The German (StGB; en, Criminal Code, link=no) in

section Section, Sectioning or Sectioned may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * Section (music), a complete, but not independent, musical idea * Section (typography), a subdivision, especially of a chapter, in books and documents ** Section sig ...

§ 86a outlaws "use of symbols of unconstitutional organizations" outside the contexts of "art or science, research or teaching". The law does not name the individual symbols to be outlawed, and there is no official exhaustive list. However, the law has primarily been used to outlaw

Fascist Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the ...

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...

, and

Islamic extremist Islamic extremism, Islamist extremism, or radical Islam, is used in reference to extremist beliefs and behaviors which are associated with the Islamic religion. These are controversial terms with varying definitions, ranging from academic und ...

symbols. The law was adopted during the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...

and notably affected the

Communist Party of Germany The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...

, which was banned as unconstitutional in 1956, the Socialist Reich Party (banned in 1952) and several small far-right parties. The law prohibits the distribution or public use of symbols of unconstitutional groups—in particular, flags, insignia, uniforms, slogans and forms of greeting.

Text

The relevant excerpt of the German criminal code reads:

Symbols affected

The text of the law does not name the individual symbols to be outlawed, and there is no official exhaustive list. A symbol may be a flag, emblem, uniform, or a motto or greeting formula. The prohibition is not tied to the symbol itself but to its use in a context suggestive of association with outlawed organizations. Thus, the

Swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious and cultural symbol, predominantly in various Eurasian, as well as some African and American cultures, now also widely recognized for its appropriation by the Nazi Party and by neo-Nazis. I ...

is outlawed if used in a context of völkisch ideology, while it is legitimate if used as a symbol of religious faith, particularly any South Eastern or East Asian religions. Similarly, the is outlawed if used in the context of the Junge Front but not in other contexts such as heraldry, or as the emblem of "landscape poet"

Hermann Löns Hermann Löns (29 August 1866 – 26 September 1914) was a German journalist and writer. He is most famous as "The Poet of the Heath" for his novels and poems celebrating the people and landscape of the North German moors, particularly the L ...

. Because of the law, German Neo-Nazis took to displaying modified symbols similar but not identical with those outlawed. In 1994, such symbols were declared equivalent to the ones they imitate ( § 2). As a result of the ban on Nazi symbols, German Neo-Nazis have used older symbols such as the black-white-red German Imperial flag (which was also briefly used by the Nazis alongside the party flag as one of two official flags of Nazi Germany from 1933 until 1935) as well as variants of this flag such as the one with the and the variants, the Imperial-era , the and the flag of the Strasserite Black Front – a splinter Nazi organization – as alternatives. Affected by the law according to Federal Constitutional Court of Germany rulings are: * (1952) * (1956) * () * (1982) * (1983) * (1992) (not to be confused with ) * (1992) * (1994) * (1995) * Blood and Honour, Germany chapter (2000) Symbols known to fall under the law are: *the

swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious and cultural symbol, predominantly in various Eurasian, as well as some African and American cultures, now also widely recognized for its appropriation by the Nazi Party and by neo-Nazis. I ...

as a symbol of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

, prohibited in all variants, including mirrored, inverted etc. (exceptions are only applied to swastikas used as religious symbols in Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain temples) *a stylized

Celtic cross The Celtic cross is a form of Christian cross featuring a nimbus or ring that emerged in Ireland, France and Great Britain in the Early Middle Ages. A type of ringed cross, it became widespread through its use in the stone high crosses e ...

, prohibited as a symbol of the VSBD/PdA and in the variant used by the

White Power White pride and white power are expressions primarily used by white separatist, white nationalist, fascist, neo-Nazi and white supremacist organizations in order to signal racist or racialist viewpoints. It is also a slogan used by the prominen ...

movement. The legal status of the symbol used in non-political contexts is uncertain, but non-political use is not acted upon in practice. *the solar cross as a symbol of the

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Cat ...

(symbol of

cross burning In modern times, cross burning or cross lighting is a practice which is associated with the Ku Klux Klan. However, it was practiced long before the Klan's inception. Since the early 20th century, the Klan burned crosses on hillsides as a way to ...

from the "second Klan" era onward), the German Faith Movement, the Thule Society and the

5th Fifth is the ordinal form of the number five. Fifth or The Fifth may refer to: * Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as in the expression "pleading the Fifth" * Fifth column, a political term * Fifth disease, a contagious rash tha ...

and 11th

Waffen SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with volunteers and conscripts from both occupied and unoccupied lands. The grew from th ...

divisions *the

Sig rune Sig used as a name may refer to: *Sig (given name) *Sig, Algeria, a city on the banks of the Sig River * Sig Alert, an alert for traffic congestion in California, named after Loyd Sigmon *Sig River, a river of Algeria also known as Mekerra sig (l ...

as used by the SS *the emblem *the legal status of the

Othala rune Othala (), also known as odal and ēðel, is a rune that represents the ''o'' and ''œ'' phonemes in the Elder Futhark and the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc writing systems respectively. Its name is derived from the reconstructed Proto-Germanic *''ō� ...

