Apologies for resending and correcting a typo. In March, I interviewed playwright C.J. Hopkins, prosecuted for "disseminating pro-Nazi propaganda" after criticizing Germany's COVID-19 response. Despite being acquitted in January, the prosecutor appealed, leading to a second trial on August 15. This prosecution absurdly misrepresents his criticism as pro-Nazi propaganda. Drawing parallels to historical totalitarianism does not imply support for it; rather, it's dissent against current state actions. The case primarily seeks to silence dissent, not genuinely address Nazi propaganda. We support Hopkins and wish him well in the upcoming trial.
The Most Ridiculous DA on Earth Berlin prosecutor of American author, CJ Hopkins, insists on making an obviously FALSE claim. Tue, 13 Aug 2024 14:20:27 GMT https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/the-most-ridiculous-da-on-earth-976 NOTE to Substack Email Subscribers: My apologies for sending this post twice to your email. I am doing so to correct a substantial typo in the original post’s subtitle in which I accidentally omitted the key descriptive word “FALSE.” I beg your pardon for the error.
Back in March I interviewed the American playwright and Berlin resident, C.J. Hopkins , about his ongoing prosecution by the Berlin DA’s office for the alleged crime of “disseminating pro-Nazi propaganda.”
“Der Spiegel” and “Stern” magazines may use the swastika to criticize elements of German society deemed right wing. Hopkins is prosecuted for using the swastika as a form of political expression in his criticism of the German state.
At his first trial in January, Hopkins was found not guilty. However, the Berlin prosecutor appealed the verdict, and Hopkins’s second trial is scheduled to begin at the Berlin Superior Court on August 15.
It seems to me that the Berlin prosecutor must surely be the most ridiculous on earth for making such an obviously false assertion. The facts of this matter are obvious to anyone who has retained the tiniest fragment of common sense. Hopkins did NOT “disseminate pro-Nazi propaganda.”
In fact, he PROTESTED the German state’s fraudulent and totalitarian COVID-19 pandemic response by pointing out how its actions resembled the actions of notorious totalitarian states of the past, the most immediately recognizable being Germany’s National Socialist regime of 1938-1945.
Hopkins couldn’t have made it clearer that he strongly objected to the German state’s actions in 2020-2021, so it is the height of absurdity to claim that his likening of these actions to those of the Nazi government was an act of “disseminating pro-Nazi propaganda.”
The American equivalent would be for a California prosecutor to claim that my comparison of California’s pandemic response in 2020-2021 to the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II makes me guilty of disseminating the anti-Japanese racist doctrine for which Congress apologized in 1988.
As we approach Hopkins’s second trial, it remains crystal clear that his statement during his first trial presented the essential facts of the matter.
However, I hope that you will at least have the integrity to call this what it is, and not hide behind false accusations that I am somehow supporting the Nazis by comparing the rise of a new form of totalitarianism to the rise of an earlier totalitarian system, one that took hold of and ultimately destroyed this country in the 20th Century, and murdered millions in the process, because too few Germans had the courage to stand up and oppose it when it first began. I hope that you will at least have the integrity to not pretend that you actually believe I am disseminating pro-Nazi propaganda, when you know very well that is not what I am doing.
No one with any integrity believes that is what I am doing. No one with any integrity believes that is what my Tweets in 2022 were doing. Every journalist that has covered my case, everyone in this courtroom, understands what this prosecution is actually about. It has nothing to do with punishing people who actually disseminate pro-Nazi propaganda. It is about punishing dissent, and making an example of dissidents in order to intimidate others into silence.
We wish to express our heartfelt solidarity with Mr. Hopkins and the best of luck at his second trial.
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