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Twitter bullies push deaf politician to resign
Published: 3 Dec 12 14:58 CET | Print version
Online: http://www.thelocal.de/politics/20121203-46537.html
A deaf German politician who was mocked on Twitter after speaking on television said on Monday that she was thinking about giving up her position because of the insults. Her deaf voice remained, she said, a taboo.
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Her microblogging feed, under the handle @EinAugenschmaus, was so popular that she was named one of the most important people on Twitter by US broadcaster ABC in 2011. But last Wednesday she became the target of bullies mocking the way she spoke, Tagesspiegel said on Monday.
An activist for inclusion, Probst made her first live television appearance talking about the future of the Pirate Party on “log in" a show aired by German state broadcaster ZDF last Wednesday. Like many people who are deaf, her voice is different from a person with full hearing capacity - and for some viewers, this warranted ridicule.
User @Xylophilon, tweeted that she must have no idea “how stupid she seems” when she spoke. And that if she were smart she would step down. “If not then she should get used to people laughing at her,” they wrote.
Following the outburst, Probst announced that she would probably relinquish her candidacy for the 2013 parliamentary election. Her Twitter account, boasting around 22,000 followers, has been suspended.
She wrote on her blog that she recognised being in the public eye made her a target to some degree, but that her voice was taboo. Adding that although she did not like it, she was considering speech therapy to reduce how vulnerable she was.
Support has flooded in, in the form of hundreds of encouraging comments on her blog, and from fellow Pirate politician Anke Domscheidt-Berg who tweeted that she hoped Probst would return to politics.
“We need her,” tweeted Domscheit-Berg about the football fanatic politician.
The Local/jcw
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Your comments about this article:
Yes, bullying is wrong, but she is over 30. That cannot have been the first time she was ridiculed for it. And mean annonymus people on the internet? Well, that's unheard off for some internet illiterate party like the Pirates I guess.
I'd say I feel bad for her, but that is normally the last thing people with a handicap want. But at least she got a wake up call what it means to govern people. All people. You have to take the dregs with the rest. And sadly, there is no IQ requirement for internet use.
(Actually, I wonder if she is now against anonymity on the net after that run in with bullies)
Just pack in twitter it is only soundbites for idiots.
(And yes, I'm aware that FDR and the USA was not pro-Germany, but look to his overall life and his accomplishments, and how he could have sat in one room staring at a wall his entire life, but instead changed the world because of what he believed).
Or in other words, don't let the turkeys get you down!
I think a little history lesson is in order. Neither the US nor FDR were "for or against Germany." Both the leader and the country had problems with what was happening in Germany under the leadership of the Nazi party, a position that a whole lot of people around the world also took. Like the US, Germany was struggling with the global depression, although Germany was also suffering from the impacts of Versailles, something FDR never denied. He was openly supportive of the programs such as building the autobahns and other infrastructure projects because he was trying the same ideas in the US.
With a few exceptions, most people hoped for the best for Germany, and no less than Churchill initially praised much of what happened in the early days of the Nazi regime.
What the US and FDR didn't like was the actions that came "later" and I think they had every right to feel that way. FDR would be a great role model for this young woman, although perhaps Helen Keller might even be better. In any case, let's not re-write history too much, because the US position clearly evolved as a reaction to the things that happened.
wa
Thanks for the history lesson and ignoring the message.
>>What the US and FDR didn't like was the actions that came "later" and I think they had every right to feel that way
Do you want to equate everything on this site with the U.S.A. or is that the limit of your knowledge ?.