Civil libertarians have long been critical of the German speech crimes, including the prohibition on any Nazi symbols. Not only have the laws not had any discernible impact on the neo-Nazi movement but they actually make these extremists into victims and force them further underground. The laws also lead to bizarre cases like the arrest of a German man for a cellphone ringtone of Hitler. The latest case is out of Oranienburg where German politician Marcel Zech was arrested due to a tattoo spotted on his back at a pool.
Zech was charged after another bather saw that he had what appeared to be a tattoo of the Auschwitz death camp on his back and the slogan from the Buchenwald concentration camp’s gate, “Jedem das Seine” — “to each his own.”
The 27-year-old is a member of the far-right National Democratic Party, who sits on the county council in an area outside Berlin. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted.
Putting aside the less than flattering image of the love handles on the master race, these prosecutions do little to deter such extremists. Neo-Nazis have changed the Nazi salute and symbol slightly to get around the laws. Many more have gone underground. More importantly, these laws fuel the trend in Europe toward greater and greater criminalization of speech. Despite the questionable success of the German laws, countries like England and France have gone all in on the concept of criminalizing speech under a variety of rationales.
What do you think?
Free speech, being able to say whatever is on your mind at anytime, is a trait of being Human. A person is born with this ability. But governments try to limit or prevent people from using this natural ability, as if the right to free speech is something granted by the government. The truth is that governments take this and other freedoms away from people, not give them those freedoms. The way things are going these days, the government soon will be telling people that their “right to bare arms” means they can wear sleeveless t-shirts anytime they please. Unfortunately, many people probably will accept this.
@randyjet
1, December 18, 2015 at 5:46 pm
“The reason I brought the US into it is because we have legitimately and illegitimately used censorship in our own history. I approve of what Lincoln did during the Civil War since it was necessary at the time. The fact is that free speech is not an absolute right, just as the SCOTUS observed when they said shouting FIRE in a crowded theater was not protected speech. That is something you need to learn. By the way, ALL of your rights are granted and protected by the state so that you can use them. It is not God who will defend you in court, or with arms in hand.”
RJ, your thinking seems to be seriously compromised by your implicit endorsement of the notion that the end justifies the means, e.g., for example, that Lincoln’s tyrannical behavior (the means) was justified by his need to preserve the Union (the end). This fundamental intellectual and ethical error can be (and usually has been) used to rationalize virtually any atrocity in human history.
This intellectual/ethical error on your part also seems to be preventing your appreciation of the radical difference between shouting “Fire!” (if there is no fire) in a crowded theater, for example, on the one hand, and questioning one or more aspects of the Holocaust legend, for example, on the other.
As JT points out above, “More importantly, these laws fuel the trend in Europe toward greater and greater criminalization of speech. Despite the questionable success (emphasis added) of the German laws, countries like England and France have gone all in on the concept of criminalizing speech under a variety of rationales.”
Judge Andrew Napolitano makes the same point more unequivocally, i.e., independently of how much “success” such laws have enjoyed:
“What Free Speech?
“The photos of 40 of the world’s government leaders marching arm-in-arm along a Paris boulevard on Sunday with the president of the United States not among them was a provocative image that has fomented much debate. The march was, of course, in direct response to the murderous attacks on workers at the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo by a pair of brothers named Kouachi, and on shoppers at a Paris kosher supermarket by one of the brothers’ comrades.
“The debate has been about whether President Obama should have been at the march. The march was billed as a defense of freedom of speech in the West; yet it hardly could have been held in a less free speech-friendly Western environment, and the debate over Obama’s absence misses the point.
“In the post-World War II era, French governments have adopted a policy advanced upon them nearly 100 years ago by Woodrow Wilson. He pioneered the modern idea that countries’ constitutions don’t limit governments; they unleash them. Thus, even though the French Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, French governments treat speech as a gift from the government, not as a natural right of all persons, as our Constitution does. (emphasis added)
“The French government has prohibited speech it considers to be hateful and even made it criminal. When the predecessor magazine to Charlie Hebdo once mocked the death of Charles de Gaulle, the French government shut it down — permanently.
“The theory of anti-hate speech laws is that hate speech often leads to violence, and violence demands police and thus the expenditure of public resources, and so the government can make it illegal to spout hatred in order to conserve its resources. This attitude presumes, as Wilson did when he prosecuted folks for publicly singing German songs during World War I, that the government is the origin of free speech and can lawfully limit the speech it hates and fears. It also presumes that all ideas are equal, and none is worthy of hatred. (emphasis added)
“When the massacres occurred last week in Paris, all three of the murderers knew that the police would be unarmed and so would be their victims. It was as if they were shooting fish in a barrel. Why is that? The answer lies in the same mentality that believes it can eradicate hate by regulating speech.
