Summary: Just as in the 1930s, freedom of science and speech are under attack in Germany. Dozens of distinguished scientists have seen their long-planned science conference canceled due to intimidation by leftwing extremists. These tactics have long worked on US college campuses. Now the Left is taking them into the larger world, and finds that corporate leaders fold as quickly as do college administrators.
Radicals Bully NH Munich Conference Center.
Force Cancellation Of 13th Skeptic Climate Conference.
By Pierre L. Gosselin at the No Tricks Zone.
Reposted with his generous permission.
This latest climate conference cancellation comes just after leftists coerced the University of Hamburg to disinvite political leaders from making on-campus appearances. The same has also just occurred at the famed University of Göttingen.
The problem of suppressing open discussion has deteriorated to such an extent across Germany over the recent years that even according to leftist Der Spiegel: 75% of journalists and writers are “very concerned” or “somewhat concerned” about the state of free speech in Germany! Free speech in Germany is in a state of crisis.
Munich NH Congress Center bullied, then cancels.
The latest free speech suppression and intimidation have unfolded in Munich. The 13th International Climate and Energy Conference, sponsored by the European Institute for Climate and Energy (EIKE) and CFACT, has seen its contractual agreement torn up, and the event was booted out of the conference facility at the last minute.
According to EIKE spokesman, Professor Horst-Joachim Lüdecke (emeritus professor of physics at the Saarland University of Applied Sciences), “a left-green mob” pressured the hotel management of the NH Congress Center in Munich (Aschheim) “to illegally cancel the accommodation contract”.
EIKE had gone to court and demanded revocation of the termination in an emergency motion. However, today, a Bavarian court ruled in favor of the NF Conference Center, citing “security reasons”. German law is no longer able to protect its people.
200 scientists had booked, were blocked.
The Jena-Germany based EIKE is a non-profit organization, like the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK). It has published scientific works and peer-reviewed publications and is involved in the promotion of scientific education. Every year EIKE has a conference on current climate and energy topics. This year it was planned to take place in Munich on November 22nd. But now its attendees will have to make new plans.
More than 200 international scientists and experts had booked and paid for their travels, as well as their hotels – many of them in the conference hotel NH Congress Center itself. Some of them were coming from the USA, Canada, and Australia. Media representatives also asked to be accredited, many more than in past years.
The 13th International Climate and Energy Conference is one that allows alternative – non-alarmist – views on climate science to be presented, for example by distinguished scientists such as astrophysicists Nir Shaviv of Israel and Professor Henrik Svensmark of Denmark. More than a dozen were slated to speak.
The agreement to host the conference at the NH Congress Center Munich was duly signed by both parties already back in May and was followed shortly afterwards by a “substantial down payment”, according to EIKE. Everything was settled. Then came the science brownshirts. This open scientific discussion was too much to take for the far left-green Antifa and other like-minded radical organizations. They mobilized against the “climate change deniers”.
At its Facebook site the radical leftwing Antifa organization recently called on its followers to take aim at the Munich NH Congress Center for hosting the EIKE event, posting at its site the following comic image.
Antifa posting: “Strike against EIKE! Put the heat on climate deniers!”
Mob descends on NH hotel, disturbed guests, staff
The initial spark setting off the protest of the NH Congress Center Munich (Aschheim) hosting the EIKE climate conference was launched by editor Paul Gäbler of the Berliner Tagesspiegel, who publicly slandered EIKE as an “AfD-near climate denier think tank”. The AfD is Germany’s new and growing right party that has has been surging in recent polls and elections nationwide. It’s the only party in Germany that challenges alarmist climate science and acknowledges natural climate drivers.
In September, Gäbler called the management of the NH conference hotel and asked if the positions of EIKE were known to them. At first NH management declined to comment, but “journalist” Gäbler persisted and the NH caved in, issuing a declaration: “Denial of man-made climate change is not compatible with the values of the NH hotel group.” and said it would review the matter.
But it remained quiet for a while. Requests by EIKE as to whether the accommodation contract was endangered remained unanswered on the part of the NH management in Berlin. But then NH management panicked after Munich Antifa and auxiliary groups from the environmental scene mobilized.
