Iran is shocked and disheartened that anyone would think that their Holocaust-denial conference is anything but a truth-seeking endeavor:
The call prompted strong condemnation from Western leaders. Blair has reportedly branded the planned conference “shocking” and “ridiculous.” IRNA quoted Asefi as saying: “People of the world should hear all opinions and choose the best. Such comments are an insult to the wisdom of the people around the world.” “Unfortunately, blind prejudice together with political interests and aims have closed the eyes of the Holocaust defenders to the realities of the world, and they reject without any logic a scientific conference,” Asefi was quoted as saying.
One should always be wary of radical theories which purport to let the facts speak for themselves. This is more often than not the clarion call of the conspiracy theorist – the one who cherry-picks facts amenable to his theory and dismisses the others as (of course) the trick being played by the conspirators. Ahmadinejad can stitch together every purported gap in evidence as “proof” that the “theory” of the Holocaust isn’t credible – and he can dismiss every fact that could plug those gaps as “fabrications” created by the Zionists. The trick of conspiracy theory is to lower the bar for how facts can be credible knit into a “pattern” while raising the bar for disproof to impossibly high (sometimes definitionally impossible) levels.
We’ve written about the pathological effects that conspiracy theories have on the societies that buy into them, but there are also broader social effects. When no one but raging anti-Semites show up to his conference, Ahmadinejad and his allies will crow that the “Holocaust defenders” were afraid of honest, scientific debate. The genuine Holocaust historians are in the double-bind that conspiracy theories always place genuine experts in: showing up legitimizes the crazies, staying home gives them an open microphone and a claim to have “scared away” the “conspirators”. There is literally no solution to dealing with this problem – it is why there are so few ways to deal with conspiracy theorists who somehow end up with a critical mass of followers.
And then there is the problem that most of the “opinions” that will be presented are just flat out lies – and when arguments are premised on lies, there is no space for any kind of deliberation – let alone Ahmadinejad’s pathetic pretenses toward “scientific” deliberation.
[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
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