That mentality demands that government have a monopoly on violence, even violence against evil.
“So, to those who embrace this dreadful theory, the great loss in Paris last week was not human life, which is a gift from God; it was free speech, which is a gift from the state. Hence the French government, which seems not to care about innocent life, instead of addressing these massacres as crimes against innocent people, proclaimed the massacres crimes against the freedom of speech. Would the French government have reacted similarly if the murderers had killed workers at an ammunition factory, instead of at a satirical magazine? (emphasis added)
“And how hypocritical was it of the French government to claim it defends free speech! In France, you can go to jail if you publicly express hatred for a group whose members may be defined generally by characteristics of birth, such as gender, age, race, place of origin or religion.
“You can also go to jail for using speech to defy the government. This past weekend, millions of folks in France wore buttons and headbands that proclaimed in French: “I am Charlie Hebdo.” Those whose buttons proclaimed “I am not Charlie Hebdo” were asked by the police to remove them. Those who wore buttons that proclaimed, either satirically or hatefully, “I am Kouachi” were arrested. Arrested for speech at a march in support of free speech? Yes.
“What’s going on here? What’s going on in France, and what might be the future in America, is the government defending the speech with which it agrees and punishing the speech with which it disagrees. What’s going on is the assault by some in radical Islam not on speech, but on vulnerable innocents in their everyday lives in order to intimidate their governments. What’s going on is the deployment of 90,000 French troops to catch and kill three murderers because the government does not trust the local police to use guns to keep the streets safe or private persons to use guns to defend their own lives. (emphasis added)
“Why do some in radical Islam kill innocents in the West in order to affect the policies of Western governments? Might it be because the fruitless Western invasion of Iraq killed 650,000 persons, most of whom were innocent civilians? Might it be because that invasion brought al-Qaida to the region and spawned ISIS? Might it be because Obama has killed more innocent civilians in the Middle East with his drones than were killed by the planes in the U.S. on 9/11? Might it be because our spies are listening to us, rather than to those who pose real dangers?
“What does all this have to do with freedom of speech? Nothing — unless you believe the French government.
http://www.creators.com/opinion/judge-napolitano/what-freedom-of-speech.html
@randyjet
1, December 17, 2015 at 6:14 pm
“Ken The FACT is that Germany is NOT emulating the Nazis as any person can see if they live or visit Germany.”
I don’t know why you’ve thrown up this large straw man, implying that I’d said the German government was emulating the Nazis in every way.
I merely pointed out the irony of its employing one Nazi tactic, censorship, in order to discourage (incipient or surreptitious) Nazism. (“It’s not at all clear to me how emulating the Nazis’ censorship and suppression of speech serves to gird German culture against a resurgence of Nazi attitudes and behaviors”).
I also don’t know what your point is with respect to American censorship and suppression of free speech.
Many countries’ governments, historically and currently, have engaged in censorship and other forms of suppression of freedom of expression, but that hardly justifies the practice in Germany, as you seem to suggest, even if it has occurred (and still does, by the way) in the US of A.
Our different assessments of the odiousness and counter-productivity of censorship, regardless of its provenance, probably hinges on whether freedom to speak one’s mind is viewed as a God-given right or as some State’s tentatively granted privilege.
Ken
It’s not at all clear to me how emulating the Nazis’ censorship and suppression of speech serves to gird German culture against a resurgence of Nazi attitudes and behaviors.
Just to remind you and others of what YOU wrote. You will notice that you said the law in Germany is EMULATING THE NAZIS CENSORSHIP AND SUPPRESSION OF SPEECH. I don’t know if English is your second language, but you make it CLEAR by that phrasing that you DID intend to libel the Germans that they ARE just like the Nazis in that regard. Then you go on to elaborate with a brief synopsis of their history. You also miss the fact that the censorship is NOT of books, or movies, but of symbols and flags that are used as rallying symbols. One can still buy Mein Kampf in Germany and one is not arrested for having a copy either. They also have not burned any copies that i am aware of, except if they need something to start a fire in the fireplace maybe. You are over the top in your accusation.
The reason I brought the US into it is because we have legitimately and illegitimately used censorship in our own history. I approve of what Lincoln did during the Civil War since it was necessary at the time. The fact is that free speech is not an absolute right, just as the SCOTUS observed when they said shouting FIRE in a crowded theater was not protected speech. That is something you need to learn. By the way,ALL of your rights are granted and protected by the state so that you can use them. It is not God who will defend you in court, or with arms in hand.
