Speaking only for myself with no sense of authority: there's something in the air that I'm not the only one feeling. Something very subtle seems off. The water is a little hotter, but subtly enough to say "nah it's not like that". The way I see it, tens of thousands took to the streets to make damn sure it won't be like that on their watch.
The AfD has gotten louder and stronger last year, and it's reaching further and further into other parties' voter bases, fueled by growing economic problems and contentious immigration policies.
It's everywhere, not just in Germany. Like you said, there's "something in the air". The rise of populism, rebirth of strong nationalism, is everywhere in Europe. I feel like wherever that tide is pushed back, it grows stronger in the background anyway.
And the worst thing is, I don't really see how this could get better. Economic problems will continue to grow for at least several years, and one of the most contenious problems - immigration, legal or otherwise - is not going to slow down, fueled by conflicts around the globe and climate change pushing people out of previously habitable areas.
It's worth to look at the underlying cause for these sentiments gaining popularity and support in recent years. I'm pretty sure to some degree it has to do with native European populations being unhappy about illegal immigration and the problems arising from that.
And before you call me a racist: mainstream media kept redefining the meaning of the word refugee for a while now. For example: refugees are expected to stop at the nearest safe haven and not traverse multiple countries to end up in the one with the biggest social benefits. Also, tonnes of young men arriving from war-torn regions with disproportionate ratio of women and children. News outlets advertising these groups as doctors and engineers which at this point is a meme.
Economical burden, elevated crime rates and social tensions caused by this are quite apparent. Just look at Sweden, France, Germany. UK has it lucky because it's an island and harder to get into.
All that while everyone pointing at these topics as unresolved problems getting branded as racist or xenophobe. It's only natural people get angry and start leaning toward populist assholes who promise to "solve" these problems one way or another.
The pendulum is starting to sway back and that is not a good thing but also not unexpected the way things were going.
>> For example: refugees are expected to stop at the nearest safe haven and not traverse multiple countries to end up in the one with the biggest social benefits. Also, tonnes of young men arriving from war-torn regions with disproportionate ratio of women and children. News outlets advertising these groups as doctors and engineers which at this point is a meme.
The thing is, all of the above is just noise. It's not relevant to the problem at large. Even if they were all PhD educated doctors it would still leave the core of the issue to address - there's SO MANY people coming, and more will come in the next decade. All predictions on this point way up - be it do to instability in various regions, war, or things like actual literal depletion of fresh water sources and food, plus temperatures raising to the point where people are dying and crops can't grow in several African and middle eastern regions.
Getting into whether these people are men, children, skilled workers or uneducated farmers is pointless - the question is what are we going to do(as European Union) about 1M+ arriving here every year. We are trying to do the humane thing, and it's clearly resulting in a massive increase in populism and nationalism everywhere because the native populations don't like it - again, there is zero point in even getting into whether that's justified or not - the question is, where do we go from here. Because the way I see if, if something isn't done urgently we will end up in a situation where the people in power do what the louder and louder groups say we should - and that's a terrifying vision of the world.
I understand that refugees are a significant part of the perceived problem, but as an immigrant, I'm on line two of that Niemöller poem and I won't wait and see where Saxon farmers draw the line.
I'm not surprised by any of this, but I'm definitely not feeling easy about it.
The processes through which immigrants and refugees settle in Germany are enshrined into democratically enacted laws. The refugees did not demand it; Germans with voting rights did.
The presence of all immigrants except refugees is contingent on their ability to support themselves. This is a legal requirement and it's verified at every step of the immigration process.
I can't just "walk into your home". I've been here 9 years, and I'm still waiting for the immigration office to confirm that yes, I'm still supporting myself (and quite a few German retirees), and that yes, I can live in this country for another few years.
From my perspective, I was raised, educated and trained by another country, then moved to Germany in my prime to pay taxes and support the local economy, and if all goes well, I'll retire elsewhere before I'm a strain on the healthcare or pension system. I can't vote, and my presence in this country is directly linked to my ability to pay taxes.
Being an immigrant is not walking in anyone's home. It's signing a social contract on the terms of the receiving country. You are talking about extraction of value as if the immigrants are paying taxes and adding value to their country of origin which is false. The issue that Europe is having is that the "economy" benefits a few, the metrics are skewed towards the ultra rich and whenever that happens immigrants are accused of being the issue.
> walk into their home, take up residence, and just start living off them and what they and their ancestors created over centuries and millennia, and not only do you not pay anything for it, you even benefit from it even more than they do in their own home
Do you actually think immigrants don't need to work or pay for anything and just leech of society?
IDK what are you on about, but as an multi-immigrant you usually are exploited by landlords for not knowing your rights, paid less, have little money to start your life and spend everything to setup your abode all while also try to send a little money to your family.
So no, I reject the premise that I benefit more than locals do. My life was 3x harder to get where I am.
I call this auto-colonialism. Certainly in the West (if not globally since as we know our “owners and masters” just met in Davos) there is clearly a super-layer that went ‘transnational’ and has been extracting wealth from its own people. And speaking of “own people” this is precisely why they do not give a flying F about “cultural heritage” and anything whatsoever that ‘conditions mind’ (such as national myths) that is not under their narrative control.
If you study history, you will note that the elite have always used mind control means to lord it over the masses. Our current crop can not even claim ‘noble blood’ or anything remotely like that so their strategy of exploitive rule is to pyschologically confuse (and upset) the subject population.
I’ll give you an example. The memes around certain words that were/are directly targeting the sexual vulnerabilities of white(-ish) young men, coupled with pornographic content to reinforce these social and sexual vulnerabilities. I mean, if I wanted to create ultra right wing shock troops, that is what I would do.
We’re being played. We’re being fucked with. Because the elite know they can not tell us the full scope of their ‘progressive plans’ for controlling their cattle on Human plantation.
So they have us fighing each other. It works. [edit: see sibling comments. The discussion immediately turns into a polarization around secondary effects, such as ‘welfare benefits’, etc. Meanwhile they are laughing their way to the bank. Oh wait, they own the banks ..]
p.s. am imigrant myself. Even I am upset at what they are doing to my new Western homeland. After all, I came here precisely for the cultural heritage that the elite decided to destroy over the past 3 decades. Ever since USSR fell...
An eeeevil plan to transform virtually every country in the world, for three decades, without a single leak? And all those type A personalities pulling in the same direction? That's incredible!
You are just full of strawmen and not a single coherent sentence. My mind is in perfect working order. Yours looks like it needs a tuneup and an education.
> For example: refugees are expected to stop at the nearest safe haven
If that were true, countries next to warzones would risk destabilization (moreso than they already do). The system's not set up like that, and never has been.
Read the Fourth Turning, I truly wonder if this is the “there is something in the air” thing.
> The Strauss–Howe generational theory, devised by William Strauss and Neil Howe, describes a theorized recurring generation cycle in American history and Western history. According to the theory, historical events are associated with recurring generational personas (archetypes). Each generational persona unleashes a new era (called a turning) lasting around 20–25 years, in which a new social, political, and economic climate (mood) exists. They are part of a larger cyclical "saeculum" (a long human life, which usually spans between 80 and 100 years, although some saecula have lasted longer). The theory states that a crisis recurs in American history after every saeculum, which is followed by a recovery (high). During this recovery, institutions and communitarian values are strong. Ultimately, succeeding generational archetypes attack and weaken institutions in the name of autonomy and individualism, which eventually creates a tumultuous political environment that ripens conditions for another crisis.
It definitely seems to be a worldwide phenomenon. You forgot that immigration is also fueled by the receiving side, who won't admit their dependence on cheap labour that pays taxes without needing to be raised and cared for.
That something might just be the urgency of change in things we’ve taken for grander the past ~2 generations (~60years)
Right at the top of that list:
- using fossil fuels as cheap energy
- assuming continued growth while earths resources are limited (yes tech is getting more efficient)
- relying on respected and trusted media entities (opposed to outlets bought by corporations with clear interests or maybe(?) state controlled social media trolls
Change is happening, coming fast and is becoming harder to ignore but people don’t like change.
