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What is the difference between hate crime, hate incidents, and hate violence?

Hate incidents and hate violence are bigoted or discriminatory acts or expressions that injure a person; damage property; or diminish someone's quality of life because of a socially recognized status characteristic. Hate crimes are a subset of hate violence and hate incidents- but only include those events that rise to the level of a criminal offense. 

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What groups are specifically covered under these definitions? 

Anti-hate advocacy groups define hate violence as any verbal or physical act that intimidates, threatens, or injures a person or person's property motivated in whole or in part because of someone's membership in a targeted group. That membership can be based on actual or perceived race, disability, ethnicity, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or age. (Final Report of the Attorney General's Commission on Racial, Ethnic, Religious, and Minority Violence, April, 1986; National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, and National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium 1994 Audit of Violence Against Asian Pacific Americans) Furthermore, many organizations define hate violence as including bigoted acts or expressions directed against public institutions or against those who associate with "disfavored" groups.  S.C.

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What is the significance of the language "actual or perceived"?

The phrase, "perceived" in the above definition means that incidents where the perpetrator mistakes someone's membership in a particular group (e.g., calls a victim a Kike though the person is not Jewish; calls a victim who is straight a "faggot"; calls a victim a "Jap" when in fact the victim is Filipino). S.C.

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What types of incidents actually constitute hate violence/incidents and hate crimes?

Hate violence/incidents occur across a broad spectrum and may include verbal or written slurs, threats, harassment, graffiti, vandalism, property damage, and physical assaults including attacks resulting in serious injury or death. Specific examples of hate violence include drive by shootings, bias motivated fist fights, the unwelcome use of hate symbols such as a swastika or racist messages on a person's car or other property; and hate messages sent over the Internet, by phone, or other form of communication. Again, keep in mind that some forms of hate violence - such as physical assault, murder, or vandalism - also constitute crimes, while other forms such as name-calling without a physical threat may only constitute hate speech - a constitutionally protected form of communication. When hate violence or hate incidents rise to the level of being a crime, it is classified as a Hate Crime. S.C.

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What types of legal action can a victim take?

Both criminal and civil legal action may be taken by the victim, depending on a number of factors. Other interested parties may have a legal duty or legal option to take action as well. Such parties could include the victim's relatives, advocacy groups, as well as government agencies such as the U.S. Attorneys Office District Attorneys, the City Attorney, or the State Attorney General, and others listed below under the question "What other government agencies and offices can a hate violence incident be reported."  S.C.

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What is the difference in coverage between state and federal law?

Most criminal prosecutions of all kinds, including hate crimes, take place at the state and local level. Under our Constitution, the federal government's jurisdiction to enact criminal law is more limited. Federal authority to enact and prosecute hate crimes comes primarily from the post Civil War Constitutional Amendments and earlier provisions granting Congress authority to regulate interstate commerce. Recent Supreme Court decisions, however, have severely restricted Congress' authority to enact criminal laws whose connection to interstate commerce is limited. 

The two most recently enacted criminal hate crime statutes are the Federal Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994 and a 1968 Civil Rights law. The Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994 provides a penalty enhancement of up to one-third of a normal prison sentence for a limited number of underlying federal crimes involving the discriminatory selection of a victim. 

A 1968 law, 18 U.S.C. section 245(b)(2)(B) criminalizes the use of race, ethnicity, or nationality in interfering with a protected activity, such as attending school. This particular statute has been used to prosecute the following acts: Using a computer at a federally funded educational institution to send an e-mail message (or messages) that include racial or ethnic slurs coupled with a physical threat to the address(es) and various instances of racial and religiously motivated assaults and homicides.

The limited prosecution under this statute has a lot to do with its stringent requirements. First, it must be shown that the victim was targeted because of their race, color, national origin, or religion. Second, as intended by Congress when it passed the statute, the victim must have been engaged in "federally protected activity" which includes (1) enrolling in or attending a public school or public college; (2) participating in or enjoying a service, program, facility, or activity provided or administered by any state or local government; (3) applying for or enjoying employment; (4) serving in a state court as a grand or petit juror; (5) traveling in or using a facility of interstate commerce (e.g., federally-funded highway); and (6) enjoying the goods or services of certain places of public accommodation.

