Holocaust Denialism and Climate Denialism: on the necessity of taboos

Taboos are a major topic in anthropology. We teach it to our students right from the start. All social groupings have a variety of things that they consider taboo: things that cannot be done and things that cannot be said. Some taboos are religious and some are secular. Some are ritualistically observed and the very reason why they are taboos is no longer clear. But some are very recent and the practical logic that animates them is still very clear to us.

The tabooing of Holocaust denialism is by far the most important recent taboo that we know of today. Because of its recency the tabooing of Holocaust denialism can help us understand a few things about what the functional nature of taboos in general, and the importance of this functional dimension in the contemporary world.

One important thing that the taboo on Holocaust denialism help us understand is that a taboo is not just anything forbidden. It is a forbidding which has sacred dimensions. This is because what is tabooed is not considered simply a legally forbidden act. To engage in it is also considered immoral, unethical and anti-social. All this combines to make the breaking of a taboo a sacrilegious act.

Holocaust denialism has slowly been made into a taboo because there was increased generalised agreement about it being not only an unethical and immoral act but also a destructive act. It was so not just towards the victims of the Holocaust, some of whom are still alive, and their descendants, but to society in general. It became a taboo because there was general agreement that is had murderous consequences in the past and an equal agreement that no decent person would want their society to take the path which has led to the Holocaust. Taboos are of course used politically, and not necessarily for progressive reasons. But this does not make the taboo less necessary.

Of course, many people break taboos. Some break a taboo privately and some choose to challenge it publicly for political or many other reasons. How strict does society consider the breaking of a taboo depends on many things, not least with whether the forbidding associated with a taboo is institutionalised and supported by social laws and sanctions, or whether it is merely conventional. For the reasons mentioned above, Holocaust denialism is a taboo supported by the law. Still many anti-Semites do engage in private or public Holocaust denialism. But its taboo-ing has helped to restrict it's propagation, especially that we live in societies that we know can still see, and indeed do see, rises in anti-semitic beliefs and practices.

As the title of this piece indicates I am dwelling on the logic behind the taboo on Holocaust denialism because I believe it can help us think the taboo-ing of Climate Denialism: the belief that climate change caused by human activity is not occurring. This is what I'd like to advocate. And to be clear, just as the taboo-ing of Holocaust denialism does not treat so-called 'Holocaust scepticism' as anything different to denialism, my argument about Climate Denialism extends to so-called Climate Scepticism. There should be zero tolerance of Climate Denialists posturing publicly in our societies, whether in mainstream media or in our parliament. Too much is at stake for us to continue being subjected to this intellectually and ethically offensive but also more importantly, destructive, belief.

First of all, anthropogenic global heating is the most destructive phenomenon the world is witnessing today. we in Australia are in the midst of experiencing how destructive it is to humans, to animals, and to the planet in general.

Secondly, the scientific data concerning both the destruction and its anthropogenic character is at the very least as conclusive and detailed as the scientific data concerning the Holocaust.

Thirdly, just as Holocaust denialists are still around despite the evidence and have their pseudo-independent un-orthodox 'historians' to legitimise their claims, Climate Denialists also have their pseudo-independent un-orthodox historians whom they can appeal to to legitimise their claim.

Fourthly and perhaps most importantly. Tabooing Holocaust denialism was not only motivated by the fact that Holocaust denialists exist, but by the recognition that there are still powerful forces that have an interest in bringing such denialism from the woodwork and constituting it into a potent political force.

This is particularly why it is crucial to taboo Climate Denialism, and particularly in Australia. It is because there are clearly certain forces associated with the fossil fuel industry who have an on-going interest in encouraging climate denialism and making it into a potent political force.

Tabooing never eliminates what it aims to taboo. Indeed as the famous anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss pointed out, if there is no tendency for society to produce the acts being tabooed, there would be no need for a taboo. As such, an argument in favour of tabooing Climate Denialism, will not mean that Climate Denialism will simply cease to exist. There will always be people who think their personal experience ('life taught me') is a better basis for knowledge than macro-scientific experience. There will always be people to whom attacking the messenger (the bad ugly Greens) is more important than the truth of the message. There will always be people (those wonderful llittle Galileos) who think of themselves as too interesting to simply agree with what everyone expect them to agree with. Tabooing, will not stop such people. And they will always be able to engage in their muttering privately, in the pub or as part of some social media subculture. But it'll help removing them out of those spaces that really matter as far as decision making is concerned. And this is what we should no longer have to deal with in Australia in the light of how this summer has begun. And, to be sure, not having those denialists where it matters is as anti-democratic as not having Holocaust denialists pollute our mainstream media and political space.