The erosion of free speech in Britain: blogger and YouTuber convicted of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denialism

An anti-Semitic British woman has just been convicted, and may well be jailed, for posting “grossly offensive” songs on YouTube. This is just another step in the continuing erosion of free speech in Britain. In effect, what she was convicted for was anti-Semitic statements (not illegal in the U.S.), which include denying the Holocaust. She also claimed, in her songs, that Auschwitz was a “theme park.”

As both the BBC and the Guardian report, Alison Chabloz of Derbyshire wrote and performed several anti-Semitic songs in public and posted them as well on her Youtube channel (the site is here, but the offending material seems to have been removed).

From the Guardian:

Alison Chabloz, 54, was convicted of three charges relating to three of her songs at Westminster magistrates court on Friday. The district judge, John Zani, said he was satisfied the material was grossly offensive and that Chabloz intended to insult Jewish people.

The prosecutor Karen Robinson previously told the court: “Miss Chabloz’s songs are a million miles away from an attempt to provide an academic critique of the Holocaust. 

The songs Chabloz were charged over included one titled (((survivors))) – using the white supremacist online convention of placing Jewish names within three brackets. The prosecution was initially brought privately by the charity Campaign Against Antisemitism, then taken over by the CPS.

. . . About 20 supporters of the musician groaned when the verdict was given, with shouts of “shame” from the public gallery.

Chabloz had uploaded the songs to YouTube, as well as performing them at a London Forum event in 2016. They included one song describing the Nazi death camp Auschwitz as “a theme park” and the gas chambers a “proven hoax”. The songs were in part set to traditional Jewish folk music.

Adrian Davies, defending, previously told Zani his ruling would be a landmark one, setting a precedent on the exercise of free speech. He had argued his client did not commit an offence, saying: “It is hard to know what right has been infringed by Miss Chabloz’s singing.”

From the BBC:

Chabloz, who describes herself as a Holocaust revisionist, said her music was “satire” and had previously told the court there was “no proof” gas chambers were used to kill Jewish people in World War Two.

However, prosecutors said three of Chabloz’s songs, including one which referred to the notorious Nazi death camp Auschwitz as a “theme park”, were criminally offensive.

Another song included a section set to the tune of a popular Jewish song Hava Nagila.

Indeed, what right was infringed by Chabloz’s songs? Is “insulting Jewish people” a crime? Not in my book. It’s reprehensible, and brands you as a slimeball, but it’s not a crime.

Don’t get me wrong: although Chabloz claims her songs were satirical and that some Jews found them “funny” (I doubt that!), there’s little doubt she’s a Jew-hater. Is that illegal? And is it illegal to deny the Holocaust, even if it’s not an “academic critique”? Remember, Jew-hating elides into Muslim-hating, which elides into criticism of Islam, which elides into all kinds of “offensive” speech whose prohibition, as John Stuart Mill so eloquently argued, is inimical to the public good. That includes, these days, questioning affirmative action, the tactics of Black Lives Matter, and whether unequal representation of the sexes in jobs is prima facie evidence of sexism.

Even denying the Holocaust, however “academic” your arguments may be, is useful: it not only outs a person’s views, but gives us an opportunity to study the issue and rebut the claims. As I’ve said before, it was Holocaust denialism that got me to read the rebuttals of these cranks by historians, and that in turn has not only educated me, but also made me a better critic of this form of bigotry. Without the knowledge gained in an attempt at refutation, all you can do is sputter and call the other side names.

Here’s one of Chabloz’s milder songs; you’ll have to go to YouTube to hear it and also click on a box saying that you accept that it’s identified as “inappropriate and offensive” but you want to watch it anyway. At 24 seconds in, she makes the “quenelle“, an anti-Semitic gesture—a stylized Nazi salute—popularized by the bigoted French entertainer Dieudonné M’bala M’bala. The song, based on a famous (and innocuous) Edith Piaf recording, attacks Zionists and expresses Chabloz’s lack of regret for her attacks on Jews.  This, apparently, is a milder version of the songs for which she was convicted.

But she’s right: a song’s not a crime, even a bigoted one.

The increasing suppression of speech in the UK (and Canada) disturbs me. Will it snuff out bigotry? No, it will just drive it underground and allow bigots to play the censorship card, even gaining adherents. Is the UK better off than the U.S. because of such prosecutions? I don’t see how.

So let the bigots speak. Bring on the anti-Semites. Let them call me a Jew, a sheenie, a Hebe, a Christ-killer, a big nosed, money-grubbing kike! Let them say that the Jews should have been exterminated. I will fight them (verbally), but I’ll also feel sorry for them, for they’ve outed themselves as reprehensible, shameless haters. And they’ll get no traction in today’s society for, as Steve Pinker argues, our morality has progressed. Britain is going down a very dangerous road with prosecutions like this.

Chabloz was supposed to be sentenced last Friday, but I can find no record of what happened.