is disputed; prohibited as a symbol of the . Post-war military usage was incorporated into the with a stylized "Othala rune" being featured on the shoulder insignia of the with it also being used by the ranks succeeding it. *the as used by the 2nd, 4th and 34th

Waffen-SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscripts from both occup ...

divisions, and * badges (2002) *: prohibited in the Third Reich version including a swastika. *the greeting (1970) *the greeting (1990) * , along with the symbol, as the motto of the

and as the verbal equivalent of the

Hitler salute The Nazi salute, also known as the Hitler salute (german: link=no, Hitlergruß, , Hitler greeting, ; also called by the Nazi Party , 'German greeting', ), or the ''Sieg Heil'' salute, is a gesture that was used as a greeting in Nazi Germany. Th ...

. *The with the Nazi swastika. *the (the anthem of the Nazi Party) and (a song of the Hitler-Jugend) (1991) *the

hammer and sickle The hammer and sickle (Unicode: "☭") zh, s=锤子和镰刀, p=Chuízi hé liándāo or zh, s=镰刀锤子, p=Liándāo chuízi, labels=no is a symbol meant to represent proletarian solidarity, a union between agricultural and industr ...

red star A red star, five-pointed and filled, is a symbol that has often historically been associated with communist ideology, particularly in combination with the hammer and sickle, but is also used as a purely socialist symbol in the 21st century. I ...

and red flag when used as emblems of the

*The

Black Standard The Black Banner or Black Standard ( ar, الراية السوداء, ar-rāyat as-sawdāʾ, also known as (, "banner of the eagle" or simply as , , "the banner") is one of the flags flown by the Islamic prophet Muhammad according to Muslim ...

of the

Islamic State An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic ter ...

; widely considered the chief sigil or flag of the jihadi group. * the

People's Protection Units The People's Defense Units (YPG), (YPG) ; ar, وحدات حماية الشعب, Waḥdāt Ḥimāyat aš-Šaʽb) also called People's Protection Units, is a mainly- Kurdish militia in Syria and the primary component of the Syrian Democra ...

(YPG) pennant was explicitly banned as a symbol related to the

PKK The Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK is a Kurdish militant political organization and armed guerrilla movement, which historically operated throughout Kurdistan, but is now primarily based in the mountainous Kurdish-majority regions of sout ...

on 2 March 2017, even though the organisation itself is not currently recognised as terrorist. *Since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine by Russia, several states including

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony (german: Niedersachsen ; nds, Neddersassen; stq, Läichsaksen) is a German state (') in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ...

and

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total l ...

are looking to put the military Z symbol under the law. Illustration of the emblems mentioned in the list above: File:NSDAP Hakenkreuz.svg, Nazi

File:Parteiadler_der_Nationalsozialistische_Deutsche_Arbeiterpartei_(1933–1945).svg, Party Eagle () of the Nazi Party. File:Crossed_circle.svg, Solar cross File:Celtic_cross.svg,

as used by

movements File:Thule-Gesellschaft.svg, Broken solar cross of the Thule Society and the German Faith Movement File:KKK.svg,

(1915–current) "fiery cross" from the 1905 novel The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan, and its 1915 film adaptation

The Birth of a Nation ''The Birth of a Nation'', originally called ''The Clansman'', is a 1915 American silent epic drama film directed by D. W. Griffith and starring Lillian Gish. The screenplay is adapted from Thomas Dixon Jr.'s 1905 novel and play ''The Clan ...

File:SS-Panzer-Division Wolfsangel.svg, File:SS Odal Rune.svg,

Odal rune Othala (), also known as odal and ēðel, is a rune that represents the ''o'' and ''œ'' phonemes in the Elder Futhark and the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc writing systems respectively. Its name is derived from the reconstructed Proto-Germanic *''� ...

File:SA-Logo.svg, emblem Image:Sig runes (outlined).svg, sig runes Image:Totenkopf.svg, Image:Flag_of_the_NSDAP_(1920–1945).svg, Flag of the

Image:War Ensign of Germany 1938-1945.svg, 1938–1945 (national war flag) Image:Reichsdienstflagge 1935.svg, 1935–1945 (Reich service flag) File:KPD-logo.svg, Emblem of the

(redrawn after a historical lapel pin) File:Flag of the Communist Party of Germany.svg, Red flag of the

File:Flag of the Communist Party of Germany (reverse).svg, Reverse side of the Red flag of the

File:AQMI_Flag_asymmetric.svg, IS / ISIL / ISIS / Daesh version of the

File:People's Protection Units Flag.svg, Flag of the

File:2022 Russian Invasion vehicle marking Z.svg, Russian military Z symbol Hakenkreuz_im_Verbotsschild

Anti-fascist symbols

In 2005, a controversy was stirred about the question whether the paragraph should be taken to apply to the display of ''crossed-out'' swastikas as a symbol of

anti-fascism Anti-fascism is a political movement in opposition to fascist ideologies, groups and individuals. Beginning in European countries in the 1920s, it was at its most significant shortly before and during World War II, where the Axis powers were ...

