Westminster Politics

NinjaFletch said:
Is there any plausible deniability to suggest that it's still possible to come across Irving without knowing who he is?

His credibility as a historian is obviously in tatters as a result of the Lipstadt case, but there are at least enough references to him as serious historian (in some cases from people who are pushing their own denialism agenda but in some cases not) to make me think that you could stumble across it and not realise who he is.

I simply don't accept that as an excuse for Gove, at the very least we should hold our politicians to the standards of being able to do a google search, but it was a question which struck me when I re-read Slaughterhouse Five and saw Irving quoted uncritically by Vonnegut without any comment.



The thing is that Hitler's book is of interest at a primary source account of that period of history. Irving's work has absolutely no value except as a study of denialism, and I don't see any of the necessary works surrounding that (e.g. Lipstadt's own book) to suggest that that is the context in which Gove may have been interested in it. The best defence you can offer is that he didn't know what Irving was, but I think it's both extremely implausible and ludicrously week.
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From what I understand that particular book was published before Irving’s reputation and credibility collapsed. I don’t think it’s such an issue to have it on the shelf given that it’s balanced somewhat by some other works in the collection concerning the broader topic. I’ve got books by anti-Islam authors like Robert Spencer, Bat Ye’or and Ayan Hirsi Ali on my shelf, but many many more which would counter them.

I’d be much more concerned by The Bell Curve and The Strange Death of Europe, especially as they may be perceived to potentially pertain much more to current issues facing the present government.
 
I'm more concerned that an education secretary is into books like the bell curve.

It's also annoying that these books are going to see increased sales thanks to this little stunt by Gove. He can own David Irving for all I care but don't promote the prick by being an influential public figure and tweeting a photo of his book in your collection.
 
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The thing I notice from a brief scan is an absolute dearth of women or books outside the anglosphere - also the vast preponderance of Americans.

Edit: Although I'm delighted to see Ayn Rand made an appearance.
 
He has a copy of the Koran! Also a copy of "How Michael Gove saves the world"
 
The main issue is less that Gove has an Irving book on his shelf and more the media’s collective shrug in response. If this was a left-wing Labour MP allied to Corbyn (or, Corbyn himself) we’d have had calls to resign, Kuenssberg’s fingers would be sore from hysterical tweeting and the journalists would have made sure a largely unaware public knew just how distasteful Irving’s work is.

I find the presence of most books on that shelf worrying largely as you can see how they frame the worldview of the likes of Gove and Vine. But out of intellectual curiosity I think the presence of virtually any book can be justified. It’s more interesting for exposing the media bias and the free pass given to figures on the right. Some people may recall Gove’s tweet a few months back conflating British Jewish citizens with Israel but it didn’t get a peep either in mainstream media.
 
2cents said:
From what I understand that particular book was published before Irving’s reputation and credibility collapsed. I don’t think it’s such an issue to have it on the shelf given that it’s balanced somewhat by some other works in the collection concerning the broader topic. I’ve got books by anti-Islam authors like Robert Spencer, Bat Ye’or and Ayan Hirsi Ali on my shelf, but many many more which would counter them.

I’d be much more concerned by The Bell Curve and The Strange Death of Europe, especially as they may be perceived to potentially pertain much more to current issues facing the present government.
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The problem with Irving's earlier work is that it's tainted by the same ideas that led to the reputation collapse. The Destruction of Dresden, for example, vastly inflates the figure of the dead to equate it the horrors of Auschwitz because Irving was a Nazi sympathiser, an anti-semite, and generally a piece of absolute garbage even before he transitioned to full blown denial. As the judgement made clear:

In the first place Irving knew all along that there were powerful reasons for doubting the genuineness of the purported TB47. It had been denounced by Seydewitz as fraudulent. Indeed Irving himself was aware that Goebbels had been seeking to take propagandist advantage of the raid by making exaggerated claims as to the number of deaths. Irving in 1963 described the so-called TB47 as “spurious” (although I accept that at that date he had not seen a copy). When he did receive a copy, he was warned by Lange, the Dresden archivist, that it was a patent forgery. I accept the evidence of Evans, which I have summarised above, that there were features within the document itself which cast doubt on its bona fides. Irving therefore had every reason to be suspicious about the claim that the death toll might ultimately be 250,000.

The Leucther report and Irving's acceptance of it blew the lid off of the pretence that he was a historian acting in good faith or that he has anything interesting to say. He wasn't a good historian who made mistakes, or a person whose opinion was informed by the sources and came up with a kooky premise, he was an intelligent, able historian who manipulated, misused and mischaracterised what he was dealing with to push a racist, anti-semite, Nazi agenda. There's no historical merit or value to anything he's written as a result.

Thankfully he was stupid enough to sue Deborah Lipstadt and show that to the world.
 
NinjaFletch said:
In the first place Irving knew all along that there were powerful reasons for doubting the genuineness of the purported TB47. It had been denounced by Seydewitz as fraudulent. Indeed Irving himself was aware that Goebbels had been seeking to take propagandist advantage of the raid by making exaggerated claims as to the number of deaths.
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I can't believe that Irving had any possible excuse for that 'oversight'. I mean, I've only read about half-a-dozen books on WWII, yet even I'd read of the controversy over (and manipulation of) the Dresden figures; so, if a layperson was aware of it, no way was an historian ignorant of the matter. Irving had no defence.
 
