The Volokh Conspiracy

Iron-clad Mel has already retracted his anti-Semitic statements.

To see how the Mel Gibson incident affected the credibility of Catholic League head William Donohue, watch the 1 minute 42 second YouTube video at: Colbert Report Guest William Donohue Loses Credibility

Some other strange quotes from William Donohue on Mel Gibson and Hollywood back in December 2004 are at: http://tinyurl.com/eqade

This is an article written in a foreign newspaper, presumably by a foreign journalists. Most people living overseas have little understanding of the US and this article is just another exhibit.

I will agree that it almost seems as though the journalist is cheering Mel Gibson on to be a tough anti-semite.

Nope, Professor, I think your quotes capture the overall flavor of the article pretty well. Amazing.

Then his father got brought up as being a holocaust denier, a position which Mel Gibson specifically disavowed.

Can you give an example? I know that he has said something along the lines of "Yes a lot of Jews died in WWII. A lot of people altogether died in WWII." When asked specifically about his father's claims he responded with the ambiguous, "My father has never lied to me." Now, maybe his father excluded Mel when he was telling the rest of the world that there were more Jews in Europe after WWII than there were before and that there was no holocaust, but I doubt it. I haven't seen The Passion... and have no reason to believe that that film itself is anti-semitic in an unusual way, but there's a whole lot of evidence that Gibson himself is, and not just when drunk.

Can you give an example? I know that he has said something along the lines of "Yes a lot of Jews died in WWII. A lot of people altogether died in WWII." When asked specifically about his father's claims he responded with the ambiguous, "My father has never lied to me." Now, maybe his father excluded Mel when he was telling the rest of the world that there were more Jews in Europe after WWII than there were before and that there was no holocaust, but I doubt it. I haven't seen The Passion... and have no reason to believe that that film itself is anti-semitic in an unusual way, but there's a whole lot of evidence that Gibson himself is, and not just when drunk.

This particular smear was debunked rather thoroughly on the previous thread.

As far as the “whole lot of evidence,” either cite it or retract.

I think you let the paper off too easily for its characterization of Hollywood as "dominated by powerful Jews." To be sure, there are many such creatures, and as you note, they have influence out of proportion to their numbers in gen pop.

But there is a chasm between disproprtionate influence and "domination." The one is an empricial fact; the other is the undying echo the oldest anti-semitic tropes. The paper's diction is, to this reader at least, troubling, although unfortunately not surprising.

Artie: "Do you know who runs this town?"
Phil: "The Jews?"
Artie: "No! The gay Jews!"
--The Larry Sanders Show

I think Mel Gibson made those statements to cover up the fact that he is part of the Zionist conspiracy.



and yes that was a joke.

Thorley,

Thanks for that cite. The context is helpful and does indeed contradict the claim that Mel Gibson himself is a holocaust denier (which I never made directly).

I'm still not convince, however, that the "My father never lied to me" thing isn't at least partly an endorsement of his father's views. His father is known for three things: being Mel Gibson's father, following a particular brand of Catholicism, and being a holocaust denier (I assume you don't take issue with this last characterization of his father, which seems pretty undisputed). In that context, it still seems pretty fishy to say what he did. Why not just come out and say "I love my father. He taught me a faith that is still very important to me. We do, however, have some pretty strong disagreements about the holocaust"? As for "a whole lot of evidence" (and remember that this is not for his being a holocaust denier, but "just" an anti-semite), I think the recent tirade against the Jews and their conspiracies is plenty. I've been around a lot of drunks who've said stupid things, but I simply refuse to believe that some who goes off on Jewish conspiracies when he's just a little drunk (which is what Gibson was, given his BA level, and the fact that he claims to be a alcoholic) doesn't believe that bullshit when he's sober. This is just not the same as just saying "motherf***ing pigs" to the cops or something like that.

Wow. That is an anti-semitic rant if I ever heard one (the Telegraph). And no it doesn't matter if he was drunk. When most people get drunk they don't start spouting hatred against Jews or any other group, unless they hate that group when sober.

Erect - I didn't say conspiracy, I said contrived.

Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best. And sometimes the simplest explanation is wrong. It just strikes me as odd that Mel Gibson, whom many people had accused of being an anti-Semite, just happens to spout anti-Semitic rantings when pulled over for drunk driving. It just seems like too great a coincidence.

My immediate thought upon reading the "Jews start all wars" comment was that he was listening to news about Israel/Lebanon on the radio in his car. He was drunk, getting angrier hearing the news, driving faster--the first person he encountered would face his wrath, and that person happened to be a cop.

Bizarre coincidence in light of the Passion's controversy, sure, but, then again, James Dean made a traffic safety film while making Giant just before he died in a car crash.

I should point out to many in this thread that the best argument IN FAVOR of Mel Gibson being an holocaust denier is the evidence submitted against that. Gibson says:

"I have friends and parents of friends who have numbers on their arms. The guy who taught me Spanish was a Holocaust survivor. He worked in a concentration camp in France. Yes, of course. Atrocities happened. War is horrible. The Second World War killed tens of millions of people. Some of them were Jews in concentration camps. Many people lost their lives. In the Ukraine, several million starved to death between 1932 and 1933. During the last century, 20 million people died in the Soviet Union."

