Iran to hold a conference on the Holocaust....

[AchtungBono]

You know? I think that this is actually a GOOD idea.

If any other country had held a conference like this, Iran and the other Arab states would say that we "fixed" it and fabricated everything.

This way, Israel won't be participating and Iran can get its information "untainted" by us Zionist propagandist liars....lol.

I truly hope this conference DOES take place - it would be so interesting to see the Iranian president standing with egg on his stupid face as he watches the overwhelming evidence of the slaughter of the European Jews - evidence that the Nazis THEMSELVES catalogued and filmed.

----------

From the CNN website:


TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iran, whose president has denied the Holocaust, said Sunday it would hold a conference to examine the scientific evidence concerning Nazi Germany's extermination of 6 million Jews.

Hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has recently provoked global condemnation for saying the Holocaust is a "myth" and calling for Israel to be wiped from the face of the earth.

Iran further alarmed Western countries last week by restarting its research at a nuclear facility after a two-year freeze.

"It is a strange world. It is possible to discuss everything except the Holocaust," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters.

"The Foreign Ministry plans to hold a conference on the scientific aspect of the issue to discuss and review its repercussions."

Asefi did not say where or when the conference would be held or who would attend.

Earlier this month, the Association of Muslim Journalists, a hard-line group, proposed holding a similar conference.

But Asefi said he was not aware of the association's wishes. He said the conference he announced was planned and supported by the ministry.

On Saturday, Ahmadinejad urged the West to be open-minded enough to allow a free international debate on the real aspects of the Holocaust.

Rep. Tom Lantos, a California Democrat, has said he understood Iran was considering a conference to call into question the evidence that the Nazis conducted a mass murder of European Jews during World War II.

 

[VertigoGal]

 

[melon]

Muslims create conspiracy theories to blame Jews for all their problems, and Christians create conspiracy theories to blame homosexuals for all their problems. So what's new?

Melon

 

[indra]

Muslims create conspiracy theories to blame Jews for all their problems, and Christians create conspiracy theories to blame homosexuals for all their problems. So what's new?

Melon

I think that's not quite fair.

Everyone knows plenty of "Christians" blame the Jews too.

 

[aislinn]

I think that's not quite fair.

Everyone knows plenty of "Christians" blame the Jews too.

Excellent point. After all, don't these same "Christians" blame the Jews for crucifying Christ?

(but that's for a whole other thread, I know. )

I hope the Iranians do their investigation because I want to see what kind of evidence they use and how they try to refute it. I'm curious to see if this will be a balanced inquiry or if it will be a one-sided affair to try and convince people the Holocaust never happened.

 

[melon]

I'm curious to see if this will be a balanced inquiry or if it will be a one-sided affair to try and convince people the Holocaust never happened.

Holocaust denial is standard fare for neo-Nazi organizations. I imagine that their literature will be used as "evidence" to deny the Holocaust. We all know what the conclusion will be, because appealing to anti-Semitism is the populist sentiment.

It would be like expecting the Republican Party to come to a pro-gay conclusion during their puppet hearings on whether to have a federal "Defense of Marriage" amendment. Unsurprisingly, the Republican-led conclusion was very anti-gay and full of pseudoscientific nonsense.

Melon

 

[nbcrusader]

How did I know that the Christianity/homosexual issue would get tied to this???

 

[anitram]

It's easy to have an investigation when you already know the answer.

 

[financeguy]

I know what'll probably happen. They'll line up a bunch of Holocaust deniers and call it a 'conference'.

If they actually make a genuine effort to put together a conference then fine but I'm sceptical of the bona fides of this little project.

 

[melon]

How did I know that the Christianity/homosexual issue would get tied to this???

Because watching the Bush Administration condemn Iran over this is an exercise in hypocrisy.

Anti-Semitic sentiment and homophobia have much in common. In fact, much of the rhetoric against homosexuals is the same rhetoric used against Jews in history, so, yes, discussing the two together are relevant.

Why doesn't America deal with its own religious fanaticism before trying to deal with Iran's?

Melon

 

[nbcrusader]

Perhaps a thread defining fanaticism would be more productive, instead of seeing the same statements repeated in countless threads.

 

[financeguy]

In fact, much of the rhetoric against homosexuals is the same rhetoric used against Jews in history, so, yes, discussing the two together are relevant.

Sorry but I would not entirely agree. I think you are perceptibly - maybe not dramatically - but perceptibly exaggerating by putting rhetoric against homosexuals on the same level as rhetoric against Jews. If you look at conspiracy theory sites on the Internet, for example, a worryingly large number of them are just rehashing of long discredited 'Elders of Zion, the Jews control banking' mythology.

And there must be some kind of market for this kind of stuff otherwise people wouldn't bother setting up these kind of sites. While many of those sites may also be homophobic they don't blame homosexuals for the ills of the world to the same extent that they blame Jews.

 

[indra]

How did I know that the Christianity/homosexual issue would get tied to this???