The first activity listed - attending a public school - has been applied in a case where the perpetrator used a computer at a federally funded educational institution to send an e-mail message (or messages) that include racial and ethnic slurs coupled with physical threats to the Asian American students. 

A glaring inadequacy of section 245 is that it does not cover hate crimes involving the victim's sexual orientation, gender, or disability. Also, prosecution under this statute is not usually commenced until after state or local authorities have refused to take action or have acted inadequately and community groups have pressured federal authorities. S.C.

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What are the civil remedies available to victims of hate incidents?

Victims of most hate crimes and various types of hate incidents can sometimes sue for the harms they suffer if that harm constitutes a legally recognized "tort". Torts are wrongful acts for which the law recognizes a compensatory or remedial civil remedy - usually money damages. Tort law doctrine allows civil liability for wrongful acts to extend beyond the actual aggressors to those who intentionally or negligently further the commission of the wrongdoing- such as those who negligently or malevolently train or supervise others. Negligence occurs when an unreasonable act results in a foreseeable harm to another. The standard of proof a litigant needs to prevail in civil tort cases is that of preponderance of the evidence- a much lower evidentiary standard than the one used in criminal trials. In addition tort law allows an additional monetary recovery in the form of punitive damages to punish wrongdoers. These awards are generally offered for intentional torts and in negligence cases where the conduct is viewed as particularly blameworthy- characteristics commonly found in hate violence cases. (Edwards & Edwards, 1998).

Injunctive relief to prevent further harm to a victims is also allowed under tort law and some hate crime statutes. A number of states allow for police enforcement of civil injunctions against bias offenders who habitually target the same victim. 

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What other government agencies and offices can a hate violence incident be reported to?

Other government agencies besides the police incident can have hate crimes reported to them. These include the state and local human rights commission, a community agency, the district attorney's office, or any other appropriate government agency. Depending on where the incident occurred, a hate violence victim may also file a report with the other following government agencies: latter may include the local or state human rights commission; the city housing authority; the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (see http://www.eeoc.gov/facts/howtofil.html), or the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (see http://www.hud.gov).

Filing with these agencies is an option a victim may pursue in addition to filing a police report. This option is highly advisable when police refuse to take a report on an incident or when police appear to not be following up aggressively on a police report. To further pressure law enforcement authorities, a victim should also contact their elected officials at the federal, state, county, and municipal levels. For more information, see http://congress.nw.dc.us/gr/. S.C.

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Is underprosecution of hate crimes and other inadequate action by law enforcement authorities a problem in many places? 

Probably. While there are thousands of hate crimes reported every year only a small number of metropolitan
jurisdictions prosecute more than a few dozen cases each year. Similarly, the Department of Justice prosecutes a few dozen more annually. The 1998 Audit of Violence Against Asian Pacific Americans by the National Asian Pacific American Legal Center (NAPALC) observed that even in jurisdictions such as San Francisco that are regarded as national models for law enforcement handling of hate crimes, there is a problem of hate crime underprosecution. For more details, see "Are Hate Crimes Underreported?" at see http://www.apbnews.com/cjsystem/justicenews/2000/04/09/asianhate0409_01.html.

Similarly, civil rights groups in the Boston area, long considered a model jurisdiction for hate crime response, also have complained recently of a lack of prosecution of hate crimes by prosecutors. See "As Reported Hate Crimes Surge in Boston, Prosecutions Drop" by Judy Rakowski, Boston Globe, June 12, 2000.

