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German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

reuters.com

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Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#91

Post by sintaxi »

Grollicus wrote: post #85
olivermarks wrote: post #70

That term 'hate speech' - what does it actually mean? This seems like another assault on free speech to me and there is a danger in limiting the online Overton Window to a massive bland snooze fest. The current joy of the internet is being able to read all sorts of perspectives from 'sensible' to radical and I really hope that continues...I worry for all the citizen journalists and investigators who have been so magn…

'hate speech' is an oversimplification chosen by the media. The law acually forces large social media companies in germany to remove illegal* content from their site within one week. Context is that Facebook has been ignoring illegal* content on their site and generally made an ass out of german law enforcement, so they got a law to rein them in. *illegal: libel, Volksverhetzung ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volksv…

Are you saying facebook is ignoring court orders from the German authorities to have content removed?

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#92

Post by jwommack »

everdev wrote: post #47
dilap wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no dilema. It's just an excuse for control. Letting Nazis speak will not actually convert modern society into Nazis.

It happened 70 years ago. Obama has a good line, something similar to: If you were in a restaurant in 1930s Vienna surrounded by great art, music and intellectuals you may have been forgiven for thinking that wonderful setting would continue on forever. Unfortunately, a short time later millions we're dying on a continent engulfed in war. When the stock market is up we think it'll keep going up. When we have peace we…

This is more than a bit of revisionism, or possibly he just didn't know much about the German/Austrian interwar period.

It's well documented, and covered in most of the histories regarding the rise of Nazism, that a not insignificant part of why the party was able to gain traction was that there was already an environment of political violence and suppression. The SPD, KPD, and Freikorps were fighting in the streets well before the Nazis were relevant (the 20s. The fighting dates back to the end of WW1 and through the Weimar period).

There was similar violence in Austria at the time including a small civil war in the mid 30s, probably not what one would call a great and peacful environment for appreciating art and music.

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#93

Post by cmurf »

Twitter's TOS cannot be taken seriously when it comes to abusive speech. They apply their rules arbitrarily.

While I think it's never inappropriate to punch a Nazi (self avowed variety anyway), I'm definitely on the side of letting Nazis have free speech. It's best when the cockroaches are scurrying around in public, rather than hiding in the wood work. And as it turns out, the U.S. has a long history of fascists engaged in crimes, theft and murder, and have plotted the overthrow of the government - same as Germany where these ideas are illegal.

So which method actually inhibits Nazis? Neither. But at least one is cheaper, and at least with one you've got an example that most every one else, not merely just the government, will point to as what not to be. Unless you wanna get punched.

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#94

Post by AcerbicZero »

MikkoFinell wrote: post #27
everdev wrote: post #8

This is exactly the moral dilemma with free speech vs hate speech. Do you use fascist techniques like criminalizing speech to stop the spread of fascist ideas? Or do you simply hope fascist ideas don't take hold? The former is a scary slippery slope but Germany doesn't have a great track record with the latter.

Fascists aren't what they used to be. They used to be a far-right fringe, but fascism lately is more of a thing on the left.

I think this is more an issue with the lack of nuance in a Left-Right political spectrum. The more axis and metrics used to define a political position the easier it tends to be to to compare it to other positions.

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#95

Post by Houshalter »

icebraining wrote: post #86
Houshalter wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These people aren't "nazis" or "fascists". They have beliefs that would have been considered completely normal and moderate in 1940's US. The people that defeated the Nazis would be considered Nazis today. It's obscene how far left the overton window has moved. Opposing immigration is a pretty long way from Nazism.

Accusing the police of trying “to appease the barbaric, Muslim, rapist hordes of men” by putting out a tweet in Arabic is not just "opposing immigration".

Seriously though, how do you oppose immigration without criticizing the people who are immigrating? The comment may have been hyperbolic, sure. But it's completely reasonable to be concerned about immigrants raising the crime rate. Or having objectionable cultural beliefs and changing your country's culture.

Look at it from an outside view. Tibet was taken over by China and they are intentionally flooding it with Chinese immigrants. The goal is to destroy Tibetan culture and eventually assimilate or replace the Tibetan people. Liberals seem pretty upset by this and even consider it literal genocide. If a Tibetan is angry at Chinese immigrants and says something insulting to them, is that hate speech?

