Historical revisionism (negationism)
Encyclopedia
Historical revisionism is either the legitimate scholastic re-examination of existing knowledge about a historical event, or the illegitimate distortion of the historical record such that certain events appear in a more or less favourable light. For the former, i.e. the academic pursuit, see historical revisionism
. This article deals solely with the latter, the distortion of history, which—if it constitutes the denial of historical crimes—is also sometimes (but not commonly) called negationism.
In attempting to revise the past, illegitimate historical revisionism appeals to the intellect—via techniques illegitimate to historical discourse—to advance a given interpretive historical view, typically involving war crimes or crimes against humanity. The techniques include presenting known forged documents as genuine; inventing ingenious, but implausible, reasons for distrusting genuine documents; attributing his or her own conclusions to books and sources reporting the opposite; manipulating statistical series to support the given point of view; and deliberately mis-translating texts (in languages other than the revisionist's). Practical examples of negationism (illegitimate historical revisionism) include Holocaust denial
and some Soviet historiography
. Contemporarily, hate groups practice negationism on the Internet. In literature, the effects of historical revisionism are usually described in science fiction
novels such as Nineteen Eighty-Four
(1949), by George Orwell
. Moreover, some countries have criminalised the negationist revision of certain historical events.
and/or politics for a particular purpose. Revisionists understand Plato’s dictum that, “those who tell the stories also hold the power.” Sometimes the purpose is as innocent as wanting to sell more books or attract attention with a startling headline. Often, however, that purpose is to achieve a nation’s aims by transferring war guilt, demonizing an enemy, providing an illusion of victory, or preserving friendship. James McPherson, President of the American Historical Association in 2003, wrote that some would want revisionist history understood as, “a consciously falsified or distorted interpretation of the past to serve partisan or ideological purposes in the present.” Broadly understood, there are two motivations behind revisionist history: the ability to control ideological influence and to control political influence.
Because historians are credited as people who single-mindedly pursue truth, revisionist historians capitalize on the profession’s credibility and present their pseudohistory
as true scholarship. By adding a measure of credibility to their work, their ideas are more readily accepted in the public mind. To an extent, historical revisionism is recognized as ‘truth-seekers’ finding different truths to fit the needed political, social, or ideological context.
– sometimes with official consent. Self-taught, amateur, or dissident academic historians
manipulate and/or misrepresent historical accounts to achieve deliberate political ends. Herodotus
, for example, wrote his version of history to gather political support for the Greek system of government over the aggressive Persian despot. Also, Communism
and Soviet historiography
treated reality and the party line
as one and the same, employing historical revisionism to advance a specific political (and ideological) agenda.
and/or denial
. The specific techniques of historical revisionism vary from using forged documents as genuine sources (or inventing reasons to distrust genuine documents), to exploiting opinions by taking them out of their historical context. Other techniques include manipulating statistical series to support the given point of view, and deliberately mis-translating texts (into other languages)... etc. Instead of submitting their work to the challenges of a peer review, revisionists rewrite history to support an agenda, and often use logical fallacies to obtain the desired results. Because historical revisionism can be used to deny, deceive, or influence explanations and perceptions, it can be regarded as a technique of propaganda
. Finally, techniques of historical revisionism operate within the intellectual battlespace in order to advance an interpretation or perception of history.
British historian Richard J. Evans
describes the difference in technique between historians
and revisionists thus:
work based on credible sources, and deceptive history books based on uncredible sources. The distinction between types of history books rests upon the research techniques used in writing such histories; accuracy and revision are central to historical scholarship
. As in any scientific discipline, historians submit their papers for peer review
, however, instead of submitting their work to the challenges of a peer review, revisionists rewrite history to support an agenda, often political, and use many techniques and logical fallacies to obtain the desired results. In doing so, the revisionists therefore engages in deceiving their audience into believing manipulated information.
The distinction between types of history books rests upon the research techniques used in writing such histories; accuracy and revision are central to historical scholarship
. When these techniques are purposefully side-stepped, the presented information may be considered deception.
, and prevention techniques
such as blame shifting, censorship
, distraction, and media manipulation
. Negationism is the denial of established historical facts – particularly in regards to denying the crimes of World War II and the Holocaust.
|, propose that Japan’s invasion of China, and the Second World War
, itself, were justified reactions to racist Western imperialism of the time. On 2 March 2007, Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe
denied that the military had forced women into sexual slavery
during the war: "The fact is, there is no evidence to prove there was coercion." Before he spoke, some Liberal Democratic Party legislators also sought to revise Yohei Kono
’s apology to former comfort women in 1993; likewise, there was the controversial negation of the six-week Nanking Massacre
in 1937-1938.
Tsuneo Watanabe
, editor-in-chief of the conservative newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun
, criticized the Yasukuni Shrine
as a bastion of revisionism: "The Yasukuni Shrine runs a museum where they show items in order to encourage and worship militarism. It's wrong for the prime minister to visit such a place". Other critics note that men, who would contemporarily be perceived as "Korean" and "Chinese", are enshrined for the military actions they effected as Japanese Imperial subjects.
("explosion-affected people") of Hiroshima and Nagasaki seek compensation from their government and criticize it for failing to "accept responsibility for having instigated and then prolonged an aggressive war long after Japan's defeat was apparent, resulting in a heavy toll in Japanese, Asian and American lives." Historians Hill and Yukiko have pointed out that attempts to minimize the importance of the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
is revisionist history. EB Sledge expressed concern that such revisionism, in his words "mellowing", would allow us to forget the harsh facts of the history that led to the bombings.
were unarmed civilians or armed resistance fighters, whether death tolls were inflated, and whether prison camps such as Sremska Mitrovica camp
were sites of mass war crimes. Scholars, commentators, and activists who have taken contrarian/negationist views, arguing that reports of Serbian war crimes were exaggerated, include Diana Johnstone
, Lewis MacKenzie
, Milorad Dodik
, Pamela Geller
and Julia Gorin
.
with disrespecting Turkey
, for saying that "Thirty thousand Kurds, and a million Armenians
, were killed in these lands, and nobody, but me, dares to talk about it." The controversy occurred as Turkey was first vying for membership in the European Union
(EU) where the suppression of dissenters is looked down upon. Article 301 originally was part of penal-law reforms meant to modernise Turkey to EU standards, as part of negotiating Turkey's membership to the EU. In 2006, the charges were dropped due to pressure from the Turkish government.
On 7 February 2006, five journalists were tried for insulting the judicial institutions of the State, and for aiming to prejudice a court case (per Article 288 of the Turkish penal code). The reporters were on trial for criticising the court-ordered closing of a conference in Istanbul regarding the Armenian genocide
during the time of the Ottoman Empire
. The conference continued elsewhere, transferring locations from a state to a private university. The trial continued until 11 April 2006, when four of the reporters were acquitted. The case against the fifth journalist, Murat Belge
, proceeded until 8 June 2006, when he was also acquitted. The purpose of the conference was to critically analyze the official Turkish view of the Armenian Genocide in 1915; a taboo
subject in Turkey. The trial proved to be a test case between Turkey and the European Union
; the EU insisted that Turkey allow increased freedom of expression rights, as a condition to membership.
The Republic of Turkey does not deny the Ottoman Armenian casualties
, but denies they were genocide
, specifically claiming that said deaths were consequence of war, and also were criminal killings neither approved nor committed by the Ottoman Empire.
(1922–91), the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) attempted to ideologically and politically control the writing of both academic and popular history. These attempts were most successful in 1934–52 period. According to Mehnert, the Soviets attempt to control academic historiography
(the writing of history by academic historians) to promote ideological and ethno-racial imperialism
by Russians. During the 1928–56 period, modern and contemporary history was generally composed according to the wishes of the CPSU, not the requirements of accepted historiographic method. According to some authors, such as Mehnert, this practice was fundamentally corrupt.
During and after the rule of Nikita Khrushchev
(1956–64), Soviet historiographic practice is more complicated. Although not entirely corrupted, Soviet historiography was characterized by complex competition between Stalinist and anti-Stalinist Marxist historians. To avoid the professional hazard of politicized history, some historians chose pre-modern, mediæval history or classical history, where ideological demands were relatively relaxed and conversation with other historians in the field could be fostered; nevertheless, despite the potential danger of proscribed ideology corrupting historians’ work, not all of Soviet historiography was corrupt.
Control over party history and the legal status of individual ex-party members played a large role in dictating the ideological diversity and thus the faction in power within the CPSU. The history of the Communist Party was revised to delete references to leaders purged from the party, especially during the rule of Joseph Stalin
(1922–53).An example of changing visual history is the Party motivated practice of altering photographs
.
In the Historiography of the Cold War
, a controversy over negationist historical revisionism exists, where numerous revisionist scholars in the West have been accused of whitewashing
the crimes of Stalinism
, overlooking the Katyn massacre
in Poland and disregarding the validity of the Venona messages
with regards to Soviet espionage in the United States.
novel Nineteen Eighty-Four
(1949) by George Orwell
, the government of Oceania continually revises historical records to concord with current politics. For example, when Oceania is at war with Eurasia
, records indicate that this has always been the case, yet when they are no longer fighting the historical records are changed and the populace are brainwashed
to believe that the two nations have always been allies. In the novel, historical revisionism is the principal method of propaganda
used by the Ministry of Truth
, where the protagonist, Winston Smith
, works as a historical revisionist.
