Yahoo! Publicizes German Portal With Nazi Slogan
Yahoo! Germany launched a new homepage. To spread the word to the world, their press office sent a release this week — and doing so made a huge mistake in the choice of words.
In the press release the company said verbatim: "Die neue Yahoo! Startseite macht es möglich: Jedem das Seine." which means: "The new Yahoo! Home makes it possible: Each to his own/To each his own."
Meanwhile, the second part of the title was changed to "Anything for everyone", but searching the 'Net, specifically by Google, however, will currently show the old title. In the era of National Socialism the slogan "Each to his own" was emblazoned at the gate of the Buchenwald concentration camp - where more than 50,000 people were killed by the Nazis.
In the recent past, the slogan has been used many times for promotional purposes:
- The coffee company Tschibo advertised once at petrol stations for its offerings, but stopped the campaign after public protests.
- In March 2009, the Student Union of NRW CDU banked on the Nazi slogan to protest against the community schools project. The local party had to stop immediately any further use.
- Austrian Airlines had recently the idea of winning new customers with "To each his own" - this attempt also ended in a retreat.
Thereby, the sentence originates from the Greek antiquity and is a positive connotation originally considered to express one of the classic principles of law. In Germany, out of respect and preservation of dignity to the victims and survivors of the Nazi dictatorship, "Each to his own" has not been in public use since the end of World War II. However, the meaning of this slogan falls into oblivion, as shown in the example of Yahoo! Germany.
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