Cabaret artist Dieter Nuhr (65) is defending himself against accusations that he made jokes about the murder of women in a show. On Facebook, he clarified: "I did not." Nuhr continued: "No joke about femicide, nowhere. I have never done that. I will not do it. The accusation is ridiculous." He also denies having blamed victims.
The accusations refer to statements Nuhr made in an XXL edition of "Nuhr im Ersten" on June 18. In it, the cabaret artist said: "There are about 300 to 350 murders of women every year and please: Of course that's 300 to 350 too many. There's no question about that." But the probability of encountering a murderer of women in a relationship among the "tens of millions" of men in Germany "is practically zero. To be safe, it wouldn't be a bad idea to simply get to know your partner first before being intimate."
How Dieter Nuhr defends his statements
On Facebook, Nuhr emphasized that with his contribution he wanted to draw attention to what he sees as a blanket condemnation of men. He particularly criticized the use of the term "structural", which "assigns guilt to all men". The occasion for his statements were newspaper articles in which women questioned "whether they could still live with men because they 'statistically kill'". He wanted to address this "completely exaggerated blanket vilification" from his point of view.
The comedian continued: "I emphasized that every murder of a woman is of course (!) one too many, but that the chance of encountering a murderer of women when choosing a partner is vanishingly small." He wanted to show that one "can remain calm when choosing a partner".
rbb refers to artistic freedom
Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (rbb), which is responsible for the show, has already responded to the criticism. "We can understand that the quoted passage is meeting with great criticism. However, in satire formats, artistic freedom must also be respected", a statement says. The show is known as a satire format. "As an artist, Dieter Nuhr is fundamentally allowed to formulate in a provocative and pointed manner against the background of artistic freedom."