In his novel, Orwell writes, "He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future."This quote illustrates Orwell’s understanding of how the past can influence both ideology and politics, offers a counterpoint as to why protecting the scholarly practice of history is important, and describes the extreme effects of state-sponsored censorship.
prefer "Holocaust denier" to differentiate deniers from legitimate historical revisionists
, whose goal is to accurately analyze historical evidence with established methods.To clarify the terminology of denial vs. "revisionism":
Hence, as retroactive minimisation of the Holocaust, Holocaust deniers have attached themselves to the Heimatvertriebene
n (ethnic Germans expelled mainly from the eastern quarter of Germany annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union after the war), and have, per their opponents, attempted to use sympathy for said Germans, and blame the Jews for the suffering of the Heimatvertriebenen. Moreover, when the discredited author David Irving
Further information of how Irving was discredited as a historian:
, and her publisher, Penguin Books
, and thus was publicly identified as a Holocaust denier, the trial judge, Justice Charles Gray, concluded that:
On 20 February 2006, Irving was found guilty, and sentenced to three years imprisonment for Holocaust denial, under Austria's 1947 law banning Nazi revivalism and criminalising the "public denial, belittling or justification of National Socialist crimes". Besides Austria, eleven other countries—including Belgium, France, Germany, Lithuania, Poland, and Switzerland—have criminalised Holocaust denial as punishable with imprisonment.Laws against denying the Holocaust:
, who wanted a more patriotic textbook. Critics of the textbook note the lack of detail about historical events such as the Siege of Leningrad
(1941–44), the Gulag
forced-labour camps, the Russo–Finnish Winter War
(1939–40), the First Chechen War
(1994–96), and the Second Chechen War
(1999–2000), as serious factual inaccuracies; most egregious, the critics propose, is the absence of the Holocaust (1933–45), and the glorification of the rule of Josef Stalin
(1922–53).
centers upon the secondary school history textbook Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho ("New History Textbook") said to minimise
the nature of Japanese militarism in the First Sino-Japanese War
(1894–95), in annexing Korea in 1910, in the Second Sino-Japanese War
(1937–45), and in the Second World War
(1939–45). The conservative Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform
commissioned the Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho textbook with the purpose of traditional national and international view of that Japanese historical period. The Ministry of Education vets all history textbooks, and those that do not mention Japanese war crimes and atrocities are not vetted; however, the Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho de-emphasises aggressive Japanese Imperial wartime behaviour and the matter of Chinese and Korean comfort women
.
and promoting "expansive pan-Islamic
imaginings" that "detect the beginnings of Pakistan in the birth of Islam on the Arabian peninsula". Since 2001, the Pakistani government has stated that curriculum reforms have been underway by the Ministry of Education
.
defines it as the "denial, gross minimisation, approval or justification of genocide
or crimes against humanity" (article 6, Additional Protocol to the Convention on cybercrime). The European Union
has a provision
Cybercrime Convention, addressing materials and "acts of racist or xenophobic nature committed through computer networks"; it was negotiated from late 2001 to early 2002, and, on 7 November 2002, the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers adopted the protocol's final text titled Additional Protocol to the Convention on Cyber-crime, Concerning the Criminalisation of Acts of a Racist and Xenophobic Nature Committed through Computer Systems, ("Protocol"). It opened on 28 January 2003, and became current on 1 March 2006; as of 30 November 2011, 20 States have signed and ratified the Protocol, and 15 others have signed, but not yet ratified it (including Canada and South Africa).
The Protocol requires participant States to criminalise the dissemination of racist and xenophobic material, and of racist and xenophobic threats and insults through computer networks, such as the Internet. Article 6, Section 1 of the Protocol specifically covers Holocaust Denial
, and other genocides recognised as such by international courts, established since 1945, by relevant international legal instruments. Section 2 of Article 6 allows a Party to the Protocol, at their discretion, only to prosecute the violator if the crime is committed with the intent to incite hatred or discrimination or violence; or to use a reservation, by allowing a Party not to apply Article 6 — either partly or entirely. The Council of Europe's Explanatory Report of the Protocol says that the "European Court of Human Rights
has made it clear that the denial or revision of 'clearly established historical facts — such as the Holocaust — . . . would be removed from the protection of Article 10 by Article 17' of the European Convention on Human Rights
" (see the Lehideux and Isorni
judgement of 23 September 1998);
Two of the English speaking states in Europe, Ireland and the United Kingdom, have not signed the additional protocol, (the third, Malta, signed on 28 January 2003, but has not yet ratified it). On 8 July 2005 Canada became the only non European state to sign the convention. They were joined by South Africa in April of 2008. The United States government does not believe that the final version of the Protocol is consistent with the United States' First Amendment Constitutional rights and has informed the Council of Europe that the United States will not become a Party to the protocol.
(which may encompass negationism), in sixteen different countries including
Additionally, the Netherlands
considers denying the Holocaust as a hate crime – which is a punishable offense. Wider use of domestic laws include the 1990 French Gayssot Act
that prohibits any "racist, anti-Semitic or xenophobic
" speech., and the Czech Republic
and the Ukraine
have criminalised the denial and the minimisation of Communist-era crimes.
On 23 February 2005, the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP)
conservative majority at the French National Assembly
voted a law compelling history textbooks and teachers to "acknowledge and recognize in particular the positive role of the French presence abroad, especially in North Africa". Criticized by historians and teachers, among them Pierre Vidal-Naquet
, who refused to recognise the French Parliament's right to influence the way history is written (despite the French Holocaust denial
laws, see Loi Gayssot
). That law was also challenged by left-wing parties and the former French colonies
; critics argued that the law was tantamount to refusing to acknowledge the racism
inherent to French colonialism
, and that the law proper is a form of historical revisionism. In retaliation against the law, Algeria
n president Abdelaziz Bouteflika
refused to sign a prepared "friendly treaty" with France. On 26 June 2005, Bouteflika declared that the law "approached mental blindness, negationism and revisionism". In Martinique
, Aimé Césaire
, author of the Négritude
literary movement, refused to receive UMP leader Nicolas Sarkozy
, the incumbent president of France.
Supporters of the law were denounced as a resurgent "colonial lobby", a term used in late nineteenth-century France to identify supporters of French colonialism, i.e. deputies, scientists, businessmen, et al. In the event, the public's discontent with the law compelled President Jacques Chirac
to publicly oppose it, and his own UMP majority, who approved the law; defying such historical revisionism, he said, "In a Republic, there is no official history. It is not to the law to write history. Writing history is the business of historians". He then decree
d to the President of the Assembly, Jean-Louis Debré
(UMP), that he delete the revisionist article of law ordering the "recognition of the positive role of the French presence abroad". To effect that, President Chirac ordered Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin
to seize the Constitutional Council of France
, whose decision would allow repealing the law. The Constitutional Council judged that history textbook regulation is not the domain of the law, but of the administrative reglementation [regulation], and the article was repealed in early 2006.
Moreover, further debate about colonialism
, which is linked to immigration
, continued in France; historian Benjamin Stora
noted that colonialism is an important "memory" stake influencing how communities, and the nation
, itself, represent themselves, because official state history has accepted French historic crimes and errors with great difficulty; the historian Olivier LeCour Grandmaison
also criticized the 23 February 2005 law. It was not until 1999 that the French National Assembly recognised the Algerian War (1954–62)—previously a "public order operation"—as a "war" proper. Hence philosopher Paul Ricœur's (1981) emphasis upon the need for a "decolonization
of memory", because mentality, itself, has been colonised in the "Age of imperialism".
Historical revisionism
In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event...
. This article deals solely with the latter, the distortion of history, which—if it constitutes the denial of historical crimes—is also sometimes (but not commonly) called negationism.
In attempting to revise the past, illegitimate historical revisionism appeals to the intellect—via techniques illegitimate to historical discourse—to advance a given interpretive historical view, typically involving war crimes or crimes against humanity. The techniques include presenting known forged documents as genuine; inventing ingenious, but implausible, reasons for distrusting genuine documents; attributing his or her own conclusions to books and sources reporting the opposite; manipulating statistical series to support the given point of view; and deliberately mis-translating texts (in languages other than the revisionist's). Practical examples of negationism (illegitimate historical revisionism) include Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
and some Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography is the methodology of history studies by historians in the Soviet Union . In the USSR, the study of history was marked by alternating periods of freedom allowed and restrictions imposed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , and also by the struggle of historians to...
. Contemporarily, hate groups practice negationism on the Internet. In literature, the effects of historical revisionism are usually described in science fiction
Social science fiction
Social science fiction is a term used to describe a subgenre of science fiction concerned less with technology and space opera and more with sociological speculation about human society...
novels such as Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel about Oceania, a society ruled by the oligarchical dictatorship of the Party...
(1949), by George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
. Moreover, some countries have criminalised the negationist revision of certain historical events.
Reasons for Revisionism
Historical revisionism is conducted to influence a target’s ideologyIdeology
An ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to...
and/or politics for a particular purpose. Revisionists understand Plato’s dictum that, “those who tell the stories also hold the power.” Sometimes the purpose is as innocent as wanting to sell more books or attract attention with a startling headline. Often, however, that purpose is to achieve a nation’s aims by transferring war guilt, demonizing an enemy, providing an illusion of victory, or preserving friendship. James McPherson, President of the American Historical Association in 2003, wrote that some would want revisionist history understood as, “a consciously falsified or distorted interpretation of the past to serve partisan or ideological purposes in the present.” Broadly understood, there are two motivations behind revisionist history: the ability to control ideological influence and to control political influence.
Ideological Influence
Historical revisionists …“seem to have been given a collective task in [a] nation's cultural development, the full significance of which is emerging only now: to redefine [a nation’s] status in a changing world.” History is a tool that contributes to the shaping of national identity, cultures, and memories. Through the study of history, individuals are imbued with a particular identity. By revising history, therefore, one has the ability to specifically craft that ideological identity.Because historians are credited as people who single-mindedly pursue truth, revisionist historians capitalize on the profession’s credibility and present their pseudohistory
Pseudohistory
Pseudohistory is a pejorative term applied to a type of historical revisionism, often involving sensational claims whose acceptance would require rewriting a significant amount of commonly accepted history, and based on methods that depart from standard historiographical conventions.Cryptohistory...
as true scholarship. By adding a measure of credibility to their work, their ideas are more readily accepted in the public mind. To an extent, historical revisionism is recognized as ‘truth-seekers’ finding different truths to fit the needed political, social, or ideological context.
