An angry American traveller recently landed in serious legal hot water in Germany after allegedly calling federal police officers “Nazis” while involved in a dispute at Frankfurt International Airport.
According to the police, a 49-year-old professor became “unreasonable and irritated” when she was told that she had too many liquids in her carry-on during security screening. As the matter escalated she allegedly called them “f–ing bastards” and “f–ing German Nazi police.”
But according to her she never called the police “Nazis,” and they had apparently misheard her when she wondered aloud why she was caught rather than the “Nazi-looking dude” with a “Hitler’s youth haircut” behind her.
As a result of the dispute, the woman now faces preliminary criminal proceedings on suspicion of slander, along with a $260-bill (€207) for legal expenses.
Implications of The Nazi Insult
Nazi insults have a long history in postwar Germany as it refers to the horrors of the Third Reich .
According to Heidrun Kämper, an expert in cultural linguistics and terminology at the Institute for the German Language in Mannheim, calling someone a Nazi invokes the entire range of issues associated with “a totalitarian dictatorship, the belief in conforming to one reality.”
He added that such an insult brings up “the oppression known under that type of state.”
Differentiating between Slander and Freedom Of Speech
The use of the insult still tests the line between freedom of speech and slander in the country .
However two lawsuits in 2017 provided more leeway to satire and political freedom.
In the case the AfD’s Alice Weidel a Hamburg court dismissed her cease-and-desist request against a show which had referred to a “Nazi bitch,” as it was clearly satire.
The other case was against Green politician Volker Beck who lost a slander case wherein a far-right politician had called him Obergauleiter of hordes of members of the Nazi paramilitary SA.
The country’s top court overturned an earlier lower court ruling as the two politicians had been involved in a sparring match, and therefore the insult was considered polemical rather than slanderous.
However these cases involves politicians and laypersons may have more cause to take offense.
Not Illegal But Considered Slander
The German penal code holds slander as a criminal offense. For example an impatient driver who shouted “You old a–hole,” was penalised with a €1,600 fine in 2016.
However comparing people to Nazis is in a class of its own under German law. Law professor Manfred Heinrich of Kiel University noted that calling some only a Nazi has more to it than the insult ‘you’re dumb’ , as calling someone ‘Nazi’ “implies unscrupulous acts and barbarism” .
Heinrich further pointed out that Germany has outlawed the glorification of Nazism, but there is no actual law forbidding calling someone a Nazi.
Under German law “hurting someone’s honor” or hurting someone’s reputation via verbal abuse is illegal and this constitutes slander, which includes calling someone a Nazi.
