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In a coordinated campaign across 14 states, the German police on Tuesday raided the homes of 36 people accused of hateful postings over social media, including threats, coercion and incitement to racism.
Most of the raids concerned politically motivated right-wing incitement, according to the Federal Criminal Police Office, whose officers conducted home searches and interrogations. But the raids also targeted two people accused of left-wing extremist content, as well as one person accused of making threats or harassment based on someone's sexual orientation.
"The still high incidence of punishable hate posting shows a need for police action," Holger Münch, president of the Federal Criminal Police Office, said in a statement. "Our free society must not allow a climate of fear, threat, criminal violence and violence either on the street or on the internet."
The raids come as Germans are debating the draft of a new social media law aimed at cracking down on hate speech, a measure that an array of experts said was unconstitutional at a parliamentary hearing on Monday.
The measure, championed by Justice Minister Heiko Maas for passage this month, would fine Facebook, Twitter and other outlets up to $53 million (50 million euros) if they failed to remove hate speech and other forms of illegal content.
The left ladies and gentlemen.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Monday June 26 2017, @02:02AM (6 children)
So, O Mandatory Buzzfeed, you are not familiar with the American roots of German anti-hate speech laws? Lots of people, ones usually not involved in rocketry or chemistry, were prohibited from speaking out publicly for quite some time after the fall of Nazism, like Martin Heidegger, because of their support of a criminal and heinous regime. You are not buying into khallow's ingenious revisionist history where censorship caused the rise of Fascism, are you? Because you know what else causes a rise of Fascism? Yep, libertarian free speech! Normalization of hate and stupidity, works every single time.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Monday June 26 2017, @05:20AM (5 children)
Perhaps you could look into the circumstances between the Beer Hall Putsch and the publishing of Mein Kampf rather than hurl ignorant taunts yet again? Hitler went from a drunken attempt to overthrow the Munich government to a major political player in Germany not as a result of the failed coup or the writing of his book, but rather the very public trial for treason which establish Nazi legal strategy for years after. The Nazis then exploited a number of other trials mostly for libel or hate speech violations (the very sort of thing that European hate speech law theoretically will suppress now) to generate street cred, publicity, and cheap martyrdom.
I await your evidence for your assertion.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Monday June 26 2017, @06:47AM (4 children)
No, you do not, khallow. This is like private property and Anthropogenic Global Warming to you. Nothing will change your mind.
But if I might, could it be that perhaps your reading of history is correct, but that it has nothing to do with anything? Imagine that the libel and treason trials had not taken place: are you asserting that the Nazis would not have come to power? Nice counter-factual, but the problem is that your "factual" is just as contrived, that it was the libel laws and "persecution" of the Nazis that was essential to their rise. I am saying that it might have had much more to do with a world-wide Capitalist caused economic depression, and the dumkoffheitness of some Germans that led to Nazi Germany, that and Rush Limbaugh (he did have Nazi counterparts, you know).
So I still say it is alright to punch a Nazi in the face, to cut a Republican that is trying to deprive you of health care, and to shut the f*** up racist, misogynist right-wing nut-jobs, and put them in the mental hospitals and re-education facilities, BEFORE they go all crazy with "Final Solutions" and "Making Germany Reich Again!".
And did you see, today, that Spencer was out in full force, with a pathetic group of deplorables, protesting the cartoon killings of trump? Laughable. Deplorable, and you know, we should prosecute that guy for hate speech. Yeah, white supremecists say they just want separation of races, and respect for their artificial construct of "whiteness", but we all know where that leads. This is why we need a Final Solution to the White Supremecy Question. Self-defense, under natural law, against hegemonic racists. We will not tolerate intolerance.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 26 2017, @12:10PM (3 children)
Not that you tried. One little paragraph asserting that rational argument wouldn't sway me and then a few paragraphs of crap that wouldn't sway anyone. Seems par for the course.
The Wiemar Republic was going to fall. It's enemies, such as the German military, industrialists, Junkers, etc were too strong while support for the Republic was lackluster at best. But the Nazis being on top in the aftermath of that fall was not so destined. They needed a very high profile and powerful support from voters to make that happen. Nor were they the only game in town. As I noted earlier, these trials were a key step in obtaining that publicity and to build the political base of the Nazis up to the point where they were essential to any attempt to overthrow the Republic.
As to the Great Depression, the Nazis grew in power between recessions as well.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 27 2017, @01:45AM (2 children)
Correct. I tried many times before. But now I can tell when you get your ideology on, and are not amenable to rational argument. Usually, it is when you start talking about "rational argument".
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by khallow on Tuesday June 27 2017, @03:06AM (1 child)
(Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 27 2017, @03:28AM
I hereby bequeath, in totality, the entire philosophical tradition of the world, as inadequately channel through myself, to my student, khallow. May the gods have mercy on his nous.