I think migration is mostly driven by technological changes. Tens of thousands simply fly to Middle America and trek to the US border. That (tens of thousands affording a plane ticket) wouldn't have been possible in the 90s's. Regardless of whether it's climate change, population growth or growing riches though, it's going to get more intensive in the future.
>>I think migration is mostly driven by technological changes. Tens of thousands simply fly to Middle America and trek to the US border.
While you aren't wrong, I don't see how that's relevant when talking about immigration into Europe from Africa and Middle East - those migrants arrive either on foot or on crappy boats, at best they manage to catch a train or get trafficked inside a van. They aren't flying in.
Not all ME immigrants are refugees. For most people, immigration means meeting a list of requirements and months of paperwork. The process is much harder for ME nationals than for people from favored nations.
Fascism is a product of capitalism's crisis. It's the final breath of capitalism when the system is not working for the masses, it's counter revolutionary, it's a doubling down of the status quo into a more violent form.
Wages stagnated, inflation is eating up the last pennies of a more impoverished worker class, populism will always rise up from these conditions, and right wing populism will eventually lead to fascism.
It seems you are equating them just by virtue of authoritarianism, to me that's just one trait they share (and from which only Fascism has it necessarily in any instance it happens). I'd like to know what else you consider them to be so similar at to call "two sides of the same coin".
Authoritarianism is commonly discussed as the foundation of each, without which neither can exist. i.e. they are each offshoots stemming from authoritarianism, and cannot exist without it.
Yes, not only both of them are based on totalitarianism, they are also totalitarian systems based on ideology.
But there is more. Both began as support for the working class after World War I (in Germany). In fact, both the Communist Party and the Nazi movement fought for their influence on the workers and other disgruntled groups. They also used very similar methods like organizing strikes, providing support and shelter to the workers, using propaganda as the main method of communication, playing the nationalism card, nationalizing companies and seizing private assets for planned productions etc. Also their militaristic aggression as a means of expansion of their ideologies bears many similarities: Soviet in Afghanistan, Vietnam in Cambodia, China in Korea and beyond, etc... Even in terms of the will to genocide/mass kill the "enemies", they are not far from each other: Nazis and the concentration camps, Khmer Rouge and their killing fields, China and the Uighur prison camp/Cultural Revolution, Soviet Union and the Holodomor famine in Ukraine etc...
With enough power, both communism and fascism will tend to extremism and will not shy away from military aggression to spread their ideologies.
"The AfD has gotten louder and stronger last year, and it's reaching further and further into other parties' voter bases"
They reached into actual daily politics of the government - because Chancellor Scholz now also say things like "we have to start massivly kicking immigrants out"
This is when I started paying attention. The anti-immigration sentiment has flared up and it became advantageous to fan those flames, even as a boring centrist party.
The overton window has shifted right even in left-leaning, immigrant-packed forums. I am stunned by the sort of stuff I see on reddit these days. They think that they'll only come for the other immigrants. I'm not going to wait and see.
Yes, and the notorious meeting where the AfD supposedly planned to evict everyone:
1. Wasn't an AfD meeting
2. Had CDU politicians there too
Reality is, the AfD's positions are popular and Scholz tries to respond to that, whilst also claiming his opponents are a threat to democracy. But that is a risky strategy. After all, if one party can make a policy that another party cannot then campaign to reverse, then who is really dismantling democracy?
This is known in some circles as the fourth turning; in others, it's just common sense: failed policies lead to demoralising the center electorate and activating the extreme, both left and right.
Yea, Kremlin supported AfD is having a success. Putin is happily destroying european unity while we let their propaganda hit us in social media daily. [1]
The Russia induced Syrian migrant wave of 2015 sure helped undermine the current right wing popularity rise. [2]
And Russias involvement in making brexit happen... [3]
Russia didn't induce the 2015 migrant wave. The small child on the beach and "refugees welcome" have happened months before Russia's involvement in Syria began.
Schroeder isn't far-right, no. Schroeder was a bit like a softer version of what pre-Obama era Trump was expected to be like as a politician (i.e. when he was still expected to run as a Democrat). He openly has financial ties to Gazprom these days (or at least before the invasion of Ukraine - haven't heard much from him since) and seems to have spent most of his time after being chancellor schmoozing with oligarchs. Of course none of that demonstrates any corruption because his close ties to Russian money and his pro-Russian economical stance as a chancellor are entirely separate and there's no reason to suspect any conflict of interest. /s
Maybe that Kremlin influence contributes a little, but most importantly what drives their rise is the corruption and bad government we have had for decades. Stop having politicians in your parties elected who only are out for their own enrichment, and start actually improving the situations of lower income population, and you will quickly regain support.
I hold CDU, SPD, FDP and the greens all accountable for the rise of AFD. Much more than Putin or the Kremlin or whatever. I even think it is dangerous to overlook the mainstream parties' own hand in this. They must learn now, or it will get very unpleasant soon.
>The Russia induced Syrian migrant wave of 2015 sure helped undermine the current right wing popularity rise. [2]
I think you mean the 5-eyes induced ME immigration that started in 2003 with the illegal invasion and destruction of 5% of Iraqs population, the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan, destruction of Libya, invasion and occupation of Syria by the West, and so on.
We (5-eyes and by proxy, Europe too) still occupy 1/3rd of Syria - its oil fields - specifically to prevent the Syrian people rebuilding their nation.
The "migrant wave" is a bit more complex than that and largely manufactured and artificially intensified as a political talking point which the AfD (and other far-right movements in Europe) primarily benefited from.
Some factors involved are:
- Turkey and other "gateway" states closing their outbound borders to Europe in return for financial and political favors, thus preventing "migrants" (mostly refugees and asylum seekers, legitimate or not) from moving into Europe - Libya even went so far as to imprison migrants on spurious charges
- the lackluster handling of post-war Iraq and Afghanistan and the lukewarm involvement by Western powers in the Arab Spring creating a power vaccuum filled that allowed for the rise of ISIS and prolonged the Syrian civil war (which even saw an absurd NATO-internal confrontation between Turkey-backed ISIS-affiliated groups and US-backed Kurdish Rojava - until the US pulled out)
- brutal and at times legally dubious treatment of "migrants" by EU border countries (e.g. preventing rescue attempts at sea resulting in people drowning that could otherwise have been saved, "refugee camps" in places like Lampedusa or tent cities near the French-UK transit lines)
- countries like Germany being unwilling or very slow to allocate more resources to the actual processing of "migrants" and asylum requests or the housing and aid provided to them (contrast this with the "quick and unbureaucratic help" immediately extended to Ukranian refugees where politicians literally said the refugee housing was inadequate for them - legally, Ukranian refugees were and still are treated more like foreign EU citizens rather than as refugees when it comes to various permits and benefits)
In effect, the 2015 "migrant wave" was rather uneventful in Germany if you look at the actual numbers. It was a temporary spike followed by a statistically high plateau in 2016 caused by the bureaucratic backlog rather than a still ongoing "wave". But of course there was a trendic topic of a "migrant wave" present throughout the media and heavily utilized by the AfD as one of the only parties to run with it and use it to their advantage (whereas none of the other parties really had any interest in debunking it wholesale, thus just appearing rhetorically weak).
Prior to the sanctions that followed the invasion of Ukraine, Russia had very successfully seeded right-wing movements in Western countries and used social media, RT and Sputnik to provide a "counter-narrative" to mainstream and public news. It's telling that when the sanctions started, a lot of the COVID deniers rebranded as "peace movements" and often explicitly used Russian flags as symbols of solidarity while calling for an end to military aid to Ukraine.