Political Influence
History provides insight into past political trends and helps predict political implications of the present. Revisionism can be used to cultivate specific politically motivated mythsPolitical myth
A political myth is an ideological explanation for a political phenomenon that is believed by a social group.In 1975, Henry Tudor defined it in Political Myth published by Macmillan. He said In 2001, Christopher G...
– sometimes with official consent. Self-taught, amateur, or dissident academic historians
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
manipulate and/or misrepresent historical accounts to achieve deliberate political ends. Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
, for example, wrote his version of history to gather political support for the Greek system of government over the aggressive Persian despot. Also, Communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
and Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography is the methodology of history studies by historians in the Soviet Union . In the USSR, the study of history was marked by alternating periods of freedom allowed and restrictions imposed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , and also by the struggle of historians to...
treated reality and the party line
Party line (politics)
In politics, the line or the party line is an idiom for a political party or social movement's canon agenda, as well as specific ideological elements specific to the organization's partisanship. The common phrase toeing the party line describes a person who speaks in a manner that conforms to his...
as one and the same, employing historical revisionism to advance a specific political (and ideological) agenda.
Revisionist Techniques
Most (if not all) of the techniques used in historical revisionism are used for the purpose of deceptionDeception
Deception, beguilement, deceit, bluff, mystification, bad faith, and subterfuge are acts to propagate beliefs that are not true, or not the whole truth . Deception can involve dissimulation, propaganda, and sleight of hand. It can employ distraction, camouflage or concealment...
and/or denial
Denial
Denial is a defense mechanism postulated by Sigmund Freud, in which a person is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable to accept and rejects it instead, insisting that it is not true despite what may be overwhelming evidence.The subject may use:* simple denial: deny the reality of the...
. The specific techniques of historical revisionism vary from using forged documents as genuine sources (or inventing reasons to distrust genuine documents), to exploiting opinions by taking them out of their historical context. Other techniques include manipulating statistical series to support the given point of view, and deliberately mis-translating texts (into other languages)... etc. Instead of submitting their work to the challenges of a peer review, revisionists rewrite history to support an agenda, and often use logical fallacies to obtain the desired results. Because historical revisionism can be used to deny, deceive, or influence explanations and perceptions, it can be regarded as a technique of propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
. Finally, techniques of historical revisionism operate within the intellectual battlespace in order to advance an interpretation or perception of history.
British historian Richard J. Evans
Richard J. Evans
Richard John Evans is a British academic and historian, prominently known for his history of Germany.-Life:Evans was born in London, of Welsh parentage, and is now Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge and President of Wolfson College...
describes the difference in technique between historians
Historical revisionism
In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event...
and revisionists thus:
Deception
Deception is offensively using falsified information, lying, and obscuring the truth to manipulate information or opinion. Revisionist historians use deception techniques to help achieve their political or ideological goals. Within literature, history distinguishes between books published by academic historians doing peer-reviewedPeer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
work based on credible sources, and deceptive history books based on uncredible sources. The distinction between types of history books rests upon the research techniques used in writing such histories; accuracy and revision are central to historical scholarship
Scholarly method
Scholarly method or scholarship is the body of principles and practices used by scholars to make their claims about the world as valid and trustworthy as possible, and to make them known to the scholarly public.-Methods:...
. As in any scientific discipline, historians submit their papers for peer review
Peer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
, however, instead of submitting their work to the challenges of a peer review, revisionists rewrite history to support an agenda, often political, and use many techniques and logical fallacies to obtain the desired results. In doing so, the revisionists therefore engages in deceiving their audience into believing manipulated information.
The distinction between types of history books rests upon the research techniques used in writing such histories; accuracy and revision are central to historical scholarship
Scholarly method
Scholarly method or scholarship is the body of principles and practices used by scholars to make their claims about the world as valid and trustworthy as possible, and to make them known to the scholarly public.-Methods:...
. When these techniques are purposefully side-stepped, the presented information may be considered deception.
Denial
Denial is defensively protecting information from being shared or claiming facts are untrue. Protection can include both physical securitySecurity
Security is the degree of protection against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security as a form of protection are structures and processes that provide or improve security as a condition. The Institute for Security and Open Methodologies in the OSSTMM 3 defines security as "a form of protection...
, and prevention techniques
Risk management
Risk management is the identification, assessment, and prioritization of risks followed by coordinated and economical application of resources to minimize, monitor, and control the probability and/or impact of unfortunate events or to maximize the realization of opportunities...
such as blame shifting, censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
, distraction, and media manipulation
Media manipulation
Media manipulation is an aspect of public relations in which partisans create an image or argument that favours their particular interests. Such tactics may include the use of logical fallacies and propaganda techniques, and often involve the suppression of information or points of view by crowding...
. Negationism is the denial of established historical facts – particularly in regards to denying the crimes of World War II and the Holocaust.
- The HolocaustThe HolocaustThe Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
and NazismNazismNazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
: Deborah LipstadtDeborah LipstadtDeborah Esther Lipstadt, Ph.D. is an American historian and author of the book Denying the Holocaust and The Eichmann Trial. She is the Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University...
contends that the concept of "comparable Allied wrongs", such as the post-war expulsionsExpulsion of Germans after World War IIThe later stages of World War II, and the period after the end of that war, saw the forced migration of millions of German nationals and ethnic Germans from various European states and territories, mostly into the areas which would become post-war Germany and post-war Austria...
and the formal Allied war crimes, is at the center of, and a continuously repeated theme of, contemporary Holocaust denial, calling them "immoral equivalencies".
Japanese war crimes
The post-war minimisation of the war crimes of Japanese imperialism is an example of illegitimate historical revisionism; some contemporary Japanese revisionists, such as Yuko IwanamiThe granddaughter of General Hideki TojoHideki Tōjō
Hideki Tōjō was a general of the Imperial Japanese Army , the leader of the Taisei Yokusankai, and the 40th Prime Minister of Japan during most of World War II, from 17 October 1941 to 22 July 1944...
|, propose that Japan’s invasion of China, and the Second World War
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, itself, were justified reactions to racist Western imperialism of the time. On 2 March 2007, Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe
Shinzo Abe
was the 90th Prime Minister of Japan, elected by a special session of the National Diet on 26 September 2006. He was Japan's youngest post–World War II prime minister and the first born after the war. Abe served as prime minister for nearly twelve months, before resigning on 12 September 2007...
denied that the military had forced women into sexual slavery
Sexual slavery
Sexual slavery is when unwilling people are coerced into slavery for sexual exploitation. The incidence of sexual slavery by country has been studied and tabulated by UNESCO, with the cooperation of various international agencies...
during the war: "The fact is, there is no evidence to prove there was coercion." Before he spoke, some Liberal Democratic Party legislators also sought to revise Yohei Kono
Yohei Kono
is a Japanese politician and a member of the Liberal Democratic Party. He served as Speaker of the House of Representatives from November 2003 until August 2009, when the LDP lost its majority in the 2009 election...
’s apology to former comfort women in 1993; likewise, there was the controversial negation of the six-week Nanking Massacre
Nanking Massacre
The Nanking Massacre or Nanjing Massacre, also known as the Rape of Nanking, was a mass murder, genocide and war rape that occurred during the six-week period following the Japanese capture of the city of Nanjing , the former capital of the Republic of China, on December 13, 1937 during the Second...
in 1937-1938.
Tsuneo Watanabe
Tsuneo Watanabe
is a Japanese businessman. He leads Yomiuri Shimbun, and he has a great influence on Japanese sports and Japanese politics. Informally he's nicknamed as Nabetsune, although he hates it.-Controversies:...
, editor-in-chief of the conservative newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun
Yomiuri Shimbun
The is a Japanese newspaper published in Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, and other major Japanese cities. It is one of the five national newspapers in Japan; the other four are the Asahi Shimbun, the Mainichi Shimbun, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, and the Sankei Shimbun...
, criticized the Yasukuni Shrine
Yasukuni Shrine
is a Shinto shrine located in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. It is dedicated to the soldiers and others who died fighting on behalf of the Emperor of Japan. Currently, its Symbolic Registry of Divinities lists the names of over 2,466,000 enshrined men and women whose lives were dedicated to the service of...
as a bastion of revisionism: "The Yasukuni Shrine runs a museum where they show items in order to encourage and worship militarism. It's wrong for the prime minister to visit such a place". Other critics note that men, who would contemporarily be perceived as "Korean" and "Chinese", are enshrined for the military actions they effected as Japanese Imperial subjects.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings
The HibakushaHibakusha
The surviving victims of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are called , a Japanese word that literally translates to "explosion-affected people"...
("explosion-affected people") of Hiroshima and Nagasaki seek compensation from their government and criticize it for failing to "accept responsibility for having instigated and then prolonged an aggressive war long after Japan's defeat was apparent, resulting in a heavy toll in Japanese, Asian and American lives." Historians Hill and Yukiko have pointed out that attempts to minimize the importance of the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
During the final stages of World War II in 1945, the United States conducted two atomic bombings against the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, the first on August 6, 1945, and the second on August 9, 1945. These two events are the only use of nuclear weapons in war to date.For six months...
is revisionist history. EB Sledge expressed concern that such revisionism, in his words "mellowing", would allow us to forget the harsh facts of the history that led to the bombings.
