Germans Prosecute Man for Kooky Beliefs

In 1997, rightwing Dutch parliamentarian Hans Janmaat was sent to jail for speaking his mind on immigration. He'd advocated that Holland should close its borders, and that so-called oprot-premies — "fuck-off bonuses" — were a great instrument to induce foreigners to leave the country. In those pre-Pim-Fortuyn, pre-Theo-van-Gogh days, that was a most improper thing to say. The famous Dutch tolerance broke down right there and then, and Mr. Janmaat — a narrow-minded man whose politics I loathed but whose right to speak his mind can hardly be called into question — was convicted of hate speech and sentenced to a jail term of two weeks and a 3,500-dollar fine.

But that wasn't the shocker.

The shocker was that my Dutch friends — well-educated, kind, socially progressive — just couldn't get worked up over Mr. Janmaat's prison stint. I distinctly remember two dinner-table conversations that made my blood run cold, precisely because there were no credible arguments in favor of his sentence. My friends even allowed that I was right to insist on the principle of the thing. "But," they'd say with a wink or a shrug, "he is a bit of a creep, you know." Or they'd come up with some tired truism about yelling fire in a crowded theater, as if Mr. Janmaat, then perhaps the most powerless and certainly the most isolated politician in the country, compelled armies of jackbooted thugs to beat up foreigners.

After the murders of Fortuyn and Van Gogh, it became clear that lack of free speech — not too much of it, as the prosecutors and the bien pensants had alleged — had helped pave the way for violence. Arguably, because criticism of immigration had been suppressed at the state's insistence, it was such a shock when Pim Fortuyn brought it to the surface that the lid blew off the pressure cooker — just not in the way most people had imagined. The corpses, after all, weren't those of Moroccans or Turks. It was Fortuyn and Van Gogh who had to be carried to an early grave.

Anyway, I was reminded of the Janmaat episode because as far as I can tell, few Germans — or Americans — currently give a toss about the imprisonment of Ernst Zündel, whose trial just got underway.

I derive no more pleasure from defending Zündel — an accused anti-Semite who claims the Holocaust never took place — than I do from defending Flat Earthers, or those who believe that they saw Elvis shopping for Depends at the local SuperSave the other day. Kooks will be kooks.

But why would a civilized society put anybody behind bars for clinging to admittedly outrageous ideas? Where's the damage, other than to freedom of speech itself?

As far as we know, there's no evidence that anything Zündel ever said or wrote led directly to a crime — unless the words themselves were a crime, as German prosecutors indeed allege. Well, that's a big, fat Schande. The very notion should be instinctively repulsive to anyone who takes free speech seriously. (That would exclude Canadian authorities, who extradicted Zündel to Germany half a year ago after a kangaroo court made a cruel mockery of Canada's justice system.)

Is Germany's commitment to not be caught on the wrong side of history again so frail, so shamefully wimpy, that the country must fight the specter of fascism with show trials that Hitler himself, back in the 1930s, would have been all too pleased with?

Comments

[mare]

A good thing you Godwin-ed your own post in the last paragraph.

Denial of the Holocaust is a crime in Germany. Just as selling 'Mein Kampf'. In the US free speech also has its limits. For example I can't say or write "k*ll Bush" for instance, or I could be send to one of the CIA's secret prison's without any trial, fair or not.

I know you don't want any laws, but Free Speech is an American thing, and not always a good one. In Germany there is no such thing as free speech. For many people, including me, all those web-sites hosted in the US and claiming that the Holocaust did not take place and that 6 million victims is a lie, are hard to swallow. You might not lose any sleep over it, but some people, who've lost family members during that same Holocaust that didn't exist, do.

[Rogier]

Mare:

Not to be impolite, but I don't care much about what you find "hard to swallow," even though I agree with you on an important point -- I find Holocaust deniers distasteful little cretins. If it makes you feel any better, by the way, I consider what *I* find distasteful a case of neither here nor there, too. It's just not relevant. Keep in mind that Zündel and his posse probably find what WE have to say distasteful, too. Does that mean they get to shut US up? Does that mean they get to throw US in jail? Are you saying that anyone whose feelings are hurt deeply and genuinely enough should get the chance to muzzle the offender in question? Are we going to have a contest about who has the thinnest skin; about who can most convincingly emote a supremely 'worthy' form of moral indignation?

Why do you get to have rights that Zündel doesn't?

If freedom of speech only applies to popular beliefs but not to so-called dangerous or impopular ones, then it's a completely useless concept. Maybe that's fine with you. I don't know.

By the way, your "Kill Bush" argument is a bit unconvincing, as Zündel has not called for the killing of anybody or anything (unless the prosecutors know something I don't). Sure, he's a first-class creep, but if being a creep were a crime, half the world's population would be in prison right now. Words are words. Bad words can be countered and nullified with better ones. Sick arguments can be ameliorated by healthy ones. Words are letters. They are not violence.

[Matt]

I'm not going to get excited when a nation (such as Germany) that doesn't respect free speech...um...doesn't respect free speech.

Dog bites man. Politician betrays constituents. Government grows more powerful and intrusive. Not news.

[John palubiski]

Umm.... I've a question. What's a "schande"?

[John palubiski]

The one liability all racists have is a crying lakc of intelligence.

The best way to deal with Zundel is to let him rant and rave openly so that poeple can see he's not all there.

You know I never had anything against "Calypso" Louis Farakhan until, several years ago, I listened to a speech he gave in Washington during his "million man march".

Boy! Let me tell ya! I've sworn off calypso!