Yes, the Western nations are hardly innocent when it comes to interfering in or outright invading in foreign countries, especially in the Middle East, but neither is Russia although Russian interference is historically less blatant and less open, often using plausible deniability or multiple parallel constructions (i.e. less misinfo or disinfo and more undermining the trust in any form of info altogether by pushing multiple mutually contradictory alternative explanations).
> In effect, the 2015 "migrant wave" was rather uneventful in Germany
Nobody ever mentions brexit, even though it had a significant bureaucratic impact. The immigration office was clearly affected by it. Now it's equally impacted by the wave of Ukrainian refugees. I see these clearly since I work with the immigration office a lot.
The "good" options are doing what their funders demand them to do and that is keeping the current system limping onward.
The opposition, the far right ones are however funded by new sources, shady ones. Their platform is thin as ice, there is no substance behind their loud slogans. But the slogans they use, do reach peoples heads. If the current leaders are not able to take these points for them selves and gain back the votes by actually doing what the proletariat want, then a very sudden and painful fall is the outcome. It has always been that way.
That "something in the air" is underlying guilt on the part of the West, for the mass crimes against humanity and war crimes which Europe and its partners in the 5-eyes has let occur, with impunity, since the illegal invasion and destruction of Iraq in 2003.
The Western nations know, intrinsically, that they are being run by war criminals - people such as Cameron and Macron, who have the blood of MILLIONS of innocent peoples lives on their hands, and yet: they are getting away without facing justice.
In such circumstances, you can be sure there is populist anger which can be deftly exploited by propagandists in the West to create movements conducive to their gaining more power as the war-criminal class fights to hide its crimes against humanity.
Until we prosecute our OWN war criminals we will have to shelter their victims. Period.
The answer is, unfortunately, yes, you probably should. I am in the same boat and have an expectation to receive the sharp end of the stick eventually. Not that the exit strategy is self-evident...
You copy/paste these comments on every unrelated post created by immigrants. Please stop.
Obviously your comment is irrelevant, your parent poster didn't migrate "without paying any cost or contributing in the form of higher taxes" but indeed pays extremely high tax rates without receiving nearly any social benefits. This finances the life styles of the (mostly) retired or underemployed voters who oppose this migration.
Conflating legal economic migration with illegal immigration, asylum and/or refugee status is a foreign disinformation tactic to radicalise people against their neighbours.
Yes and they likely will win in some eastern states.
"The party leads in several states in eastern Germany, the region where its support is strongest — including three, Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia, that are slated to hold elections this fall."
Which sucks, because I happen to live there. And my partner with latin american origins often experience racism here. So we are thinking of going away, but the mass rallies are giving me some hope.
Mass rallies in Berlin and Munich aren't going to do much about blatant racism in Saxony. That's a bit like an American thinking that activism in NYC is going to have a real effect on the mentality of people in rural Mississippi. The values of people in those different areas are extremely different, and the people in the economically "left behind" regions are actually going to feel even more attacked by these rallies, most likely, since they already feel like their views are being ignored.
There were also some rallies in saxony and more are scheduled for next weekend. Way lower in numbers of course, but it is something. And it is a wake up call for people to come together, before it is too late.
"the people in the economically "left behind" regions are actually going to feel even more attacked by these rallies, most likely, since they already feel like their views are being ignored."
And most of those people radicalized during Covid (there is a big intersection of anti vaxx people with the AfD). They already live in their own universe - disconnected from any source that might challenge their worldview and they made up their mind already about everything. They are comfortable with a de facto Nazi Leader (Höcke) - and yes, they complain that they are getting ignored. But sorry, I would continue to ignore their views of a racist white germany. Apart from that, sure the big politics made many misstakes and did not care about those "left behind" regions at all.
And yes, imposing top down, that a quite village suddenly has to host many war traumatized immigrants - was not the way to do it. But the big politics did - and just branded every concerns as racist.
That rightfully pissed people off. But being pissed off about the government is still no justification for becoming a Nazi in my opinion.
I don't live in Germany, but your points seem similar to what I see happen on this side of the Rhine. But what are those people to do?
Their only weapon is the ballot. I don't know how elections work over there, but over here, blank votes aren't counted. You can't vote "against" someone while at the same time not voting for someone else. Don't like Macron nor Le Pen (the runner-up in the last elections)? Tough. Your opinion doesn't count.
So maybe they don't actually want the AfD in power, but hope that the incumbents get the message that they will get their asses voted out if they don't at least feign to listen. And you know that being in power is a politician's topmost priority.
Calling them racists and whatnot will very probably not help "non-nazis'" case.
"Calling them racists and whatnot will very probably not help "non-nazis'" case."
Well, but they overwhelmingly are racists. I should know, I grew up and live here. And I debate with them. And I try to shield my half german kids from their racism as much as possible.
Of course, officially allmost no one is a racist. So there is a meme by now: "I am no racist, but .... " (followed by something clearly racists, germany needs to remain white, but of course white is also not said, but biological germans. Autochtone germans, etc. )
"Their only weapon is the ballot. I don't know how elections work over there, but over here, blank votes aren't counted."
Over here neither. And I also have a hard time finding a party I could really support. And I am also pissed of at the government. I still don't vote for people, who want a new german empire, as I see no improvement here, but rather the opposite. Oh and quite many there (but not all) also dream of joining forces with Putin as he also hates multiculture and diversity. I understand the frustration that made people go into that direction - that does not mean I have to open myself up, to embrace them.
The above point is, for the moment those people don't get many alternative solutions to their problems. Okay not "solutions" as what AfD proposes is not a solution, but alternative views. And it will be an uphill battle because as you noticed the neonazis ride the conspiracies wave, and that's something very difficult to fight...
Well that sort of language won't help. The AfD are not Nazis. This claim makes everything worse and needs to be discarded.
The National Socialists campaigned very openly on Hitler's belief that democracy was a bad system that should be abolished. Nobody was surprised when he went ahead and did that, because that's exactly what he always said he would do. They also campaigned on a very left wing agenda, with lots of talk in their speeches about comrades and ending class divisions, and they ran regular shows of strength in the streets with mass rallies of their supporters.
The AfD in contrast:
- Disdain socialism
- Do not organize massive street rallies
- Campaign on pro-democratic positions, like wanting lots of Swiss-style referendums. They say they dislike the EU because it's got a democratic deficit and they talk sometimes about a UK style referendum on leaving it, for that reason
Their opponents:
- Are left wing
- Organize massive rallies of supporters on the streets
- Take anti-democratic positions, like wanting to ban their opponents
So it's very dangerous strategy to attack the AfD as Nazis because they can just turn this around. They will say to those who listen: who is the bigger threat to the constitution? The people who spend years engaging in peaceful political campaigning (AfD), or the ones who have already had a key policy invalidated as unconstitutional and now talk about making it illegal to vote against their other policies (Ampel)?
Well, there was an official court case about it, with the result that Höcke indeed may be called a faschist, due to many things he said, that were often literal Nazi quotes. And he was a history teacher, so he knows what he was referencing. (and yes, I oversimplify a bit by conflating nazis with faschists, but a) I see no fundamental difference b) it is pretty much common nowdays
And the AfD in its whole is not a Nazi Party, but some sections like thuringia, the base of Hoecke, are verified far right extremists, according to the Verfassungsschutz.
And Hoecke becomes increasingly powerful within the party, many sources say he is already the de facto leader.
And I frequently read their news sites and forums. But I never read of criticism of Hoecke there - so this means to me, the rest of the AfD may not be propper faschists (yet) - but they accept that one of their main leaders is one. That tells me enough.
"The AfD in contrast:
- Disdain socialism
- Do not organize massive street rallies"
The original Nazis also did not do socialism, but rather elimenated their socialist wing soon after taking power. And the AfD surely would love to organize bigger rallies, than they already do. They just cannot, as in reality they do not have the majority behind them, unlike they like to think.
