When Inciting Mass Murder Becomes Mainstream

Just when you think you’ve read the nuttiest thing that could possibly come out of Norway, along comes this one.

Two Norwegian professors — educated folks, mind you; people whose salaries are presumably paid by the state — think it’s perfectly OK to incite terrorism and mass murder.

Our Norwegian correspondent The Observer, who translated the piece below, described it this way:

Have a look at this translated article, and in particular the bolded text. The professor interviewed here actually believes that it should be legal in Norway to encourage someone to kill Jews, just not a particular Jew.

In other words:

Good:		“Let’s kill all the sheenies!”
Bad:		“Let’s kill Moishe!”

It’s also important to remember that Fjordman, whose writings call for an end to mass immigration and the preservation of traditional Norwegian culture, is considered by polite society to be the second most evil person in Norway.

Insanity.

From VG.no:

Incitement to commit terrorism should be legal

Norwegian sociologist, Kristian Skagen Ekeli believes that extreme speech and incitement to commit terrorism are natural aspects of a democracy.

Ekeli is a researcher at the University of Stavanger (UiS). He believes that incitement to commit terrorism should be allowed in a stable democracy like Norway. Such statements should only be banned if there is an imminent threat of terrorism, he tells the campus newspaper, Univers.

Mullah Krekar was sentenced to five years in prison on Monday for having threatened to kill Norwegian citizens, among them former Prime Minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik. Some of the threats were made last weekend. Ekeli fails to see the problem with this in a democracy such as Norway.

“A ban won’t prevent extreme ideas, nor will it stop speech that incites to terrorism. A ban will only drive such ideas underground, where they remain unchallenged,” he says.

Freedom of speech should be given precedent, Ekeli believes, although he acknowledges that calls to commit criminal acts are likely to increase the odds of someone breaking the law,

He is supported by Helge Rønning, professor of media studies at the University of Oslo.

“Driving anti-democratic sentiment underground is dangerous,” Rønning tells national newspaper Vårt Land.

He agrees with Ekeli that it should be legal to incite to terrorism. It should only be made illegal in those cases were these threats are aimed at specific individuals or groups, he says. Rønning believes that it’s okay to encourage someone to kill Jews, but he believes that it should be a criminal offense to encourage someone to burn down the Jewish synagogue in Oslo. [emphasis added]

The duo is criticized by Anine Kierulf from the Law Faculty at UiS who believes that there need to be certain restriction placed upon freedom of speech.

And take note of this final sentence:

“Statements that encourage violence can undermine the democracy, by threatening or scaring people into silence,” she says.

In Norway, “threatening or scaring people into silence” isn’t a bug, it’s a feature.

It’s what the media elite tried to do to Fjordman, but it didn’t work.