On November 9th, a mob of 15-20 people appeared inside the hotel and disturbed guests and employees. They mixed in with the guests in the lobby. According to the hotel management of the NH Congress Center in Munich (Aschheim), they apparently “forced” them to cave in “by singing songs and distributing leaflets”. The leaflets announced that further activities would take place if the conference took place
NH Munich Conference Center gets a hate letter
At about the same time, an open letter from the Munich Environmental Institute was sent to the NH Munich Conference Center management demanding they not make conference rooms available to EIKE.
The letter begins by telling the NH Munich Conference Center how influential the Institute fancies itself to be, and claims “EIKE denies man-made climate change and is trying to influence political parties and public opinion.” The letter ends by demanding the NH Munich Conference Center management “not provide the climate change deniers any space.” “Please disinvite EIKE.”
Thus the NH management terminated the contract (in spite of the previously granted contract extension) due to a perceived “danger to its guests and employees.”
Big win for violent radicals, a loss for free speech.
The Berliner Tagesspiegel (TS) triumphantly reported at the news: “NH hotel group disinvites EIKE, climate change deniers have to find a new venue,” was the triumphant headline in the leftist Tagesspiegel. “This is comparable to the behaviour of arsonists who first set a fire and then proudly report about it,” commented EIKE.
All attempts by the EIKE Board to avert the contract cancellation, which was demonstrably based on defamation and lies, did not alter the NH Conference Center decision. EIKE took immediate legal action against this, hiring well-known law firm Steinhöfel, but to no avail. The conference is canceled.
At its site, EIKE called the coercion and intimidation to force NH to shirk its contractual obligations a “particularly serious case of coercion and blackmail for the suppression of scientific facts.” “If the rule of law still works in this country, the court should make a decision in our favour,” EIKE wrote.
With that, the German court has de facto ruled it can no longer protect and uphold the rights of persons to dissent and to speak freely. The court ruling sends a dangerous signal to radical leftwing organization, hinting to them that it is open season on dissenters.
EIKE writes that all hotels and conference centers throughout Germany “are already so afraid of Antifa and their thugs, as well as their green auxiliary troops, that they have no more confidence in the protection by our constitutional state. This makes them willing opportunists. A constitutional state that allows this is no longer a constitutional state.”
The last minute, sudden cancellation by the Munich NH also results in hefty damages to a number of parties involved in the conference. “Travel expenses have now been spent in vain,” EIKE says. “Perhaps the NH-Conference Center would even come to its senses, recall the rule of law and bring charges against the Antifa (Unknown).”
Caving in to extreme leftist pressure sends the wrong signl, EIKE warns. “The reputation to have given way to the pressure of the street will perhaps deter more future visitors of the NH Conference Center than visitors who have apparently forgotten where it leads if fascists of all colours, whether left, green or brown, are not fought with all means of our constitutional state and immediately brought before the judge.”
Update
EIKE says that they managed to find an appropriate place in Munich, on time. All the reservations as well as dates remain valid. Unfortunately, for safety reasons, they have to keep the location secret. Free speech in Germany! But only if you do it in secret.
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About the author
Pierre L. Gosselin received a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Arizona in Tucson, and currently lives in Europe. He receives no funding and accepts no donations.
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To learn more about the state of climate change see The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters & Climate Change
And you still think we won’t end up shivering in the dark, unless we push back and hard? If Antifa shows up at the local power plant and forces it to shut down, do you think the police will stop them? In a sane world they would, but we live in Clown World.
Frank,
“If Antifa shows up at the local power plant and forces it to shut down, do you think the police will stop them?”
You must be kidding.
Have the police stopped them from beating conservative speakers on college campuses? Have they stopped them from beating people at political rallies? They certainly didn’t stop them from shutting down those conferences in Germany by using threats and intimidation, forcing them to hold them in secret locations.
Actions that were unthinkable 10 years ago are now accepted with a shrug as the new normal. I don’t see why this won’t continue to escalate. Yes, it defies common sense, we think that law and order should prevail and the lights will stay on. I’m just not so sure anymore. When you think that things can’t get any stupider and crazier, they do just that.
Frank,
You’ve lost it. Got to be one of the silliest things I’ve read in a long time.