"or the ones who have already had a key policy invalidated as unconstitutional"
And are you talking about the covid money transfers? There was a court case and it was ruled not allright. But nothing of the sort that the Ampel is opposed to the constitution. There was also a constitutional ruling that the government is not doing enough for climate change. Constitutional rulings against the government happen all the time and it is simply the job of the Verfafssungsgericht to make sure that the government stays in line. A system that is somewhat working.
Hoecke on the other hand marched together with the NPD .. and the quotes he uses, well, I assume you understand german, so maybe read for yourself?
It is verified by now that he admires the Nazis and dreams of a new German Empire. That is very much unconstitutional, opposed to a wrong accounting trick.
Was there a court case? I can only find reference to an accusation that he might have said in a speech "Everything for our homeland, everything for Saxony-Anhalt, everything for Germany", which apparently everyone should know shares the last three words with an SS slogan and that therefore saying it is indisputable signs of wanting to conquer Poland. Also Höcke claimed he didn't know this but, according to his critics, being a history teacher, he must have known really.
This supposedly famous SS slogan is a "motto applied to the blades of uniform daggers worn by the SA and National Socialist Motor Corps (NSKK)."
For sure everyone in Germany memorizes literally everything ever printed on any physical object made by the Nazis. A totally reasonable expectation that is not at all driven by a desire to ban their political opponents. According to the Glossary, the Nazis were also fond of criticizing Das System, which is what they called the Weimar Republic. I'm sure nobody on the German left has ever railed against The System because that would be Nazi language, and certainly the Verfassungsschutz would investigate such things promptly and without bias.
This kind of thing makes Germany look ridiculous and sinister.
> The original Nazis also did not do socialism, but rather elimenated their socialist wing soon after taking power.
Hitler killed fellow Nazis for the same reasons Lenin and Stalin killed fellow Soviets. It's wrong to assume a socialist dictator would not kill fellow socialists. They always do. It's one of the things that makes them scary, even their allies aren't safe. As for the "original" Nazis, here's a quote for you:
"Socialism as the final concept of duty, the ethical duty of work, not just for oneself but also for one’s fellow man’s sake, and above all the principle: Common good before own good, a struggle against all parasitism and especially against easy and unearned income. And we were aware that in this fight we can rely on no one but our own people. We are convinced that socialism in the right sense will only be possible in nations and races that are Aryan, and there in the first place we hope for our own people and are convinced that socialism is inseparable from nationalism"
> the quotes he uses, well, I assume you understand german, so maybe read for yourself?
I spot checked a few of them but none of the sources check out. Some are 404s or paywalled. Other quotes come from writing by Landolf Ladig. From Googling it appears the German left think this was once a pseudonym for Höcke, but he denies it. The journalist who makes this claim based it on the fact that Höcke once used the term organic market economy, and that term also appears in this article. That's such a weak standard of evidence it's insufficient to make such incendiary claims.
Quote 14 says Germany isn't a real democracy because of speech controls. That he complains about being censored is then used as evidence he's a Nazi who should be censored.
In another place Höcke is quoted as saying "this Merkel system is all cartel parties that do not mean well for this country" which the page paraphrases as "Höcke wants to abolish all other parties", which is not what he said.
Another: "I am taking this party down a long and difficult path. But it is the only path that leads to a complete victory" which is paraphrased as him wanting a "Final victory" which is then presented as evidence of being a fascist.
Quote 24 says the AfD should only consider a coalition with other parties if they change their positions. This is scandalous because refusing to consider coalitions is something only his opponents are allowed to do, apparently.
This compilation comes across as untrustworthy. They have to rephrase everything he said and attribute things not written under his name, because if they didn't their thesis wouldn't hold.
"Die Staatsanwaltschaft Frankfurt hat ein Verfahren gegen einen Demonstranten eingestellt, der bei Anti-AfD-Protesten Björn Höcke als "Nazi" bezeichnete. Es handle sich hier nicht um eine strafbare Beleidigung, sondern um ein "an Tatsachen anknüpfendes Werturteil", so die Ermittler."
So to be clear, the court did not declare him a Nazi. But close enough, that people may call him that.
And if you read a bit in his biographie in wikipedia, you should find more than enough:
"In einem Leserbrief von 2006 behauptete Höcke im Anschluss an den Geschichtsfälscher David Irving, anders als die deutschen Luftangriffe auf Coventry 1940 seien die britischen Luftangriffe auf Dresden 1945 eine völkerrechtswidrige, geplante Massentötung an ostdeutschen Flüchtlingen in einer unverteidigten überfüllten Stadt gewesen."
"Beim Gedenken an den 13. Februar 1945 in Dresden im Jahr 2010 demonstrierte er zusammen mit Neonazis."
"Höcke ist seit etwa 2008 mit dem NPD-Vertreter Thorsten Heise bekannt oder befreundet, der sechs Kilometer von Bornhagen entfernt wohnt."
"lobte die Ideen der NPD, verherrlichte das NS-Regime, behauptete, auf den „Fleiß“ und die „Formbestimmtheit“ der Deutschen neidische fremde Mächte hätten Deutschland in beiden Weltkriegen überfallen"
"In seinem Gutachten zur AfD vom 15. Januar 2019 urteilte das Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV) mit Bezug auf Kempers Belege, Höckes Identität mit „Landolf Ladig“ sei „nahezu unbestreitbar“ und „angesichts der plausibilisierten Faktendichte nahezu mit Gewissheit anzunehmen"
So to me this is 100% Neonazi ideology and this is where he came from. Now of course he hides it wherever he can, but at least to me it is obvious, that he still believes all of it. Would you really be comfortable with such a guy as chancellor?
> So to be clear, the court did not declare him a Nazi. But close enough, that people may call him that.
That wasn't a court case, it didn't even go to court. If there are so many, why pick one that wasn't a case? Prosecutors dropped a potential case against a protestor and said it's not a criminal insult because it's (roughly translated) subjective but evidence based?
Germany has laws against being a Nazi. Either there's strong evidence he is one, in which case there should be a criminal finding of fact, or there isn't, in which case calling him that is surely slander. There's no First Amendment in Germany to protect such people. The prosecutor's press release goes off on a political attack on Höcke. They seem to have decided that he's not actually a Nazi but it should be OK to call him one anyway, because they don't like his politics. Very bad levels of political independence from such an office.
The claim about Dresden being a war crime is one I've seen many times. Even in Britain there are people who have argued that. It's like arguing the US shouldn't have nuked Nagasaki. How is that evidence of being a Nazi?
I'm not gonna spend the time to translate more of this. None of this stuff seems legit. The left always call everyone who isn't on their side a Nazi, this whole thing with this guy looks like more of the same. The Nazis openly called for the end of democracy and praised dictatorship. Where is the AfD doing that? This guy doesn't even run the AfD.
Ok, I assumed you speak german but apparently not.
"Germany has laws against being a Nazi."
No we don't. There are laws against certain symbols etc. but you can be a Nazi as your political point of view. No one can prosecute you for it, but if you deny the holocaust, or wear a swastika - then yes (I actually do not agree to those restrictions btw.) But you also can openly try to convince other people of your Nazi ideology. (they came to my school to preach). The limit is in actually trying to overtake the state and abolish the constitution. But I think most states have that law.
"That wasn't a court case, it didn't even go to court."
It was a court case - but the court decided to drop the case on the grounds that it is obvious. That still makes it a court case I think.
"The claim about Dresden being a war crime is one I've seen many times. Even in Britain there are people who have argued that. It's like arguing the US shouldn't have nuked Nagasaki. How is that evidence of being a Nazi?"
I also think bombing Dresden was a War Crime. But I don't think - like Höcke - that the germans bombing Coventry (way before) wasn't one. That is Nazi Rhetoric. The war was forced upon germany and germany didn't actually do anything bad. So he wants a 180 degree turn on the memory of the 3.Reich. Which means praising it, instead of despising. The only people who argue this way, are Nazis. Simple as that. Or do you have another explanation why he wants to turn 180 degree in the view of the 3.Reich?
"This guy doesn't even run the AfD."
