Many adherents of germanic paganism have been persecuted, mainly by Christians. Persecution may include unwarranted arrest, imprisonment, beating, torture, execution, confiscation or destruction of property, or incitement to hatred.
In the middle ages[]
In some instances, medieval conversion of pagans to Christianity was forceful. Charlemagne, in the course of the Saxon Wars, converted Saxon pagans with violence. In 772, he destroyed their sacred tree, and in 782, he allegedly ordered the beheading of 4,500 Saxons who were caught practicing paganism in spite of being baptized.
The Christianization of Northern Europe in the 11th century was accomplished with a significant amount of violence between pagan and Christian factions.
The conflict in Sweden was brought to a point between the pagan king Blot-Sweyn and his Christian brother-in-law Ingold I in the 1080s. After Ingold was forced into exile, he returned to Sweden in 1087, and having arrived at Old Uppsala, he surrounded the hall of Blot-Sweyn with his húskarls, and set the hall on fire, slaying the king as he escaped from the burning house. The burning of the Temple at Uppsala probably dates to the same time.
In 10th century Iceland, there was similar tension between the Christian and pagan factions, but violent clashes were avoided by the decision of the Althing in 1000 CE to put the arbitration between them to Þorgeir Ljósvetningagoði, who opted that the country should convert to Christianity as a whole, while pagan worship in private would continue to be tolerated.
In Sweden Gutalagen (an early Swedish law book) officially in use until 1595, but in practice until 1645, stated that performing blóts was punishable by a fine
In the modern age[]
In Hitler's Germany[]
The SS had invented its own mystical religion in order to counter Christianity completely including it's influence. Nevertheless, the leaders of the NSDA party in Germany, according to their private (Hitler's Table Talk, page 61, translated by Norman Cameron and R.H. Stevens, 1953) and (Mein Kampf, chapter 12) did not wish to encourage forms of paganism which did not serve to further their goals of promoting pan-Germanic ethnic consciousness. The NSDAP had their own form of 'Paganism' that believed in a higher power while also completely rejecting the Christian faith. Though this does not mean that other forms of faiths outside of Christianity were not persecuted.
Hitler himself did not identify with the idea of Odin/Wotan, on (Hitler's Table Talk Page 61) he describes as the revival of Wotan being outdated, especially when Christianity came along. Despite this fact, there was also many other Pagans within the NSDAP and within Germany that had high positions. The issue on this topic is that a lot of these neo-pagans with very high positions most likely did not specifically worship Odin, but probably some other higher being. And the fact that Hitler tolerated that there were many neo-pagans in high positions most likely shows that Hitler most likely specifically hated Odinism/Wotanism and not other forms of Paganism.
The Germanic Faith-Community was heavily suppressed by the Hitler regime in the 1930s. In 1933, the leader of the GFC, Rudolf von Sebettendorff, was arrested and exiled. Being a current or former member of an Odinist organization disqualified anyone from holding rank or office within the NSDAP. But the only reason why Rudolf von Sebettendorff was persecuted was due to him being a freemason and not based on him being an Odininst alone. There were some occult groups that had to due with freemasonry so was therefore arrested, though theoretically one can worship Odin in Nazi Germany and not be persecuted just because he worshipped Odin alone. In 1936 the runemaster Friedrich Bernhard Marby, a follower of Guido von List's occult "ariosophic" Armanenschaft was arrested and sent to a concentration camp at Flossenberg only because of the Criticism of Heinrich Himmler "this criticism may have led to Marby's harsh treatment in the Third Reich.". He was released from the Dachau concentration camp in 1945. Many other members ended up in the concentration camps, although as far as can be told, only one member was actually killed. The full focus of the state was not aimed at religious groups until June 9th 1941, when Reinhard Heydrich, the head of the security police, banned a large number of spiritual practices in General, also targeting Christianity horrendously. The organizations were dissolved, their property confiscated, and many of their leaders arrested, same would go with the Churches.
Despite it not seeming very clear what Hitler's religion specifically was, what is clear is that Hitler hated both Christianity and Odinism. Though his hatred for Odinism seemed to be only on a personal level of opinions and not much of a physical manifestation. Read the "Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church in Germany" for the issues on Christianity in the Third Reich and "Occultism in Nazism" for info on the persecution of Freemasonry, Kabbalism, and Rosicrucianism.
In the USA[]
On November 10, 1999 the International Asatru/Odinic Alliance (IAOA) accused the FBI of violating its First Amendment rights to freedom of religion, free speech, and peaceful assembly. The reason given for this accusation was the propagation of numerous false statements and innuendos about the group in the FBI's "Project Megiddo" report.
In Texas, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice does not allow inmates to study or use the runes in any way. First they were not allowed to receive publications that contain runes, but after the runes were cut out the policy was changed so that inmates may not receive any Asatru publications. The prison authorities claim runes are related to hate groups and used as 'secret codes' for communications between gang members
According to Mark Pitcavage, prisons differentiate between racist and non-racist Neopagans, saying that the racist women's group Sigrdrifa, which has chapters in the United States and Canada, runs a special "Odinism in Prison" project. The imprisoned anti-jewish killer David Lane, who is serving a 190-year sentence in federal prison, is one of the principal propagandists for a violently racist version of Odinism called Wotanism.