Repost: NYT on Goebbels Censoring Comedy (1939)
The New York Times has always had a soft spot for framing Nazis as quirky characters rather than mass murderers. Back in 1939, they even ran a piece about Goebbels ending the careers of five “Aryan” actors — not because they were resisting the regime, but because they made a few jokes. That’s the angle the Times thought was worth memorializing, in the same era they buried news of Jewish suffering in the back pages. It isn’t quite PR for Hitler’s ministry, but it is dressing up severe censorship as a cultural curiosity.
What makes this worth revisiting today is how governments still police speech. In the UK, people are actually being jailed for memes and for criticism of designated terrorist groups like Hamas — with judges handing down sentences that treat sarcasm like sedition. The United States is no saint either. The FCC’s appetite for controlling broadcast speech is growing. That’s not the same as jailing someone over a meme, but it points to the same instinct: when the state decides which jokes, criticisms, or viewpoints are too dangerous, it is less about protecting the public and more about protecting power. [To be clear, I have long wished the FCC did not censor cursing and nudity too.]
You can see the original piece for yourself here: https://www.nytimes.com/1939/02/04/archives/goebbels-ends-careers-of-five-aryan-actors-who-made-witticisms.html
This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them.
Goebbels Ends Careers of Five 'Aryan' Actors Who Made Witticisms About the Nazi Regime
Feb 4, 1939
BERLIN, Feb. 3.—Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels today ended the professional careers of five "Aryan" actors and cabaret announcers by expelling them from the Reich's Chamber of Culture on the grounds that “in their public appearances they displayed a lack of any positive attitude toward National Socialism and therewith caused grave annoyance in public and especially to party comrades.” The five include perhaps the best known German stage comedians who survived previous Chamber of Culture purges and still dared to indulge in political witticisms—namely, Werner Finck, Peter Sachse and “The Three Rulands,” represented by Helmuth Buth, Wilhelm Meissner and Manfred Dlugi. Their expulsion means that they are henceforth forbidden to appear before the public in Germany.
Besides motivating this action in an official communiqué, Dr. Goebbels also publishes a long article in the Voelkischer Beobachter in which he denounces them as “brazen, impertinent, arrogant and tactless" and generally imitators and successors to Jews. Simultaneously he denounces the "society rabble that followed them with thundering applause—parasitic scum, inhabiting our luxury streets, that seems to have only the task of proving with how little brains people can get along and even acquire money and prominence."
As regards the details of the "crimes" of which the five are accused, Dr. Goebbels mentions that they made political witticisms about the colonial problem, the Four-Year Plan and Chancellor Hitler's monumental building program and one of them even raised the question of whether there was any humor left in Germany today.
What amused the public most, however, and presumably roiled the National Socialist authorities most—although Dr. Goebbels does not mention it—is that they deftly, but unmistakably, caricatured some gestures, poses and physical characteristics of National Socialist leaders—sometimes with bon mots that made the rounds of the country.
Dr. Goebbels says that the National Socialists proved during their struggle for power that they had a keen sense of humor that could kill opponents with ridicule. But as National Socialism proposes to remain in power 2,000 years it has neither the time nor the patience to apply that method to the "miserable literati.”
If the anti-German press of Paris, London and New York, Dr. Goebbels says, or the democratic governments in Western Europe, should now again complain about the lack of freedom of opinion in Germany it does not matter, “for after all during the last year the Fuehrer reconquered 10,000,000 Germans for the Reich."
Today, the same people who once shrugged at Nazi propaganda brand you a criminal, a bigot, or worse if you dare criticize the latest thing the faux-progressives are obsessed over. If free speech only applies to the safe and state-approved, then it isn’t free at all.
What do you think — where should the line be drawn?
Q4 2025 Update: The left was mad over Jimmy Kimmel’s show being canceled after alleged threats by the FCC. It then came back on air, had a brief spike in viewers, and returned to abysmal ratings. Here were some major recent cancelations, plagarized from a conservative account called “Swampist” (I edited the text below a bit):
Roseanne Barr – Her hit show Roseanne was canceled by ABC/Disney overnight in 2018 after a racist tweet.
Gina Carano – Fired from The Mandalorian in 2021 for a social media post. Dropped by her agency.
Megyn Kelly – Fired by NBC in 2018, her morning show canceled after comments about Halloween costumes.
Dave Chappelle – Netflix employees staged a walkout and demanded his comedy special be pulled.
Joe Rogan – People pressured Spotify to drop him, running coordinated campaigns and advertiser boycotts.
Tucker Carlson – Taken off Fox News in 2023. [To be fair, Tucker is a literal neo-Nazi]
J.K. Rowling – Blacklisted from events, attacked by activists, and pressured out of projects for transphobia.
Mike Lindell – MyPillow pulled from major retailers, banned from Twitter, and targeted with advertiser boycotts.
Alex Jones – Simultaneously banned in 2018 by YouTube, Facebook, Apple, and Spotify. [To be fair, he lied about a horrific school shooting. You’re only allowed to do that if you’re a Free Palestine supporter.]
