{"id":7550,"date":"2005-02-07T13:55:18","date_gmt":"2005-02-07T20:55:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2005\/02\/07\/and-where-does-it-stop.html"},"modified":"2005-02-07T13:55:18","modified_gmt":"2005-02-07T20:55:18","slug":"and_where_does","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/02\/07\/and_where_does.html","title":{"rendered":"And where does it stop?"},"content":{"rendered":"

As certain folks in the EU militate toward banning the swastika and other Nazi symbols<\/a>, others have jumped on the bandwagon and said, hey, if we’re going to ban the symbols of evil, tyrannical, murderous regimes, why not also ban Communist symbols, too?<\/a><\/p>\n

Several European Parliament members have urged the EU to match a proposed ban on Nazi signs with one on communist symbols like the hammer and sickle. The MEPs, from Lithuania, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, said communist symbols were a reminder of suffering under Soviet-era regimes. <\/p>\n

“We would like to have an equal treatment of the other evil totalitarian regime of the communist system,” said Jozsef Szajer, a Hungarian MEP, according to the Associated Press news agency. Czech MEP Jan Zahradil agreed: “If we decide to ban one, we should decide to ban all of them.”<\/p>\n

Which brought this odd repsonse:<\/p>\n

But Mr Frattini’s spokesman, Frisco Roscam Abbing, said the commissioner felt it “might not be appropriate” to include communist symbols in the context of discussions on xenophobia and anti-Semitism.<\/p>\n

Because, of course, the Communist regimes of Europe never exhibited either of those traits. Huh?<\/p>\n

The problem, of course, is that this becomes the Ban the Symbol of the Week. When do we get start getting suggestions that the cross and other Christian symbols be banned, given past persecution (including “xenophobia and anti-Semitism”) from the Church? Will someone suggest (and get serious attention) that the US flag (given the despicability of American actions in the eyes of folks) should be similarly banned? How about the Star of David, since many in Europe think of Israel as being as evil a state (in their stance toward the Palestinians) as the Nazis were? And didn’t a number of countries suffer severe depredations from Napoleon’s armies a couple of centuries back?<\/p>\n

We can follow that up with banning various corporate logos, Islamic insignia, and the colors of the football teams we dislike.<\/p>\n

I don’t dismiss the pain that the Nazis (or the Commies, for that matter) inflicted upon Europe, but if someone wears or bears their symbol, it’s handled much better by social opprobrium (as with Prince Harry’s recent imbroglio) than with force of law. Not only does the latter make something covertly more attractive, it’s difficult to come up with a reasonable principle for including some things as crimes and not others. And law without reason is tyranny.<\/p>\n

(via the Flea<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As certain folks in the EU militate toward banning the swastika and other Nazi symbols, others have jumped on the bandwagon and said, hey, if we’re going to ban the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-zt-pc"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7692,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/17\/sticks_and_ston.html","url_meta":{"origin":7550,"position":0},"title":"Sticks and stones","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 17-Jan-05 3:11pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm no fan of the swastika -- at least as the symbol of the Nazis and their heirs -- but obviously the EU's justice ministers have never raised kids, since...","rel":"","context":"In "ZT & PC"","block_context":{"text":"ZT & PC","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/zt-pc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":50915,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/05\/11\/men-are-from-mars-women-from-venus-symbols-from-greek.html","url_meta":{"origin":7550,"position":1},"title":"Men are from Mars, Women from Venus, Symbols from Greek","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 11-May-15 2:24pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I'd always heard the explanation for the male and female symbols that is, here, rejected. 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