Not yet. The AfD started as a liberal party by a professor - all of the founders are gone now as they don't want to have anything to do with what the AfD became. And they get more extreme every year and the remaining moderates pushed away.
"None of this stuff seems legit. "
And if this is what you choose to believe, then this is your decision.
Probably not worth spending energy on people that are on the revisionism level of "The Nazis were socialists" anyway, they've clearly decided to shut the door on reality.
> No we don't. There are laws against certain symbols etc ... the limit is in actually trying to overtake the state and abolish the constitution
Yes you do. A core part of Nazi ideology was the Führerprinzip. They openly did not agree with the concept of democracy. If you don't talk publicly about your desire to overthrow democracy then you aren't a Nazi, it's as simple as that. The AfD do not want to overthrow democracy, therefore, they are not Nazis.
> It was a court case - but the court decided to drop the case
Do you understand the difference between prosecutors and the court? Because it feels like this understanding is missing here. None of the sources I can find mention the courts at all. There was going to be a prosecution of someone who insulted Höcke and the prosecutors - who are not the courts - decided not to, citing their own politically biased opinions.
But if the prosecutors don't prosecute, it never goes to court and never becomes a case. Right? The opinion of prosecutors has no legal weight whatsoever, that's the whole point of having courts in the first place.
> Or do you have another explanation why he wants to turn 180 degree in the view of the 3.Reich?
You've assumed he does, but that isn't obvious at all.
I would assume that if he objects to both allied and Nazi bombing being a war crime, he just doesn't accept that the concept of a war crime exists at all. This is a very common perspective outside of the left, because the notion of a war crime assumes there is such a thing as international law that makes it a crime, which in turn assumes the existence of an international government that can make and enforce such law. But there isn't any such government, therefore international law does not exist, therefore there is no such thing as a crime that countries can be found guilty of.
The left doesn't like this idea, they're big fans of the idea of world government and thus tend to enthusiastically support courts who pass "judgements", even when they aren't enforceable by anything.
I find both perspectives understandable. People on the left often don't, which is why you extrapolated from his position into assuming he must be a Nazi.
I think the protests were a much needed morale boost for all middle-plus-left voters, but the real power is still with the swing voters that can give their vote to either the legacy parties or the AfD. The fact that many parties now woo these swing voters enfuriates much of the middle-plus-left electorate. They consider not voting for the AfD to be a no-brainer democratic duty anyway and dismiss the notion that one should entice these 25% of voters with anything. Kind of as it is with Trump.
As to why the swing voters might vote for the AfD, consider that the right-most non-AfD party is the Union (CDU+CSU) of Merkel that welcomed 1mio Syrian refugees in 2015 and has, mostly passively, overseen a massive influx of Ukrainian, Syrian and Afghan migrants. There is currently no right-of-center party that is neither the AfD and can credibly claim to limit migration.
The solution could be a new middle-left party to talk exactly about those concerning problems, but proposing different solutions. Is there any? Because the traditionals look more like trying to minimize the points, to the success we can all see. Also because I cannot imagine the pension system for once, without a steady influx of younger immigrants - so without them Germany is heading to fresh, Macron-style problems.
"So they will finally give the people what they ask for? "
How is that possible, when the people themself are divided?
For example with weapon support for Ukraine:
"Some 44% believe sending Leopard 2 battle tanks to Kyiv is the wrong decision, according to the results of a survey by pollster YouGov published on Sunday.
At least 41% support the German government as it plans to send the first of 18 tanks to Ukraine "
And with immigration it is similar. Quite some literally want to protect germany as a white nation that speaks only german - but many don't. Many are sceptical of arab troublemakers, but otherwise like a diverse society.
So where is the solution fitting everyone? What can the politicians do, to make everyone happy?
So let's say they would vote to keep it the today's way - as current majorities still tend to show. Will that appease AfD and the neonazis? No it wouldn't. As a Swiss I would say the Swiss way doesn't mean necessarily more educated voters, or more involved. But a better trust in the elected representatives, which the traditional German parties seem to lose.
Exercising real democracy ? Are you nuts ? That would require educated citizens in the first place. No no no... elected representatives with carte blanche will do.
Oh yes, I am very much a fan of the swiss system (and consider moving there) and direct democracy wherever possible. But my point was, that a plebiscite does not change the fact, that the people are very divided themself. Also not everyone would accept those results, because they would argue, too many non white germans could vote who should not have the right etc. Some worldviews are just not compatible.
My solution? I would not mind if germany breaks up into smaller states. (The Swiss system works, because it is small.) Some white, some diverse, some whatever. If possible, all still members of the EU. But many nationalists would rather have civil war instead.
Here we are again. If anyone as much as hints at politics from the "other side", their account is immediately nuked. But it's all good when you guys do it. 80 highly political comments, all good. But no, hn is not political. And if it is, it surely is neutral and rational... Sure.
And no, this were no protests against the "far right". It was an attempt to get the only opposition party in Germany banned, which is more than scary.
> And no, this were no protests against the "far right". It was an attempt to get the only opposition party in Germany banned, which is more than scary.
The protests certainly weren't that. At the one I was at, the speaker made it abundantly clear that the protest isn't even against the AfD in particular (tho you could see lots of signs against them), but for democratic values.
What should be noted is that both the protests and recent calls for a ban of the AfD were sparked by a report [1] of a meeting where some neonazis (including someone quite high up in the AfD) were literally making plans for how to force people with a migration background (including those with nationalities) to leave Germany.
Force people who aren't allowed out of the country, exactly as the law says.
The protests in my and the surrounding cities were extremely focused on the afd. On the current push to ban it. And making highly illegal (and absurd) comparisons between the afd and Nazi Germany. Which just for foreigners reading is super illegal and if done by the other side is punished by incredibly high fines and regarded as one of the worst crimes our justice system knows.
The opposition in the German Bundestag is quite large. Of a total 736 seats there are 319 opposition seats. 78 of those are occupied by AFD politicians. The largest oppostion party is in fact the CDU/CSU with 197 members.
Yet curiously, all those parties share the same politics in the relevant topics, and all work together to prevent the afd to take part in any (federal or local) government. Even where they have massive votes. That is not how the party system is supposed to work.
Outcry of an affected one? Democracy has the achilles heel of aborting itself, not only once that happened. That is why of course parties that want to keep that system need to fight parties that want to abolish it - and til there nothing is wrong in the party system, but it a starts when such a party comes to real constitution changing power.
Just for the books, neither the demos (nor myself) were directly for forbidding the AfD (sure, a lot of people are), because that is not the solution to the underlying problems.
But the exact opposite is happening. By sabotaging the popular vote via cross-party alliances, democracy is already effectively abandoned in Germany. And those who did it make up false statements of that very party being anti-democratic. It's frightening, it's scary. I'm very scared for the future
Not letting an extremist party with 20% or unfortunately even a tad more into power is not sabotaging the popular vote? Each party is free to form a coalition or not, by their conditions and principals.
The party has clearly shown and expressed that its anti-democratic. I mean, come on, you know you are too much Nazi if even Le Pen doesn't want to continue coalition with you [1], lol. Funny btw also how the NSDAP cried ANTI-DEMOCRATIC before they did what they did.. rest is history.
Besides that, stop dreaming on, we have too many far rights, but the 20% you call popular vote is still at least half protest votes, barely supporting most points of that party, but so frustrated with the other politics.
I don't think that's true, at least if you look at the topics that Germans think are most important. Which are also the topics of the opposition. There we have statements of parties which are quite different. But effectively when they are part of the government, they all collapse to the same politics. In particular, the FDP and CDU are guilty of this. The others are completely interchangeable anyways.
For context: This happened after an allegedly "secret plan against Germany" was leaked which the AfD conceived during a secret gathering and by which they want to "deport millions of citizens".
