I just read with interest an article on the BBC about a law in Austria that makes it illegal to deny that the holocaust occured. Am I the only person that feels that this is the first step along the road to recreating what the Nazis were building?

While denying that the holocaust happened is certainly repulsive should it necessarily be a illegal? As with all freedoms the freedom of speech comes with certain responsibilities. I don't think that anyone, well anyone that is well balanced, would argue that shouting fire in a packed theatre is anything but irresponsible and should be punished. The case for punishment for this act is obvious: there is a good chance that someone could be hurt in the ensuing panic. Denying that the holocaust happened does not, however, directly physically hurt anyone. It might offend and upset some people but that is not the same as physical hurt *. Is it right therefore to pass a law against offending people? If it is where do we stop?

To take the idea to it's logical conclusion we could ban holding hands in public with extra punishments if the couple isn't married or are of the same sex. How about a law against whistling in public – I'm sure we could find someone that finds that offensive. We could even pass laws about women not showing any part of their body in public.

At the end of the day it is not irresponsible to deny the holocaust and therefore shouldn't be illegal. It may increase anti-semitic feelings and behaviour and perhaps racism in general but should we be locking people up because of what might happen? Perhaps if it could be proved that there was a direct link between something that was said and an act by someone else there is scope for prosecution but the burden of proof would have to be very high. After all, people have free will, they are not forced to commit acts of crime by hearing speech about crime**.

The most worrying aspect of this law, I feel, is that every time it is used it gives the racists a martyr and what better way to spread a cause than create a martyr. If we simply ignored these people and treated them like the fools they are we would deny them a voice. Instead, by our knee jerk reaction of locking up people a person we disagree with, we have given that person a voice that can be heard all over the globe.

Lets try and keep speech free and not confuse physical hurt with emotional hurt.

* This is not to say that speech acts can't cause real harm. Constant verbal abuse, for instance, can easily lead to emotional problems but that is hardly in the same category as this. In this case the speech act is easy to ignore by switching off the television or not reading the book.

** This is an interesting point and highly debatable. Some people, I believe, are sufficiently manipulatable that it would be trivial to get them to commit a serious crime. That then requires us to ask whether they are actually fully in control of their actions.