Serbian war crimes in the Yugoslav wars
There have been a number of scholars and political activists who have publicly disagreed with mainstream views of Serbian war crimes in the Yugoslav wars of 1991-1999. Among the points of contention are whether the victims of massacres such as the Račak massacre and Srebrenica massacreSrebrenica massacre
The Srebrenica massacre, also known as the Srebrenica genocide, refers to the July 1995 killing, during the Bosnian War, of more than 8,000 Bosniaks , mainly men and boys, in and around the town of Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina, by units of the Army of Republika Srpska under the command of...
were unarmed civilians or armed resistance fighters, whether death tolls were inflated, and whether prison camps such as Sremska Mitrovica camp
Sremska Mitrovica camp
Sremska Mitrovica prison is the biggest prison in Serbia, consisting of two facilities. It is situated in Sremska Mitrovica, Vojvodina province....
were sites of mass war crimes. Scholars, commentators, and activists who have taken contrarian/negationist views, arguing that reports of Serbian war crimes were exaggerated, include Diana Johnstone
Diana Johnstone
Diana Johnstone is a American leftist political writer based in Paris, France. She focusesg primarily on European politics and Western foreign policy. Johnstone received a Ph.D...
, Lewis MacKenzie
Lewis MacKenzie
Major-General Lewis Wharton MacKenzie, UE, CM, CMM, MSC, O.Ont, CD is a retired Canadian general, author and media commentator. MacKenzie is most famous for establishing and commanding Sector Sarajevo as part of the United Nations Protection Force UNPROFOR in Yugoslavia in 1992...
, Milorad Dodik
Milorad Dodik
Milorad Dodik , is the President of Republika Srpska, and the president of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats political party. He graduated from the Belgrade University of Political Sciences .-Political career:...
, Pamela Geller
Pamela Geller
Pamela Geller is an American blogger, author, political activist, and commentator. She is known primarily for her criticisms of Islam and opposition to Muslim activities and causes, such as the proposed construction of an Islamic community center near the former site of the World Trade Center...
and Julia Gorin
Julia Gorin
Julia Gorin is an American conservative writer, humorist, and political commentator.Born into a Jewish family in the Soviet Union, she immigrated as a toddler to the United States with her family in 1976. Her father was a violinist with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra...
.
Turkey and the Armenian Genocide
Turkish laws such as Article 301, that state "a person who publicly insults Turkishness, or the Republic or [the] Turkish Grand National Assembly of Turkey, shall be punishable by imprisonment", were used to criminally charge the writer Orhan PamukOrhan Pamuk
Ferit Orhan Pamuk , generally known simply as Orhan Pamuk, is a Turkish novelist. He is also the Robert Yik-Fong Tam Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University, where he teaches comparative literature and writing....
with disrespecting Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
, for saying that "Thirty thousand Kurds, and a million Armenians
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....
, were killed in these lands, and nobody, but me, dares to talk about it." The controversy occurred as Turkey was first vying for membership in the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
(EU) where the suppression of dissenters is looked down upon. Article 301 originally was part of penal-law reforms meant to modernise Turkey to EU standards, as part of negotiating Turkey's membership to the EU. In 2006, the charges were dropped due to pressure from the Turkish government.
On 7 February 2006, five journalists were tried for insulting the judicial institutions of the State, and for aiming to prejudice a court case (per Article 288 of the Turkish penal code). The reporters were on trial for criticising the court-ordered closing of a conference in Istanbul regarding the Armenian genocide
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian Genocide—also known as the Armenian Holocaust, the Armenian Massacres and, by Armenians, as the Great Crime—refers to the deliberate and systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during and just after World War I...
during the time of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
. The conference continued elsewhere, transferring locations from a state to a private university. The trial continued until 11 April 2006, when four of the reporters were acquitted. The case against the fifth journalist, Murat Belge
Murat Belge
Murat Belge is an outspoken left-liberal Turkish intellectual, academic, translator, literary critic, columnist, civil rights activist, and occasional bull fighter.- Career :...
, proceeded until 8 June 2006, when he was also acquitted. The purpose of the conference was to critically analyze the official Turkish view of the Armenian Genocide in 1915; a taboo
Taboo
A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and or forbidden based on moral judgment, religious beliefs and or scientific consensus. Breaking the taboo is usually considered objectionable or abhorrent by society...
subject in Turkey. The trial proved to be a test case between Turkey and the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
; the EU insisted that Turkey allow increased freedom of expression rights, as a condition to membership.
The Republic of Turkey does not deny the Ottoman Armenian casualties
Ottoman Armenian casualties
Ottoman Armenian casualties refers to the number of deaths of Ottoman Armenian people between 1914 to 1923. The Republic of Armenia and several other nations recognize the deaths to have occurred during an Armenian Genocide.Most estimates of related Armenian deaths between 1915 to 1918 range from...
, but denies they were genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
, specifically claiming that said deaths were consequence of war, and also were criminal killings neither approved nor committed by the Ottoman Empire.
Soviet history
During the existence of the Russian SFSR (1917–91) and the Soviet UnionSoviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
(1922–91), the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) attempted to ideologically and politically control the writing of both academic and popular history. These attempts were most successful in 1934–52 period. According to Mehnert, the Soviets attempt to control academic historiography
Historiography
Historiography refers either to the study of the history and methodology of history as a discipline, or to a body of historical work on a specialized topic...
(the writing of history by academic historians) to promote ideological and ethno-racial imperialism
Imperialism
Imperialism, as defined by Dictionary of Human Geography, is "the creation and/or maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationships, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination." The imperialism of the last 500 years,...
by Russians. During the 1928–56 period, modern and contemporary history was generally composed according to the wishes of the CPSU, not the requirements of accepted historiographic method. According to some authors, such as Mehnert, this practice was fundamentally corrupt.
During and after the rule of Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
(1956–64), Soviet historiographic practice is more complicated. Although not entirely corrupted, Soviet historiography was characterized by complex competition between Stalinist and anti-Stalinist Marxist historians. To avoid the professional hazard of politicized history, some historians chose pre-modern, mediæval history or classical history, where ideological demands were relatively relaxed and conversation with other historians in the field could be fostered; nevertheless, despite the potential danger of proscribed ideology corrupting historians’ work, not all of Soviet historiography was corrupt.
Control over party history and the legal status of individual ex-party members played a large role in dictating the ideological diversity and thus the faction in power within the CPSU. The history of the Communist Party was revised to delete references to leaders purged from the party, especially during the rule of Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
(1922–53).An example of changing visual history is the Party motivated practice of altering photographs
Censorship of images in the Soviet Union
After Joseph Stalin rose to power in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and became Soviet leader, he initiated a number of purges that eliminated perceived enemies. At first, a purge meant expulsion from the Communist Party, but after the Great Purge in the 1930s members were arrested,...
.
In the Historiography of the Cold War
Historiography of the Cold War
As soon as the term "Cold War" was popularized to refer to postwar tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, interpreting the course and origins of the conflict became a source of heated controversy among historians, political scientists, and journalists. In particular, historians...
, a controversy over negationist historical revisionism exists, where numerous revisionist scholars in the West have been accused of whitewashing
Whitewash (censorship)
To whitewash is a metaphor meaning to gloss over or cover up vices, crimes or scandals or to exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data. It is especially used in the context of corporations, governments or other organizations.- Etymology :Its first...
the crimes of Stalinism
Stalinism
Stalinism refers to the ideology that Joseph Stalin conceived and implemented in the Soviet Union, and is generally considered a branch of Marxist–Leninist ideology but considered by some historians to be a significant deviation from this philosophy...
, overlooking the Katyn massacre
Katyn massacre
The Katyn massacre, also known as the Katyn Forest massacre , was a mass execution of Polish nationals carried out by the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs , the Soviet secret police, in April and May 1940. The massacre was prompted by Lavrentiy Beria's proposal to execute all members of...
in Poland and disregarding the validity of the Venona messages
Venona project
The VENONA project was a long-running secret collaboration of the United States and United Kingdom intelligence agencies involving cryptanalysis of messages sent by intelligence agencies of the Soviet Union, the majority during World War II...
with regards to Soviet espionage in the United States.
In fiction
In the science fictionSocial science fiction
Social science fiction is a term used to describe a subgenre of science fiction concerned less with technology and space opera and more with sociological speculation about human society...
novel Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel about Oceania, a society ruled by the oligarchical dictatorship of the Party...
(1949) by George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
, the government of Oceania continually revises historical records to concord with current politics. For example, when Oceania is at war with Eurasia
Nations of Nineteen Eighty-Four
Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia are the three fictional superstates in George Orwell's futuristic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.-Oceania:...
, records indicate that this has always been the case, yet when they are no longer fighting the historical records are changed and the populace are brainwashed
Mind control
Mind control refers to a process in which a group or individual "systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator, often to the detriment of the person being manipulated"...
to believe that the two nations have always been allies. In the novel, historical revisionism is the principal method of propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
used by the Ministry of Truth
Ministry of Truth
The Ministry of Truth is one of the four ministries that govern Oceania in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four...
, where the protagonist, Winston Smith
Winston Smith
Winston Smith is a fictional character and the protagonist of George Orwell's 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. The character was employed by Orwell as an everyman in the setting of the novel, a "central eye ... [the reader] can readily identify with"...
, works as a historical revisionist.
In his novel, Orwell writes, "He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future."This quote illustrates Orwell’s understanding of how the past can influence both ideology and politics, offers a counterpoint as to why protecting the scholarly practice of history is important, and describes the extreme effects of state-sponsored censorship.
Holocaust denial
Many Holocaust deniers reject "denier" as an accurate description of their point of view, preferring, instead, the term "Holocaust revisionist"; nonetheless, scholarsScholarly method
Scholarly method or scholarship is the body of principles and practices used by scholars to make their claims about the world as valid and trustworthy as possible, and to make them known to the scholarly public.-Methods:...
prefer "Holocaust denier" to differentiate deniers from legitimate historical revisionists
Historical revisionism
In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event...