What is not said however is:
- that this meeting never was secret
- there was no plan conceived but rather a kind of conservative TED-talk of individuals
- that the smeared politicians (from other parties than AfD as well) are already suing the news outlet leaking this for libel
- that the leaking news-outlet is mostly government funded and its leadership almost entirley comprised of members of the ruling SPD- and Green-Party
- that not one of the attendees used the word "deportation"
- that not one of the attendees talked about "deporting citizens"
- that this meeting happened in november last year thus raising a lot of red flags about the timing of leaking this "story": As it just got released to the press days before the culmination of the government-critical, authentic, farmers-protests. Which are in contrast to the "anti-deportation" protests not run and organized by political parties (especially not those parties in power).
Organisers of the protests estimated that there were 1,4 million participants in Germany over the weekend.[1] German police had a more conservative estimate of 900k participants.[2]
In the city where I'm staying (Cologne) 80k people showed up. That's almost one in ten for a city of a million. That is impressive.
It's easy to say these numbers are not large enough for a country of 83 million. What has to be taken into account, is that it happened all in a matter of a week and nationwide. These were not protests that were advertised and organised long before.
Whatever it is, immigration is impossible to stop in a humane way if we want to keep our current standard of living. Of course you wish everyone the live we have, but it is not sustainable to have that in Europe - but because of the inherent polution and the space in the cities.
So, you need to distuigish between refugees that can’t return home safely because they are political activist, gay, or thousands of other reasons - and regufees who are, as the populists like to say “gold diggers” and are here to get a better way of living, regardless how they achieve that.
To distuigish that, you need to investigate each individual refugee, and that takes time and money by itself. Because you can’t keep them in a single building for months or even years at a time, you allow them to roam free. This however causes other issues, because there are bad apples in the bunch who then steal from the local population, or even commit atrocities against fellow refugees. However, the view of part of the public is that there isn’t sufficiently acted by the police or politics on this. And even sending them back costs money, in the form of airplanes and such.
No, don't generalize like that.
What you have to understand is that even as a percentage of the total population, immigration is only a problem in certain countries/regions mainly both because of failed immigration policies and also because the people there are plainly more racist/xenophobic.
I would put the slowing economic growth and aging population as more substantial EU-wide problems.
What's wrong with being "woke"? People can't tolerate the fact that some still want social justice as supposedly "less equal" people rush into the country? Yeah? Then they should just say it!
I just want people to openly express the racism in their minds without coming up with ridiculous terms like "anti-woke". Truth would be them saying "We don't want equality, we believe we are privileged and we want to live that", why is it so hard to say?
But no. We didn't want to throw away the government! We like equality, just not woke! This is all you hear.
Ideology that tries to make wired and pathological behavior and ideas a normal thing and try shame others for not adopting it will never be accepted by majority.
They are the biggest source of racial prejudice and discrimination, from anti-white attitudes like "it's impossible to be racist to white people" to DEI policies that openly discriminate against white people.
This isn't even hidden. Advocates proudly declare: "The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination."
Perhaps this is an instance of Goodhart's law (when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure). Diversity is an excellent thing when it happens naturally as a result of equal opportunity.
But when diversity becomes the target, it inspires divisive race-based selection practices that people quite correctly fight against. That's surely a factor in the recent decline of the left.
Transathletes is a hill I'm willing to die on. There's no equality in letting men compete with women.
Regardion migration, that's the vibe I got from OP. And I frequently see woke to bother about native and indigenous rights. But they shut silent about native europeans preserving their cultures.
A person who is alert about racial discrimination can still not support transathletes. That's a big discussion topic and many people have differing opinions.
The post above clearly states that anti-woke is being used as a cover for racism. Supporting controlled migration is no racism (by itself, to be clear). Probably we have very different opinions about migration but none of us need to be racist. Racist people are more likely to want to restrict migration but of course not all people who do so are racist.
It seems like the woke movement became something like Antifa, an imaginary enemy that supports everything that one doesn't.
Being alert to racial prejudice and discrimination doesn't mean you do or don't care about the European culture. It tells nothing about it. Like being a feminist also doesn't.
I’m saying why woke gets the bad rap. As long as woke people themselves won’t set sane borders for their movement, they’ll be seen as more vocal parts of it.
I see „alert to racial prejudice“ issues all the time. E.g. mass media writing Black but white. And all the „muh racism“ crowd is silent.
Woke seems to be all about hipocrisy tbh.
Antifa in my experience is much less hipocritical. More like they’re kids looking for trouble to went their frustrations in physical ways. Both types of skinheads, „antifa“ and „neonazis“ fit perfectly together.
There was a piece in the Guardian this morning arguing that it differed by country, and in particular that in countries with vocally anti-migrant governments such as Italy, it had become less of an issue.
"Germany is the only country where immigration is clearly in the lead when people are asked which crisis bothers them most when they think about the future. Estonians and Poles are focused on the war in Ukraine. Italy and Portugal see the economic crisis as their biggest threat. Spain, Britain and Romania are the countries where Covid-19 is seen as the biggest trauma. And in France and Denmark the climate emergency is considered the most important crisis."
That article seems rather confused. They asked people "Which of the following issues has, over the past decade, most changed the way you look at your future?" and then assume that this is what will define the 2024 election year. Clearly COVID will not.
So that leaves climate and immigration, but the question is very vague. "Changed the way you look at the future" doesn't imply you think there's a crisis or will vote for a party that treats the issue as a crisis. The Guardian and the organization they cite both think it does.
NO. Just no. It is the loudest of the topics and easiest to incite the slightly racist majority. Criminality numbers, welfare expenses, "jobs taken", these numbers do not reflect the huge impact the right proclaims. "No-go zones" and "gang warfare in sweden" are easy to pull out of context. The immigration numbers don't even touch the overall population decline. The overall topic of "population exchange" is a longer term philosophical topic (that began decades ago) rather than "number 1 burning issue".
The #1 issue for Europe is the participation in the USA/5-eyes war crimes regime, and the subsequent culpability for the heinous acts committed by the West on the very nations where Europe is getting a majority of its refugees from.
Middle-East refugees are coming here to EUROPE to escape OUR wars. Until we prosecute the war criminals involved, the immigration issue is not going to resolve.
Make Damascus Great Again, and you won't have Syrian orphans burning cars in Paris ... rebuild Mosul and Raqqa, and the immigrant kids whose lives were torn apart by those atrocities will have somewhere other than Cologne in which to party.
It is OUR wars which are forcing these much-derided immigrants to flee their nations and find refuge in the one places WE are not dropping bombs - our own nations.
Until we stop this, there will be victims of our wars attempting immigration to safer places .. our own back yards, of course.
No, they really are escaping OUR wars, which we are fighting because we are using the presence of 'dictators' in the region as an excuse to expand our control over the Middle East and demolish nation after nation, per plans made by PNAC/CNAC criminals decades ago.
The Western nations have a LOT of innocent blood on our hands, more so than any dictator you might care to identify as your hated enemy/Emmanuel Goldstein figure, used to justify further atrocities by our nations.
The genocides we support (Yemen, Somalia) and the destruction of the civilization of countless other sovereign nations as dictated by our oligarchic ruling class - factually a segment of a ruling military junta which dictates foreign policy doctrine allowing for the wanton destruction of other nations - is what is producing the refugee crisis in the world today.
34 million refugees from OUR wars clog Europes borders, currently. That is the biggest issue we have to deal with: why are they there?
They are there because USA and and its allies in Europe have given themselves the false moral authority to destroy nations, cart blanche: Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen - on the basis of a fundamentally racist ideology set in place by the oligarch ruling classes who seek to profit from these wars, and have DONE SO for decades now.
Yes, we are destroying nations in the Middle East on the basis of racist, intolerable policies set in place by known fascist oligarchs of OUR OWN MAKING.
We are NOT stopping genocide. We are actively funding and supporting them.
OUR failure to accept responsibility for this fact is why our nations are inundated with refugees and immigrants.