If you notice I did put quotation marks around the word Christian in my comment. If that type of "Christian" (which is to say a pseudo Christian as no real Christian would blame the world's ills on any specific group or groups) is not you, then it should be no slight to you.

If you are that type of "Christian," well, then I'm surprised.

 

[A_Wanderer]

No link, is this from in Iran or George Bush's America?

 

[financeguy]

I just think it's interesting the way the executioners are wearing balaclavas. Like they actually know deep down they're doing something wrong.

 

[nbcrusader]

If you notice I did put quotation marks around the word Christian in my comment. If that type of "Christian" (which is to say a pseudo Christian as no real Christian would blame the world's ills on any specific group or groups) is not you, then it should be no slight to you.

If you are that type of "Christian," well, then I'm surprised.

I wasn't responding to your post, so I didn't notice whether or not you used quotation marks.

 

[deep]

No link, is this from in Iran or George Bush's America?

looks like it is in public

so I say

Iran

 

[melon]

Sorry but I would not entirely agree. I think you are perceptibly - maybe not dramatically - but perceptibly exaggerating by putting rhetoric against homosexuals on the same level as rhetoric against Jews. If you look at conspiracy theory sites on the Internet, for example, a worryingly large number of them are just rehashing of long discredited 'Elders of Zion, the Jews control banking' mythology.

Justice Scalia has been quoted off-the-bench as saying that homosexuals were a "disproportionately wealthy minority," thus undeserving of civil protection. And what about the supposed "gay mafia" in Hollywood? You know, since gay people only exist to corrupt and destroy heterosexual families, as revenge for not being to have children of their own.

And there must be some kind of market for this kind of stuff otherwise people wouldn't bother setting up these kind of sites. While many of those sites may also be homophobic they don't blame homosexuals for the ills of the world to the same extent that they blame Jews.

There's plenty of a market for this kind of stuff here in America:

http://www.family.org/married/topics/a0025114.cfm

We just don't think twice about it, whereas looking at anti-Semitic literature sets off an alarm for us.

Melon

 

[melon]

No link, is this from in Iran or George Bush's America?

I'm no friend of Iran by any stretch of the imagination. I have a passing interest in classical Iranian culture, and I'd have an interest in visiting Iran someday. However, I would never visit it in its current state, because I could never implicitly back a government of which I do not approve (not to mention that there are U.S. travel restrictions to Iran).

But, aside from not killing homosexuals, America has been no friend to the gay community. And I will point out and decry any hypocrisy when it comes to Westerners pointing their fingers at foreign cultures. Maybe they should spend equal time examining their own. But that's ethnocentrism at its best.

Melon

 

[A_Wanderer]

And Ahmadinejad declaring the west to be Medieval whats that, telling it like it is?

 

[financeguy]

And Ahmadinejad declaring the west to be Medieval whats that, telling it like it is?

Another form of 'ethnocentrism' perhaps?

 

[A_Wanderer]

It cannot work both ways, didn't you read Orientalism?

 

[financeguy]

It cannot work both ways, didn't you read Orientalism?

No I was lucky to escape leftist brainwashing at university.

Probably because I studied business.

 

[Angela Harlem]

 

[financeguy]

Well no A_Wanderer I have never read any of Edward Said's books.

Just curious, what is wrong with the statement below:-
"I have spent a great deal of my life during the past 35 years advocating the rights of the Palestinian people to national self-determination, but I have always tried to do that with full attention paid to the reality of the Jewish people and what they suffered by way of persecution and genocide. The paramount thing is that the struggle for equality in Palestine/Israel should be directed toward a humane goal, that is, co-existence, and not further suppression and denial"

 

[A_Wanderer]

Nothing at all is wrong with that statement.

I found that Bernard Lewis gave a brilliant critique in an essay called "The Question of Orientalism" in his book 'Islam and the West'.

 

[melon]

And Ahmadinejad declaring the west to be Medieval whats that, telling it like it is?

If we're so much better than those dirty sand people, then we should be setting the shining example for the savages, should we not?

Iranian reformists have taken notice that the Bush Administration isn't exactly a shining example for secularism. That's why they don't look to America for help anymore.

Melon

 

[A_Wanderer]

Almost sounds like Kipling.

Tremendous straw man argument there though, but the problem is there isn't much that the world can do in the face of a regime that is eagerly awaiting the return of the Mahdi and the end of days other than give more active support to dissidents both financial and material.

Sanctions would be terrible, war is impossible and undesirable and a nuclear Iran would be an invitation for trouble all over the place - one would sooner trust North Korea with those weapons, for all their many murderous faults even Stalinists are pragmatic.

 

[financeguy]

Almost sounds like Kipling.

Sorry but you're one of the people on here that espouse neo-'conservatism' and interventionism.

So don't give us bullshitology like 'almost sounds like Kipling'.

It makes you look like a hypocrite.

 

[A_Wanderer]

The British Empire wasn't built on democratic peace theory.