, whose goal is to accurately analyze historical evidence with established methods.To clarify the terminology of denial vs. "revisionism":
- "This is the phenomenon of what has come to be known as 'revisionism', 'negationism', or 'Holocaust denial,' whose main characteristic is either an outright rejection of the very veracity of the Nazi genocide of the Jews, or at least a concerted attempt to minimize both its scale and importance... It is just as crucial, however, to distinguish between the wholly objectionable politics of denial and the fully legitimate scholarly revision of previously accepted conventional interpretations of any historical event, including the Holocaust." Bartov, Omer. The Holocaust: Origins, Implementation and Aftermath, Routledge, pp.11-12. Bartov is John P. Birkelund Distinguished Professor of European History at the Watson Institute, and is regarded as one of the world's leading authorities on genocideGenocideGenocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
("Omer Bartov", The Watson Institute for International Studies). - "The two leading critical exposés of Holocaust denial in the United States were written by historians Deborah LipstadtDeborah LipstadtDeborah Esther Lipstadt, Ph.D. is an American historian and author of the book Denying the Holocaust and The Eichmann Trial. She is the Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University...
(1993) and Michael ShermerMichael ShermerMichael Brant Shermer is an American science writer, historian of science, founder of The Skeptics Society, and Editor in Chief of its magazine Skeptic, which is largely devoted to investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims. The Skeptics Society currently has over 55,000 members...
and Alex Grobman (2000). These scholars make a distinction between historical revisionism and denial. Revisionism, in their view, entails a refinement of existing knowledge about a historical event, not a denial of the event itself, that comes through the examination of new empirical evidence or a reexamination or reinterpretation of existing evidence. Legitimate historical revisionism acknowledges a "certain body of irrefutable evidence" or a "convergence of evidence" that suggest that an event - like the black plague, American slavery, or the Holocaust - did in fact occur (Lipstadt 1993:21; Shermer & Grobman 200:34). Denial, on the other hand, rejects the entire foundation of historical evidence..." Ronald J. Berger. Fathoming the Holocaust: A Social Problems Approach, Aldine Transaction, 2002, ISBN 0202306704, p. 154. - "At this time, in the mid-1970s, the specter of Holocaust Denial (masked as "revisionism") had begun to raise its head in Australia..." Bartrop, Paul R.Paul R. BartropPaul R. Bartrop is an Australia-born historian of the Holocaust and genocide. He is the 2011-2012 Ida E. King Distinguished Visiting Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Richard Stockton College of New Jersey....
"A Little More Understanding: The Experience of a Holocaust Educator in Australia" in Samuel Totten, Steven Leonard Jacobs, Paul R Bartrop. Teaching about the Holocaust, Praeger/Greenwood, 2004, p. xix. ISBN 0275982327 - "Pierre Vidal-NaquetPierre Vidal-NaquetPierre Emmanuel Vidal-Naquet was a French historian who began teaching at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales in 1969....
urges that denial of the Holocaust should not be called 'revisionism' because 'to deny history is not to revise it'. Les Assassins de la Memoire. Un Eichmann de papier et autres essays sur le revisionisme (The Assassins of Memory - A Paper-Eichmann and Other Essays on Revisionism) 15 (1987)." Cited in Roth, Stephen J. "Denial of the Holocaust as an Issue of Law" in the Israel Yearbook on Human Rights, Volume 23, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1993, ISBN 0792325818, p. 215. - "This essay describes, from a methodological perspective, some of the inherent flaws in the "revisionist" approach to the history of the Holocaust. It is not intended as a polemic, nor does it attempt to ascribe motives. Rather, it seeks to explain the fundamental error in the "revisionist" approach, as well as why that approach of necessity leaves no other choice. It concludes that "revisionism" is a misnomer because the facts do not accord with the position it puts forward and, more importantly, its methodology reverses the appropriate approach to historical investigation... "Revisionism" is obliged to deviate from the standard methodology of historical pursuit because it seeks to mold facts to fit a preconceived result, it denies events that have been objectively and empirically proved to have occurred, and because it works backward from the conclusion to the facts, thus necessitating the distortion and manipulation of those facts where they differ from the preordained conclusion (which they almost always do). In short, "revisionism" denies something that demonstrably happened, through methodological dishonesty." McFee, Gordon. "Why 'Revisionism' Isn't", The Holocaust History ProjectThe Holocaust History ProjectThe Holocaust History Project is a non-profit corporation based in San Antonio, Texas. Its website offers a comprehensive archive of documents, recordings, photographs, and essays regarding the Holocaust, Holocaust denial and antisemitism...
, 15 May 1999. Retrieved 22 December 2006. - "Crucial to understanding and combating Holocaust denial is a clear distinction between denial and revisionism. One of the more insidious and dangerous aspects of contemporary Holocaust denial, a la Arthur Butz, Bradley Smith and Greg Raven, is the fact that they attempt to present their work as reputable scholarship under the guise of 'historical revisionism.' The term 'revisionist' permeates their publications as descriptive of their motives, orientation and methodology. In fact, Holocaust denial is in no sense 'revisionism,' it is denial... Contemporary Holocaust deniers are not revisionists — not even neo-revisionists. They are Deniers. Their motivations stem from their neo-nazi political goals and their rampant antisemitism." Austin, Ben S. "Deniers in Revisionists Clothing", The Holocaust\Shoah Page, Middle Tennessee State UniversityMiddle Tennessee State UniversityMiddle Tennessee State University, commonly abbreviated as MTSU, is a public university located in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, United States....
. Retrieved 29 March 2007. - "Holocaust denial can be a particularly insidious form of antisemitism precisely because it often tries to disguise itself as something quite different: as genuine scholarly debate (in the pages, for example, of the innocuous-sounding Journal for Historical Review). Holocaust deniers often refer to themselves as 'revisionists', in an attempt to claim legitimacy for their activities. There are, of course, a great many scholars engaged in historical debates about the Holocaust whose work should not be confused with the output of the Holocaust deniers. Debate continues about such subjects as, for example, the extent and nature of ordinary Germans' involvement in and knowledge of the policy of genocide, and the timing of orders given for the extermination of the Jews. However, the valid endeavour of historical revisionism, which involves the re-interpretation of historical knowledge in the light of newly emerging evidence, is a very different task from that of claiming that the essential facts of the Holocaust, and the evidence for those facts, are fabrications." The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?, JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved 16 May 2007.
Hence, as retroactive minimisation of the Holocaust, Holocaust deniers have attached themselves to the Heimatvertriebene
Heimatvertriebene
Heimatvertriebene are those around 12 million ethnic Germans who fled or were expelled after World War II from parts of Germany annexed by Poland and Russia, and from other countries, who found refuge in both West and East Germany, and Austria...
n (ethnic Germans expelled mainly from the eastern quarter of Germany annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union after the war), and have, per their opponents, attempted to use sympathy for said Germans, and blame the Jews for the suffering of the Heimatvertriebenen. Moreover, when the discredited author David Irving
David Irving
David John Cawdell Irving is an English writer,best known for his denial of the Holocaust, who specialises in the military and political history of World War II, with a focus on Nazi Germany...
Further information of how Irving was discredited as a historian:
- "In 1969, after David Irving's support for Rolf Hochhuth, the German playwright who accused Winston Churchill of murdering the Polish wartime leader General Sikorski, The Daily Telegraph issued a memo to all its correspondents. 'It is incorrect,' it said, 'to describe David Irving as a historian. In future we should describe him as an author.'" Ingram, Richard. Irving was the author of his own downfall, The IndependentThe IndependentThe Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
, 25 February 2006. - "It may seem an absurd semantic dispute to deny the appellation of 'historian' to someone who has written two dozen books or more about historical subjects. But if we mean by historian someone who is concerned to discover the truth about the past, and to give as accurate a representation of it as possible, then Irving is not a historian. Those in the know, indeed, are accustomed to avoid the term altogether when referring to him and use some circumlocution such as 'historical writer' instead. Irving is essentially an ideologue who uses history for his own political purposes; he is not primarily concerned with discovering and interpreting what happened in the past, he is concerned merely to give a selective and tendentious account of it in order to further his own ideological ends in the present. The true historian's primary concern, however, is with the past. That is why, in the end, Irving is not a historian." Irving vs. (1) Lipstadt and (2) Penguin Books, http://www.holocaustdenialontrial.org/evidence/evans006.aspExpert Witness Report by Richard J. EvansRichard J. EvansRichard John Evans is a British academic and historian, prominently known for his history of Germany.-Life:Evans was born in London, of Welsh parentage, and is now Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge and President of Wolfson College...
FBA, Professor of Modern History, University of CambridgeUniversity of CambridgeThe University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
], 2000, Chapter 6. - "State prosecutor Michael Klackl said: 'He's not a historian, he's a falsifier of history.'" Traynor, Ian. Irving jailed for denying Holocaust, The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, 21 February 2006. - "One of Britain's most prominent speakers on Muslim issues is today exposed as a supporter of David Irving. .. Bukhari contacted the discredited historian, sentenced this year to three years in an Austrian prison for Holocaust denial, after reading his website." Doward, Jamie. "Muslim leader sent funds to Irving", The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, 19 November 2006. - "David Irving, the discredited historian and Nazi apologist, was last night starting a three-year prison sentence in Vienna for denying the Holocaust and the gas chambers of Auschwitz." Traynor, Ian. "Irving jailed for denying Holocaust", The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, 21 February 2006. - "Conclusion on meaning 2.15 (vi): that Irving is discredited as a historian." David Irving v. Penguin Books and Deborah Lipstadt/II.
- "DAVID Irving, the discredited revisionist historian and most outspoken British Holocaust denier, has added further fuel to the controversy over his early release from an Austrian jail by recanting his court statement of regret over his views." Crichton, Torcuil. "Holocaust denier reneges on regret", The Sunday Herald, 24 December 2006.
