[Vision2020] Proposed debate

[Melynda Huskey]

Doug wonders why he hasn't heard from UI history professors Quinlan and 
Ramsey after he invited them to a debate . . . and coyly attributes their 
non-response to cowardice.

Perhaps they feel, as Deborah Lipstadt feels about David Irving, that 
further debate is unnecessary.

The Oregon Holocaust Resource Center offers these thoughts on debating 
Holocaust Deniers:

"What is one to do? Having ready access to websites that deal with these 
matters is helpful. But what of the matter of "debating" these claimants? 
Should valuable class time be spent in an item-by-item refutation of the 
claims of deniers and revisionists? Or simply deal with the phenomenon 
itself, and its underlying motivations?

"A strong case could be made that a "debate" is precisely what the 
revisionists want. They lack academic standing and credibility . . . . The 
Internet has provided a ready means of transmitting their messages and 
young, naïve, trusting students may not have developed the critical 
intellectual skills needed to sort through the credentials of the many 
Holocaust related sites on the Web. Conducting a "debate" may be said to 
serve the purpose of spreading the revisionist claims, even though rebuttal 
may be powerful and convincing to most people. The nature of the "debate" is 
such that lending one's academic standing and institutional prestige to the 
effort also succeeds in allowing the revisionists and deniers to bask in the 
limelight they seek."

It pleases me that Christ Church is paying to run the screed which 
belittles, accuses, and berates every resident of Moscow who doesn't share 
their theology.  That Zion of Doug's dreams--you know, the one in which the 
Priest King has his lips stretched wide, and the rest of us are silenced by 
exile, by execution, by marriage, by slavery, by a theocratic monarchy--gets 
clearer and clearer with each ad, and most of us--particularly those of us 
who are Christians--don't like what we see.

As a reminder that Christianity has more than one face in this world, I 
offer another altar call with a *real* punch and no serrated edge.  I wish I 
lived up to it better.

"There is a spirit which I feel, that delights to do no evil, nor to avenge 
any wrong, but delights to endure all things in hope to enjoy its own in the 
end. Its hope is to outlive all wrath and contention, and to weary out all 
exaltation and cruelty, or whatever is of a nature contrary to itself. It 
sees to the end of all temptations. As it bears no evil in itself, so it 
conceives none in thought to any other: if it be betrayed, it bears it; for 
its ground and spring are the mercies and forgiveness of God. Its crown is 
meekness, its life is everlasting love unfeigned, and takes its kingdom with 
entreaty, and not with contention, and keeps it by lowliness of mind. In God 
alone it can rejoice, though none else regard it, or can own its life. It is 
conceived in sorrow, and brought forth without any to pity it; nor doth it 
murmur at grief, and oppression. It never rejoiceth but through sufferings; 
for with the world's joy it is murdered. I found it alone, being forsaken. I 
have fellowship therein with them who lived in dens, and desolate places of 
the earth, who through death obtained this resurrection, and eternal holy 
life."  (James Naylor's deathbed testimony, 1660)

Melynda Huskey

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