Are Five Eyes trying to stop genocides? To my knowledge, the systematic destruction of Gaza and the horrible death toll that accompanies it is still fully supported by the Five Eyes, three and a half months later. They are also expressing opposition to an ongoing genocide trial in a court of the international order that they claim to support and enforce, without even waiting for the trial to play out.
No, the 5-eyes are not preventing any genocide - they are instead participating in the wanton destruction of society ("not quite genocide, but destruction of society nevertheless") across the globe in multiple nations being violently targeted by a clique of ruling oligarchs who long ago granted themselves the moral authority to refactor "lesser, inferior nations" according to their non-democratic religious, political and ideological doctrine.
The criminal 5-eyes super-state is the worlds biggest violator of human rights, bar none.
There are plenty of lesser violators - Russia, Israel, Hamas - but by far the biggest fire is our own 5-eyes criminal endeavour: 34 million refugees from our wars.
5% of Iraqs population murdered in cold blood on the basis of lies.
Near endless destruction of formerly functioning states and cities of millions of people across the landscape.
A non-stop parade of propaganda designed to foment yet further war and atrocity. An absolutely dire and useless diplomatic corps .. the litany of OUR failures to prosecute our own war criminals goes on and on and on ..
1000 CIA-operated black-ops torture sites across the landscape, hidden from the prying eyes of our democratic institutions but not at all invisible to millions of other human beings whose lives were unfortunately started - and too often, cruelly ended - outside our Western morality bubble ..
If you, for a moment, consider that some foreign nation is inferior to your own, you are part of the problem.
Stop doing that. Instead, apply that critical thought to your own nation and DEMAND JUSTICE FOR OUR OWN WAR CRIMINALS.
Because we in the 5-eyes nations have a big, big problem with letting our war criminals have carte blanche to do whatever the hell they want with our military powers .. time and again, over and over again, they get away with it to repeat the act across the landscape.
This must stop. Public ignorance gets in the way of stopping this, and that is why we are all being distracted with hateful agitprop of other nations we believe are morally inferior.
WE are the morally inferior nation we need to be doing something about.
Protests are fun. You can shout in the street, stroll and sing with your friends and feel morally superior. But how about addressing citizens' problems in the first place, so they don't turn to extremes ? Weird idea, I know...
It's such a strange report. What they're actually saying is "Tens of Thousands Protest Reality". It's like going out in a flood, and complaining that you got wet. The reality is that many people in Germany have been so desperate that they've been convinced that _actual goddamn fascism_ in Germany! _is the answer_.
How about we first reflect on how we got here, instead of further segregating and demonising those people, which in turn pushes them further into extremes.
When you still believe that someone above you solve the problems, you rather go out screaming than take responsibility and actually do something usueful.
But that is what education teach us. Listen the authority and let them tell you what to do.
When I moved to Canada, on a work visa that is not guaranteed to be permanent, and with a job already lined up, they still had me do an extensive medical exam beforehand to make sure I won't be a burden on the free healthcare. Productive member of society, not healthy enough? GTFO. Healthy enough? You're welcome, and the work visa rules, for example, are much more friendly than the US ones.
That attitude (not this particular law, in general) is why the only far-right person I talked to in BC (accidentally in a bar) told me that "Pakistanis are still better than Quebecois" :)
I think the immigration debate in the west has the biggest amount of stupid, averaged between two sides... it's possible to have a massive yet reasonable immigration system that is productive and does not alienate the local. Most of the west has two sides passionately arguing if throwing baby out with the bathwater is best done onto tile, or cement... Before complaining about other side's stupid, look at your own.
To add some context: at least in Munich, this protest was - no matter if you trust the police count at 100k people or the organizers' at 320k (they also count the people in the side streets or those stuck in completely overcrowded public transport) - the largest ever since the 1992 "Lichterkette" protests, which in turn also were protests against the rising far-right, that time it was terrorism like the riots in Rostock-Lichtenhagen [1].
The thing that triggered the protests was a meeting of the far right including AFD people where they discussed a plan to deport all migrants including those that have a German passport. There is no listening to that kind of blatantly unconstitutional nonsense.
I do think the communication from the left on migration is often problematic, at least for the center-left parties in Germany there isn't a huge difference to what the center-right parties want. The main difference is the rethoric and how they talk about it.
Was the recent change to legislation which made only 3 years of residence enough to apply for citizenship a trigger for this? In most countries it’s 5-10 years
That's not a lot, in a country of millions. We do much more in France, every year. And it's been showing diminishing returns, as the government realized it could just not listen, and nothing bad would happen.
In fact, it's a drop in the sea, compared to the rising casual xenophobia I can notice with my German acquaintances, friends, and even family. Medias, general discussions, and overall atmosphere is not going in the direction of peace.
The fact that they welcomed many African refugees in the last few years increased the tensions, and the Russian crisis made economy a big focus. As a result, there is a general feeling of unfairness which politics use to push a divisive narrative.
Prices have gone up, which in most countries is visible, but quality has gone down, and in Germany, this is a sin. Everything is touched by this: transport, food, service...
And when people are unhappy, you can sell them an enemy.
I've never seen such a big protest. The transit system in Hamburg was completely overloaded. People standing around Alster lake, you couldn't even get close to the actual point where the protest was scheduled to happen. Those protests possibly may be ineffectual and what not - they certainly weren't small.
Both Hamburg and Munich protests needed to be canceled in the middle of the thing because the huge crowds were considered dangerous (I think rightly so).
But I am not sure why grand poster is downvoted so much. This is a significant and important sign of the liberal and democratic side.. still the frustration is huge and fear and anger is constantly rising.. humans are bad and egoist. Extremism as everywhere is not avoided with good people showing their good faith, unfortunately, the only thing that keeps it low is happy people without economic stress.. in that sense the world is bound for trouble in many places, as we already see it. Democratic protests are good, but in the end it is democracy and current politics that fail here, not the misguided humans, and the other side which shows up won't improve it much..
I was thinking compared to a Russian invasion, the Israeli-Palestine conflict. For the first time, it feels like people are reacting to the implications and not just the results.
But yeah, that's definitely the catalyst. What an awful bunch of people.
"A lot" means 2, they weren't neo-Nazis, the CDU also had people there and the meeting was so secret that journalists turned up to it on the day it was happening.
Indeed, that wouldn’t be a lot: the framing in the article is grossly misleading. The actual number of protesters this weekend was hundreds of thousands, and plausibly >1M (not “tens of thousands”), according to unanimous reporting in various German media and official sources (see e.g. https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/demos-gegen-rechts-bilanz-1...).
And when people are unhappy, you can sell them an enemy.
In the US, the enemy being sold to the public is China. It's China this. China that. China is stealing your future. China is stealing our technology. Both parties are happy to throw China under the bus to win some votes and hide their deficiencies.
It's ironic coz in the 90s they were condescendingly told they were shooting themselves in the foot by not having a "free market" and centrally planning. Now they're too successful and it's a threat.
There’s not just one enemy being sold to the public. We are a nation of consumers and we have varied taste. Other enemies include Democrats, elites, Russia, the trans agenda, Republicans, billionaires, immigrants, fascists, and antifa.
In a democracy, the people have a right to control immigration. Uncontrolled immigration has been very anti democratic and has angered people literally all over the world (you can find many examples). I’m tired of people thinking that just because they have some reflective empathy doesn’t make their policy choices better or morally superior. There are real negatives when it comes to it that many in the left pretend don’t exist
But that party is planning to remigrate people with the wrong blood. The plan is to take away their German passports, move them into northern African country and create laws to make their life's as hard as possible in a decade long project to remove the unassimilated with German passports.
Yeah, that's the theory, but in practice, pretty much across all EU countries, for about 35+ years there was no party which you could vote for which both had a chance of being able to form a government and had an anti-immigration policy.
For all intents and purposes immigration policy was not (and remains not) somthing that was under democratic influence. That's why so many conspiracy theories have sprung up around the subject.
