I had a history seminar a couple years back, on a graduation paper on the Armenian Genocide. I then told the speaker I wasn't sure if calling it Genocide in the very title of the paper was appropriate, for as far as I know there was no concensus among historian upon this issue, and the fact that you could only access second-hand litterature because the main sources were in turkish didn't help. The teachers in charge agreed with me.
I don't know if it's qualify as Genocide denial, but if it does, when a whole university section of historians are guilty. (My understanding though, is that you're judged differently in respect of your intention. Academical debate is OK. Public ranting is not.)

Not that I'm saying there wasn't a genocide. I would even go as far as to say that, for what little I know, there was .
But in historical term it has a quite precise definition: organized mass-murder aimed at eliminate a whole group of people in reason of their race, religion , etc.
It's kind of a dead-end : Any turkish historian who claims these massacres don't qualify under this definition is considered with suspicion abroad, whereas any international historian who claim there was a genocide is questioned about what kind of documentation he had access to. And if he's right ''by law'', what is the need for factual accomptability ?

Anyhow all the historians are quite feed up of the so-called ''memorial laws'' passed by different parlement aroud the world. History is no politician's turf and they should know their place ! Those are just politicaly motivated attempts to regain some legitimacy, and hold no regard for the facts or the historical method. Which is not to say what they are wrong in their particular opinion about the armenian genocide, it's the whole concept of memorial law I find flawed.

It doesn't help that the word Genocide ( with a big G) has been overused and overpublicized by the media, and is used in as a weapon of mass destruction in international politic. For a variety of reasons, the Armenian Genocide is still too hot an issue to be serenely studied and thought upon.
As far as I'm concerned though, I confess I find little difference between Genocide and gruesome mass massacres. They both kill you just as dead.

One last word to end this too long entry: perhaps I gave the impression I was against the antiracial law of switzerland itself, as it curtails free speech. I am not.
For once there always is censorship, there isn't such a thing a absolute free speech, for obvious reason. If you go on the lawn of the white house professing your intetion to kill Obama, wait and see what happens to you, even if you haven't done anything but speak yet.

Seriously, the infamous Radio Mille-colline in rwanda actively professed on the wave the mass-killing of tutsis, and have a huge part in it. Speech isn't always ''just speech''. It precedes action.

Another thing are racial slurs, which are considered ''emotional'' attacks and thus punished by law (as they should). Now in switzerland denying the holocaust is also illegal.

From what I read some of you may think that public statements of such nature, so obviously wrong and ludicrous, should be allowed under free speech because no one would pay intention, and the censorship partisan are hypocrites, only like-minded opinons.

I disagree. First because there was such a thing as Nazy Germany. And second, the rationale being Holocause has been historicaly proven beyond any kind of doubt. It's denial is but a weapon in the arsenal of Antisemits, aimed at the very identity of the jewish people. Armadinejhad and his ilk who pose as reasonnable apprenty historians just waiting for a fair trial , so to speack, of their ideas , a tribune for their hate should not find it in switzerland. There should be no mistaking it: denial of Holocaust is a hate crime, and should be punished as such.

And the same goes for those ultranationalist turk: they are not interested in facts and historical truth, they just push forward their misguided nationalism, and their contempt and lack of compassion toward their country's minority. They maybe not guilty law-wise in their home country, but they're dicks just the same.

Sorry for the too long, non-humourus intervention. Just the kind of stuff I actually care about.