Often times, law enforcement inadequately addresses incidents as hate motivated. While some police leaders may promote their department's efforts against hate crimes as "national models", the fact is many rank-and-file officers are inadequately trained or insensitive. Officers sometimes find civil rights cases unnecessary, tedious record keeping that amounts to social work by law enforcement. Also, performance might be limited because line officers are not traditionally trained to respond to community conditions or respond to crimes by motive. Thus, they will often fail to investigate an incident as hate motivated or if they do so, they have been known to trivialize investigated incidents as "copycat hate crimes", crimes that would have occurred if the victim were of any race, or neighborhood conflicts that can be resolved through mediation.
S.C.

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Why should a hate violence victim report an incident to law enforcement or other authorities even if a crime is not involved?

According to the NAPALC, "More serious (criminal) incidents often follow smaller (non-criminal) incidents. By ignoring smaller incidents we may invite further harassment. Smaller incidents may also provide important evidence which may lead to the identification of the people who cause more serious crimes." Hate incidents may include:

á Receipt of hate literature, e-mails, or threatening phone calls;
á Seemingly random acts of harassment
á Offensive language directed to you or name calling
á Graffiti or minor vandalism
S.C.


What exactly does the First Amendment say and do?

The First Amendment, ratified in 1791, states: "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for redress of grievances."

The First Amendment's wording is unique among the Bills of Rights in its apparent clarity and strength. The other amendments in the Bill of Rights were worded to give government much more latitude when its action infringed on fundamental liberties. Notwithstanding the First Amendment's wording, disputes over the extent of its protections started soon after ratification and continue to this day.

The First Amendment is now applied to the actions of all level of government, not just Congress and the federal government.

Over the years the Supreme Court has established other new standards relating to expressive rights. Specifically, the Court has identified various circumstances where the government has greater latitude to interfere with expression. These circumstances where the government has greater authority relate to the presence of either a compelling state interest, an unprotected area of speech; symbolic conduct; criminality, or the use of time, place and manner restrictions. Generally governmental regulations based on the content of the idea expressed will be overturned. If expression falls under an "unprotected" area of speech the government has far greater ability to regulate or proscribe it. Unprotected areas of speech include defamation, fraudulent commercial speech, obscenity, and incitement to criminality. Technically another unprotected category called "fighting words" exists, but is considered by many to be dormant because the Court has refused to invoke the category in upholding a speech restriction in five decades. 


Isn't hate speech protected by the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment Free Speech provision?
Yes. As a general rule, the First Amendment protects hate speech as long as it does not:
* include a physical threat of violence or property damage; 
* incite imminent criminality;
* does not defame a particular individual; 
* solicit or actively abet criminality;
* or evidence a conspiracy.


If hate speech is protected, don't hate crime laws also violate the Constitution's protection of freedom of speech?

The Supreme Court has consistently upheld criminal civil rights laws and hate crime laws that punish status based criminal acts or status based interference with particular civil rights. The Court has, however, invalidated criminal laws that seek to punish otherwise legal expression because it promotes bigotry or merely offends people. 

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What about the law in other countries?

Most other Western countries have various prohibitions on hate speech- although those laws are rarely enforced. There is an increasingly accepted international body of law - known as the Article 4 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination - which calls for the criminal punishment of racial hate speech. Countries that have criminalized racial hate speech, based on this protocol, include Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Advocates of hate crime victims have argued that the First Amendment Free Speech right should be weighed against the right to equality and respect covered by the Fourteenth Amendment.

For more on this specific issue, see "Countering Cyberhate: More Regulation or More Speech?" at http://www.abanet.org/irr/hr/sum98cacas.html and "Racism and Racial Discrimination on the Internet, at http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/10/c/racism/guzman.htm. 

In Canada a piece of federal legislation, The Sentencing Reform Bill (C-41) is a penalty enhancement provision, similar to those in the United States, that allows for increased sentences when a crime is committed because of someone's nationality, color, religion, sex, age, mental or physical disability, or sexual orientation. In addition Canada has far more expansive hate speech laws that are common to other Western nations with less stringent protections of free speech. Section 318 of the Canadian Criminal Code criminally punishes those who "advocate genocide" on the basis of color, race, religion or ethnic origin. Section 319 (1) punishes those who incite hatred on the basis of color, race, religion or ethnic origin where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace." Section 319(2) of the Canadian Criminal Code punishes the public communication of statements that willfully promote hatred on the basis of color, race, religion
or ethnic origin.

