Swiss court rules calling someone a ‘foreign pig’ is not racist

[unhappycamper]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/02/21/swiss-court-rules-calling-someone-a-foreign-pig-is-not-racist/



Swiss court rules calling someone a ‘foreign pig’ is not racist
By Agence France-Presse
Friday, February 21, 2014 13:04 EST

Calling someone a “foreign pig” or “dirty asylum-seeker” is insulting but is not against Switzerland’s anti-racism law, the country’s top court said in a ruling released Friday.

The Federal Tribunal found in favour of a police officer who had used the slurs when he arrested an Algerian suspected thief.

The incident took place at a trade fair in the northern city of Basel in April 2007, where the Algerian was detained for allegedly snatching a Russian man’s bag.

After checking the suspect’s identity papers, the policeman discovered that he was an asylum-seeker and proceed to insult him.

[Democracyinkind]

1. I'm not sure that the headline really applies

First, this is a big story here, and there's no doubt that the cop in question is a racist pig and not fir to do his job (as many cops are, even here).

Then again, being familiar with the law, it's not that it is really aimed at such occurrences. Basically the motivation behind the law was to prevent public agitation of racism of the type that some parties and political speakers here liked to dish out. It was never really aimed at sanctioning such semi-public behavior. So while I agree that the guy is a racist idiot who's not fit to be a cop, it do think that the court is in the right on this one. There has been a troubling tendency in Switzerland to use the law for other purposes than what it was intended for, and its only effect has been the weakening of the publics regard for the law.

But yeah, that is Switzerland in 2014. "Foreign pigs" is on a lot of people's minds, sad as that is.