- "Discredited British author David Irving spoke in front of some 250 people at a small theatre on Szabadság tér last Monday." Hodgson, Robert. "Holocaust denier David Irving draws a friendly crowd in Budapest", The Budapest Times, 19 March 2007.
- "An account of the 2000 - 2001 libel trial in the high court of the now discredited historian David Irving, which formed the backdrop for his recent conviction in Vienna for denying the Holocaust." Program Details - David Irving: The London Trial 2006-02-26 17:00:00, BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
. - "Yet Irving, a discredited right-wing historian, was described by a High Court judge after a long libel trial as a racist anti-semite who denied the Holocaust." Edwards, Rob. "Anti-green activist in links with Nazi writer; Revealed: campaigner", The Sunday Herald, 5 May 2002.
- "'The sentence against Irving confirms that he and his views are discredited, but as a general rule I don't think that this is the way this should be dealt with,' said Antony LermanAntony LermanAntony Lerman is a British writer who specializes in the study of antisemitism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, multiculturalism, and the place of religion in society. From 2006 to early 2009, he was Director of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, a think tank on issues affecting Jewish...
, director of the London-based Institute for Jewish Policy Research. 'It is better to combat denial by education and using good speech to drive out bad speech.'" Gruber, Ruth Ellen. "Jail sentence for Holocaust denier spurs debate on free speech", j.J.j., also known as Jweekly, is a Jewish website and weekly magazine in Northern California. It is owned and operated by "j. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California"...
, 24 February 2006. - "Deborah Lipstadt is Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies and director of The Rabbi Donald A. Tam Institute for Jewish Studies at Emory University. She is the author of two books about the Holocaust. Her book Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory led to the 2000 court case in which she defeated and discredited Holocaust denier David Irving." Understanding Auschwitz Today, Task of Justice & Danger of Holocaust Deniers, Public Broadcasting ServicePublic Broadcasting ServiceThe Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
. - "After the discredited British historian David Irving was sentenced to a three-year jail term in Austria as a penalty for denying the Holocaust, the liberal conscience of western Europe has squirmed and agonised." Glover, Gillian. "Irving gets just what he wanted - his name in the headlines", The ScotsmanThe ScotsmanThe Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
, 23 February 2006. - "...is a disciple of discredited historian and Holocaust denier David Irving." Horowitz, DavidDavid HorowitzDavid Joel Horowitz is an American conservative writer and policy advocate. Horowitz was raised by parents who were both members of the American Communist Party. Between 1956 and 1975, Horowitz was an outspoken adherent of the New Left before rejecting Marxism completely...
. The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America, Regnery Publishing, 2006, ISBN 0895260034, p. 175. - "If the case for competence applies to those who lack specialist knowledge, it applies even further to those who have been discredited as incompetent. For example, why ought we include David Irving in a debate aiming to establish the truth about the Holocaust, after a court has found that he manipulates and misinterprets history?" Long, Graham. Relativism and the Foundations of Liberalism, Imprint Academic, 2004, ISBN 1845400046, p. 80.
- "Ironically, Julius is also a celebrated solicitor famous for his defence of Schuchard's colleague, Deborah Lipstadt, against the suit for of libel brought by the discredited historian David Irving brought when Lipstadt accused him of denying the Holocaust." "T S Eliot's anti-Semitism hotly debated as scholars argue over new evidence", University of YorkUniversity of YorkThe University of York , is an academic institution located in the city of York, England. Established in 1963, the campus university has expanded to more than thirty departments and centres, covering a wide range of subjects...
, Communications Office, 5 February 2003. - "Irving, a discredited historian, has insisted that Jews at Auschwitz were not gassed." "Irving vows to continue denial", Breaking News, Jewish Telegraphic AgencyJewish Telegraphic AgencyThe Jewish Telegraphic Agency is an international news agency serving Jewish community newspapers and media around the world. The JTA was founded on February 6, 1917, by Jacob Landau as the Jewish Correspondence Bureau in The Hague with the mandate of collecting and disseminating news among and...
, 7 February 2007. - "David Irving, the discredited historian and Nazi apologist, was on Monday night starting a three-year prison sentence in Vienna for denying the Holocaust and the gas chambers of Auschwitz." "Historian jailed for denying Holocaust", Mail & GuardianMail & GuardianThe Mail & Guardian is a South African weekly newspaper, published by M&G Media in Johannesburg, South Africa, with a strong focus on politics, government, the environment, civil society and business.- The Mail & Guardian newspaper :...
, 21 February 2006. - "Irving, a discredited historian, has insisted that Jews at Auschwitz were not gassed." "Irving Vows To Continue Denial", The Jewish WeekThe Jewish WeekThe Jewish Week is an independent weekly newspaper serving the Jewish community of the metropolitan New York City area. The Jewish Week covers news relating to the Jewish community in NYC and has world-wide distribution.-Editorial staff:...
, 29 December 2006. - "The two best-known present-day Holocaust deniers are the discredited historian David Irving, jailed last year in Austria for the offence, and the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who wants Israel wiped off the map." Wills, Clair. " Ben Kiely and the 'Holocaust denial'", Irish IndependentIrish IndependentThe Irish Independent is Ireland's largest-selling daily newspaper that is published in both compact and broadsheet formats. It is the flagship publication of Independent News & Media.-History:...
, 10 March 2007. - "[Irving] claimed that Lipstadt's book accuses him of falsifying historical facts to support his theory that the Holocaust never happened. This of course discredited his reputation as a historian. .. On 11 April, High Court judge Charles Gray ruled against Irving, concluding that he qualified as a Holocaust denier and anti-Semite, and that as such he distorted history to defend his hero, Adolf Hitler." Wyden, Peter. The Hitler Virus: the Insidious Legacy of Adolf Hitler, Arcade Publishing, 2001, ISBN 1559705329, p. 164.
- "Now that holocaust denier David Irving has been discredited, what is the future of history?" Kustow, Michael. "History after Irving", Red PepperRed Pepper (magazine)Red Pepper is an independent ‘red, green and radical’ magazine based in the UK. For most of its history it appeared monthly, but relaunched as a bi-monthly during 2007.- Origins :...
, June, 2000. - "In Britain, which does not have a Holocaust denial law, Irving had already been thoroughly discredited when he unsuccessfully sued historian Deborah Lipstadt in 1998 for describing him as a Holocaust denier." Callamard, Agnès. "Debate: can we say what we want?", Le Monde diplomatiqueLe Monde diplomatiqueLe Monde diplomatique is a monthly newspaper offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first created mainly for a diplomatic audience as its name implies...
, April, 2007. - "Holocaust denier and discredited British historian David Irving, for example, asserts. .. that Auschwitz gas chambers were constructed after World War II." "Hate-Group Web Sites Target Children, Teens", Psychiatric News, American Psychiatric AssociationAmerican Psychiatric AssociationThe American Psychiatric Association is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the most influential worldwide. Its some 38,000 members are mainly American but some are international...
, 2 February 2001. - "Holocaust denier: An Austrian court hears discredited British historian David Irving's appeal against his jail sentence for denying the Nazi genocide of the Jews.", "The world this week", BBC NewsBBC NewsBBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...
, 20 December 2006. - "Discredited British historian David Irving began serving three years in an Austrian prison yesterday for denying the Holocaust, a crime in the country where Hitler was born." Schofield, Matthew. "Controversial Nazi apologist backs down, but still jailed for three years", The AgeThe AgeThe Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
, 22 February 2006.
Deborah Lipstadt
Deborah Esther Lipstadt, Ph.D. is an American historian and author of the book Denying the Holocaust and The Eichmann Trial. She is the Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University...
, and her publisher, Penguin Books
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...
, and thus was publicly identified as a Holocaust denier, the trial judge, Justice Charles Gray, concluded that:
On 20 February 2006, Irving was found guilty, and sentenced to three years imprisonment for Holocaust denial, under Austria's 1947 law banning Nazi revivalism and criminalising the "public denial, belittling or justification of National Socialist crimes". Besides Austria, eleven other countries—including Belgium, France, Germany, Lithuania, Poland, and Switzerland—have criminalised Holocaust denial as punishable with imprisonment.Laws against denying the Holocaust:
- Philip Johnston Britons face extradition (to Germany) for 'thought crime' on net in Daily Telegraph 18 February 2003
- Brendan O'Neill Irving? Let the guy go home' [from Austria] BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
4 January 2006 - Malte Herwig The Swastika Wielding Provocateur in Der SpiegelDer SpiegelDer Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
16 January 2006 - 14 July 1990 Act prohibiting racist, antisemitic and xenophobic acts - loi Gayssot
- About Switzerland laws by the Stephen Roth InstituteStephen Roth InstituteThe Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism is a research institute at Tel Aviv University in Israel. It is a resource for information, provides a forum for academic discussion, and fosters research on issues concerning antisemitic and racist theories and...
for the Study of Antisemitism and Racism - Philip Johnston Blair's pledge on Holocaust denial law abandoned in the Daily Telegraph 21 January 2000 and Lithuania.
Russia
In May 2009, Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, established the History Commission of Russia (formally, the Presidential Commission of the Russian Federation to Counter Attempts to Falsify History to the Detriment of Russia's Interests) to counter aggressive attempts to rewrite history to Russian disadvantage, yet Alexander Cherkasov of the Memorial human-rights group, called it a regression to Soviet-era control. Historian Isaak Rozental says, "Their [the Kremlin’s] approach is not to study history but to use it." The textbook History of Russia and the World in the 20th Century (2004), by Nikita Zagladin, replaced the National History: 20th Century, by Igor Dolutsky; Zagladin’s textbook was produced under the aegis of President Vladimir PutinVladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
, who wanted a more patriotic textbook. Critics of the textbook note the lack of detail about historical events such as the Siege of Leningrad
Siege of Leningrad
The Siege of Leningrad, also known as the Leningrad Blockade was a prolonged military operation resulting from the failure of the German Army Group North to capture Leningrad, now known as Saint Petersburg, in the Eastern Front theatre of World War II. It started on 8 September 1941, when the last...