In the United Kingdom the primary law that punishes racial hatred is located in Part III of the Public Order Act 1986.(1)¤¤17 et. seq. The statute punishes the incitement of racial hatred through words, conduct or the display of written material . The law expansively defines race as including color, race, nationality (including citizenship) and ethnic or national origins. 

Germany also a has criminal law which punishes inciting racial hatred. In 1996 American Gerhard Lauck, was sentenced to four years in prison by a German court after he was apprehended by authorities during a European trip. Lauck was convicted for the mass mailing of hateful neo-Nazi materials to Germany, where it is banned, from his home in Nebraska where it is legal (Associated Press, 1996). Article 5 of the German Constitution provides limited protection for free speech but only to the extent that the expression is truthful and does not contravene the human rights of others (Rosenberg and Keesler, 2000)
S.C./B.L.

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Is non-violent, but bigoted hate speech online Constitutionally protected?

Yes, as long as it does not cause, threaten, solicit, or conspire criminality. In June 1997, in the case of Reno v. ACLU, the United States Supreme Court issued a ruling that had far reaching implications for hateful and other controversial websites. The Court voted 7-2 to invalidate two sections of the Communications Decency Act, a new law that among other things, punished the knowing transmission of various types of obscene, patently offensive or indecent messages in a manner in which minors might view it. The Court held that the Internet was a form of communication that enjoys the widest protection from government censorship or punishment. The justices rejected the government's contention that the Internet should be as highly regulated as broadcast radio and television, and in particular rejected the application of an indecency or offensiveness standard to Internet communications. The Court found that using indecency or offensiveness as benchmarks for restriction on Internet communications impinged on Constitutionally protected speech because they were both too vague and too restrictive (Reno v. ACLU,1997).

Pursuant to the Court's ruling, many offensive sites that spewed hatred remained Constitutionally protected. The Court's ruling in Reno, however, did not extend protection to individuals who use the Internet as an instrumentality to commit conduct, like threats, frauds, or criminal solicitation, that is unlawful irrespective of the context.

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Have there been hate-related prosecutions or civil cases pursued for online legal violations?

Yes, but these online bigoted violators have been prosecuted or pursued under existing laws. On September 26, 1996 Richard Machado using a university computer sent a racist epithet filled threat to about sixty, mostly Asian, students at the University of California, Irvine where he had flunked out that warned, " I personally will make it my life career to find and kill everyone of you personally. OK?????? That's how determined I am. Get the f**k out, Mother F**ker (Asian Hater)"

In February 1998, Machado became the first individual to be convicted in the United States of a so-called hate crime over the Internet. After a jury deadlock in his first trial a subsequent jury convicted Machado of violating 18 USC 245 for interfering with their right to attend a public college. Machado was sentenced to one year in prison. (United States v. Machado, 1998.) 

Less than a month later, in March 1998, 67 Latino students and employees of California State University, Los Angeles, MIT, and other institutions received a threatening e-mail that read in part: "I hate your race. I want you all to die. will (sic) do kill all your people for me, wetback....I'm going to come down and kill your wetback, affirmative action ass.....I hate wetbacks!!!Kill all wetbacks!!!"

In June 1999, Kingman Quon, an Asian-American California college student received a two year sentence under 18 USC 245 for sending those threatening e-mails. His probation bars him from using a computer or going online for a year once he is released from prison. (United States v. Quon, 1999.) 

Online haters face prosecution not only for violating traditional civil rights statutes, but also from other statutes dealing with telecommunications. Under 47 USC 223 those who seek to threaten , annoy, or harass another through the use of a telecommunications device by making lewd, indecent or anonymous contact face up to two years in prison. In addition 18 USC 875 provides for up to two years incarceration for threats communicated in interstate commerce which can include phone or computer lines. 

