Genocide denial is an attempt to deny or minimize the scale and severity of an incidence of genocide. The most well-known type is Holocaust denial.

Where there is near universal agreement that a genocide occurred, genocide denial is usually considered a form of illegitimate historical revisionism. However, in circumstances where the event in dispute is not seen to constitute genocide by the majority of scholars, the use of the term may be an ad hominem by those who argue that a genocide occurred.

The extremely serious nature of the crime of genocide, along with the terrible reputation it creates, and potential repercussions that may come against a nation as a result of committing it, ensures that whenever genocide is charged, there will be parties that attempt to avoid or divert blame. However as Larissa van den Herik has pointed out there is a gap in international law that encourages the use of the charge of genocide when other charges might be more appropriate "The only way for Bosnia to go to the ICJ was to allege genocide. There is no Crimes against Humanity Convention providing for jurisdiction for the ICJ"

Robert Linlithgow "Bob" Livingston Jr. (born April 30, 1943) is a Washington, D.C.-based lobbyist and a former Republican U.S. Representative from Louisiana. He was Chairman of the Appropriations Committee from 1995–99, and he was chosen as Newt Gingrich's successor as Speaker of the United States House of Representatives late in 1998 but chose to withdraw and retire after an extramarital affair was discovered.

Livingston is a descendant of Robert Livingston (via Henry W. Livingston), the elder brother of Philip Livingston, one of the signers of the United States Declaration of Independence. One of his ancestors in New York State (Henry Livingston) was probably the (then anonymous) author of the poem, ''The Night Before Christmas".

Livingston is married to the former Bonnie Robichaux (also born 1943), a native of Raceland in Lafourche Parish and niece of former United States Senator Allen J. Ellender. Raised as an Episcopalian, he converted to his wife's religion of Roman Catholicism. The Livingstons had a son named Richard, who died in July 2006, while trimming a tree and being electrocuted by a live wire.