Its already happening :
https://reclaimthepower.org.uk/press-releases/breaking-hundreds-in-climate-protest-and-gas-power-station-shut-down/
https://www.concordmonitor.com/bow-merrimack-station-nh-power-plant-28847012
sahgatafkar,
No, it’s not “already happening.”
These protests were as common as dirt in California, and have been for decades. They get their photos taken for the news then go home. Their protests didn’t stop the cold war, prevent the construction of more nuclear carriers or gas pipelines, stop lumbering or genetics research, or anything else.
These people in Grimsby were arrested, fined, and given probationary sentences.
The protest in NH did nothing.
It happened before in the post 1968 wave of civil disorder, it could happen again. I wouldn’t put it in the Alex Jones realm.
In the 1970s the antinuclear greens in California had mass trespassing, civil disobedience protests at the nuclear plants. The police/DA refused to press charges.
There were also numerous forestry protests that included putting spikes in trees.
A similar protest almost occurred in the 1980s at a Navy Ballistic Missile Sub base, the Navy wouldn’t play ball with nuclear weapons at potential risk. The sheriff “informed” the Navy that there would be a mob shpwing, the Navy “informed” the sheriff that the guards for the nukes were armed and orders to respond to protect the nuclear weapons with lethal force. No mob showed up.
There was a Ploughshares/Catholic Worker protest at a US military base recently that was widely reported in the news.
I could definitely see the Extinction Rebellion types doing something similar today.
Daniel,
You are missing the point. Yes, there were lots of protests. Still are. But that’s not the question here. The question is if they accomplished anything. The answer is “no”. They accomplished nothing.
“I wouldn’t put it in the Alex Jones realm.”
If you think the Greens will produce massive black-outs, time will test your prediction. IMO that’s the usual demonization of political foes that has become commonplace in tribal America. Those evil-doers on the other side will do horrible things!” That’s pure Alex Jones.
It’s the info-tainment that Americans watch as a substitute for citizenship. Needless to say, it does not work.
Another yummy example of why I love this site. Kudos, Larry.
The blackouts scenario reminds me of the leftest hellhole universe contrasted with libertarian utopia in L.Neil Smith’s “The Probability Broach.”
The news from Germany is certainly troubling, however.
“Big win for ‘violent’ radicals, a loss for free speech.”???? Another weapon of hyperbolic mass distraction, LK? Pray tell, what act of “violence” was committed by the “mob” of 15 to 20 protestors cited in this piece? Also curious to know how many members of so-called “Antifa” have killed people in lone wolf mass shootings?
At least these poor “victimized” scientists lived to find another posh hotel for their meeting, which could easily be held online by video conference, with their opinions shared as widely as they prefer online as well, without the inconvenience of encountering real people who disagree with them, and then whining about being victims of dissent.
Thomas,
Always nice to see someone speaking out for Nazi-like tactics, reminding us of the foes in our midst.
“Pray tell, what act of “violence” was committed by the “mob” of 15 to 20 protestors cited in this piece?”
When the local Mafia (or other crime syndicate) comes to your business offering protection services, he (or she) is mild and well-dressed. As with Antifa. Everyone knows the playbook. Everyone has seen Antifa’s mobs in action. You know this, although you pretend not to.
“how many members of so-called “Antifa” have killed people in lone wolf mass shootings?”
How many climate skeptics have killed people in lone wolf shootings? That’s a pitiful attempt at misdirection. BTW, the most recent political assassination (unsuccessful) of a major figure in the US was of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) in 2017 – by a Leftist (Wikipedia).
“which could easily be held online by video conference,”
Yes, that’s how political intimidation goes – your opponents are driven to meet in secret or cancel meetings.
Your support for those using Nazi-like tactics is noted. Supporters of violence are not allowed here. You are banned. Take your hateful ideas and support for violence elsewhere.
But, but….they were “punching up!” That means anything is justified!
Make fun of ANTIFA-type organizations may do nothing, but I think pointing out they use violence and despise debate is a good strategy for the long, medium, and short term.
Christopher,
“pointing out they use violence and despise debate is a good strategy for the long, medium, and short term.”
I totally agree! Stick with the fundamentals. This also positions serious reformers as above the circus. I suspect (and hope) there is a demand for serious government.
