Argument: The freedom of Holocaust deniers to use to the internet legitimizes their organization and message in eyes of consumers

When the internet places no moral judgments on content, and the gatekeepers let all information through on equal footing, it lends an air of legitimacy that these beliefs have a voice, and that they are held by reasonable people. This legitimacy is enhanced by the anonymity of the internet where deniers can pose as experts and downplay their opponents’ credentials. While the internet is a wonderful tool for spreading knowledge, it can also be subverted to disseminate misinformation. Holocaust deniers have been able to use the internet to a remarkable extent in promoting pseudoscience and pseudo-history that have the surface appearance of credibility. [1] Compounding this further, the administrators of these sites are able to choke of things like dissenting commenters, giving the illusion that their view is difficult, or even impossible to reasonably challenge. They thus create an echo chamber for their ideas that allows them to spread and to affect people, particularly young people susceptible to such manipulation. By denying these people a platform on the internet, the government is able to not only make a moral stance that is unequivocal, but also to choke off access to new members who can be saved by never seeing the negative messages.

[1] Lipstadt, Deborah. Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory. New York: Free Press, 1993.

Candidate 1: "While it is true that Holocaust deniers spread misinformation and seek to undermine and bend the systems of discourse to be as favorable as possible, they are a tiny fringe minority of opinion, and the number of sites debunking their pseudo-history is far greater than that of the actual deniers. Even young people are able to surf the web with great skill, and can easily see that the Holocaust denial position is fringe in the extreme."
Candidate 2: "Denying Holocaust-denier their right to speak is a threat to everyone’s freedom of speech. It is essential in a free society that people be able to express their views without fear of reprisal. As Voltaire said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”. As the facts are against the Holocaust deniers their opponents should have no fear of engaging them in open discussion as they will be able to demonstrate how erroneous their opponents are."
Candidate 3: "The internet is a flourishing place for discourse because it is absolutely free to all, and everyone accepts and experiences the fruit of that freedom. When the government abandons its stance of neutrality and begins censoring materials, even if it begins only with the nastiest examples, it compromises the copper-fastened liberties that the internet was created to furnish. Many people will abuse that tool, but thankfully people can evade the hate sites easily and never have to experience them without compromising their own freedoms by censoring their opponents."
Candidate 4: "Holocaust deniers will always find ways to organize, be it in smaller pockets of face-to-face contact, clandestine social networking, or untraceable black sites online that governments cannot shut down because they cannot find them. The result of blocking these views from the public internet only serves to push their proponents further underground and to make them take less public strategies on board. Ultimately, it is a cosmetic, not substantive solution."

While it is true that Holocaust deniers spread misinformation and seek to undermine and bend the systems of discourse to be as favorable as possible, they are a tiny fringe minority of opinion, and the number of sites debunking their pseudo-history is far greater than that of the actual deniers. Even young people are able to surf the web with great skill, and can easily see that the Holocaust denial position is fringe in the extreme.
