French Deputies Vote to Make Armenian Genocide Denial Illegal

This journal doesn’t consider itself hostile to French Fifth Republic, French culture, or indeed, French Fries (never Freedom Fries). Yet, when one’s friends do a stupid thing, one has a duty to point it out. Yesterday, the French Chamber of Deputies voted 106 to 19 to make it a crime in France to deny that Turkish officials in 1915 killed 1.5 million Armenians for the sin of being Armenian. One may quibble with the count, or precisely which Turks were involved, but it did occur. Those who want to deny that reality deserve argument, or even ridicule, but not a €45,000 fine and a date with a magistrate.

Fortunately for one’s amis Françaises, the upper chamber of the legislature has yet to vote, and the president of the republic can veto the thing. This isn’t a done deal yet, and there is something in French history called the “Declaration of the Rights of Man,” which dates from August 26, 1789 and says clearly, “The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law.”

Being responsible for one’s speech is part of being an adult, but should the law say that one must pay a fine for writing or saying “The Armenian genocide never happened?” It is not a crime in Ireland to write or say that “Cromwell never hurt anyone at Drogheda,” nor in America can one be punished for writing or saying “The Sand Creek Massacre, the Japanese Internment in 1942 or slavery never happened.” All of these statements are expressions of ignorance, which can be demonstrated to be false. Those who persist in believing these things after being shown the evidence are irrationalists, or neoconservatives in the vice president’s office.

Of course, this proposed law stems from the laws in Europe against denying the murder of 6 million Jews and hundreds of thousands of others by the Nazi regime. The worry is that by denying that genocide, modern-day admirers of Hitler try to make it acceptable to be a Nazi, which in turn threatens all of Europe. This is a matter of a hard case making bad law because it presupposes a moral equivalent between the Ottoman authorities and the SS. While one can make the case that there is such an equivalence, it is on the very basis of free speech that the argument is made. This law would prevent that quite reasonable discussion.

There is, of course, an additional dimension to this. Turkey is trying to join the EU, a club that France believes it invented. Many Frenchmen across the political spectrum don’t like the idea of a bigger, Muslim country coming into the EU – this was a tweak of the nose, while pandering to the 500,000 French of Armenian descent who can vote. Of course, the honorable way to deal with Turkish membership is an open debate. Trying to score historical points against the Turks to try to break up a treaty arrangement is a rotten reason to take away a Frenchman’s right to speak his mind. Or anyone else’s for that matter.

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

Home