BERLIN, March 8 (UPI) -- Reversing an earlier decision, a German high court has ruled that a German mail order salesman can continue selling anti-Nazi symbols.
Juergen Kamm, who sells anti-Nazi t-shirts and other anti-right wing goods via his 'Nix Gut' ('No Good') mail-order service, was fined last year by a Stuttgart court for selling badges that include one of a man kicking the swastika into a garbage can. His badges with a crossed-out swastika on them are extremely popular in the far-left scene.
In Germany, the portrayal of Nazi symbols like the swastika is illegal, no matter the context they are used in. That means protesting neo-Nazism with a crossed-out swastika can get you in the same kind of trouble as wearing unchanged neo-Nazi symbols.
Karlsruhe High Court Judge Gerhardt Altvater reversed the previous verdict, arguing that the crossed-out swastika was visibly altered to reject the Nazi ideology, and that neo-Nazis were thus unable to use the badges for their propaganda.
Ahead of the decision, Brigitte Zypries, Germany's justice minister, said the law banning unconstitutional symbols needed to be revised, and several left-wing politicians had called on judges to side with Kamm, who can now continue his highly profitable mail-order service.
