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The thing about Europe: it's the actual land of the free now

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160 points cruzcampo | 1 comments | 11 Apr 25 08:04 UTC | HN request time: 0.203s | source
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MrBuddyCasino ◴[11 Apr 25 08:44 UTC] No.43651689[source]▶
> "Europeans can say almost anything they want, both in theory and in practice."

David Bendels has been threatened with prison time and sentenced to seven months of probation for a Twitter meme [0]. It is the harshest sentence ever handed down to a journalist for a speech crime in the Federal Republic of Germany.

This is the tweet, poking fun at the German minister of the interior Nancy Faeser (the sign says "I hate free speech"):

https://x.com/Deu_Kurier/status/1762895292075053348

[0] https://www-welt-de.translate.goog/politik/deutschland/artic...

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mehwoot ◴[11 Apr 25 08:52 UTC] No.43651768[source]▶
He claims it was poking fun. The court found differently.

> Bendels claimed the meme, posted by his newspaper's X account, was satirical.

> But the judge in the case said during the verdict that Bendels published a 'deliberately untrue and contemptuous statement about Interior Minister Ms. Faeser (...) that would not be recognizable to the unbiased reader and is likely to significantly impair her public work'.

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1. MrBuddyCasino ◴[11 Apr 25 08:59 UTC] No.43651829[source]▶
If a picture of Nancy Faeser holding a "I hate free speech" sign can be ruled to be a "deliberately untrue and contemptuous statement", satire has become effectively illegal.