"Police said the nationwide raids followed investigations into 342 people who had posted songs by skinhead bands on the Internet. The songs contained lyrics inciting racial hatred, the crime agency said.

Police said they would carry out 333 raids by the end of Wednesday at the homes of people who posted songs on a music sharing Web site.

"Inciting racial hatred is more than just a petty crime," said Federal Crime Office President Joerg Ziercke. "Skinhead music groups create an enemy image and help propagate extreme right ideas."

Inciting racial hatred, displaying Nazi emblems like the swastika and performing the stiff-armed Hitler salute used under Adolf Hitler are crimes punishable by imprisonment in Germany, the country which carried out the Holocaust.

The Federal Crime Office started clamping down on Internet trading of music inciting neo-Nazis to hate and attack Jews and foreigners in 2001.

The songs convey Nazi ideology and contain lyrics such as these from the group Tonstoerung (Sound Interruption):

"Sharpen your long knives on the pavements; delve them into Jewish bodies."

More than 100 people have been killed in racist violence in Germany since unification in 1990. Most of the attacks are random and involve skinheads picking on foreigners in the street.

Property has also been attacked. Swastikas have been daubed on Jewish gravestones, bricks thrown at Turkish kebab shops and firebombs hurled at asylum hostels. Most synagogues have 24-hour police guards.

German police raided homes of more than 300 people on Wednesday whom they suspect them of sharing neo-Nazi music files on the Internet."

Read the full story at:
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/internet/03/25/bc.germany.nazis.reut/index.html

As someone with both German and Jewish heritage, I find the actions of Neo-Nazis and skinheads reprehensible, but I think this story has another, more subtle message...
"The Federal Crime Office started clamping down on Internet trading of music inciting neo-Nazis to hate and attack Jews and foreigners in 2001."

It appears to me they are ALMOST trying to subtly associate file trading of songs with Neo-Nazi propaganda....sullying file trading with the stench of Nazi philosophy.

The German government has become particularly militant in raiding file trading operations.

Polizei have always had the reputation of being rather rough ,gruff fellows...but, under the watchful eye of the globalists, they are becoming even more aggressive.

"Sharpen your long knives on the pavements; delve them into Jewish bodies."

I've been in martial arts for 30 years, and am proficient in lots of weapons...this is one person with Jewish heritage they better not try that crap on...

Die Nacht der langen Messer was June 1934...you Neo-Nazis need to get a life! Hitler is no more!

I'm sending out my own survey to friends and family. I need to know if my feelings on this matter is that this is so wrong on so many levels, is actually a correct way to feel, or am I becoming a certifiable paranoid fruitcake? ~pepe~

you're not a paranoid fruitcake pepe!

This story reminded me of a scene from a movie which starred Robin Williams....

One Jewish person tells another that he knows for certain that Hitler will die on a Jewish holiday....

The other asks the first one how he can be so sure....

The first says, "Because any day that Hitler dies will be a Jewish holiday!"

I like that one.

Shalom....
~Code

this is bullshit. As much as I think that their message and they are scum, they do deserve their right to free speech, ya bunch o pinkos.

Code, while I thank you on your vote of confidence on the fruitcake issue, I just can't get over how angry this is all making me.

One of my biggest problems is my nasty temper, and how to control it. And speaking of fruit, or nuts, this whole world is going nuts, and one feels so powerless to HELP it! Where have all the reasonable, rational thinkers gone to? Besides this board .... ~pepe~

PS - sorry, I liked the Jewish holiday story as well ~pepe~

If they were american I would say they do deserve that right. I'm not up on german law but i'm the government is well within its right. As far as these people go. I could care. I don't like violent people of any sort. I don't care how strong their beliefs are theres no need to add hatred to this world. Its got enough as is.

this was a hard story for me too...because, although I am totally against everything Nazis stand for, I also am staunchly pro freedom of speech and ability to trade music online....

one thing about this story is that Germany has in place, laws which forbid people from making or trading in Nazi posters, memorabilia, etc., and thus, I imagine this is one reason the police raided this...it is more a reflection of their laws against the Nazi and neo-Nazi movement, than a copyright infrngement issue...so part of me said good, stop that Nazi music crap, and the other side said...defeat bad ideas with good ideas, bad songs with good songs....

~Code

Purfus, Code, you are both right on, and therfore
lies the dilemma.

I actually have MP3 recordings of a few original nazi marching songs on my computer which I obtained out of curiosity (me being a WWII buff and whatnot). I have no idea who owns the copyrights to these songs today (if anyone) but I wouldn't be surprised if these original nazi tunes are some of the few recordings which are in the public domain - after all, who after WW II would want to be the copyright owner of nazi music?