NinjaFletch said:
Anyway, we know why Gove has it on his shelf. He's a bit of a fan:

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This is the article, he really doesn’t come across as a fan of Irving:

EXLCNedWoAArb5Q
 
Gove's criticism of Professor Evans' words is just plain wrong-headed...perhaps deliberately missing the point:

 
2cents said:
This is the article, he really doesn’t come across as a fan of Irving:

EXLCNedWoAArb5Q
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That's a fair reading.

It is a really odd article though which seems to set Irving up simply as a yardstick in which to argue that Kissinger isn't a war criminal and that suggesting he could be is akin to holocaust denial. At best, I'd say he'd had too much coke that week.
 
2cents said:
This is the article, he really doesn’t come across as a fan of Irving:

EXLCNedWoAArb5Q
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Hmmm. The motivations of the article are very suspicious at best. Interesting use of an attempted moral equivalence argument whilst deriding the use of "moral equivalence".
Would love to have seen Gove and Hitchens on the debating podiums in response to this article.
 
NinjaFletch said:
That's a fair reading.

It is a really odd article though which seems to set Irving up simply as a yardstick in which to argue that Kissinger isn't a war criminal and that suggesting he could be is akin to holocaust denial. At best, I'd say he'd had too much coke that week.
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Fingeredmouse said:
Hmmm. The motivations of the article are very suspicious at best. Interesting use of an attempted moral equivalence argument whilst deriding the use of "moral equivalence".
Would love to have seen Gove and Hitchens on the debating podiums in response to this article.
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I suspect it’s fairly standard Cold War stuff from the right, pushing American/Western innocence, etc.

Anyway this resonates as maybe the primary issue with that collection:



There’s a real lack of intellectual curiosity on display there.
 
2cents said:
I suspect it’s fairly standard Cold War stuff from the right, pushing American/Western innocence, etc.

Anyway this resonates as maybe the primary issue with that collection:



There’s a real lack of intellectual curiosity on display there.
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It’s what you’d expect a Brexiteer ideologue’s bookshelf to look like - an obsession with US politics and WWII, very little interest in continental Europe (apart from Hitler) and zero curiosity about the rest of the world (or indeed any subjects other than politics or history). The only thing missing are books on Wellington and Nelson.
 
Well, thanks to Sarah Vine I've now seen a bunch of people today defending The Bell Curve. What a twat.
 
Maybe it's just me but I didn't need to know Michael Gove reading habits to come to the conclusion that he is in fact a cnut.
 


Reading material you disagree with sharpens your thinking.

I have most of David Irving's books. I also have books by Ian Kershaw, Richard Evans and Robert Jan Van Pelt, among other authors on WWII.

My range of books on Israel and the Arabs is just as broad. I have books by both the 'Old' Historians' (Efraim Karsh, Yoav Gelber, Shabtai Teveth, ectra) and the 'New' Historians (Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, Simha Flapan, ectra).

Owen Jones should try reading a book he disagrees with sometime. He might learn something.
 
Chairman Woodie said:


Reading material you disagree with sharpens your thinking.

I have most of David Irving's books. I also have books by Ian Kershaw, Richard Evans and Robert Jan Van Pelt, among other authors on WWII.

My range of books on Israel and the Arabs is just as broad. I have books by both the 'Old' Historians' (Efraim Karsh, Yoav Gelber, Shabtai Teveth, ectra) and the 'New' Historians (Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, Simha Flapan, ectra).

Owen Jones should try reading a book he disagrees with sometime. He might learn something.
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I also read books with words.
 
Chairman Woodie said:


Reading material you disagree with sharpens your thinking.

I have most of David Irving's books. I also have books by Ian Kershaw, Richard Evans and Robert Jan Van Pelt, among other authors on WWII.

My range of books on Israel and the Arabs is just as broad. I have books by both the 'Old' Historians' (Efraim Karsh, Yoav Gelber, Shabtai Teveth, ectra) and the 'New' Historians (Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, Simha Flapan, ectra).

Owen Jones should try reading a book he disagrees with sometime. He might learn something.
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Yes, I too was struck by the great breadth of views populating Gove's bookshelf. One could hardly say he isn't well rounded in his reading habits.
 
Ekkie Thump said:
Yes, I too was struck by the great breadth of views populating Gove's bookshelf. One could hardly say he isn't well rounded in his reading habits.
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I agree. It's not the broadest range of reading material you'll ever see. But at least he is will to read books by authors he disagrees with, judging by his article in The Times.
 


Glad we live in a democracy where people are free to speak out about problems leading to deaths at work without fear of being sacked.
 
Just watched the highlights of PMQs. Johnson's waffling not really effective without the noise makers.
 
'Astonishingly, this afternoon’s session will mark the first time Johnson has even made a statement in the Commons on coronavirus and only the second time he has turned up to make a statement on anything at all since this year. We’re also still waiting for his first appearance before the Commons liaison committee, eight and a half months into his premiership. More pressingly the PM has refused to give a press conference or a media interview for the past 11 days, and has managed just one presser since March 25, having been off sick for much of April. Aides say he will only take pre-recorded questions from the public tonight.'

(Politico)
 
I think some might jumping the gun a bit here. The current government ''strategy'' is no different than the one the tories used during the election last year and well it won them a massive majority. Boris and the tory party are currently polling at around 50% and have a double digit lead over the opposition party.

So far the British public are fully embracive of this shit show.
 
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