Yes, that wasn't Roger Schawinski at his best. And yes, Schawinski stumbled over the crude provocations of Andreas Thiel, who refused to answer questions from the start, so that Schawinski lost his composure and lost the thread several times in an emotional state. You can blame Schawinski for that. Agreed. But that's not the scandal. The talk has barely begun and Schawinski is asked, without any comprehensible context: "Are you a paper Jew?" Thiel puts on this "oh, I'm so cool poland rcs data and brave and intelligent" look. What's that about? Why does a Swiss Jew have to put up with this smug question? That's blatant anti-Semitism.
Political correctness can be restrictive and nip important discussions in the bud. However, anti-Semitism has no place in our liberal society, nor does racism. Anyone who deliberately crosses boundaries here is not brave, at best they are self-righteous. Thiel's job would have been to face the discussion. Deliberately torpedoing this discussion in the first few minutes was weak and cowardly. Because his hate tirade against the Koran, published in the "Weltwoche", raises legitimate questions. It would have been worth discussing these openly. The fact that this did not work is not Schawinski's fault.