Thomas,
The leftists already shot an American politician, assaulted supporters of Trump, and held their own Kristallnacht on the night of Trump’s inauguration, complete with burning store fronts, and breaking of windows. And they’ve held numerous others in Portland Oregon. Have you been living under a rock?
The “Green Menace” gets all the press.
Here’s some coverage of local clowns two years ago; https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/23-protesters-arrested-nuns-chapel-pipeline-construction-zone-n811736
The NG pipeline is in and I could care less what they’re up to now.
Ron,
This is how the Left works: they play the long game – building institutional support, doing publicity stunts to shape public opinion. They Right laughs. Then the Left wins, and moves on to the next project.
FAILure to Learn is among the greatest, and most pitiful, of weaknesses.
Larry,
They are well organized and funded. They have a right to protest to a point, then reality and “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one” usually prevails.
A constant battle that I suspect will never end.
Ron,
You are missing my point. I was responding to “NG pipeline is in and I could care less what they’re up to now.” You’ll care when they win, just as you have complained at great length in the comments here about the Left’s past wins. There is a pattern here.
The Nir Shaviv link goes to his Wikipedia entry. This is a very impressive guy who has done groundbreaking work. But the second paragraph outs him as “a climate-change denialist.”
So, you know, don’t listen to THAT guy.
Scott,
Wikipedia is a source carefully curated by the Left. There was a NASA employee who worked for several years pretty much full-time editing its entries to conform to the alarmist narrative.
Amazing to me that this is widely known but few even care. It ought to be a scandal.
Link to a WUWT post about one of the worst offenders.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/19/wikibullies-at-work-the-national-post-exposes-broad-trust-issues-over-wikipedia-climate-information/
Scott,
It’s not a scandal because few Americans care about accurate information. We are a nation lit by propaganda because we like it that way. It makes us easy to govern.
For another example — The news narrative doesn’t just happen. See a behind-the-scenes look at organizing the propaganda for the latest campaign for climate activism. If we don’t want to be treated as sheep, we shouldn’t act like sheep.
Antifa sucks
David,
Antifa will rule, unless people must the will to oppose it. Insulting them makes no difference.
LK: Will making serious fun of them lessen their impact: using laughter as a shaming, instead of violence or ignoring their anti-freedom longterm objectives/activities? It would need to be public and broadcast widely, I believe. I worry that the requirement of mass dissemination highlights one of the real problems with co-opted press, and highlights how bad the press’s fall is to the Republic. Though, I think the effects of the WWW didn’t help.
Your thoughts.
John,
“Will making serious fun of them lessen their impact”
Not in the slightest. Their supporters will think this shows weakness, an inability to make a substantive response. The vast undecided will ignore it as chaff cast into the public space by clowns.
Like so much of what pretends to be political discussion in modern America, it is intra-tribal entertainment.
Thanks Larry, that was the tentative conclusion I had.
Larry, they’re also targeting more mainstream meetings.
A few months ago, my university helped organize the European Climate Change Adaptation conference – a relatively large gathering, sponsored by the European Commission, with thousands of leading scientists working on more mainstream views than those of EIKE. You can see from the website alone (https://www.ecca2019.eu/) that it’d be difficult to put them in the “skeptical” side of the debate; I would call them “moderately alarmist”.
Even so, a few dozen Extinction Rebellion activists showed up for the opening ceremony, and threatened to cause chaos until they could take over the podium and replace the speakers with their own. The conference staff stood up to them, and after some discussions with the organizers, they gave up and went away. Perhaps in the next edition of the conference they’ll be more organized and won’t be so easy to stop.
I might add that some of the organizers of this action were graduate students at our university, who got their information from our internal communications and who use our facilities and resources to organize other actions.
https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1197403507671715842
Rando,
Thanks for flagging that. The Left has discovered that their speech suppression has no effective opposition on America’s campuses. Now they’re taking to the streets. We’ll see if US authorities will oppose them.
Update; Radicals fail to silence German scientific conference.
https://mailchi.mp/cfact/radicals-fail-to-silence-german-science-conference?e=4ca91645c7
Ron,
You are reporting the exact same event described in this post, but that article has less detail. Are you commenting without reading the post?
Larry,
I was updating the update. The location isn’t a secret anymore.
Ron,
Thank you!