In October 1998 a neo-Nazi hate site, Alpha HQ, run by longtime Philadelphia racist Ryan Wilson became the first hate site to be removed by court order from the World Wide Web after the Pennsylvania Deputy Attorney General Trent Hargrove obtained a civil injunction. His site allegedly published threats against two Pennsylvania civil rights workers. The Attorney General's Office contended that the site was in violation of state laws that generally prohibited harassment, terrorist threats and ethnic intimidation. Wilson failed to appear in his own defense. Wilson later was assesses in a one million judgment in a federal administrative hearing for violating the rights of one of the sites targets. 

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How long have online hatemongers been around?

The use of computer networks by white supremacists dates back to the early 1980s when West Virginia neo-Nazi publisher George Dietz established a computer bulletin board (BBS) to post racist, anti-Semitic and Holocaust denial material. These bulletin boards, accessible to those with a computer and a modem, were text postings arranged by titles that included "The Jew in Review," "The Holohoax," and "WVA Real Estate Bargains." These bulletin boards allowed space for additional comment and the downloading of files by interested users. Shortly thereafter the Aryan Nations and White Aryan Resistance set up BBSs of their own to spread their ideology. The men behind each BBS, Louis Beam and Tom Metzger, are influential white supremacists whose ideology promote random racist violence- a message well situated for the anonymous and far reaching medium of computer networks. During the mid 1990s anti-government "patriot" groups added this technology to an array of communication media that included fax networks and short-wave radio broadcasts. (Political Research Associates, 2000)

It was in the Spring of 1995 that computer programmer Don Black set up the first, and arguably most influential hate website, Stormfront, from his Palm Beach, Florida home. Black a former Ku Klux Klansman and federal felon, was soon joined by other notorious hatemongers on the web. Today, there are a vast array of bigots in cyberspace including the neo-Nazi National Alliance, Aryan Nations, White Aryan Resistance, World Church of the Creator, National Association for the Advancement of White People, various Klan factions, skinheads, holocaust deniers, and hate rock promoters. It is estimated that there are about 500 hate websites on the Internet in addition to various chat rooms, e-mail services, and USENET posting locations. Out of those 500 hate sites there are only a few dozen hub sites that update their content regularly and get a consistent stream of visitors. (Perine, July 25, 2000) 

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What were the characteristics of the African Slave trade?

The slave trade to the New World lasted over 350 years - into the 1860s (Fogel, 18). Brazil was the most common
destination for slaves during the period, with 41% of them ending up there. English and French Caribbean Islands and Spanish territories accounted for another 47% of the arrivals. Another 5% ended up in territories owned by Holland, Sweden and Denmark. England's American Colonies, and later the United States accounted for 7% of the slaves brought to the New World (Fogel at 18).

The extent of the New World slave trade is somewhat elusive, but staggering by any credible analysis. Earlier estimates put the number of slaves brought to the New World at 13.8 million persons, while more recent estimates were revised to about 9.7 million people, with an additional 150,000 persons going to Europe. [ Fogel 424].

IMPORTATION OF AFRICANS DURING SLAVE TRADE: 1451 - 1870 (Fogel 19)
BRAZIL 4,030
HAITI 936
JAMAICA 787
UNITED STATES/ENGLISH COLONIES 661
GUYANA/SURINAM 500
MARTINIQUE 365
BARBADOS 344
GUADELOUPE 290
MEXICO 200
COLUMBIA 200
VENEZUELA 121
PERU 95
PUERTO RICO 77
GRENADA 67

It should be noted that while slaves were brought to many New World European territories, it was the British who were by far the most common traders in human cargo. The English regularly transported slaves to a variety of different locations in the Americas, administered by a variety of different European nations. [Franklin at 40]. The English would often trade items refined or manufactured in Europe such as fabric, metal goods, food liquor and guns for slaves. The exchanges would take place at trading posts along the coast of Western Africa. [Id].

