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Barbara Rosenkranz, the "Freedom Party" candidate for the Austrian presidency, secured only 15.6% of the vote. Heinz Fischer stomped all over her.
And that would have been that. Small unimportant country in the middle of Europe re-elects nonentity, would be the Daily Mail headline, if it wasn't running stories about Nick Clegg having taken a senior position in the Khmer Rouge administration of 1975-1979, despite having only been an adolescent at the time.
Except that Ms Rosenkranz had criticized Austria's strict laws on the Jewish Holocaust.
Basically, in Germany and/or Austria it is against the law to deny the Jewish Holocaust. I think you can get away with denying the Turkish slaughter of Armenians earlier in the last century, but Austria tried to make sure that there was no Nazi resurgence by banning people from saying things that Nazis might say.
So far, so understandable. Personally, I've always felt that the best way to show up people who make idiotic self-evidently wrong statements is to (a) laugh at them and (b) prove that they are wrong. Banning them from making stupid self-evidently wrong statements doesn't strike me as progress.
Now, the problem arises when someone, as Ms Rosenkranz did, questions the sense of having such a law. Because, well, Ms Rosenkranz's husband is a bit of a far-righty, the kind of bloke who might just say something like "the Holocaust is a myth".
The follow-on from this, almost inevitably, is that the mere questioning of the sense of a law becomes code for saying something else entirely. And that is the problem, because I might think that the law is stupid, but if I say that the law is stupid, the interpreted meaning is that "ahh, he wants to deny the Holocaust, but, because he can't, he criticizes the law that bans him from denying the Holocaust".
Which, of course, isn't the case at all. I think that the law is stupid because it doesn't solve one problem (people can get round it in coded ways) and it creates another one (people who oppose the law, but who also oppose those who wish to deny the Holocaust) are condemned to silence.
I've always felt that loony right-wingers and loony left-wingers should be allowed to say anything stupid that they want. Then I can mercilessly take the piss out of them and show them up to be the dildoes that they are. What do we get instead? People banned from making racist comments dress up in suits, claim to represent "England" and a "sensible way", and fool more people rather than fewer. At least you knew where you were with John Tyndall.
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And that would have been that. Small unimportant country in the middle of Europe re-elects nonentity, would be the Daily Mail headline, if it wasn't running stories about Nick Clegg having taken a senior position in the Khmer Rouge administration of 1975-1979, despite having only been an adolescent at the time.
Except that Ms Rosenkranz had criticized Austria's strict laws on the Jewish Holocaust.
Basically, in Germany and/or Austria it is against the law to deny the Jewish Holocaust. I think you can get away with denying the Turkish slaughter of Armenians earlier in the last century, but Austria tried to make sure that there was no Nazi resurgence by banning people from saying things that Nazis might say.
So far, so understandable. Personally, I've always felt that the best way to show up people who make idiotic self-evidently wrong statements is to (a) laugh at them and (b) prove that they are wrong. Banning them from making stupid self-evidently wrong statements doesn't strike me as progress.
Now, the problem arises when someone, as Ms Rosenkranz did, questions the sense of having such a law. Because, well, Ms Rosenkranz's husband is a bit of a far-righty, the kind of bloke who might just say something like "the Holocaust is a myth".
The follow-on from this, almost inevitably, is that the mere questioning of the sense of a law becomes code for saying something else entirely. And that is the problem, because I might think that the law is stupid, but if I say that the law is stupid, the interpreted meaning is that "ahh, he wants to deny the Holocaust, but, because he can't, he criticizes the law that bans him from denying the Holocaust".
Which, of course, isn't the case at all. I think that the law is stupid because it doesn't solve one problem (people can get round it in coded ways) and it creates another one (people who oppose the law, but who also oppose those who wish to deny the Holocaust) are condemned to silence.
I've always felt that loony right-wingers and loony left-wingers should be allowed to say anything stupid that they want. Then I can mercilessly take the piss out of them and show them up to be the dildoes that they are. What do we get instead? People banned from making racist comments dress up in suits, claim to represent "England" and a "sensible way", and fool more people rather than fewer. At least you knew where you were with John Tyndall.
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