It's illegal to insult anyone in Germany, and has been for a long time. Libel, slander, and insults are all criminal (not civil) offences. I know what you're thinking: "That sounds crazy" - Yeah, it kinda is. In practice this is rarely enforced, as the offended party must file a formal complaint and most people have better things to do.

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autoexec 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

> "That sounds crazy" - Yeah, it kinda is. In practice this is rarely enforced

Generally, selective enforcement is itself a huge problem. That might not actually be an issue in this instance though if the only thing preventing enforcement is the lack of a formal complaint and assuming that the complaint process is easily accessible to everyone (not requiring money to file, and without other barriers that might prevent certain people from filing but not others). It's still a terrible idea to make it illegal to insult others, but "rarely enforced" may not be the red flag it usually is.

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tormeh 2 days ago | parent [-]

Well, time is money, right? If someone files a complaint and goes through with whatever proceedings ensue you can bet that it's not a single mom working a full-time job. For police officers, on the other hand, enforcing this law on behalf of themselves is part of their job. So in practice this law is grossly unfair. It does lead to a greater level of decorum in public debate than in most other countries, which is nice, but it's not a fair law by any means.

	▲	kubb 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		I think you're holding the German law to a much higher standard than many hold their legal systems. On the other side of the pond cases are routinely decided by who can afford the right lawyer or litigation costs. So yeah, it's very admirable that you want German law to be perfect, but you've gotta admit how it currently ranks up against real-world points of reference other than the ideal.

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Amezarak 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

German prosecutors actually did a bizarre and out-of-touch (for an American audience) interview with 60 Minutes recently where they proudly declare they're going to bring order to the Internet and how things like calling politicians "dicks"[1] is rightfully VERBOTEN.

> But it was a 2021 case involving a local politician named Andy Grote that captured the country's attention. Grote complained about a tweet, that called him a "pimmel," a German word for the male anatomy. That triggered a police raid and accusations of excessive censorship by the government. As prosecutors explained to us, in Germany, it's OK to debate politics online. But it can be a crime to call anyone a "pimmel," even a politician.

Naturally, it's necessary to arrest people for being mean and/or expressing VERBOTEN political beliefs on the Internet so that...uh...everyone will feel free to express their opinions.

> Josephine Ballon: This is not only a fear. It's already taking place, already half of the internet users in Germany are afraid to express their political opinion, and they rarely participate in public debates online anymore. Half of the internet users.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/policing-speech-online-germany-...

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tormeh 2 days ago | parent [-]

Germany does not protect free speech the way the US does. You're free to voice any opinion, but the exact wordings in which you are allowed to do it are restricted. You are allowed to say "I hate Merz" but not "Merz is a piece of garbage".

I'm not saying this is good, but it's not recent and it does not prevent free communication of ideas.

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pyuser583 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Is Germany consistent about this? Is it equally forbidden to say “Merz is a piece of garbage” and “Weidel is a piece of garbage?”

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istjohn 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You can't expect people to express themselves freely when a single mistatement could land them in prison.

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tick_tock_tick 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> You're free to voice any opinion

What a bold lie. There are plenty of opinions that are literally illegal to voice such as Nazism.

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fao_ 2 days ago | parent [-]

Why do you want to voice or otherwise condone voicing Nazism?

	▲	tick_tock_tick 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		That's just the easiest example that no one is even going to try and dispute to prove them wrong.
	▲	pyuser583 2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Why are you equating “Germany outlaws supporting Nazism” with supporting Nazism?

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Amezarak 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

As we have seen, it is very easy to declare certain beliefs beyond contestation and any disagreement with them as insulting/inciting hate/etc.

That's why freedom of speech must entail the freedom to say things people find offensive, or there's no free communication of ideas at all. The state and ruling elites will determine that there is a set of proscribed ideas and a set of approved ideas and yours fall into the wrong set.

Banning speech and ideas also accelerates extremist - Weimar had very strong hate speech laws and prosecuted and imprisoned Nazis many many times. [1] The Nazis turned around and used the same laws on their enemies. Then the Stasi with similar motives used similar means. Suppressing speech in the name of order seems to be a German cultural value.

[1] https://www.thefire.org/news/blogs/eternally-radical-idea/wo...

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tormeh 18 hours ago | parent | next [-]

This is generally the mainstream take on it. These laws are not generally seen as good. However, if dictatorship comes back, the law is meaningless, so what a dictator would use a law for is a moot point.

As for whether it's ingrained in German culture, quite possibly! These laws originate from the 1500s.

	▲	Amezarak 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Dictators, despite the name, cannot do whatever they want. That’s even moreso the case with long democratic or republican histories and in large modern states with enormous political machineries. They require backing from large swaths of the population and have to subvert the existing institutions to their will, which requires a delicate hand. Already having a legal infrastructure and social expectation that offensive speech is criminal is an enormous help to dictators.

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kubb 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

“Country X should change it’s laws because Y” is a belief you can have even if Y is not shared by enough people in Germany to make that change.

Claiming that Germany recently introduced a law prohibiting criticism of politicians is an admission of belief in something demonstrably incompatible with reality.

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ThrowawayTestr a day ago | parent [-]

My mistake. My comment should have been "doesn't Germany have laws criminalizing the insulting of politicians?"

	▲	kubb a day ago \| parent [-]
		Still the answer would have been “no”. If you want to keep both narrative and truthfulness, you should ask “doesn’t Germany have laws criminalizing insults, and someone had to pay a fine after insulting a politician”. Still not very authoritarian on a global scale. We have countries where politicians are exempt from criminal prosecution via presidential pardons and countries that kill dissidents. These countries form alliances and align their foreign policy.