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Comment by AHappyCamper | Hacker News Reader

My grandparent's families were mostly wiped out. We lost over 300 on my Dad's side, and there's no number for how many we lost on my Mom's side - everyone was killed. I grew up listening to my Grandmother screaming when she had panic attacks and night terrors, and the stories we heard were horrific. I'm so so glad that Facebook has done this. Maybe it hurts freedom of speech, and maybe it's overreach - I don't know - those are large and complex subjects. From the subjective point of view, it just makes me happy that they are putting a stop to it.

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Same here. My Jewish German grandfather's father was taken by the Nazis and beaten. Somehow he managed to escape.

They lost the family bakery on Kristellnacht.

His synagogue was burnt down that night as well.

My grandfather routinely got beaten up at/after school by Hitler Youth.

Not to mention many other things.

After immigrating to the US he was drafted at 16 to fight in WWII and landed in Normandy on D-Day, where he almost drowned because his landing vessel opened too far from shore and he didn't know how to swim. And his unit was also captured later and he could understand the soldiers who'd captured them debating in German whether to kill them or not.

Crazy stories.

I know some people are desensitized to it by now, but whenever classmates in school would throw up the Nazi salute at me because they knew I was Jewish or make other anti-Semitic comments/jokes "in jest" always made my blood boil.

I still feel this way and don't think I'll ever be desensitized.

Even in middle school two decades ago I understood there was a huge lack of Holocaust education.

I hope someday that changes.

I'm just glad my grandfather is still alive for now and that he was able to share his family's story in a Shoah Foundation interview (I recommend anyone curious to look them up [0]); Shoah Foundation was able to gather a plethora of interviews of Holocaust survivors specifically for this reason of educating about what happened.

[0] https://sfi.usc.edu/ (USC Shoah Foundation)

Well you can at least rest assured this doesn't infringe on the rights protected in the 1st amendment; FB not being the government and all...

>> Maybe it hurts freedom of speech, and maybe it's overreach

That you are even willing to say that is both admirable and shows just how far out of control the concept of 'freedom of speech' has gotten; and how unfair it is - when you, whose family actually died from the Holocaust - allow room for these perspectives, while they would look you in the eye and tell you, point-blank; your family didn't die / you're making it up?

I think freedom of speech needs to have some sort of intentional hate speech clause.

Theoretically within the space of such a clause diplomatic discussion should be able to take place.

People are equating freedom of speech with freedom for hate speech, and since there are laws against hate speech, we have seriously conflicting laws.

Free speech includes hate speech.

> since there are laws against hate speech

Not in the United States. See e.g. this unanimous high court decision https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201...

I understand not everybody is fully supportive of liberal ideas like free speech. But there shouldn't be any confusion about what it means. Telling somebody that the Holocaust didn't happen is indubitably an example of free speech.

> I understand not everybody is fully supportive of liberal ideas like free speech. But there shouldn't be any confusion about what it means. Telling somebody that the Holocaust didn't happen is indubitably an example of free speech.

One of the disputes that exist within the group supporting the liberal idea of free speech is it's boundary; there is general agreement that some range of speech that is both false and harmful is excluded, but the boundary of the kind and mechanism of harm that qualifies is disputed.

> Telling somebody that the Holocaust didn't happen is indubitably an example of free speech.

It's both false and in many contexts quite arguably harmful; whether it (in any particular context) involves the kind of harm that take it out of the realm of free speech is very much a dispute within the liberal, pro-free-speech community.

This may feel like a no true scotsman, but it really isn't - those that oppose free speech are not true liberals. The heart of liberalism is individual freedom, responsibility, and culpability. True liberals believe that speech that does not directly evoke violence (such as Holocaust denial) is not violent. If somebody hears that speech and decides to become violent, that's on them.

Believing that we need to restrict what is said in the town square because people will get bad ideas, believing that people are not free but just a confluence of the ideas around them, believing that people need to be led by an authority - these are the classic arguments against liberalism.

You're trying to say that liberals are reciting anti-liberal talking points within their community regarding whether this kind of free speech is good. I think it's far more likely that these people are not really liberals, and just consider themselves to be liberals because it's the most popular political ideology of the day. We should not call those that recite anti-liberal talking points "liberals" - to do so is to rob the word of any meaning at all.

> True liberals believe that speech that does not directly evoke violence (such as Holocaust denial) is not violent.

True liberals still frequently oppose defamation and sometimes other harmful false speech on grounds other than evoking violence.

> Telling somebody that the Holocaust didn't happen is indubitably an example of free speech.

Not only is it an example, it's the best example. Free speech rights exist to protect the most offensive speech. It doesn't exist to protect popular benign speech.

This is what so many people here, mostly foreigners without a doubt, don't understand. If you find something offensive or hateful, that's what free speech exists to protect. If it doesn't, free speech rights are worthless.

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