German City of Dresden declares it has 'Nazi emergency' - Alex Eberhardt

German City of Dresden declares it has 'Nazi emergency'

Lucia Suarez Sang, Fox News

I don't have a link, I found this on my iPad.

This article talks about a city in Germany that has declared a Nazi emergency. There have apparently been rises in Nazi and far-right activity that has even led to violence. The authorities of the town have stated they want to reinforce and keep democratic values and restore the importance of keeping racisim and the sort away. They havent explained what exactly they are going to do about it, but it brings up a question that I always like to discuss. When, if ever, is it ok to keep people from expressing their view points? And in what way is it acceptable to do so? Are some opinions too horrible to even be allowed?

Again, I get to bring my Philosophy classes into this again. In philosophy of law, we just went over the National Socialist Party of America vs The Village of Skokie case. Very interesting case that is really hard to make decision on. It puts us (or at least me) in a very difficult position. It conflicts two very important values of mine. The first value, is the value of people. I highly value people and so an ideology that doesn't value people, even if only a specific group, is something I cannot by any means agree with. It is also something that I want other people to agree with (and thankfully most do). The other value that this situation challenge is the value of being able to freely express whatever opinion you want. Now when it comes to violence over an ideology, there really are not any arguments that have yet convinced me, and it seems most people share the same experience as me. But in the case of Skokie, the Nazi members wanted to do a demonstration in public that was supposed to be completely peaceful. But since Skokie was a village with a particularly high Jewish population, and at the time had many holocaust survivors in residence there, it understandably inspired a lot of controversy. If you allow the Nazis to give their demonstration, you are allowing the spreading of an ideology that has proven to be extremely dangerous, something the world is still healing from today. But if you prevent the Nazi's from demonstrating, you are claiming that not all expression is allowed, and not all ideas are truly equal, which can be an equally dangerous ideology. We can't just say we will tolerate all opinions if we censor any. If we do that then our policy is "you are allowed to express whatever you want as long as we like it".

There are many routes you take to explore this topic but no one has quite yet figured it out inarguably. And with the internet today, things are getting very interesting.




by Alex Eberhardt