Say an insult, go to jail in Germany?
 

And if you post one online it's even worse, because it "doesn't go away."



I wonder what the Germans on the Technodrome think about this?

Interesting timing to create this thread considering the upcoming German elections.

I'm hoping for an AfD victory.

I mean it's not like North Koreans or Russians can openly say **** about Kim or Putin without consequences either.

Those are horrible examples to point at for whattabouts. Although maybe not so dissimilar in this way?

Barkworm shook!

For those of you who watched it, that‘s a very informative and accurate video. It‘s also nothing new, hate speech has always been an illegal offense here.

That's what I thought. For the longest time the US has always been known as the one country you can get away with talking **** about the president without any serious consequences. So what does that tell you about any other country then?

Ironically enough, nowadays you get in trouble in the US for speaking positively about the president, lol.

Sounds a bit extreme from this vantage point, but it's not like we can hardly talk, considering the FDA were given a list of words they're now banned from using. (Terrible words like... woman, elderly, and disabled.)

I swear, I'm pretty much convinced that humans have peaked and are now intellectually de-evolving. I mean what excuse can there be otherwise when we damn well know the world doesn't need to be like this, that we have the power to just quit the crap, work stuff out, make the world a decent place... but nah, that's too hard, too many want everything that's advantageous for them and bad for anyone else it impacts.

If you actually watch the video, they even mention that going to jail for hate speech is extremely rare. There's a prominent example of an old Nazi witch who publicly denied the Holocaust on several occasions.

I'm perfectly fine with our laws in this regard. Free speech is not desirable if it means that there aren't any boundaries.

Well, exactly. Those that continually argue “free speech” and “help, I’m being censored!” are generally the ones who want to continually say crappy things about people they’ve been told to hate, and not face any action for professing said crappy opinion. Freedom of speech is not freedom of consequences.

Which is why Trump was indicted quite rightly for Jan 6 by what he said.

Trust me, it’s perfectly legal to criticise heads of state and power here in Europe. It’s just the manner in which you exercise your opinion that matters, including threats and incitement to trigger others to violence.

A good indicator of how "free" speech in your country actually is (i.e. how much you can openly criticize public institutions and authorities) is a look at the press freedom index. Here, Germany's ranked 10th which is not amazing by any means but loooooots better than the country whose right-wing citizens seem to think that its first amendment is the be-all and end-all of freedom of speech (spoiler: the US is ranked 55th).

The UK is 23rd, okay not quite as high as I was thinking, but some of that was undoubtedly the back end of the previous Government trying to stiffle certain news reports. And all the fustercluck in Scotland over the SNP.

I suspect a lot of that has to do with how litigious US society tends to be and thus part of the "throttling" on reporting is the threat of being sued up the wazoo by printing various things.

JD Vance's speech about this. Making people over there cry, apparently...

How 'tistic do you have to be to keep bringing up politics on a form for a toddlers cartoon from 4 decades ago? Even Resident Evil 7 restrains himself.

Struck a nerve? And again, there is no reason in the world for anyone in their right mind to be taking fortune cookies from a man who just a year ago or so was proudly -- and loudly -- pretending to be an obese black woman. Were we supposed to just forget about that? And who even does that, like what kind of person? Can you shed any light? A dusting of the 'tism would be a generous appraisal of such an individual. And seriously, that's all I need to say about that. "The prosecution rests."

These threads are making people of color and people of weight feel unsafe. It also goes against the forum rules.
I say this as a proud straight white man.

Yes, I'm autistic with Asperger's, but the reason why I restrain myself is because I'm not letting some of your opposing political opinions bother me, because some of you, Mayhem, can't even vote in America. So why should I be bothered by anyone who can't vote here?

And yet here we are. In a thread about Germany.

I'm curious, how does it work in Germany in regard to... places like this? Just for example, if you, as a German citizen, were to say to someone "You dirty honkey!" on this message board, and then that someone complained to the German police... would you get in trouble? Or what?

Honestly, I'm not sure. It also depends on your intent. If I can believably show that the insult was meant in a satirical way, it's no biggie.

There was a case from a couple of years ago when a German comedian insulted Turkish president Erdogan in a poem on TV. He introduced the segment by saying he wanted to show the difference between illegal public insults and satire. He then proceeded with a hilariously juvenile barrage of insults (Erdogan is a goat ****er etc).

Of course, the Turkish government sued but German courts decided that the satirical nature of the poem and the show was so clear that no harm was done.

Or on... what may be judged as intent by judicial types, right?

I'm sure you've been hit with this question before, being in Germany, but can you shed any light on who over there exactly determines what "hate speech" is and what is keeping those people determining that in check in terms of not being able to go crazy and lump anything they don't like in as such?

Hate speech is whatever is judged as unconstitutional. The first article of our constitution says "Human dignity is inviolable." So whatever violates anyone's constitutional right to dignity is classified as an offense. Nazi symbolism and phrases are also unconstitutional.

Last year, Björn Höcke, one of the leaders of our extreme right, used the slogan "Everything for Germany" in his campaign and was fined for it because it used to be a Nazi slogan. He filed an appeal because he said it was such a basic phrase that he just used it without knowing that it was a Nazi slogan. Which does make sense for most people but he's a historian with ties to Neonazi organizations so it wasn't believable.

According to Wikipedia, its first documented usage was in March 1848 by King Louis I of Bavaria, 23 prior to the establishment of the German Empire, and 85 years before Adolf Hitler would rise to power in Germany.