. In late 2005 police raided the offices of the punk rock label and mail order store "Nix Gut Records" and confiscated merchandise depicting crossed-out swastikas and fists smashing swastikas. In 2006 the

Stade Stade (), officially the Hanseatic City of Stade (german: Hansestadt Stade, nds, Hansestadt Stood) is a city in Lower Saxony in northern Germany. First mentioned in records in 934, it is the seat of the district () which bears its name. It is l ...

police department started an inquiry against anti-fascist youths using a placard depicting a person dumping a swastika into a trashcan. The placard was displayed in opposition to the campaign of right-wing nationalist parties for local elections. On Friday 17 March 2006, a member of the

Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet") is the German federal parliament. It is the only federal representative body that is directly elected by the German people. It is comparable to the United States House of Representatives or the House of Comm ...

Claudia Roth Claudia Benedikta Roth (born 15 May 1955) is a German politician ( Alliance 90/The Greens). She was one of the two party chairs from 2004 to 2013 and previously served as one of the vice presidents of the ''Bundestag''. She is also currently se ...

, reported herself to the German police for displaying a crossed-out swastika in multiple demonstrations against Neo-Nazis and got the Bundestag to suspend her immunity from prosecution. She intended to show the absurdity of charging anti-fascists with using fascist symbols: "We don't need prosecution of non-violent young people engaging against right-wing extremism." On 15 March 2007, the

Federal Court of Justice of Germany The Federal Court of Justice (german: Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) is the highest court in the system of ordinary jurisdiction (''ordentliche Gerichtsbarkeit'') in Germany, founded in 1950. It has its seat in Karlsruhe with two panels being situat ...

(Bundesgerichtshof) reversed the charge and held that the crossed-out symbols were "clearly directed against a revival of national-socialist endeavors", which thereby settled the dispute for the future.

Application to forms of media

Section 86a includes a social adequacy clause that allows the use of the symbols that fall within it for the purposes of "art or science, research or teaching". This generally allows these symbols to be used in literature, television shows (as with the 1960s ''Star Trek'' episode, ''Patterns of Force'', itself allowed after 1995), films, and other works of art without censoring or modification and stay within the allowance for the clause. For example, German cinemas were allowed to screen ''

Raiders of the Lost Ark ''Raiders of the Lost Ark'' is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman. It stars Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman, Ro ...

'' and ''

Inglourious Basterds ''Inglourious Basterds'' is a 2009 war film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Brad Pitt, Christoph Waltz, Michael Fassbender, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger, Daniel Brühl, Til Schweiger and Mélanie Laurent. The film tells an altern ...

'', films which feature frequent displays of Nazi symbols, without

censorship Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governments ...

. Up until 2018,

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedba ...

s were not included in the social adequacy clause. A High District Frankfurt Court ruling in 1998 over the video game ''

Wolfenstein 3D ''Wolfenstein 3D'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Apogee Software and FormGen. Originally released on May 5, 1992, for DOS, it was inspired by the 1981 Muse Software video game '' Castle Wolfe ...

'' determined that because video games do attract young players, "this could lead to them growing up with these symbols and insignias and thereby becoming used to them, which again could make them more vulnerable for ideological manipulation by national socialist ideas". Since this ruling, the (USK), the German content ratings board, would refuse to rate any game that includes symbols under Section 86a, effectively banning them from retail sales within Germany. This led to software developers and publishers to either avoid publication in Germany, or create alternative, non-offending symbols to replace them, such as in '' Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus,'' where the developer had to replace the game's representation of Adolf Hitler with a version without the moustache and named "Chancellor Heiler". In August 2018, the German government reversed this ruling as a result of a ruling from April 2018. The web-based game was released prior to the September 2017 elections, which included parodies of the candidates fighting each other; this included Alexander Gauland, who had a special move that involved Swastika imagery. When this was noticed by public authorities, they began prosecution of the game in December 2017, submitting it to the Public Prosecutor General's office for review based on the ''Wolfenstein 3D'' decision. The Attorney General declined to consider the game illegal under Section 86a, stating that the 1998 ruling was outdated; since then, USK had adopted age ratings for video games, and that there was no reason not to consider

video games as art The concept of video games as a form of art is a commonly debated topic within the entertainment industry. Though video games have been afforded legal protection as creative works by the Supreme Court of the United States, the philosophical pr ...

within the social adequacy clause. As a result, the

Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons The Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons (german: link=no, Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien or ''BPjM'') is an upper-level German federal censorship agency subordinate to the Federal Ministry of Family Affai ...

adapted the Attorney General's ruling to be applicable for all video games within Germany, and subsequently the USK announced this change in August 2018; USK will still review all games to judge whether the use of imagery under Section 86a remains within the social adequacy clause and deny ratings to those that fail to meet this allowance. In August 2020, '' Through the Darkest of Times'', in which players follow an anti-Nazi resistance group, became the first game permitted by USK to depict swastikas.

References

External links