Thread by @libcomorg

The Labour anti-Semitism scandal has reached the point where Rachel Riley, presenter of the TV quiz show 'Countdown' is citing Chomsky and the Faurisson affair. As usual all the reactions to this are fucking terrible, so here's some quick background.

Faurisson was a well known French Holocaust denier. Here's a couple of his books to establish that for those not familiar. There are multiple obituaries online.

Chomsky is a free-speech absolutist, so similar-ish to the ACLU's defence of Nazis' right to march at Skokie in 1978, he's also been outspoken against the prosecution of holocaust deniers in France.

In 1980, Chomsky went further and wrote the preface to one of Faurisson's books, including "..is it true that Faurisson is an anti-Semite or a neo-Nazi? ..I do not know his work very well. But ... I find no evidence to support either conclusion."
chomsky.info/19801011/

Then in 1989 he continued to defend his stance, giving this reasoning for not assuming that someone who has spent their career denying the holocaust might be an anti-Semite: someone who'd never heard of the Nazis might not believe it was possible. Note URL chomsky.info/1989____/

So you have a combination of free speech absolutism, with writing prefaces to books he suggests he hasn't read, and defending people as probably not anti-Semitic because he hasn't personally read all of their books on Holocaust denial. I believe this is called 'doubling down'.

None of this means 'Chomsky is anti-Semitic' much less 'Chomsky is a holocaust denier'. It does mean Chomsky has taken positions in support of some extremely dodgy people, in excess of signing a petition/open letter, in the name of 'free speech' and his defences are often bad.

So if someone is throwing around claims that Chomsky is anti-Semitic, what you should not do, as some Labour Party people are, is just dismiss things out of hand like this. 'guilt by association' - he wrote the preface to the dude's book, it's obviously 'association' ffs.

We host a 1981 exchange, originally from the NS, where Chomsky responds to a piece by Gitta Sereny (both are included).
libcom.org/history/chomsk…

One of the reasons Chomsky gives for defending Faurisson was that the publisher of one of his books had its roots in the French ultra-left. This should not have been a defence, since the people involved had crossed over from the ultra-left to negationism. libcom.org/library/john-g…

This isn't the only case where Chomsky has taken dodgy positions. He has repeatedly objected to the use of the term 'genocide' because it is deployed selectively, but this slips into apologism/denial, for example on Kosovo. libcom.org/library/chomsk…

There's a long exchange between Chomsky and Monbiot here on Kosovo. Again, rather than address points directly, Chomsky tends to obfuscate, which does not help. monbiot.com/2012/05/21/218…

When you lost a libel case for accusing ITN of faking a photo of an emaciated Bosnian and had to change the name of your magazine from Living Marxism to Spiked.

Chomsky on LM/Spiked vs Spiked on Spiked. Once again slipping from defence of free speech to apologism.
chomsky.info/20060425/
spiked-online.com/2018/12/03/the…

One clarification on this tweet. Chomsky wrote the statement, the statement appeared as the preface to the book, but Chomsky had not originally intended to the statement being used for the preface and at first tried to stop it. chomsky.info/19810228/

https://twitter.com/libcomorg/status/1082624262584840195

He said 'do what you want with it' to Thion, organiser of the petition who requested the statement, who then used it as preface. However Chomsky here says he regrets asking for a retraction at the last minute. "I should have just said fine, let it appear"

On Chomsky's & genocide, apart from free speech, he objects to use of 'genocide' when it is ill-defined & applied inconsistently based on geopolitical allegiance. This reinforces anti-war movements depending on 'innocence', which is not a strong foundation

https://twitter.com/libcomorg/status/1080866099946799105

You wrote a book called ‘The Left-wing Case for a Neoconservative Foreign Policy’ and supported the war in Iraq, how was Chomsky wrong?

https://twitter.com/OliverKamm/status/1082993705492066304