I don't think it's German WW2 marching songs that their government are worry about but more modern bands like Screwdriver. As much as we may hate it even stinking Neo-Nazi's as well as on the other side Filthy Marxist are protected under our system. I do know judging by the money Kerry's wife is pumping into the Stalinist International A.N.S.W.E.R. that it must be all be legal. As for German law I believe anything of this sorts was banned after WW2 under Denazification.

Right on Code, I'm not sure if my Schmelski side hates my Levin side or vice versa.....that would explain my undiagnosed angst. As far as free speech, I think the shit they are spouting could be seen as incitement, and therefor a crime. There is a brittle line somewhere. John Ashcoft will redefine that line here I'm sure. Bufo, I bet the RIAA plays Nazi marching music over their musak system every morning for inspiration. And my take on the Neo Nzi's are that they are freking punks and cowards just like the gangbangers here, nothing but low life cockroaches who scatter when the lights come on.

Just like the RIAA tries to tie in P2P with pornography.....shameful, and reprehensible.

:-:~ Phantom

I am Jewish and believe that even if the speech is hateful, racist, and offensive, it should still be allowed.

The most anti-semetic pamphlets should be allowed to be printed and not censored. The reason for this is that you can never BAN an idea by simply declaring that idea illegal.

If such material is censored, it flourishes in the underground, where nobody can argue against it .It faces no objection since the only ones who would see it are people partial to the cause.

Why doesn't Germany try to educate people and confront the neo-nazi problem instead of just trying to silence them?

If taken to far, this kind of censorship can also begin to erase history. Nazi references in textbooks would be removed, German history would become sanitized.

If such material is censored, it flourishes in the underground, where nobody can argue against it .It faces no objection since the only ones who would see it are people partial to the cause.

Why doesn't Germany try to educate and confront the neo-nazi problem instead of just trying to silence them?

Skrew

I was stationed in Germany. They have laws against owning anything Nazi. There was a big stink while I was there because a German citizen managed to buy a copy of Mein Kampf from a US Army base bookstore. Our version of free-speech does not exist on most of this planet and is dying fast here as well. Post 'em while you've got 'em.

nyer...I'm like you...
"Never forget...and Never again ".
~Code

"I may not agree with what you have to say, but I will fight to the death defending your right to say it" you fucking Neo-Nazi assholes.

I can't believe this. Really. What if this happened in the USA? It would spark a lot of shit. I don't see the problem with having that music and whatever else as long as you don't take any negative actions based on your beliefs.

I'm actually worried about this type of thing happening in the United States. I own and have read many pieces of literature like this. Why? I study history. I hate what these people represent, and I hate what they want to do or have done. But just because something is in my possession, it doesn't mean I'll do anything like that. It doesn't mean I'll take on those views.

Like I said, I study history. Among the things that fascinate me are: The Civil War, World War II, Vietnam, all of the 60s, Nazism and Neo-Nazism. Does this mean I'm going to do anything wrong? No. And if anyone ever tries to take away my right to own this stuff and study this stuff, then they might as well do the same for the many historians around the world...

Good one killerontheroof

One thing that has always fascinated me is the close parallels between ancient Rome and Nazi Germany, because I, like undeath, am a student of history....or shitory as I often mistype it.

Rome made torture, rights deprivation, killing of thousands of humans and animals in inhumane ways legal and in fact, de facto state policy. In the end, the regime was morally bankrupt and sexually depraved and decadent. They carried aloft the "fasces"...a bundle of sticks with an axhead as their symbol of state power, and this re-emerged with the fascists under Mussolini in Italy, as an ally of Nazi Germany. The real irony is that the main external force that finally overturned the corrupt Romans, was in fact the "barbarians" who, in fact, were mainly tribes of Germanic origin....
Goths, Visigoths, Ostrogoths, etc.

An interesting aside is that the Roman soldiers looked at the German warriors as "giants". The average height of the Roman soldier was 5 foot 1 inch, and the average height of the German warrior they faced was 5 foot 8 inches, a full seven inch difference in height!

Also, if you look at a lot of Nazi films, they used a lot of Romanesqe themes in their parades, and their "standards" the soldiers carried were Roman looking, as were the eagle symbols and on and on.

Hitler put together an odd admixture of
Roman symbolism and early Norse and Teutonic philosophy.

Back to the comparisons...both Rome and Nazi Germany were ruled by madmen, whose own servants/employees tried to kill them through assasination attempts.

Certain groups were seen as not quite human, and were either outright killed, or a genocidal policies were instituted.

Both regimes had hired thugs doing their enforcement of rules....

Both had visions of grandeur that their governments would go on for thousands of years...on and on....

The comparisons go on and on...but, it's clear that a fairly good case can be made that, when government is allowed free rein...it does evil things.