Europe Is Determined to Prove JD Vance Right

By Judson Berger

Friday, February 21, 2025

 

“In Britain and across Europe, free speech, I fear, is in retreat.” So lectured Vice President JD Vance at the Munich Security Conference a week ago. The thing is — he’s right. And rather than refute the allegations the VP used to illustrate his point, European officials have reinforced it in the days since.

 

As National Review’s editorial notes, Germany’s defense minister responded by saying Vance’s remarks were “not acceptable”:

 

This rather made Vance’s point. There was the vice president of the United States, arguing that the Europeans had become far too comfortable telling people what they could and could not say, and, instead of developing a counter-theory, the first official to issue a rejoinder told him that he shouldn’t have said that.

 

European leaders’ indignant reaction has had a familiar ring of, “It’s not happening; also, it’s good that it’s happening.” On one hand, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius did insist in an interview with DW that “everybody in Germany and Europe is allowed to say his opinion wherever and whenever he wants.” On the other, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz clarified that “free speech in Europe means that you are not attacking others in ways that are against legislation and laws we have in our country,” and that “hate” cannot be part of “public debate.” Scholz separately defended the shunning of far-right factions, citing Germany’s historical imperative to prevent the return of fascism.

 

But the country’s speech crackdowns are about much more than anti-fascism. A 60 Minutes special on the subject that aired two days later made Vance’s central contention all but irrefutable. The introduction begins thus: “Germany is trying to bring some civility to the world wide web by policing it in a way most Americans could never imagine. In an effort, it says, to protect discourse, German authorities have started prosecuting online trolls. And as we saw, it often begins with a pre-dawn wake-up call from the police.”

 

Germans’ free speech has “limits,” a state prosecutor tells CBS’s Sharyn Alfonsi. “Is it a crime to insult somebody in public?” she asks. “Yes” is the response. What about to insult someone online? “Yes.” And typing the mean thing on the internet can increase the fine.

 

What 60 Minutes depicts is an illiberal model that places the value of not being offended miles above the value of free speech. The prosecutor’s assertion that Germans’ free speech has limits is, itself, a distortion — misinformation, one might say. In Germany, speech is not free but rigorously policed. Technically speaking, sure, anyone can share an opinion “wherever and whenever he wants” — and run the risk of getting raided.

 

Brittany Bernstein sums up:

 

German law goes so far as to prohibit “the spread of malicious gossip, violent threats and fake quotes.” Even reposting lies online can be considered a crime punishable by a hefty fine, the revocation of the offender’s devices, or even jail time for repeat offenders.

 

60 Minutes spoke to a unit that successfully prosecuted more than 750 hate speech cases over the last four years.

 

One infamous case in Germany involved a user who called a local politician the German word for penis. (Who among us . . . )

 

As Jeff Blehar writes, Europeans do not treasure free speech the way Americans do. In all likelihood, the Germans and others are not going to change just because JD Vance scolded them. But the determined drift into thought-policing should be a cautionary tale for America, especially for officials who seem to resent the values codified in the First Amendment.

 

Andrew Stuttaford and others here at NR have been documenting the abuses and excesses of European speech codes for years. A few examples:

 

·       Germany agreed to prosecute a comedian for an insulting poem about Turkey’s President Erdoğan, before the case was dropped and the related law repealed. German law still prohibits insulting political figures, and some politicians pursue legal action under the provision. 

 

·       A number of European countries still have laws on the books protecting heads of state from being insulted.

 

·       Scottish law now threatens seven years’ imprisonment for stirring up “hatred.” Ireland for months debated its own sweeping hate-speech law before pulling back.

 

·       The EU’s Digital Services Act raises all sorts of thorny questions over how far tech companies must go to police speech on their platforms.

 

Presumably, officials in Europe believe that these measures are for the greater good, and that free speech as a principle must be subordinated to goals such as “civility.” They can argue either that Vance is right but their way is better, or that Vance is right and they need to reform their speech laws. In neither case can they say Vance misdescribed their approach.

 

NR’s editorial, with some closing thoughts:

 

It is, indeed, unfortunate that the nations of Europe have begun to slip into illiberalism, but that it is unfortunate does not mean that it is untrue. JD Vance did not create the problem he was critiquing; he described it.