Passage to the New World, called the "middle passage" was described by historian John Hope Franklin as a "veritable nightmare." Massive and inhumane overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, disease and suicide ravaged the ranks of Africans placed in transit. Many also suffered permanent injury from being constantly shackled together with little room to move. [Id. at 42]. Franklin estimates that only about half of these people transported to the New World actually ended up laboring in the Americas because of death, disease or disability. [Id at 42]. Notwithstanding, the tremendous loss in human life, those slaves that survived helped make the slave trade "one of the most important sources of European wealth in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries." (Franklin at 44) 

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What is the Holocaust?

The Holocaust refers to the largest and most recent coordinated genocidal attack against Jewry in world history. At its conclusion between five to six million men, women, and children of Jewish ancestry or religious affiliation were killed by the Nazi regime. Many others including gays, gypsies, the disabled, intellectuals, and Christian religious objectors were also systematically killed.

Estimated Figures of Jews Killed As A Result of the Holocaust
TABLE 1
Country Number Percent of Jewish Population Killed

Poland 3,000,000 - 90
SSR Ukraine 900,000 - 60
Hungary 450,000 - 70
Romania 300,000 - 50
SSR White Russ. 245,000 - 65
Baltic States 228,000 - 90
Germany/Aus. 210,000 - 90
Other 600,900
TOTAL 5,933,900 - 67
(Dawidowicz, 1975, p. 402)

TABLE 2
Nation Number of Jews Killed

Poland - up to 3,000,000
USSR - over 700,000
Romania - 270,000
Czechoslovakia - 260,000
Hungary - over 180,000
Lithuania - up to 130,000
Other 560,000
TOTAL 5,100,000
(Hilberg, 1985, p. 1220) 

The official Nazi propaganda bureaucracy orchestrated a systematic effort to scapegoat responsibility for Germany's military, diplomatic and economic defeats on to Jews. Media campaigns labeled Jews as rodents or vermin unfit for inclusion in an Aryan society. Nazi laws worked hand in glove with economic deprivation and social castigation to remove Jews from meaningful participation in German society.

On November 9, 1938 a two day long attack of coordinated hate crimes by roving bands of Nazi mobs commenced across Germany and Austria resulting in the death of 96 Jews, and the illegitimate arrest of 30,000 more. Arsons, vandalism and looting destroyed thousands of Jewish businesses, homes and synagogues. As correspondent Otto Tolishus reported in the New York Times, "...by nightfall there was scarcely a Jewish shop, cafe, office or synagogue in the country that was not either wrecked, burned severely, or damaged." The combination of government complicity and the lack of any meaningful public condemnation in Germany to this initial violent salvo is widely regarded as a crucial turning point for the even greater atrocities that followed (Berenbaum, 1993, p. 54; ADL,1991, p. 7). 

The final stages of the Nazi atrocities involved the complete isolation of Jews from society. Victims were stripped of their belongings and forcibly removed from their homes. In violation of Judaic law victims were tattooed with identification numbers on their forearms. They were transported in sealed railroad cattle cars to cramped unsanitary slave labor camps ringed by electrified fences, guard towers, and armed soldiers.

Most of the Jewish deaths that occurred under the Nazi regime occurred at 17 major concentration camps spread across Eastern Europe from 1942-1945. While most died from gassings involving either the insecticide Zyklon B or carbon monoxide, a smaller number died from shootings, beatings, anatomical experimentation and disease (Berenbaum, 1993, p.123; O'Brien & Palmer,1993, p.68). 

These concentration camps were the most efficient killing machines ever developed in human history. Those who were infirm, elderly, or too young for forced labor were immediately segregated and executed upon arrival. All others, except the few liberated by the Allies, were killed after a period of forced labor. At the conclusion of their period of forced labor, most victims were stripped naked and herded into large enclosures where they faced a painful death through asphyxiation from poison gas. The bodies of the victims were, contrary to Judaic law, cremated and reduced to ash in a mass collection of superheated black industrial iron ovens located on the premises. 