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#96

Post by guelo »

everdev wrote: post #8

This is exactly the moral dilemma with free speech vs hate speech. Do you use fascist techniques like criminalizing speech to stop the spread of fascist ideas? Or do you simply hope fascist ideas don't take hold? The former is a scary slippery slope but Germany doesn't have a great track record with the latter.

fascism != authoritarianism

fascism == authoritarianism && nationalism && racism

Censorship is done by authoritarians of all stripes.

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#97

Post by LoSboccacc »

nine_k wrote: post #63
everdev wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It happened 70 years ago. Obama has a good line, something similar to: If you were in a restaurant in 1930s Vienna surrounded by great art, music and intellectuals you may have been forgiven for thinking that wonderful setting would continue on forever. Unfortunately, a short time later millions we're dying on a continent engulfed in war. When the stock market is up we think it'll keep going up. When we have peace we…

It would be naive to ascribe Nazi propaganda alone the role of the fire starter in WWII. The problem is that the Nazi propaganda fell on ears that eagerly wanted to believe it, so the Nazi leader was democratically elected before he seized the absolute power. If Nazi propaganda might have any noticeable success in today's Germany (or US, or wherever), it's not because of some crackpots from stormfront; they are a con…

the cycle continues as follow: politicians ignore the masses pleads, populist start selling untenable dreams, the politician still refuse to aknowledge the existence of the problem of that partcular generation, a reaction shifts the power to populist, populist cannot really realize whatever they sold because the masses have a fractured interpretation of their message, populistvsearch for internal or external enemies to redirect blame and direct the mounting hate, the society fractures, strife follows until the society can reunite under a single ideal or gets repressed, at which point it's either a new longer or shorter cycle

of course we somehow manage to always blame the masses or the populists, but they rarely are the ones initiating the cycle

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#98

Post by LoSboccacc »

Grollicus wrote: post #66
dilap wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no dilema. It's just an excuse for control. Letting Nazis speak will not actually convert modern society into Nazis.

Actually you should look at the flip side of the coin: We - Germans - just decided that letting Nazis not speak their hurtful lies harms nothing of value.

nazism is not a well defined concept, nor is hate, you'll figure it out soon enough

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#99

Post by Grollicus »

steveeq1 wrote: post #80
Grollicus wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually you should look at the flip side of the coin: We - Germans - just decided that letting Nazis not speak their hurtful lies harms nothing of value.

Would you hold that same opinion if the thing said were, say, violent american black rap lyrics?

I don't understand your meaning, sorry.

Do you mean would I want to see 'violent american black rap lyrics' banned? Depends on what is said I guess? If theres a song about 'kill all the jews' we've had enough of that shit here 70 years ago.

Generally german courts are very narrow about what is Volksverhetzung. If you run afoul of it you are very far away from any sensible discussion. The law is basically "don't (1)incite violence (2)against Minorities in a way that is (3)able to disturb the public peace". These three things are impossible to do without generally being a dangerous ass. We don't want people like that.

Re: German hate speech law tested as Twitter blocks satire account

#100

Post by rbehrends »

mentos wrote: post #38
shaki-dora wrote: post #26

That's obviously stupid. But it's day two, and Twitter is likely to get their procedures in order, just like they (and Facebook etc) have previously done when implementing their own content policies. The law applies only to a narrowly defined class of hate speech. Statements that fall under the definition have always been illegal. People always ran the risk of prosecution when calling for genocide etc. As such, nobod…

Hate Speech Isn't Real | Change My Mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0hPd2gMlGw I found Steven Crowder's arguments here to really challenge my thoughts on what is free speech and what is hate speech. Give that a watch if you have the time.

The problem here is that "hate speech" is an anglosphere term and doesn't have an exact correspondence in German law.

What is commonly called "hate speech" in the English-language media is §130 (1) of the penal code (part of the set of "Volksverhetzung" offenses). It's a poor fit because:

* The law can in principle apply to any identifiable subgroup of the population or any individual as a member of such a subgroup. Subgroups defined by their ethnic characteristics or religious beliefs are listed as examples, but the list is not exhaustive (though of course the group of Bavarian vintage car collectors is unlikely to be a target).

* It's not related to the motives of the speakers. It's about the effects the speech creates, specifically threats against the public peace, such as incitement to and encouragement of violence (unlike in America, incitement of lawless action need not be imminent) or creating an atmosphere through slander where members of a subgroup have reason to not feel safe anymore. If you want an example or why, look up what Julius Streicher was convicted of in Nuremberg and how it contributed to the Holocaust.

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