All they really need to do is continuously stuff him with Wiener Schnitzel – he’s already so fat that soon you won’t be able to read it anyway. Crime solved 🙂
I see tasteless disgusting tattoos all the time. At least the tattoo identifies them. It’s the ones who LOOK innocent that are really worrisome. You can always cross the street if you see a Nazi tattoo coming toward you.
” The laws also lead to bizarre cases like the arrest of a German man for a cellphone ringtone of Hitler. ” Hey you know some people just have a good sense of humor. I’m going to get in a lot of trouble for that statement. Oh well!
Ken The FACT is that Germany is NOT emulating the Nazis as any person can see if they live or visit Germany. This one exception to absolute free speech is not any threat to our or their freedom any more than Lincoln is regarded as a dictator when he imposed even WORSE limitations on free speech and the press during the Civil War. During our Revolution, we meted out FAR worse penalties to Tories and other traitors. I guess that means we are a dictatorship now? I grew up in the McCarthy era and there was NO freedom of speech or the press back then. People DID go to prison for their political beliefs and books WERE BANNED in the USA. The US was not a free country by any reasonable standard. So give us a break from your hyperbolic rants. Today’s Germany is FAR more free than the USA was back then.
Oranienburg was the site of one of the earliest Nazi concentration camps. It was founded by the SA in 1933 and was taken over by the SS in 1934. The father of one of my best friends who was also my math teacher in my high school in Nazi occupied Amsterdam was murdered in that camp because he and his wife had tried to save Jewish lives.
It’s not at all clear to me how emulating the Nazis’ censorship and suppression of speech serves to gird German culture against a resurgence of Nazi attitudes and behaviors.
“Once they succeeded in ending democracy and turning Germany into a one-party dictatorship, the Nazis orchestrated a massive propaganda campaign to win the loyalty and cooperation of Germans.
“The Nazi Propaganda Ministry, directed by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, took control of all forms of communication in Germany: newspapers, magazines, books, public meetings, and rallies, art, music, movies, and radio. Viewpoints in any way threatening to Nazi beliefs or to the regime were censored or eliminated from all media. (Emphasis added)
“During the spring of 1933, Nazi student organizations, professors, and librarians made up long lists of books they thought should not be read by Germans. Then, on the night of May 10, 1933, Nazis raided libraries and bookstores across Germany. They marched by torchlight in nighttime parades, sang chants, and threw books into huge bonfires.
“On that night more than 25,000 books were burned. Some were works of Jewish writers, including Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud. Most of the books were by non-Jewish writers, including such famous Americans as Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, and Sinclair Lewis, whose ideas the Nazis viewed as different from their own and therefore not to be read.”
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007677
We should protect free speech, even when it’s hard. It is anathema to free speech to create government condoned speech. By allowing the good, the bad, and the ugly, we guarantee that the government will not be able to dictate thought or speech.
Our prisons are so overcrowded, I cannot conceive of the repercussions were we to investigate everyone’s tattoos for hateful sayings or slogans. What a waste. You cannot force everyone to be nice people.
I recall when I lived in low income housing for a few years, my neighbor was a Mexican gang member with the tattoo “Trust No B&*(&*&*&” tattooed all along his side and chest. In huge letters. I suppose he wanted to ensure that if he was lying supine on the ground after getting lost in the desert, the rescue helicopter crew would be sure of his last message to humanity…from 200 feet.
I walked on by ignoring it the first time I saw it, chanting in my mind, “Do NOT tell the rough crowd they are complete idiots your first day in your new place.” Or so I thought. But I have a total glass face, and wasn’t fooling anyone. He took one look at my face and said it wasn’t his fault. He had a really bad ex-girlfriend. I was telling him, “Come on! How are you EVER going to get a good one with that dummy sign on you???”
Throwing a guy in prison because he has a hateful tattoo seems like a real waste of time and money and overcrowds prisons for no benefit. It doesn’t actually make people stop thinking those thoughts, so what’s the point?
Karen, This is about GERMANY, NOT the USA. As I pointed out, Germany has plenty of free speech with the one exception that is justified by their past history. After the US Civil War, if a person was flying the confederate flag or tore down the US flag, they would be lucky if they only went to prison. Most likely they would be SHOT on the spot. i have no problem with that either. After some time, these laws will become passe or be repealed. In wartime or the immediate aftermath, the same rules of civil society do NOT apply. The point of those laws is not to deter a fool from getting a tattoo, but to keep very real Nazis and their progeny from metastasizing any more and to deter those other sympathizers. We have no need for such laws here.