But what Gibson does is CLASSIC holocaust denial. He says, yes, Jews were killed. Yes, there were concentration camp. But what happened to the Jews was just an unfortnate and somewhat proportionate tragedy of World War II, and is a minor subplot of just one of many tragedies.

Here's a webpage on Holocaust Denial, Wikipedia:



And here's something from the VC itself, a particularly interesting post by DB:



And a more partisan take by David Neiwart:

It would have been very easy for Gibson to say "I love my dad, he's a great guy, but I'm totally not with him on the Holocaust."

"Six million" is also a useful bit of code for this situation, should you ever find yourself needing to prove your Holocaust bona fides.

To me, Gibson's comments sound like textbook equivocation. I have to wonder about anyone who sees them as a flat repudiation of his father's views, particularly when recent events are taken into account.

Since he's out there looking for forgiveness, it would be really, really easy for Gibson to make a statement regarding the Holocaust that leaves no room for doubt.

What a way to win firends and influence people.

Ranting about how Jews start all the wars in the world is even better way to get people to trust your judgment, particularly about your Holocaust-denying father.

"Ranting about how Jews start all the wars in the world is even better way to get people to trust your judgment"

Well, we are talking about Hollywood.

I think it's about as flat a repudiation as he can make without to a degree repudiating his father--and that's too much to ask of him or anyone else.

I certainly won't repudiate my father for any of the mindless leftist prattle he's rattled off, and leftism has killed way more people than Nazism, and not less evilly either--of course the Nazi's were leftists as long as you were blond and pink.

TDPerkins, "I disagree with him" is hardly "repudiating" him.

How about, "I love my father, but he doesn't speak for me on this." About as polite and respectful as one can be. But still expressing clear disagreement.

Whereas "He never lied to me" is pretty much the opposite of expressing clear disagreement.

Guy in the Veal Calf Office raises an interesting empirical question: He suggests Jews disagree among themselves about much, and as a Jew that has been my impression as well. But it also has been my experience that, when it comes to Israel, there is less disagreement among Jews--independent of their politics otherwise--than there is, say, among Blacks as to whether or not to vote Democrat, independent of their particular socioeconomic status. Is the claim "(Most) Jews (mostly) support Israel" anti-semitic? Is the claim "(Most) Blacks (mostly) vote Democratic" racist?

Why might this be relevant to this thread? Because a fear of mine is that, for those who are truly anti-semitic, the ability to link the growing opposition to Israel (amazingly world wide save for the US, and growing even here) with opposition to "Jews" is enhanced if, empirically, people see that "Jews always agree with Israel" is as close to a truism as one gets in sociology. This underlying current is how I would read the Aussie news article, and Gibson's statement about Jews starting wars. (Please keep in mind I'm not defending this, merely trying to explain it.)

Can anyone tell me what the Daily Telegraph is in Australia? Is it considered a moderate newspaper or does it tend to cater to a political faction that is generally anti-semitic? Does it have a wide readership?

As gab notes, Gibson was only marginally drunk at .12%, that is, not so drunk that his words can be discounted as incoherent ravings unconnected to his actual convictions.

But to me, this shows not that the cop invented a story which Gibson inexplicably corroborated, but that he really hates Jews enough to go off on a tirade when he's slightly out of control.

That's hardly a thorough debunking. Holocaust deniers tend not to actually deny the holocaust; they tend to minimize the numbers of Jews killed and claim that many of those died of disease, but weren't deliberately murdered by the Germans. Mel's statements suggest to me that he falls into this camp.

Except of course for the fact that he did none of those things.

I think it's about as flat a repudiation as he can make without to a degree repudiating his father--and that's too much to ask of him or anyone else.

I certainly won't repudiate my father for any of the mindless leftist prattle he's rattled off, and leftism has killed way more people than Nazism, and not less evilly either--of course the Nazi's were leftists as long as you were blond and pink.

As for recent events, they outweigh an entire life otherwise lived without anti-Semitic incidents? Given his upbringing, he may very well have some horrifying ghosts stomping around in his brain. Give the man credit for distance traveled towards them mean.

Agreed on all points. The claim that “Mel Gibson is a holocaust denier” is nothing more than slander/libel considering that he specifically stated that it happened, it was an atrocity, and he knows people who were survivors.

As others have pointed out, Gibson did not specifically state it happened.

Actually he did. From Mel Gibson's earlier interview:

"I have friends and parents of friends who have numbers on their arms. The guy who taught me Spanish was a Holocaust survivor.”

The fact that Gibson referred to guy who taught him Spanish as “Holocaust survivor” is in effect an statement by Gibson that the Holocaust happened. People don’t generally refer to someone as a “survivor” of things or events that they believe didn’t happen.

