What Price Free Speech

[patrickcaturday]

Ministers approve: Calling someone Nazi would be illegal
Bill stipulating that use of Nazi symbols, nicknames would draw fine, imprisonment passes ministerial committee, to be brought to Knesset approval

Moran Azulay Published: 01.13.14, 00:13 / Israel News



MK Shimon Ohayon (Likud-Beiteinu), who proposed the bill, told Ynet: "The rise of neo-Nazi groups that use these symbols poses a danger to Jews around the world, but as long as the State of Israel doesn’t ban them, we cannot complain about their appearance around the world."


According to the bill, the use of word Nazi will be forbidden, as well as Nazi-related nicknames. The ban relates to both verbal and written slander, targeting an individual, a group of people or a corporation.

Wearing striped attire reminiscent of Jews' uniform in Nazi camps or a yellow Star of David, or any use of swastikas could lead to six months in prison and NIS 100,000 fine.

Ministers approve: Calling someone Nazi would be illegal - Israel News, Ynetnews

While I personally am opposed to the use of the word Nazi ( mainly because of its ugliness and also because the people who use it rarely know what the word means ) this seems to me to be more of a free speech issue !!! I would appreciate peoples comments on this aspect.


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[Friends]

On the internet one can find posters who admire Adolf Hitler, who express regret over the defeat of Nazi Germany, and who hate Jews.

This is disgusting to me, but intriguing from a psychological standpoint. There do seem to be white men who are angry about their economic circumstances, and who prefer to direct their anger at non whites and Jews, rather than at the largely white Gentile plutocracy that is getting richer as they get poorer. They seem to think that by getting angry at rich white Gentiles they revel themselves to be sore losers, but by hating non whites and Jews they pose as defenders of western civilization and the white race.

This is a syndrome that bears watching if the standard of living for most white men continues to stagnate or decline. the Great Depression gave us Roosevelt. It gave Germany Hitler.

I do not believe it would be a good idea to suppress these sentiments, however. I would rather debate them openly.

Also, I am afraid that efforts to suppress neo Nazism would segue into efforts to suppress biological explanations of intelligence differences and crime.

 

[Zagg]

Oppression is oppression.

 

[oldfart]

While I personally am opposed to the use of the word Nazi ( mainly because of its ugliness and also because the people who use it rarely know what the word means ) this seems to me to be more of a free speech issue !!! I would appreciate peoples comments on this aspect.

I personally believe that the remedy to bad or objectionable speech is not censorship, but good speech. There are many posters who indeed have an excellent grasp of what totalitarianism is, be it fascist, national socialist, communist, or any other ideological variety. When they encounter things that properly should be called Nazi, I hope they label it as such.

I think your objection to the misuse of the term can only be remedied by proper use of the term and pointing out misuse when it occurs. Not having the discussion merely reinforces ignorance and makes more people prone to accept such words as mere epitaphs. That is a tragic mistake.

 

[jwoodie]

I do not wish to make light of the atrocities committed by the Third Reich, but Nazism was little more than an excuse to make Hitler the emperor of greater Germany. Today, its proponents are nothing more than a few disaffected lowlifes who couldn't describe their political philosophy if their lives depended on it. Giving them undue publicity does nothing more than encourage the use of swastikas by those who wish to see their petty vandalism covered on TV.

 

[Tor Hershman]

What price the lack of free speech???