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If you wanted to go the shortest way, you could just say that Boris Palmer sees the slogan "Nazis out" critically, and you'd know that it's right and good. But because we have more time, we can take a closer look at what's going on for a sad debate since the ZDF journalist Nicole Diekmann tweeted "Nazis out" at the beginning of the year.

First of all, the most German debate ever, both in terms of the foolishness of asking what exactly each of the two words means, both individually and in combination, and in terms of the widespread willingness to tolerate misanthropy and in the Do not prefer to express solidarity with anti-fascists.

The excitement around Nicole Diekmann's tweet had something to do with the fact that Diekmann made the joke on demand, what exactly was a Nazi, "anyone who does not choose the Greens" and irony on the Internet always thin ice is. But not only. It also had to do with the fact that there is a problem in a country where people feel attacked by a "Nazis out".

A simple saying

Of course, not just problems. In addition to hostility and threats, the journalist also received a lot of solidarity from all sorts of people, from individuals to the media. Boris Becker tweeted "Nazis out", the German Football Association as well. Deutschlandfunk Kultur also lined up - but then shortly thereafter in a broadcast on Deutschlandfunk to discuss whether that was right. "A tweet for all trolls and rights. #NazisRaus", that was the text that Nicola Balkenhol, Germany radio online boss, did not succeed in retrospect, but she said after all, that you actually only have to agree on the Basic Law to see that in Germany there should be no room for Nazis.

It's really easy. "Nazis out" is a simple saying, but that's what demos say. You do not go to a demo and exclaim "Did you actually know that denazification in Germany did not work out so well and that in politics and the judiciary important offices are still occupied by people who make statements in which sometimes group-related misanthropy can be traced and if we do not want to discuss it over there, I would very much ask for it ". And last but not least, "Nazis out" is also of convincing clarity, because "foreigners out" is also very simple.

Nice controversial

For Germany 2019 is "Nazis out" but already controversial. Some ask, whether from naivety or trollery: Yes, where to go? Out of Germany? Out in the fresh air? Yes, where is it? Suggestions: Out of political institutions, out of the police, out of the schools and universities, out of the lives of people who experience racism every day. That would be a start.

Would you think so. Instead, it is explained once through the features section, which is supposedly problematic at "Nazis out".

  • On "Online Time" Mariam Lau wrote about "Nazis out" as an example of linguistic brutalization and a "dangerous fatalism".
  • "The term Nazi has become a battle concept," noted the "Cicero". So when? Maybe with his invention? "You have to decide," wrote Antje Hildebrandt, "Solidarity for a journalist pretending to care about the future of democracy, or understanding those who feel insulted as Nazis? Option A costs just one Like, Option B already requires some backbone. " Backbone does that mean recently? Or rather the rather blatant will to cuddle with rights rather than overcome the envy of a colleague who is ridiculed as "Jeanne d'Arc in the fight against law"?
  • On "World Online" it was said that the "Nazis out" -parole was "contrary to fundamental law": the author Richard Schröder managed the remarkable twist, by the fact that Nazis are against the fundamental law, umzuschwenken on the idea, "Nazis out" to say "Literally" a "call for constitutional break", because it would be suggested here, Nazis should be banned abroad, which is legally not possible in Germany. In addition, Mathias Döpfner claimed that the slogan "Nazis out" would "play down National Socialism in order to minimize the Holocaust" without any explanation as to what magical way this should work again.

Who does not do anything, has lost

Anyone who says "Nazis out", so another criticism, allows Nazis to make a victim. "Those who are right-wing extremists use the complaint about the 'club' for self-harmlessness," wrote the Süddeutsche. Yes of course. Right-wing extremists use EVERYTHING to self-harmlessness and to stylize themselves the victim of a supposed mainstream - but that does not mean they do not have to fight them. Those who do not do anything anymore, which Nazis can not somehow turn around to portray themselves as persecuted, will do nothing against Nazis and will have lost.

Thus, the reactions to a simple tweet show how one can wrongfully turn in a political debate: in highly curious textual interpretations of an old and legitimate slogan, rather than in solidarity with those who are acutely threatened with violence. All this did not get any better as a result of the attack on AfD politician Frank Magnitz: Ulf Poschardt wrote of a "black day for democracy" in the "Welt", as if not every day was a black day for democracy Bundestag rushes or people are attacked because of appearance or origin on the street.

Stand together against Nazis

The freelance author Veronika Kracher, who also wrote for the "taz", described on Twitter the attack on Magnitz as "consistent execution of #NazisRaus". You do not have to find that good, but you do not have to write a text like "taz" editor-in-chief Georg Löwisch in the "taz" blog, that you distance yourself from it. Anyway, no one decides that everything that freelance writers do on social media is representative of all the media they've ever written for (then SPIEGEL would have had to justify its cat fetish). The author Kracher had already at the time when Löwisch's text appeared, already received mass threats of Nazi violence and had a lecture on anti-Semitism, which had been planned for a long time to be moved to a secret location, for security reasons.

The "taz" itself was attacked Monday morning by activist activists who attempted to put up posters on the building, physically assaulting a "taz" employee who tried to stop them. Nobody who publicly opposes the law is safe from being attacked. It is all the more important that those standing together find that nowhere should be a place for Nazis.