Good Lord. I can think that my dad never lied to me while also believing that he told me things that were false. Lies are known by the speaker to be false, and are intended to deceive the hearer. If Gibson's father really believes that the holocaust never occurred, then he did not lie to his son when he told him it never happened. If I say that my dad never lied to me in the context of talking about my faith upbringing, and then later I am discussing a matter on which I am in strong disagreement with my father, I would not feel a strong need to say "Oh, yes, and by the way? This is consistent with my earlier remarks about his never lying to me, because..."

I am very interested in the view of belief ascription by which our beliefs are these little buoyant nuggets some of which can break to the surface only when alcohol melts the ice. One would have thought that the surest guide to one's lifetime beliefs would be how one acts and what one affirms in a cool hour, not what one spews out when drunk and stressed.

Thorley Winston, and others: I find that discussion tends to progress better if people err on the side of understatement, not overstatement. Consider this exchange:

As gab notes, Gibson was only marginally drunk at .12%, that is, not so drunk that his words can be discounted as incoherent ravings unconnected to his actual convictions.

Utter rubbish. It isn’t uncommon at all for alcoholics (particularly older ones) who after being on the wagon for a long time and having a relapse to find that their bodies don’t have the tolerance/ability to metabolize alcohol that they once did. 0.12 is much different in the context of an alcoholic who fell the wagon than it is for a non-alcoholic who just had a few too many.

The first commenter made a point that, to my knowledge, is generally quite right, even if perhaps put a little too categorically (something many of us do at times). The second commenter pointed out a possible exception, which may also be quite right, and a helpful addition to the discussion.

But the exception hardly proves that the generalization is "utter rubbish"; the "utter rubbish" response is neither fair nor likely to advance the debate. Even outright errors are usually more effectively corrected with something like "That turns out not to be so" (or something shorter, if you prefer) rather than with "Utter rubbish!" That would have been even more apt here (perhaps with a "That turns out not to always be so" or some such).

Actually, Diane Sawyer did ask Gibson whether six million Jews had died in the Holocaust. His reply -"Sure" - is perhaps not as ringing as we might prefer, but both the critics and defenders above are wrong to believe that he has never endorsed the six million number.

Even if he hadn’t settled on the “right” number, so what? He referred to it as an “atrocity” which is hardly the mark of a denier.

Frankly the more his actual public comments are scrutinized, the clearer it becomes that the accusations of holocaust denial are nothing more than a deliberate smear campaign.

Karl Marx, or maybe it was Murray Rothbard, said that history is best understood as the struggle by some to obtain something from someone else, or something like that. The question for me is who benefits from this whole Mel Gibson nightmare? As gab suggests, it seems mighty convenient that Gibson gets pulled over with a mere .12% BAC (which was my law school class average BAC within an hour of final exams -- a time of much venting of emotions...) and starts spouting off all this entertaining yet highly offensive jew stuff. On the other hand, if anti- semitism is as wide-spread as some suggest, then it seems to me that Gibson has just been elevated one more notch. Now the world anti-semites know -- for sure! -- he's one of them. And what are the "jew conspirators" going to do about it? Gibson is, for better or worse, closely associated with Christianity. For something like 2000 or so years Christians have claimed that jews are out to get them, and vice-versa. Sure, have some front-page articles on decidely un-jewish mainstream publications, like, uh, the New York Times, but all you are gonna do is sing to the choir to no end. (And remember that anti-christian sentiment is both real very much on the surface with many "insiders" or "elites" around the leftcoasts.)
So, jew conspiracy against Gibson? No, unless someone at the super-secret jew conspiracy agency goofed. Christian ani-jew conspiracy meant to heighten jew-christian hostilities at a time of danger for the Jewish State? No, unless someone at Christian Cover Ops drank too much Tequila.
My two-bit analysis results in the conclusion that Gibson was at the wrong place at the wrong time, in front of the wrong cop, and that's it. The sooner this ends up forgotten, the better for all involved, because crucifixion of Gibson will buy "the jews" nothing. Healing and forgiveness will bring us all together.
(sidenote: I wonder how the arabic press is covering this gem of a story?)

In case anyone is curious, the Wikipedia article on Anne Frank has a detailed history of the origin and the refutation of the ballpoint pen canard.

"Can we forget about the things I said when I was drunk, I didn't mean to call you that" works every time.

Relevant excerpt from the Sawyer interview:

MEL GIBSON: Do I believe that there were concentration camps where defenceless and innocent Jews died cruelly under the Nazi regime? Of course I do, absolutely. It was an atrocity of monumental proportion.

DIANE SAWYER: And you believe there were millions, six million, millions?

MEL GIBSON: Sure.

DIANE SAWYER: I think people wondered if your father's views were your views on this.

MEL GIBSON: Their whole agenda here, my detractors, is to drive a wedge between me and my father and it's not going to happen. I love him. He's my father.

DIANE SAWYER: And you will not speak publicly about him beyond that.

MEL GIBSON: I am tight with him. He's my father. Got to leave it alone, Diane. Got to leave it alone.

I.e., his belief is clear, affirming the six-million number. And his motive is clear, affirming his father, affirming his love and respect for his father. Nonetheless, the lies, the distortions, the misrepresentations, the venom and the spite will continue.