In disputed Soviet territory roaming Nazi SS and police killing squads called Einsatzgruppen, summarily executed whole communities of Jews. Approximately 25% of the Jews killed during the Holocaust were actually executed by the Einsatzgruppen (Berenbaum, 1993, p. 95). Nearly all the Jews who failed to escape European countries under Nazi domination during that period perished in concentration camps. One third of the world's Jewish population and nearly all of mainland European Jewry was obliterated (O'Brien & Palmer,1993, pp. 68-9; Berenbaum, 1993, p. 95). 

Notwithstanding wartime chaos and the Nazi's intentional attempt to hide the nature and extent of their brutality, the Holocaust is one of the most thoroughly documented events in human history. After Hitler's initial proclamation in 1939 authorizing the extermination of the disabled, explicit official documentation of extermination was still extensive, but involved the use of code words (Berenbaum,1993, p. 65). After the liberation of the concentration camps by the allies various members of Congress, the military, survivors and the press helped document the atrocities. The 1946 Nuremberg Trials presented exhaustive proof of the Nazi's extermination plan against European Jewry. During the trial the defendants did not deny the atrocities, but rather proffered that they were merely obeying commands. Among the damning evidence was Rudolf Hoess' admission to English interrogators on March 16, 1946 that he "personally arranged on orders received from Himmler in May 1941, the gassing of two million persons between June-July 1941 and the end of 1943, during which time I was Commandant of Auschwitz" (Stern, 1993, p. 69). 

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What is Holocaust Denial?

Holocaust denial is an extremist movement primarily promoted by anti-Semites and Nazi sympathizers that tries to deny or minimize the Historical fact of the European Holocaust. According to Cambridge University Professor Robert Evans Holocaust deniers generally in varying degrees subscribe to all or some of the following:

* Jews were not killed in gas chambers or if they were, not on any significant scale;
* the Nazis did not have any policy or undertake any attempt to exterminate European Jewry and that Jewish casualties were the result of unauthorized low level conduct;
* the number of Jews murdered did not go into the millions and the actual numbers were much lower;
* that the Holocaust is largely or entirely a myth invented by wartime Allied propagandists and sustained after the war by Jews to get money for Israel
(Irving v. Penguin and Lipstadt, 2000, ¤8.4)

According to Professor Deborah Lipstadt, a noted authority on denial: "Modern Holocaust denial draws inspiration from a variety of sources. Among them are a legitimate historical tradition that was highly critical of government policies and believed that history was being used to justify those policies; an age-old nexus of conspiratorial scenarios that place a neat coherence on widely diverse developments; and hyperbolic critiques of government policies which, despite an initial connection to reality, became so extreme as to assume a quality of fantasy" (Lipstadt, 1993, p. 31).

The leading academic group representing American history scholars, the American Historical Association, without dissent issued a declaration in 1991 holding, "No serious historian questions that the Holocaust took place." The organization further maintained in 1994 that the AHA "will not provide a forum for views that are, at best, a form of academic fraud" (ADL,1994, p. 8-9).

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What is genocide?

Genocide refers to the systematic and indiscriminate mass killing of most or all of a whole people or a nation. More modern uses of the term have encompassed less than total destruction of a people. In addition to the Nazi perpetrated Holocaust, genocidal or attempted genocidal killings have been perpetrated against the Armenians by the Turks in 1918, various Native American peoples by Anglo and Spanish European settlers to the Americas, West African tribes by slave traders and Muslims in the Balkans. Politically motivated mass killings, though not technically genocide, were also committed over the last century by Uganda's Idi Amin in the 1970s, the Khmer Rogue's Pol Pot in the 1970s as well as in the Stalinist Soviet Union and Communist China. 

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HateMonitor Associate Editor Sam Cacas is a writer based in San Francisco, California who has written extensively about civil rights issues, including hate violence, hate speech, and hate crimes for the last 18 years. He welcomes all questions/comments and can be reached at scacas@cs.com