It can be just depends on how its used and the context around it
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From the bit of research I did after Llama’s reply, it appears that it is mandatory after conjunctive adverbs like however, meanwhile, and furthermore but only highly recommended in cases like personally or ideally and not as recommended for so, then, yet.
Pointless to argue about who reported you…. No one will admit to it. Try to avoid it in the future and for anyone who did consider not doing so. My 5 cents.
Challenge accepted.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = someone else said it.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = you’re calling me a liar for saying I said that.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = I implied it.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = I just said someone did.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = I just said she walked away with it.
- “I never said she stole my money.” = she stole someone else’s money!
- “I never said she stole my money.” = I said she stole something else.
How’d I do? I’m also ignoring the double stressed situations like “I never said she stole my money” because I’d be here all night.
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Welcome to the linguistic field of semantics.
All of these mean the same on a basic level, but add implications that are sometimes open to interpretation, e.g. “I never said she stole my money” could also imply “I wrote it” or “I asked if she did”. Stressing any word does not modify the fundamental meaning (at least in this example), it just adds to it.
A missing comma can change the fundamental meaning, though.
- “Let’s eat, Grandma.”
- “Let’s eat Grandma.”
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Personally, I don’t always put the stress on the word personally or have a short pause. If I do then yes, I use a comma.
What’s the second word & is supposed to replace?
Yeah, my phone hasn’t autocorrected anything on this forum since they “upgraded” the software many years ago. It does my nut since autocorrect works everywhere else.
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That’s not 100% correct. You stil can say whatever you want you only have to life with the consequenses that come with your words. Freedom of speech in germany ands in an instant if you talk crap, rassist/nazi stuff, state unlawfull things, hurt someones feelings or if you misgender someone. But it don’t prohibit you from using words doing so.
It’s a bit more nuanced than that, but the freedom to express your opinion is limited by several laws, in accordance with art 5 GG (2).
Example:
Hurting someone’s feelings isn’t exactly the problem. If you tell someone that you don’t like their new haircut, this might hurt their feelings without being unlawful. Example: Sorry mate, but I don’t like your new haircut.
Doing so with insults to hurt the person’s honour is unlawful (§185 STGB - Beleidigung). Example: New Haircut? Finally, you look like the pig you are.
While you technically can insult someone, this is not protected by your freedom to express your opinion, and prohibited by law.
To further complicate things: if you artistically mock/insult a public figure (e.g. satire) this is often protected by the freedom of art (article 5 GG (3))
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Yes, that was the exact point of it. It’s a bit of fun where a single sentence can mean quite different things
I mean letters, of course. I didn’t notice it. That is due to english not being my first language (although I’d like to think that I’m actually pretty good at it, especially if I pay attention to what I’m writing). Some words, for some reason, aren’t properly mapped in my brain and I have to think about them when translating or I’ll use the wrong one.
For some reason, words/letters is such an example where I’ll mix them up if I’m not paying attention. It’s not that I don’t know what each means, it’s just that my brain didn’t map them correctly and they’re kinda “loose” in there.
Besides what Horus said, the same can be applied to anything unlawful:
-You can kill someone if you want. You then have to live with the consequences.
-You can drive without a license. Same thing.
-You can dump your garbage on the street. Same thing.
Laws don’t actually stop you from doing things. They just impose consequences on doing them. They only work because of the fear of those consequences they impose.
Which is why most people don’t have a problem jay walking, even though it’s not permitted by law. Because they know it’s not enforced and there are no consequences.
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I didn’t take it personally. All she did was to steal my money.
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Did she, though? That would depend on which word you emphasized.
Which means that, if we assume what you said as accurate, we can now eliminate a few options: she and stole. Because if you stressed those words it wouldn’t fit with your current statement.
(Yes, it seems like we went from a free speech rant to an english lesson and now a mystery game.)
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I didn’t take it, personally (as in: myself). She put it in my bag.
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Of course I didn’t steal anything. See? My pouch was just under the table. It was lucky that it fell there, otherwise you would have lost it.
(Maybe this is an obscure reference that not many will know 
)
It is 100% correct. Freedom of speech does not allow you to literally say whatever you want. Several things like insults, sedition/mass instigation (not sure what the proper word would be in english, but I mean Volksverhetzung) and many more things are not covered by freedom of speech.
When you say things that are against certain laws, they are not covered by freedom of speech and thus you are not allowed to talk in that way.
Obviously you can still do it, but that would be true for a lot more things.
You can also kill another person.
You can also hit somebody in their face.
But both of this will come with consequences.
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I love how this thread turned out.
Also, @DJSamhein, if I didn’t know from this thread that English wasn’t your first language, I would have assumed it was.
It’s my first, and only, language, (hough I took 2 semesters of German in high school and remember almost none of it) and you write better than I do
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Based on Google Translate translating Volksverhetzung into Sedition, either sedition or treason would work depending on the context.
Also, not sure how German law works, but in the USA Freedom of Speech is simply to prevent the government from setting up new laws to criminalize speech. But you can still be punished for what you say depending on the context.
Feelings are subjective, so intent is taken into consideration, but let’s say you slander someone by claiming that they’re a thief and saying “she’s a thief, she stole my money!” with no evidence. Whoever “she” is could sue you for slander and you’d face criminal charges. But not for what you said, but for the effect it had on another person
Google Translator is very very bad with singular word translation, especailly german to english.
Whole sentences with a bit of context are usually a bit better, but I am very hesitant to use translators and if I am unsure I usually throw in multiple words I think are right and then the person on the other end needs to do some context based thinking.
EDIT: PS. I also wanted to use this word specifically, because it encomapsses 3rd Reich and nationalist stuff, but obviously it is a much bigger term that encompasses much much more. But because of germany’s history it is a very important term and has a lot of weight in law.
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Honestly, that’s probably mainly because (besides the fact I’ve always liked English and excelled at it in class) for the past 30+ years, when a book was originally written in English, I’ve read it in English. This means I’ve read almost non-stop in English, over 1k books by now, for over 30 years. That does a lot for your knowledge of a language.
Translation is mostly just just interpreting the text and I’d rather interpret it myself. Honestly, it’s the main reason why I’d like to learn some more languages, except I’m too lazy to actually do so.
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You guys don’t help the poor little algorithm when you have singular words longer than most English full sentences.
Edit: I would like to take the opportunity to thank Deviant for starting the thread, it is actually quite interesting.
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While the German Basic Law (our constitution) says that everyone has the freedom to express and disseminate their opinion in speech, written form or imagery, there is a big caveat that certain laws can limit this freedom.
Article 1 of the Basic Law says that human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority.
From this article alone, you derive and justify laws that protect people against insults, discrimination, and more. Hence, insulting people is a criminal offence (if the insulted decides to pursue it, the state doesn’t do so on its own accord), as the state protects the people’s dignity.
And we have several laws that are supposed to make sure people don’t play down the horrors that happened in the 3rd Reich.
Volksverhetzung has an article in the English wikipedia for those interested.
Now, I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice ^^
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