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The rule of law, combined with the broadest possible free speech, is the best defence as had been shown in Western democracies for quite some time now. Democracy in Germany in the thirties was in a very weak condition for a variety of reasons which allowed the Nazis to undermine it fatally.


And it's probably worth considering that democracy after the forties in Germany includes Strafgesetzbuch §86a.


Notably this law perpetuates on a daily basis the Nazis' coercive and violent appropriation of a number of traditional religious and cultural symbols, and with it their unnatural exploitation as emblems of the most evil and despicable ideas ever contrived in modern history. All things considered, a very fitting example of parent poster's point.


> unnatural

There's nothing natural or unnatural about human interpretation of abstract symbols.


Indeed; there's nothing "natural" either about taking a symbol that has literally been used from time immemorial throughout the Northern hemisphere (including in Europe up until the early 20th c.!) and treating it as an inherent reference to a bunch of folks who anyone sensible regards as enemies of everything that civilized society stands for. But that's not what one would assume, given that this law exists!


Unfortunately, law exists because we cannot rely on only what the sensible people do and understand.




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