Say Anything Blog

Rob: Think about this for a moment.

Does this story sound plausible to you?

FYI: The Telegraph has journalistic standards slightly below, say, Matt Drudge.

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,1564,1302610,00.html

Excerpt: “Under the new law, long-term unemployed who refuse jobs can have their welfare benefits reduced. If a person is under 25 years of age, the government can cut all support except the monthly housing reimbursement and non-cash benefits. A person is required to take any legal job. A special morality clause, however, ensures that unemployed will not be forced into prostitution—which is legal and regulated in Germany.”

I hadn’t heard that Mark.  Can you point me to a source and I’ll update?

The war against illegal plunder has been fought since the beginning of the world. But how is… legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. Then abolish this law without delay … If such a law is not abolished immediately it will spread, multiply and develop into a system.

Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

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The Telegraph is actually quite a reputable newspaper.

However, this story has subsequently been proven to be categorically false.

(This information came from Private Eye magazine, scourge of inaccurate journalism - they don’t, unfortunately, have a website).

I can’t find a source, but I will tell you what I know.

The article in the Telegraph went on to give the example of a German brothel owner, Ulrich Kueperkoch, who is taking a local job centre to court for refusing to allow his adverts for prostitutes. The Telegraph journalist was clearly trying, in raising this case, to imply that job centres in Germany consider prostitution to be a profession one has to take up if faced with the alternative of unemployment.

However, the very fact that the job centre is being taken to court shows that it refuses to consider brothel work as an acceptable form of employment. It won’t carry the adverts, therefore making Herr Kueperkoch rather angry.

Further, the German job centre network has actually issued a statement to the Deutsche Welle, to the effect that they had ‘decided not to be active in that market sector [prostitution] due to its belief that such work could infringe on an individual’s rights if he or she is forced to take the job’.

Clearly that undermines the basis of the story entirely.

As for what actually happened?

Well, the 25 year old waitress, Sabine Bright, was given work by her job centre at a bar which (unknown to the job centre) also functioned as a brothel. She didn’t take the job. Her benefits were unaffected. No-one has threatened her with the removal of her benefits because of this embarrassing incident. The story is therefore without foundation.

Thank you Mark.  I’ve updated.

The war against illegal plunder has been fought since the beginning of the world. But how is… legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. Then abolish this law without delay … If such a law is not abolished immediately it will spread, multiply and develop into a system.

Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

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