Austrian High Court: publishing fabricated Holocaust photos

[murx]

As I said earlier: Historians too have to work according to the rules of proper scientific conduct. Forged photos and documents have to be dismissed. Those who disclose fabrications are not automatically deniers.


Decision of the Austrian Highest Court
OGH 4 Ob 71/06d
from June 26th 2006
concerning professional distribution of faked and real Holocaust pictures

The case:

The archive service provider of a major German daily newspaper is the applicant. It provides to other media pictures and text material of the Holocaust for a fee. Its service includes photos, which are from camps of the NAZI regime. However those pictures include real photos and also photos being staged (fabricated) after the war. The falsification of the document material is not mentioned where published. The defendant published two articles in which he sharply criticized the commercial exploitation of concentration camp photos. The suppliers of such photos, including the applicant, are "irresponsible traders", which made profitable business with "real and false photos of the Holocaust" which is called "reckless profiteering"".

The applicant appealed to court to interdict to the defendant by penalty the statements above, being offensive and insulting, damaging his business and therefore against related laws.

The first level of jurisdiction following the legal definition, “statements not being offensive, insulting or damaging someone's dignity if proven to be true”, dismissed the appeal.

The second level reversed the decision based on the fact that the statements undisputed damage the applicant's business interests.

The highest court confirmed the decision of the first court. The demands for accuracy are especially high in Holocaust documentation, because the publication of falsifications plays into the hands of so called revisionists, who work scientifically and are dangerous.
The undoubted damage of the applicants business interests are negligible behind the importance of those demands.


From the original text:
The defendant is the Publisher and editor-in-Chief of the online magazine "m *", which is available on the Internet address "www.m*****.info". The editorial staff is based in Vienna. The defendant published two articles in which he sharply criticized the commercial exploitation of concentration camp photos on his website. Some of these photos are not created in the Nazi era but later. The suppliers of such photos, including the applicant, are "irresponsible traders", which made profitable business with "real and false photos of the Holocaust". To millions of people they presented photos of concentration camps including the extermination camp of Auschwitz, which were demonstrably not from there, and ultimately feed those who deny the Holocaust, who talk about the 'Auschwitz lie'." Media, which published such pictures, have violated basic rules of journalistic care.

In fact, some of the photos provided by the applicant were followed, without that it would have been documented. It does not doubt that the applicant thereof before the articles of the defendant knew.


. 1. Opinion of the Court of appeal,
the defendant accuses the applicant of deliberate spreading fake photos. This is admitted now by the applicant, in the first instance she had opposed that claim Thus, the defendant would have to prove that the disputed photos had been created after the war.
The defendant makes truely accusations towards the applicant. These accusations refer only to the trading of Holocaust images as such. The accusations in this context are understood as "Dirty Business". The second criticism is lack of care in terms of staged images. Thus, the business is "irresponsible", motivated by addiction to "Profit" , it is assumed. This leads to the - more severe - charge, the applicant knew of the forgery of the photos.

Relevant factual core is the assertion that the applicant is making money with the marketing of real and faked Holocaust images. The applicant has not disputed ultimately that. It can be read in the complaint that there is no difference between Holocaust and other photos in the license charges. According to the findings of the first court, an employee of the applicant has called a fee of up to EUR 100,000 depending on type and duration for the use of photos -. Thus, it is clear that also Holocaust images can have such an enormous price and are quite profitably marketed by the applicant. It is also undisputed that individual photos were fake and that the applicant had not pointed this fact. The facts (distributed by the defendant) therefore are true.

6. For this reason, an injunctive relief would be only if the formulations of the defendant would be an excess of rating. If that is the case, the relevance of the issue depends on the criticism was expressed opinions (6 Ob = 244/02d ecolex 2004, 446).

The condemnation of the crimes of the NAZI regime is an essential element of social consensus in Austria and Germany which is reflected in particular in the rules of the law on prohibition (ESP. § 3 h VerbotsG). Vice versa is the relativation of this crime a central point of revisionist history which behaves scientifically and is therefore so dangerous. The defendant indicates in a completely correct statement, that the use of questionable sources is supporting those who with reference to historical facts deny or play down. This connection must be commonly known at the latest since the discussions about the "Wehrmachts-exhibition organised by the Hamburg Institute for social research" .

The authenticity of sources to the crimes of national socialism is therefore a matter of highest importance for the society.To the reliability of those involved, including employees of archive institutions, highest demands have to be made. This applies the more as the profitable exploitation of the real sources can be considered a moral concern and if - as here - the suffering of victims is shown in dramatic ways.

These considerations justify a significant criticism when - as here - objectively questionable sources for remuneration are made available. The applicant must therefore accept criticism of their obvious lack of care, uttered with clear words. The disputed wording such as "Profiteering" are no excess of rating on this basis.


http://www.internet4jurists.at/entschei ... 71_06d.htm

[David Thompson]

I think everyone here would agree that misrepresenting and then selling postwar photographs as authentic WWII items, as in your example, is wrong. We see repeated complaints in the forum against people who do that, or misrepresent other postwar productions as authentic WWII items.

For just one example out of hundreds we've had here, see the thread at http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=161307. So what? Everyone knows that there are fraudsters, forgers, and everything else out there. Some like the holocaust, some like the Waffen-SS, some like the Wehrmacht and some like something else. Want to buy a genuine Adolf Hitler pocketknife? You can have one to call your very own if you look around. You might even be able to score Adolf Hilter's original cellphone.

As for your statement :

Historians too have to work according to the rules of proper scientific conduct. Forged photos and documents have to be dismissed.

who specifically are you talking about, murx? Please provide sources for any claims about historians whom you claim fall into this category and refused to dismiss a photo or document they knew was forged. If you can relate it to a specific WWII incident it would be helpful. Otherwise, you're just restating the obvious.