A German man has been hit with a $3,300 fine after expressing some unconventional views on COVID-19 vaccines. Deutsche Welle reports that the unnamed vocational-college teacher, a 62-year-old from Berlin, heard his financial fate on Thursday from the Tiergarten Local Court, where a presiding judge slammed him for comparing coronavirus vaccinations to the Holocaust. The man had posted footage online that showed the Nazi slogan "Arbeit macht frei" ("work sets you free"), often found posted at World War II concentration camps—except he'd altered it to sarcastically read "Vaccination sets you free."
In a second video, he attacked his home country's government for its COVID mitigation measures, also comparing them to the Holocaust. Deutsche Welle notes it's illegal in Germany to deny the Holocaust, in which about 6 million Jewish people died, or to minimize it or spread Nazi propaganda. The man's actions were "a trivialization," the presiding judge said Thursday before handing down the consequences. "Any other interpretation is far-fetched."
The teacher had hauled his case before a labor court after he was let go from his job in August 2021. That court decided the city of Berlin no longer had to employ him, though he was awarded a severance payout of nearly $80,000. (We've had similar instances of comparing vaccines, vaccine mandates, and COVID restrictions to the Holocaust or Nazi Germany here in the States.)
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