When Is a Nazi Salute That’s Not a Nazi Salute a Nazi Salute?

As ought to be self-evident, it is only possible to clearly recognize a Nazi salute, or what Germans call the ‘Hitler salute,’ in live action or in a video, but not in a still image. In a still image, anyone waving or beckoning—even, say, hailing a taxi—may appear to have been giving the Nazi salute when they were not. In certain still images, given other congruent elements, we can safely assume that those portrayed are indeed giving the Nazi salute. Thus, for example, in the historical photograph below, we can safely assume that the assembled Wehrmacht officers are not just waving to the Führer. But, otherwise, without such congruent elements, we cannot know from a still image if an outstretched right arm is a Nazi salute or not.

Take, for instance, the below still image of Germany’s then-Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach at a June 2022 trade union rally.

Obviously, none of the members of Germany’s current political establishment would be dumb enough to give a Nazi salute, and we can safely assume that none would be tempted to do so either—or, for that matter, find their right arms rising up involuntarily in the manner of Peter Sellers’ Dr. Strangelove in the film of the same name. Not even Karl Lauterbach, despite the Social Democrat’s rather manic and, it must be said, not entirely dissimilar expression in the still. (See Sellers as Dr. Strangelove below.)

So, quite obviously, Karl Lauterbach was not giving a Nazi salute in the moment captured in the still.

But why then was a Bavarian protester found guilty of “using” a Nazi symbol—namely, the Nazi salute—and fined €1800 merely for having included the above image of Lauterbach on a poster she displayed at a demonstration in May 2024? As reported by the German news site Apollo News, the conviction was recently upheld by a court in Schweinfurt.

The question is all the more pressing because the Bavarian protestor was in fact explicitly using her poster to point out the fact that sometimes an outstretched arm is just an outstretched arm and, furthermore, to point out the hypocrisy of German authorities in treating the outstretched arms of dissidents, nonetheless, as Nazi salutes but not the outstretched arms of government officials. 

Thus, as can be seen below, the protestor juxtaposed the image of Lauterbach to that of two speakers at a 2020 demonstration against Germany’s notoriously draconian COVID-response measures—of which, incidentally, Lauterbach, at the time still a member of the Bundestag, was a major proponent. The poster also includes reports and information relating to the 2020 episode and, above all, its legal consequences.

Thus, one of the speakers—the policeman Michael F., who is on the left in the image from the anti-lockdown protest—would subsequently be fined €5000 for his gesture. The use of Nazi symbols is prohibited under Section 86a of the German Criminal Code. 

At his trial, Michael F. said that he was merely waving—a claim that, as highlighted on the poster, was dismissed as “nonsense” (Quatsch) by the presiding judge. But whatever the gesture is, note that Michael F.’s colleague Arthur H.—on the right in the image—is making the very same gesture with his left hand. A Nazi salute, as touched upon above, is done with the right hand.

The captions added to the poster by the Bavarian protestor read: 

• on the left, “Hitler salute? Political justice*?”; 
• on the right, “Lauterbach salute”; 
• and on the bottom, “In any case, double standards.”

How on earth does this constitute “using” Nazi symbols? It needs to be stressed that the protester was not charged for showing the image of Michael F. and Arthur H., which, as can be seen in the poster, was taken from a German news report, which also showed it. She was charged for showing the image of Lauterbach, who, as noted above and as the court, of course, recognized, was not in fact giving a Nazi salute!

The only possible conclusion is that German justice is indeed politicized, as the protester was suggesting, and that she was punished precisely for having had the temerity to point this out. Section 86a was used here not to suppress any sort of revival of Nazism but rather to crush political dissent—or perhaps even, more precisely, mere critical thinking!

Incidentally, and perhaps not coincidentally, the 2022 Lauterbach episode also involved opposition to COVID-19 response measures. The rally at which Karl Lauterbach began gesticulating with his somewhat manic grin was, more precisely, a rally of healthcare workers. When he began gesticulating, he was in fact being roundly booed by protesters who had shown up at the rally to voice their opposition to COVID-19 vaccination. This can be seen here in a clip of the video from which the still is taken. 

For more on the politicized use of Section 86a, see my “Political Justice in Germany: On the Prosecution of Stefan Niehoff”.

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*The expression translated here as “political justice” is Juztizwillkür: literally, “arbitrary justice.”