(1941–44), the Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
forced-labour camps, the Russo–Finnish Winter War
Winter War
The Winter War was a military conflict between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet offensive on 30 November 1939 – three months after the start of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland – and ended on 13 March 1940 with the Moscow Peace Treaty...
(1939–40), the First Chechen War
First Chechen War
The First Chechen War, also known as the War in Chechnya, was a conflict between the Russian Federation and the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, fought from December 1994 to August 1996...
(1994–96), and the Second Chechen War
Second Chechen War
The Second Chechen War, in a later phase better known as the War in the North Caucasus, was launched by the Russian Federation starting 26 August 1999, in response to the Invasion of Dagestan by the Islamic International Peacekeeping Brigade ....
(1999–2000), as serious factual inaccuracies; most egregious, the critics propose, is the absence of the Holocaust (1933–45), and the glorification of the rule of Josef Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
(1922–53).
Japan
The history textbook controversyJapanese history textbook controversies
Japanese history textbook controversies refers to controversial content in government-approved history textbooks used in the secondary education of Japan...
centers upon the secondary school history textbook Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho ("New History Textbook") said to minimise
Whitewash (censorship)
To whitewash is a metaphor meaning to gloss over or cover up vices, crimes or scandals or to exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data. It is especially used in the context of corporations, governments or other organizations.- Etymology :Its first...
the nature of Japanese militarism in the First Sino-Japanese War
First Sino-Japanese War
The First Sino-Japanese War was fought between Qing Dynasty China and Meiji Japan, primarily over control of Korea...
(1894–95), in annexing Korea in 1910, in the Second Sino-Japanese War
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
(1937–45), and in the Second World War
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
(1939–45). The conservative Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform
Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform
is a group founded in December 1996 to promote a revisionist view of Japanese history. The group was responsible for authoring a history textbook published from Fusōsha , which was heavily criticised by China, South Korea, and many Western historians for not including full accounts of or...
commissioned the Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho textbook with the purpose of traditional national and international view of that Japanese historical period. The Ministry of Education vets all history textbooks, and those that do not mention Japanese war crimes and atrocities are not vetted; however, the Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho de-emphasises aggressive Japanese Imperial wartime behaviour and the matter of Chinese and Korean comfort women
Comfort women
The term "comfort women" was a euphemism used to describe women forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World War II.Estimates vary as to how many women were involved, with numbers ranging from as low as 20,000 from some Japanese scholars to as high as 410,000 from some Chinese...
.
Pakistan
Allegations of historical revisionism have been made regarding Pakistani textbooks in that they are laced with Indophobic and Islamist bias. Pakistan's use of officially published textbooks has been criticized for using schools to more subtlety foster religious extremism, whitewashing Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinentMuslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent
Muslim conquest in South Asia mainly took place from the 13th to the 16th centuries, though earlier Muslim conquests made limited inroads into the region, beginning during the period of the ascendancy of the Rajput Kingdoms in North India, from the 7th century onwards.However, the Himalayan...
and promoting "expansive pan-Islamic
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
imaginings" that "detect the beginnings of Pakistan in the birth of Islam on the Arabian peninsula". Since 2001, the Pakistani government has stated that curriculum reforms have been underway by the Ministry of Education
Ministry of Education (Pakistan)
The Ministry of Education, also referred as MEd, is a Cabinet-leveled ministry of the Government of Pakistan. The ministry's political figure is known as Education Minister of Pakistan, and Parliamentarian Sardar Asif Ahmad Ali is the current Federal Education Minister of Pakistan while Mr. Ghulam...
.
Ramifications and Judicature
Some countries have criminalised historical revisionism of historic events such as the Holocaust. The Council of EuropeCouncil of Europe
The Council of Europe is an international organisation promoting co-operation between all countries of Europe in the areas of legal standards, human rights, democratic development, the rule of law and cultural co-operation...
defines it as the "denial, gross minimisation, approval or justification of genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
or crimes against humanity" (article 6, Additional Protocol to the Convention on cybercrime). The European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
has a provision
International law
Some council-member states proposed an additional protocol to the Council of EuropeCouncil of Europe
The Council of Europe is an international organisation promoting co-operation between all countries of Europe in the areas of legal standards, human rights, democratic development, the rule of law and cultural co-operation...
Cybercrime Convention, addressing materials and "acts of racist or xenophobic nature committed through computer networks"; it was negotiated from late 2001 to early 2002, and, on 7 November 2002, the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers adopted the protocol's final text titled Additional Protocol to the Convention on Cyber-crime, Concerning the Criminalisation of Acts of a Racist and Xenophobic Nature Committed through Computer Systems, ("Protocol"). It opened on 28 January 2003, and became current on 1 March 2006; as of 30 November 2011, 20 States have signed and ratified the Protocol, and 15 others have signed, but not yet ratified it (including Canada and South Africa).
The Protocol requires participant States to criminalise the dissemination of racist and xenophobic material, and of racist and xenophobic threats and insults through computer networks, such as the Internet. Article 6, Section 1 of the Protocol specifically covers Holocaust Denial
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
, and other genocides recognised as such by international courts, established since 1945, by relevant international legal instruments. Section 2 of Article 6 allows a Party to the Protocol, at their discretion, only to prosecute the violator if the crime is committed with the intent to incite hatred or discrimination or violence; or to use a reservation, by allowing a Party not to apply Article 6 — either partly or entirely. The Council of Europe's Explanatory Report of the Protocol says that the "European Court of Human Rights
European Court of Human Rights
The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg is a supra-national court established by the European Convention on Human Rights and hears complaints that a contracting state has violated the human rights enshrined in the Convention and its protocols. Complaints can be brought by individuals or...
has made it clear that the denial or revision of 'clearly established historical facts — such as the Holocaust — . . . would be removed from the protection of Article 10 by Article 17' of the European Convention on Human Rights
European Convention on Human Rights
The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms is an international treaty to protect human rights and fundamental freedoms in Europe. Drafted in 1950 by the then newly formed Council of Europe, the convention entered into force on 3 September 1953...
" (see the Lehideux and Isorni
Lehideux and Isorni v. France
Lehideux and Isorni v. France , was a case heard by the European Court of Human Rights on punishing statements praising collaborators...
judgement of 23 September 1998);
Two of the English speaking states in Europe, Ireland and the United Kingdom, have not signed the additional protocol, (the third, Malta, signed on 28 January 2003, but has not yet ratified it). On 8 July 2005 Canada became the only non European state to sign the convention. They were joined by South Africa in April of 2008. The United States government does not believe that the final version of the Protocol is consistent with the United States' First Amendment Constitutional rights and has informed the Council of Europe that the United States will not become a Party to the protocol.
Domestic law
There are various domestic laws against negationism and hate speechHate speech
Hate speech is, outside the law, any communication that disparages a person or a group on the basis of some characteristic such as race, color, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religion, or other characteristic....
(which may encompass negationism), in sixteen different countries including
- AustriaAustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
(Article 3h Verbotsgesetz 1947), - BelgiumBelgiumBelgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
(Belgian Holocaust denial law), - the Czech RepublicCzech RepublicThe Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
, - FranceFranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, - GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
(§130(3) of the penal code), - HungaryHungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
, - IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, - LiechtensteinLiechtensteinThe Principality of Liechtenstein is a doubly landlocked alpine country in Central Europe, bordered by Switzerland to the west and south and by Austria to the east. Its area is just over , and it has an estimated population of 35,000. Its capital is Vaduz. The biggest town is Schaan...
, - LithuaniaLithuaniaLithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
, - LuxembourgLuxembourgLuxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...
, - PolandPolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
(Article 55 of the law establishing the Institute of National RemembranceInstitute of National RemembranceInstitute of National Remembrance — Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation is a Polish government-affiliated research institute with lustration prerogatives and prosecution powers founded by specific legislation. It specialises in the legal and historical sciences and...
1998), - PortugalPortugalPortugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
, - RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
, - SlovakiaSlovakiaThe Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
, - and SwitzerlandSwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
(Article 261bis of the Penal Code).
Additionally, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
considers denying the Holocaust as a hate crime – which is a punishable offense. Wider use of domestic laws include the 1990 French Gayssot Act
Loi Gayssot
The Gayssot Act or Gayssot Law , enacted on July 13, 1990, makes it an offense in France to question the existence or size of the category of crimes against humanity as defined in the London Charter of 1945, on the basis of which Nazi leaders were convicted by the International Military Tribunal at...
that prohibits any "racist, anti-Semitic or xenophobic
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
" speech., and the Czech Republic
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
and the Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
have criminalised the denial and the minimisation of Communist-era crimes.
- French law recognising colonialism's "positive value:"
On 23 February 2005, the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP)
Union for a Popular Movement
The Union for a Popular Movement is a centre-right political party in France, and one of the two major contemporary political parties in the country along with the center-left Socialist Party...
conservative majority at the French National Assembly
French National Assembly
The French National Assembly is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of France under the Fifth Republic. The upper house is the Senate ....
voted a law compelling history textbooks and teachers to "acknowledge and recognize in particular the positive role of the French presence abroad, especially in North Africa". Criticized by historians and teachers, among them Pierre Vidal-Naquet
Pierre Vidal-Naquet
Pierre Emmanuel Vidal-Naquet was a French historian who began teaching at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales in 1969....
, who refused to recognise the French Parliament's right to influence the way history is written (despite the French Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
laws, see Loi Gayssot
Loi Gayssot
The Gayssot Act or Gayssot Law , enacted on July 13, 1990, makes it an offense in France to question the existence or size of the category of crimes against humanity as defined in the London Charter of 1945, on the basis of which Nazi leaders were convicted by the International Military Tribunal at...
