Are We “Breaking the Spell” on Campus?

Here's an update on our Campus Project. I have been reporting that we've been successful at placing ads in some of the most important student newspapers on top university campuses in the US. This is not an exaggeration. It's tempting to hope that we are actually entering a new era of free speech on campus and free inquiry regarding the Holocaust narrative.

As I've said in previous articles, it became nearly impossible to place an ad at any student newspaper. The last ad we had placed was for Bradley Smith’s last published book, A Personal History of Moral Decay, which was a thin disguise indeed since Bradley was a clear reference to CODOH and one of the stories in the book is about when he started to have doubts in the authorized version of the Holocaust. This ad created an interesting story at the University of Vermont in its student newspaper The Vermont Cynic, which you can review at our CODOH library. The ad we placed back in November of last year was just a text link – something that could easily missed be since it was not only a small but a text-only ad. So we got lucky at U. of Vermont.

Lately, though, we have been able to place ads that are considerably bigger and with a better budget we have been able to access some of the most important student newspapers in the US.  Most important, all the ads that we have placed are ads that promote our books we sell on Amazon. So it can still spread the word.

We started out being very cautious about the books we advertised. Germar had thought of using The First Holocaust: The Surprising Origin of the Six-Million Figure by Don Heddesheimer, with afterword and foreword by Germar Rudolf. Since it has quotes on from the New York Times as part of the cover of the book it seemed less likely to be rejected but I was not very optimistic about it. After being in the Campus Project for nearly 7 years and having seen many ads rejected, I was not expecting what happened: The Washington Square News had said they would run our ad, that is the student newspaper from New York University, with more than 50,000 students. So that really got me going. I think some of our guys at the CODOH team of volunteers were also pretty excited.

I won't count the campuses where we are running ads now since I don't want to attract the wrong kind of attention. Our brief is to promote freedom of speech and free inquiry regarding the Holocaust question. But some do not see it this way at all. Some are ruthlessly dedicated to silencing anyone who dares to question the “kosher” version of the Holocaust and will not stop until every student newspaper in the United States agrees that this kind of ad represents “hate speech,” anti-Semitism and a bunch of Neo-Nazis with an agenda on campus.

This is not hard to do; it is not hard to make students and academics believe that we represent danger and that Hillel and ADL, among others, are right,, since many they talk to have been brain-washed to the point that it is really impossible for them to think by themselves regarding this subject. It is a colossal job for a true believer to think outside the box and to break the taboo, and allow themselves to analyze the evidence and make up their own mind regarding what they have been told for years and years that happened during WWII to the European Jews.

There is, of course, the real threat and fear of being an outcast, of being labeled an anti-Semite. Even though it is old and stale, it still is a very effective way to prevent anyone on any university campus from breaking the installed taboo on the Holocaust.  

Free speech and free inquiry are the foundation of developing knowledge. Of course, free speech and free inquiry also represent the ideals of a free society; without it, the great democracies are nothing but disguised government-controlled societies. A "lite" flavor of dictatorship.

So the Campus Project, as simple as it seems, also provides needed protection for those who inquire into the Byzantine historiography of the Holocaust. It poses the possibility that the revisionist works could actually be read and considered by younger generations or even braver academics of today, and this in itself can promote a change in the way the Holocaust narrative is viewed, together with its taboo.

A cynic might say this is just wishful thinking.

But we are experiencing a new reaction at many student newspapers; out of 10 campuses now 2 or 3 might be willing to consider running our ad, but the number that run the ad is at times smaller.

It would be fair to say that we are doing better than before, but we are still far from breaking the terrible spell the taboo of the Holocaust has on American universities. We will not give up our mission to promote free speech and free inquiry, though. No way. Not now.