German Sinti activists destroy racist election poster
By MIKE DOHERTY
News reporter
Above: the poster said "Money for Granny - not for Sinti and Roma" and was created by the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD). Photograph © Rainer Schulze
GERMAN SINTI activists in Osnabrück have destroyed a German neo Nazi party European election poster that promised “Money for Granny – not for Sinti and Roma”.
The three activists Jeffrey Inger, Dany Franz and Jimmy Dean Jers Laubinger, all musicians and tattoo artists from Osnabrück, struck after officials refused to act and remove the racist posters that appeared all over Germany during the campaigning for the recent European elections.
One of the activists, Jeffrey Inger, explains: "We are all German Sinti, and the poster had to be removed."
“Actually, the council should have removed the posters”, says Jimmy Laubinger. "But if the council will not do anything for us, then we'll have to do this for the council.”
"We have a large family and do not want our children to see this poster and come home and ask why we take away all the money from the grannies.”
“Our grandparents were in Nazi concentration camps and these posters are a warning that it could easily happen again,” he said.
Whereas the word 'Roma' generally refers to Romani people from Eastern Europe, many in Central and Western Europe call themselves 'Sinti'. In German public discourse, the term 'Sinti & Roma' has largely replaced the old German word 'Zigeuner'- which was used by the Nazis and which many Sinti find deeply offensive.
Professor Rainer Schulze, an expert in the Holocaust and historical memory at Essex University and a campaigner for Roma rights, also came across an NPD poster when he visited Thale, a small sleepy market town in Saxony-Anhalt, on a recent work trip.
“One of these posters was prominently displayed at the main bus station outside the town’s railway station and in eyesight of the town’s tourist information office,” says Professor Schulze.
“When I asked the people working in the tourist information office how they felt about this poster, I was told that they could not do anything about it and if I had any problems with it I should contact the town’s public order office.”
Professor Schulze then went to the local police station to complain about the poster – which had also been used in last year’s national elections.
“I soon had all three of the Thale police officers on duty chatting with me about the NPD poster. They rang the state electoral office which confirmed that I was not the only one who objected to this poster, but that all complaints had been dismissed because the poster was regarded as within the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression,” says Professor Schulze.
“The poster had already been used by the NPD in last year’s national elections. Whilst Thale police were happy to record my complaint, they felt that criminal procedures would not get me anywhere but that it needed political activities and public debate to fight these kinds of posters.”
“I can’t help but wonder how the authorities would have reacted if the NPD’s poster had proclaimed ‘Money for Granny – not for Jews’. I think we all know the answer: there would have been universal condemnation, and no doubt action would have been taken,” says Professor Schulze.
“Why is public anti-Semitism unacceptable, whilst public anti-Romaism is obviously acceptable and tolerated as freedom of expression?” He asks.
Professor Schulze agrees with Jimmy Laubinger’s concerns about the Holocaust and points out the links to the sentiments expressed in the poster and the propaganda used by the Nazi’s to justify its murderous policies towards minority groups deemed outside of the ‘national community’:
“When the Nazis were beginning their campaign against the disabled people which ultimately led to the ‘euthanasia’ killings of thousands of them in euthanasia death centres and elsewhere, one of the propaganda techniques they used were the allegedly unacceptable high costs that the public purse incurred for the disabled people,” he says.