). That law was also challenged by left-wing parties and the former French colonies
French colonial empires
The French colonial empire was the set of territories outside Europe that were under French rule primarily from the 17th century to the late 1960s. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the colonial empire of France was the second-largest in the world behind the British Empire. The French colonial empire...
; critics argued that the law was tantamount to refusing to acknowledge the racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
inherent to French colonialism
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
, and that the law proper is a form of historical revisionism. In retaliation against the law, Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
n president Abdelaziz Bouteflika
Abdelaziz Bouteflika
Abdelaziz Bouteflika is the ninth President of Algeria. He has been in office since 1999. He continued emergency rule until 24 February 2011, and presided over the end of the bloody Algerian Civil War in 2002...
refused to sign a prepared "friendly treaty" with France. On 26 June 2005, Bouteflika declared that the law "approached mental blindness, negationism and revisionism". In Martinique
Martinique
Martinique is an island in the eastern Caribbean Sea, with a land area of . Like Guadeloupe, it is an overseas region of France, consisting of a single overseas department. To the northwest lies Dominica, to the south St Lucia, and to the southeast Barbados...
, Aimé Césaire
Aimé Césaire
Aimé Fernand David Césaire was a French poet, author and politician from Martinique. He was "one of the founders of the négritude movement in Francophone literature".-Student, educator, and poet:...
, author of the Négritude
Négritude
Négritude is a literary and ideological movement, developed by francophone black intellectuals, writers, and politiciansin France in the 1930s by a group that included the future Senegalese President Léopold Sédar Senghor, Martinican poet Aimé Césaire, and the Guianan Léon Damas.The Négritude...
literary movement, refused to receive UMP leader Nicolas Sarkozy
Nicolas Sarkozy
Nicolas Sarkozy is the 23rd and current President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra. He assumed the office on 16 May 2007 after defeating the Socialist Party candidate Ségolène Royal 10 days earlier....
, the incumbent president of France.
Supporters of the law were denounced as a resurgent "colonial lobby", a term used in late nineteenth-century France to identify supporters of French colonialism, i.e. deputies, scientists, businessmen, et al. In the event, the public's discontent with the law compelled President Jacques Chirac
Jacques Chirac
Jacques René Chirac is a French politician who served as President of France from 1995 to 2007. He previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988 , and as Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.After completing his studies of the DEA's degree at the...
to publicly oppose it, and his own UMP majority, who approved the law; defying such historical revisionism, he said, "In a Republic, there is no official history. It is not to the law to write history. Writing history is the business of historians". He then decree
Decree
A decree is a rule of law issued by a head of state , according to certain procedures . It has the force of law...
d to the President of the Assembly, Jean-Louis Debré
Jean-Louis Debré
Jean-Louis Debré is a conservative French political figure. He was President of the National Assembly of France from 2002 to 2007 and has been President of the Constitutional Council since 2007.-Biography:Debré was born in Toulouse...
(UMP), that he delete the revisionist article of law ordering the "recognition of the positive role of the French presence abroad". To effect that, President Chirac ordered Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin
Dominique de Villepin
Dominique Marie François René Galouzeau de Villepin is a French politician who served as the Prime Minister of France from 31 May 2005 to 17 May 2007....
to seize the Constitutional Council of France
Constitutional Council of France
The Constitutional Council is the highest constitutional authority in France. It was established by the Constitution of the Fifth Republic on 4 October 1958, and its duty is to ensure that the principles and rules of the constitution are upheld.Its main activity is to rule on whether proposed...
, whose decision would allow repealing the law. The Constitutional Council judged that history textbook regulation is not the domain of the law, but of the administrative reglementation [regulation], and the article was repealed in early 2006.
Moreover, further debate about colonialism
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
, which is linked to immigration
Immigration
Immigration is the act of foreigners passing or coming into a country for the purpose of permanent residence...
, continued in France; historian Benjamin Stora
Benjamin Stora
Benjamin Stora is a French historian, expert on North Africa, who is widely considered one of the world's leading authorities on Algerian history. He was born in a Jewish family in Constantine, then in French Algeria, which left the country following its War of Independence in 1962. Stora holds...
noted that colonialism is an important "memory" stake influencing how communities, and the nation
Nation
A nation may refer to a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and/or history. In this definition, a nation has no physical borders. However, it can also refer to people who share a common territory and government irrespective of their ethnic make-up...
, itself, represent themselves, because official state history has accepted French historic crimes and errors with great difficulty; the historian Olivier LeCour Grandmaison
Olivier LeCour Grandmaison
Olivier LeCour Grandmaison is a French historian. He is a professor of political science at the Evry-Val d'Essonne University and also teach at the Collège International de Philosophie, and mainly works on colonialism issues...
also criticized the 23 February 2005 law. It was not until 1999 that the French National Assembly recognised the Algerian War (1954–62)—previously a "public order operation"—as a "war" proper. Hence philosopher Paul Ricœur's (1981) emphasis upon the need for a "decolonization
Decolonization
Decolonization refers to the undoing of colonialism, the unequal relation of polities whereby one people or nation establishes and maintains dependent Territory over another...
of memory", because mentality, itself, has been colonised in the "Age of imperialism".
See also
- Academic integrityAcademic integrityAcademic integrity is the moral code or ethical policy of academia. This includes values such as avoidance of cheating or plagiarism; maintenance of academic standards; honesty and rigour in research and academic publishing....
- Big LieBig LieThe Big Lie is a propaganda technique. The expression was coined by Adolf Hitler, when he dictated his 1925 book Mein Kampf, about the use of a lie so "colossal" that no one would believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously." Hitler asserted the technique was...
- Black LegendBlack LegendThe Black Legend refers to a style of historical writing that demonizes Spain and in particular the Spanish Empire in a politically motivated attempt to morally disqualify Spain and its people, and to incite animosity against Spanish rule...
- Cognitive dissonanceCognitive dissonanceCognitive dissonance is a discomfort caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions. Dissonance is also reduced by justifying,...
- DenialismDenialismDenialism is choosing to deny reality as a way to avoid an uncomfortable truth: "[it] is the refusal to accept an empirically verifiable reality...
- DoublethinkDoublethinkDoublethink, a word coined by George Orwell in the novel 1984, describes the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts. It is related to, but distinct from, hypocrisy and neutrality. Its opposite is cognitive dissonance, where...
- Dunning SchoolDunning SchoolThe Dunning School refers to a group of historians who shared a historiographical school of thought regarding the Reconstruction period of American history .-About:...
- Dustbin of history
- Hate speechHate speechHate speech is, outside the law, any communication that disparages a person or a group on the basis of some characteristic such as race, color, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religion, or other characteristic....
- Historical revisionismHistorical revisionismIn historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event...
- History warsHistory warsThe history wars in Australia are an ongoing public debate over the interpretation of the history of the British colonisation of Australia and development of contemporary Australian society...
(Australia) - Information warfareInformation warfareThe term Information Warfare is primarily an American concept involving the use and management of information technology in pursuit of a competitive advantage over an opponent...
- French Loi GayssotLoi GayssotThe Gayssot Act or Gayssot Law , enacted on July 13, 1990, makes it an offense in France to question the existence or size of the category of crimes against humanity as defined in the London Charter of 1945, on the basis of which Nazi leaders were convicted by the International Military Tribunal at...
- Memory holeMemory holeA memory hole is any mechanism for the alteration or disappearance of inconvenient or embarrassing documents, photographs, transcripts, or other records, such as from a web site or other archive, particularly as part of an attempt to give the impression that something never happened...
- PropagandaPropagandaPropaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
- PseudohistoryPseudohistoryPseudohistory is a pejorative term applied to a type of historical revisionism, often involving sensational claims whose acceptance would require rewriting a significant amount of commonly accepted history, and based on methods that depart from standard historiographical conventions.Cryptohistory...
- Selective omissionSelective omissionThe selective omission is a memory bias. In collective memory it's a bias where a group work to forget some traumatic memories. This expressions is often used for post-war rewriting of history in a more coherent way according to local stereotypes and moral values. That's denying war atrocities...
- biaises to taboo some elements of a collective memoryCollective memoryCollective memory refers to the shared pool of information held in the memories of two or more members of a group, and was coined by the philosopher and sociologist Maurice Halbwachs. Collective memory can be shared, passed on and constructed by groups both small and large...
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Cases of denialism
- Armenian Genocide denial
- Denial of the HolodomorDenial of the HolodomorDenial of the Holodomor is the assertion that the 1932-1933 Holodomor, an artificial famine in Soviet Ukraine, recognized as a crime against humanity by the European Parliament, did not occur....
- Genocide denialGenocide denialGenocide denial occurs when an act of genocide is met with attempts to deny the occurrence and minimize the scale or death toll. The most well-known type is Holocaust denial, but its definition can extend to any genocide that has been minimized or met with excessive skepticism.Where there is near...
- Holocaust denialHolocaust denialHolocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
- Nanking Massacre controversy and denialNanking Massacre controversy and denialThe Nanking Massacre, in which Imperial Japanese forces murdered hundreds of thousands of Chinese soldiers and civilians during the Second Sino-Japanese War, is a highly controversial episode in Sino-Japanese relations...
- Temple DenialTemple Denial-History:The term "Temple Denial" was used by Dore Gold, president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and former Israel Ambassador to the United Nations, in his 2007 book, The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West, and the Future of the Holy City...
External links
- Untruth in the Classroom, 1994
- Why "revisionism" isn't
- Mad Revisionist: A parody site on historical revisionism
- Expert Witness Report by Richard J. Evans FBA presented at the trial "Irving vs. (1) Lipstadt and (2) Penguin Books"
- Revisionist History - a satirical look at historical revisionism
- Article about revisionism concerning the Amerindians by The Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law.
- Nizkor Project Web site answering Holocaust deniers