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Hateful words a war crime
EFL
With a trio of guilty verdicts yesterday, the U.N. tribunal for Rwanda has established that men armed only with words can commit genocide.
Now -- where do we file against the Palestinian school books and plays as well as the Hamas Declaration of Principles?
"This is the first time that journalists have been convicted for their participation in genocide, and I think itâs a wake-up call to hatemongers everywhere that they canât incite people to commit genocide or ethnic cleansing," said Reed Brody, legal counsel to Human Rights Watch. "If you fan the flames, youâll have to face the consequences." All three defendants said they were protected by freedom of speech. But Judge Pillay noted in her decision that it was "critical to distinguish between the discussion of ethnic consciousness and ethnic hatred."
Whatâs good for Rwanda should be good for Palestine as well.
Actually, I have large trouble with this as worded. The way it's stated, it trivializes genocide, the way Voices in the Wilderness trivialized WMDs when they equated sanctions with them. The definition becomes distorted, eventually losing all shape, until it's meaningless. The concept's formed illogically, so even though the end result is correct, the implications for future decisions along the same lines are bad â the "good decisions making bad law" syndrome.
If I tell you you're ugly, that your Mom wears combat boots, and that your sister gives change, I haven't assaulted you. My offense lies in the realm of civil discourse, and you're justified in making similar remarks about my looks and my family, but not in poking me in the eye.
On the other hand, if I make similar remarks to a mob and attribute the cause for your social lacks to your ethnicity, religion, hair color, or what have you, and suggest it would be a ducky idea for the mob to hang you, burn your house down, and steal your worldly goods, that's incitement, not civil discourse. Incitement's no more covered by the concept of "free speech" (something our domestic Muslim organizations forget) than is lynching, arson, or robbery. The speaker is equally culpable with those who actually do the crimes. Just ask Julius Streicher, or Doctor Ley.
But words aren't genocide. Hacking people to death with machetes in large numbers is. Gassing them is. Herding them into camps and shooting them to death is. |
Posted by: SamIII 2003-12-04 |
