“Should a Hated Word Be Banned?”
The article
“Should a Hated Word Be Banned” by Jodi Rudoren is about a new controversy in
Israel laws. Certain lawmakers in Israel
think that the word Nazi should be banned at that the punishment should be
either a fine up to $29,000 or 6 months in prison. Although in some countries such as Brazil and
others in Europe have banned Nazi symbols and flags, Israel is the first to
propose banning the word entirely. This
means that for even saying it as a joke to a friend, or anything, is a criminal
action and punishable. The banning of
the word Nazi has already been brought up as a law in 2012 but didn’t get
enough votes, so this year they are trying again. The two sides of the debate of whether this
law should be passes or not are people who want it to be passed because of
people using the word to lightly/trash talking, the fact that it’s unnecessary,
and the other side is that it shouldn’t be passed because it is a violation of
freedom of speech (which isn’t actually written in Israeli laws). My position on this debate is with the
latter, that Israel should not band the word Nazi.
Although Nazi’s
have hurt Jewish people (and many other groups of people they didn’t like) I
think saying the word should be illegal.
Some people I think this law could be applied to in extreme situations of
maybe boosting Nazi’s offensively to others, but when it’s just a little
comment not intended for harm, it isn’t worth being punished in this
severity. I also think it shouldn’t be
bad because letting one word be banned sets an example, and quickly many more
words in many more countries can be banned.
Yes they could be hurtful when said in a way to some people, and that
isn’t okay but it becomes a personal issue, not a government issue. If one doesn’t like how another is speaking
of this topic it’s completely their decision to remove themselves from that
situation. On the other hand when people
display symbols and flags that’s idolizing a horrific event in history and
makes more sense to be banned.
Some may say that
banning this word is to “establish certain value-based limits” (Dov Lipman) but
by making the word Nazi illegal isn’t establishing it’s enforcing. Rather then wanting people to live by these
values it would be more effective to implicate not using Nazi’s as trash talk
or to be hateful, is by teaching children that from a young age. This way they can grow up being more
considerate about the situation and sensitive to peoples emotions towards to
Holocaust.
In conclusion,
when it comes to the new law that may be passes in Israel about banning the
word Nazi, it should not be made illegal and punished so harshly, but rather
influence during childhood.
