they were Christians." First he challenged me to find a black swan, and then he ruled out all my swans because they were black. The fact that all these great intellects had come to the Christian view was somehow or other a proof either that they were not great intellects or that they had not really come to that view. The argument thus stood in a charmingly convenient form: "All men that count have come to my conclusion; for if they come to your conclusion they do not count." I opted not to comment since I had a skeptical inkling that he's not interested in being fair or intellectually honest. And true to my inkling, he's gone on seemingly endless trails of unfounded assertions without backing anything up.
I think it's important to keep an eye on these attempts based on emotion to persuade people towards a particular bias concerning events and people that are tied in various ways to the effort to restore the Church. Guys like this have a tendency to radicalize and could easily try to start violent movements to persecute traditional Catholics.
