Time for Germany to republish Mein Kampf?

[hellheaven1987]

An interesting BBC article.

here is no law against publishing Mein Kampf in Germany, but the copyright holders have until now refused permission. Now they are planning to publish a new edition of Hitler's book themselves and Stephan J Kramer, of Germany's Central Council of Jews, agrees the time is right.

Contrary to what some people may think, there is, at present, no general prohibition against the publication of Adolf Hitler's book.

The reason it has been possible to ban new editions is purely technical. After World War II, the state of Bavaria became the owner of parts of Hitler's property which had been confiscated by the occupying powers - including the copyright to the dictator's publications.

Thus Bavaria has been able, so far, to use its discretion and block new editions. However, the copyright expires in 2015.

The only imaginable way to continue the existing ban beyond 2015 would be explicit legislation to this effect - a complicated process which might even run into constitutional difficulties and fail to clear the hurdle of the Constitutional Court.

Source

Do you think it is time for Germany to allow the publishment of Mein Kampf, especially when the number of neo-Nazis increases sharply in Germany (and all Europe) in past two years?

[Claudius Gothicus]

I think it's simply irrelevant, one way or another.

[The Juggernaut]

It's not like people who really want to read it can't find it. All any sort of ban is doing is increasing interest and controversy over what is a rather poorly written book. To be honest, I think it should be recommended reading for history classes, just so people know how delusional Hitler really was.

[Menelik_I]

An interesting BBC article.



Source

Do you think it is time for Germany to allow the publishment of Mein Kampf, especially when the number of neo-Nazis increases sharply in Germany (and all Europe) in past two years?

Only if Germans are so lazy that they can't be bothered to look for a digital copy on a NeoNazi website.

[Stavroforos]

I don't see why Germans should be banned from reading their own history.

[The Vitiated Mind]

Won't make any difference .

[Ferrets54]

Although this may be provocative at first, I don't think there can be any harm in it. It's an irrelevancy in the internet age, anyway.

[Condottiere 40K]

The problem is more likely in future, when someone decides to do a rewrite to improve the literary tone and make it fit more into their agenda.

[Caelifer_1991]

You seem to think that neo-nazis are either willing or capable of reading...

[The Reverend]

Do you think it is time for Germany to allow the publishment of Mein Kampf, especially when the number of neo-Nazis increases sharply in Germany (and all Europe) in past two years?

If anything publishing it could counter the supposed increase in 'Neo-Nazis'. Once the text is more widely debated in the German public sphere, these deluded and rather absurd young men might come to realise how wrong they are.

Nowhere in his message does the Fuhrer encourage the thuggish, base, crude and vile behaviour one sees in 'Neo-Nazis'.

[Treize]

I want to make a remark about Greeks but I don't want to get infracted by our humourless moderators..

[s.rwitt]

Germany's Central Council of Jews?

[fkizz]

I didn't even know it was forbidden.

Well depends on how the book is presented I guess. Though in information age, any german can acess mein kampf in internet.

[brandbll]

Pffftt, go ahead and republish it, it's freaking torture to read. I got about 100 pages through and then decided i'd rather be the mid tier of a man pyramid at Abu Ghraib than go any further. If they have an audio version i'll revisit it, otherwise i just don't know if i can do it. Hitler's awful writing style and his constant meglomaniacal banter is just too much.

[Col. Tartleton]

Germany's Central Council of Jews?

I don't even know how these boards form. Plus the name is just blatant Zionist Conspiracy baiting.

It reminds me of Mark Levin being pissed a the Anti Defamation League. He's like "Who the hell are these guys? I'm a Jew. A lot of my friends are Jews. We didn't vote for you. You don't speak for us."

He was mad because they were talking up Obama or something where he was clearly going against Israeli interests by suggesting pre 1967 borders in an official capacity and naturally it pisses him off that an organization supposedly dedicated to combating bigotry, protecting civil rights, and advocating for Jewish people and Israel are going to be playing politics which don't even align with those objectives.

On topic, I don't know what scares me more: How insane Hitler was or that it was attractive to others. I mean there were Jews and other minorities who supported Hitler... Actually reading the book combats the first (better to read a crazy person's words than to be told they are crazy), but there isn't anything you can do about the other.

[G-Megas-Doux]

Crazy people attract crazy people. Who goes out to read it will agree with it if they already have a similar agenda as they identify with it. Otherwise it is pointless. I dont need to read the book because his actions show Hitler to be a mass murderer and highly effective nut job.

[Hakkapeliitta]

I've heard that there's a guy in Berlin IIRC who does public readings of Mein Kampf as a comedy performance, and that it's a popular act. It's just that horribly written, and full of crazy.

[Condottiere 40K]

If the performance had a Chaplin/Great Dictator spin, it should be hilarious.

[Tankfriend]

I've heard that there's a guy in Berlin IIRC who does public readings of Mein Kampf as a comedy performance, and that it's a popular act. It's just that horribly written, and full of crazy.

You mean Serdar Somuncu, I guess? He did some 1400+ performances between 1996 and 2006, before he turned to other topics again. He usually had to take precautions and perform with bulletproof vest and police cover, as far as I know, and some neonazis even stormed one of his performances but were literally outperformed by Somuncu until the police arrived.

Another funny (and interesting!) thing that I heard him tell in an interview is that sometimes he supposedly had neonazis in the audience getting teared up over him reading their "great example" before realizing that they were listening to someone of Turkish origin...

As for officially publishing Mein Kampf, I'd even go so far as to say that it should be obligatory literature in school as part of a critical-discussion-course of the book (and other books, possibly). The way things are these days, critical reception of media is very uncommon in school.

[Mangalore]

Germany's Central Council of Jews?

Central councils are interest groups of certain religious or ethnic background that have a particular legal standing within the German state aka the Central Council of Jews is the biggest representative of the Jewish community towards the government. They usually are the highest level of state or community based organizations on the federak level.

The same kind of organization exists for Muslims (though they have several splintered groups and the central council is only one), Sinti and Roma and some others.

Overall the translation sounds stupid, the term is less pompous in German. It means central in the sense of coordinating a bunch of other community organizations who joined into this one to be represented by it.