Günter Zehm

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Günter Albrecht Zehm (born October 12, 1933 in Crimmitschau ; † November 1, 2019 in Bonn ) was a German publicist , politically persecuted in the GDR and a philosopher . From 1993 he was honorary professor for philosophy at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena . Zehm was a long-time employee of the daily newspaper Die Welt . From 1995 he was a columnist for the new right weekly newspaper Junge Freiheit .

Study and life

Zehm studied journalism in Leipzig from 1950 to 1952 , then philosophy with Ernst Bloch . After graduating with a degree in philosophy, he received an assistant position at the University of Jena in 1956. As a result of the popular uprising in Hungary in 1956 and the subsequent persecution of dissidents in the GDR , Zehm was arrested in 1957 and sentenced to four years in prison because of his demand for freedom of expression and criticism of the SED . After his conviction, Zehm spent three years in the Waldheim and Torgau prisons . After an amnesty in 1960 he came to West Germany via Berlin in 1961 , then studied at the University of Frankfurt with Theodor W. Adorno , Iring Fetscher and Carlo Schmid and received his doctorate with a thesis on Jean-Paul Sartre .

Günter Zehm died on November 1, 2019 at the age of 86 as a result of a heart attack. His grave is in the Bad Godesberg castle cemetery .

Journalistic activities

After completing his studies, he began working as a feature editor for the daily newspaper Die Welt in 1963 and rose to deputy editor-in-chief (1977 to 1989). In doing so, he consistently represented his conservative attitude. When the Westdeutsche Rundfunk (WDR) wanted to broadcast the Holocaust film series in 1981 , Zehm, who had now advanced to the head of the arts section, criticized even before it was broadcast in the world that the broadcast was outrageous and that the person in charge at WDR at the time, Hans-Ulrich Wagner who had to pay out of his pocket the 1.1 million DM that the series had cost. In an editorial he described Peter Weiss ' Auschwitz drama as Eastern propaganda and “ brainwashing on the stage”. In 1975, Zehm began a weekly column under the pseudonym "Pankraz" (based on the novella Pankraz, der Schmoller by Gottfried Keller ) , which first appeared in the conservative Rheinischer Merkur after he left Die Welt . After leaving the Rheinischer Merkur , he published in 1995 in the right-wing conservative Junge Freiheit (JF) .

From the due sedition sentenced journalist Hans-Dietrich Sander , in whose government bonds (6-7 / 1992) held a speech on 19 June 1992 at the University of Jena was reprinted Zehms, he later distanced himself.

In 1998 he contributed the essay On Dignity and Grace to the festschrift Wagnis Truth (published by the far-right Arndt-Verlag in Kiel) for the convicted Holocaust denier David Irving . Zehm also presented this text on June 27, 1998 at the University of Jena.

In New Right Antaios publisher of Götz Kubitschek Zehms Jena lectures were reprinted.

Honorary professor in Jena

In 1990, after the political change in the GDR , Zehm received a teaching position at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, which was converted into an honorary professorship in 1993. This had been understood internally by the Philosophical Institute as “a form of reparation” for the events of 1957. He also appeared as a speaker at the summer universities of Junge Freiheit and the Bogenhausen Talks of the Danubia Munich fraternity, which was classified as right-wing extremist from 2001 to 2006 and 2012 , most recently in 2000.

The debates of 2000/2001

At the end of 2000, the “Antifascist University Group Jena” started a campaign with which they located Zehm in a “gray area between conservatism and right-wing extremism” and in particular criticized the publications in Junge Freiheit and the aforementioned Festschrift. The professor received support from the then rector of the university, Karl-Ulrich Meyn, among others : “I do not share Mr. Zehm's statements in any way and also find the publication channels he has chosen to be unsuitable, but I cannot see that they are our own has left the free-democratic constitution. ... What I have read from Mr. Zehm is covered by the freedom of science. How should I, as a lawyer, deny him his basic rights? "

Zehm, in turn, described his critics, who were also joined by union representatives, in an interview with the OTZ as a “lost bunch of radical communists” and spoke of “character assassination”. He wouldn't want to be accused of “working for a newspaper that doesn't break the law”.

The controversial debates had an impact beyond the university town and attracted attention across Germany, for example in the Spiegel , the daily newspaper and the Berliner Zeitung .

Quotes

“The 'high C' in the name of parties can be mocked, but you have to believe in the Holocaust; whoever shows doubt disappears behind bars. "

There is still some “leeway” in this country, “unfortunately not as much as in China , but still as much as in Turkey ”.

Publications

  • Historical reason and direct action. On the politics and philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre. Phil. F., dissertation v. Feb. 27, 1963, Frankfurt am Main 1963, DNB 482341297 (230 pages).
  • Pankraz and common sense. Glosses from everyday life against thick and thin board drills. Verlag Styria, Cologne / Graz / Vienna 1988, ISBN 3-7990-5546-0 (255 pages).
  • Pancraz. Columns from the Junge Freiheit. Edition JF, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-929886-05-7 (237 pages).
  • Eros and Logos. A history of ancient philosophy. Edition Antaios , Schnellroda 2004, ISBN 3-935063-41-5 .
  • The body and the soul. Of the many roots of human reason. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2004, ISBN 3-935063-42-3 .
  • The great actress reason. A History of Rationalism in the Early Modern Age. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2005, ISBN 3-935063-43-1 .
  • Evil and the righteous. In search of the ethical minimum. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2005, ISBN 3-935063-44-X .
  • Zarathustra's closing words. Friedrich Nietzsche and the consequences. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2006, ISBN 3-935063-45-8 .
  • Mask and mimesis. A little philosophy of the media. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2007, ISBN 978-3-935063-46-3 .
  • Was Plato in Asia? Adnotes on the globalization of the mind. Edition Antaios, Schnellroda 2008, ISBN 978-3-935063-47-0 .
  • At the bend. About the crises of capitalism, the West and democracy. Edition JF, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-929886-38-2 .
  • Free speech: speaking accurately about depths and shallows. JF Edition, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-929886-42-9 .
  • Image and event: about art, theater and film in the modern age. JF Edition, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-929886-60-3 .

Awards

literature

Web links

swell

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Willi Winkler: Obituary: Der Pankraz www.sueddeutsche.de, November 3, 2019
  2. ↑ Bonner General-Anzeiger : Obituaries .
  3. ↑ Heinz Werner Hübner in conversation with Peter von Rüden in: Nordwestdeutsche Hefte zur Rundfunkgeschichte, edited by Peter von Rüden and Hans-Ulrich Wagner, volume 3, March 2005, p. 50.
  4. ^ Constitutional Protection Report Bavaria 2003, p. 89.
  5. ↑ Rector demands fair intellectual debate
  6. ↑ Gernot Facius: A completely normal weekly newspaper? www.welt.de, June 28, 2001
  7. ↑ Prize winners from 1962 to 1997 ( Memento from December 8, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) at the Federal Association of German Newspaper Publishers
personal data
SURNAME Zehm, Günter
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Zehm, Günter Albrecht
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publicist and philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH October 12, 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH Crimmitschau , Saxony
DATE OF DEATH 1st November 2019
Place of death Bonn