In France, constraining immigration is equaled to racism for many people. If you include it in your program, you will be compared to the far right, and a lot of voters will ignore you without checking anything you have to say.
> That's not a lot, in a country of millions. We do much more in France, every year. And it's been showing diminishing returns, as the government realized it could just not listen, and nothing bad would happen.
You guys have a protest culture I'm pretty envious of. Meanwhile, here in Germany you can and will get arrested for wearing a bicycle helmet...
French research is doing fine, and infrastructures are in a much better shape than in the US. Things keep being built, I can't spend a minute outside without seeing some giant machine running. We are incredibly productive given a 35 hours work week, so getting things done is also right there.
Our problem is rather turning innovation into a business. Getting money for it. Taking risks.
Instead, innovations and innovators emigrate to the US. Yann LeCun went to do AI in the US, he didn't stay in France.
Great demonstration of values but I'm sad to say these are not the voters. Just a few years agon Hungary also had marches with 100s of thousands in Budapest, but Orbán's regime stands like concrete and only becomes stronger. The silent majority, mostly countryside voters, does not march for either side.
> As long as we all remember that it's never a bad day to punch a nazi
I'm not sure if I like the idea of being violent towards anyone because of their beliefs. Also, terms like nazi, antisemite or racist completely lost their meaning and nowadays just mean someone you disagree with.
Yeah, that's what it is. It's not the pendulum swinging back against the left's insanity which has been foisted upon everyone in totalitarian fashion by the corporate fiefdoms that provide all of our media and social platforms. Hey, at least you'll have a lot of "Nazis" to punch at this rate. :D
Not in modern Germany yet, no. Their protests are rather small in comparison and often met with much larger anti protests.
However, the far right party AfD has been gaining lots of votes over the last few years. It will be interesting to see whether these protests are the beginning of a reversal of that trend.
While supported by the right, farmers had a very concrete reason to make the protests.
It's actually very weird because normally right-wing ideology should not support tax cuts for agriculture on paper. These days it's more like supporting all the opposite of what the other side is doing.
The farmer protests are not necessarily right-wing protests, they represent a mixed bag of ideologies and a response to proposed changes in increased regulation and loss of subsidies. Right-wing and conservative groups attached themselves to these as a quick publicity stunt.
Dresden was infamous for a few years with the PEGIDA rallies, these routinely pulled thousands of people in the beginning [1], and eventually federally. But even then, the numbers were orders of magnitude less than what happened the last week, and after a few months it all but fizzled out. Dresden is the last holdout of PEGIDA left, with a few hundred people in attendance every few weeks, and Munich held out with literally 3-5 people up until Covid hit.
Can't speak for Germany but in the UK you'll find the usually suspects shouting in the street like this and the counter protest will be at the ballot box.
Oh yes. I live in Berlin. Usually far right demonstrations are countered by left wing ones. Often at the same time. And then there's a lot of police to keep the groups separated. During covid, there were a lot of right wing protests in Berlin.
In general, people demonstrate a lot in Berlin. Mostly, that's just business as usual for the police. Tens of thousands is not that many people for a demonstration. If people feel strongly about things, they get bigger crowds together.
Anyone that feels strongly about something can organize a demonstration. The only requirement is that you have to register these. The local police has a helpful overview of upcoming demonstrations: https://www.berlin.de/polizei/service/versammlungsbehoerde/v...
Most of these are just a handful of people protesting whatever. But some of these can draw quite a crowd and they routinely block streets to allow protesters to do their thing.
> Are there some days where right wing people protest with similar numbers?
No, not even close. This weekend were more than 1 million people on the street, spread all over Germany, with several protests that had to be cancelled for safety reasons, as way too much people tried to come. In contrast, one of the biggest right wing demonstrations in the recent years was in 2015 Pegida, who had like 25k participants on their biggest protest in Dresden. I do not have the countrywide number for these right wing demonstrations around 2015, but Dresden was kind of the center of their movement and usually the most.
No. As the system would brand that as far right extremists taking part in a riot with the objective of overthrowing the constitutional order. The police forces would represses the protests in no time.
There was a time when that happened. But the left is highly organized. They take photographs of every participant, had a database to share those. They identified everyone they could and ratted them out to their employer. There were a few high profile cases of people losing their job as a consequence. Today its effectively impossible to share your conservative opinion in Germany.
Is there a right-wing party in Germany? What happened in Greece was that a conservative party (one of the big two) started rising in power, and that took many votes away from the far right party. Maybe the case in Germany is that it's a choice between "far-right" and "leftish"?
One of the problems being that the CDU/CSU have drifted to the left over the last 10+ years and their is a gap on the right/conservative side that now the AFD is filling.
If I was a future historian - or a machine intelligence documenting the past based on mindless alignment with a long-gone humanity - I would feel very empathetic towards a common centrist like myself.
Politically, I feel completely alone. The right wing are peddling the same old tropes that gave us two world wars in the last hundred years; the left offer corporate-friendly cancel culture, censorship, and an infinite supply of sanctimony.
Politics took a gold medal in the bullshit olympics - right between religion and sports. The unappealing grey sludge of spineless career politicians and diplomats who are great at riding the waves of that bullshit but nothing else is not able to offer anything besides hiding their heads in the sand at every opportunity - and that, among other things, pushes people to the extreme.
I don't have high hopes for the near future (of course, civilisations raise and fall, the humanity might still be ok, but we won't know).
The right's position in Europe is that it would like to preserve borders and stop people moving between countries. How is that similar to WW1 or WW2, which were wars intended to abolish all borders and allow citizens of certain countries to move and settle all over the continent against the will of the people who lived there?
> The right's position in Europe is that it would like to preserve borders and stop people moving between countries.
That is the most charitable view possible - but let's say that's the case. What happens if they win and somehow achieve that? Will they just wash their hands and say - now we're done, enjoy, friends?
No, politicians always need to stay in power. Those who don't - never get to power in the first place. The more unstable the world is - the more incentive would there be for them to double down on nationalistic tendencies. So, what do you do with millions of non-ethnic germans that were born in Germany, but are still in some sense considered 'immigrants'? What do you do about the fact that the land where the Prussian kings of old were anointed is now under the yoke of barbarians from the east? Irredentism is a story as old as humanity itself; it can - and I can't see how it won't - be used to rally the electorate. Who would've thought that the senseless Russia-Ukraine war was a possibility? But that is, because that is the logical conclusion of a nationalistic ressentiment. And what do you do when there's not enough people to do fuel the economy - will it be kinder kuche kirche again (because, what else)? Etc, etc.
So, will nationalistic parties just stop at low and order - or, perhaps, there are some other stories, old like the world itself, lurking in the shadows? I can't see the future, but I personally have a strong prior on the latter.
> WW1 or WW2, which were wars intended to abolish all borders
People seem to forget that when you vote for a party, you are not just voting for their one, potentially-sensible position on an issue--you're voting for the entire basket of "other stuff" that comes with that party. And chances are, once elected, they'd rather work on that other stuff than the issue you care about.
As soon as there are significant protests by farmers and middle class against the government, a government-sponsored activist NGO publishes a lurid paper about a meeting of conservatives that took place in November 2023. Two days later, another government NGO named the word "remigration" as the bad word of the year 2023 and a few days later a play was even staged in Berlin about this alleged meeting.
Although the article cannot substantiate its claims in any way (e.g. the alleged "secret plan" has been available to everyone in book form for months), the public service media adopt every assertion without distance and make completely unsavory comparisons with the Third Reich.
The government has thus successfully suppressed the perception of protests by farmers and the middle classes. Propaganda in its purest form.
Far left - far right is such a misnomer. It presents politics as a spectrum between these two extreme values. It's as if all politics should be mapped on this scale. However, historically communism and fascism were both collectivist and authoritarian - and also racist. They were actually just two competing teams of very similar ideas.
Today, "the left" is ideologically much closer to the historical far right and fascism. It's collectivist and authoritarian, while "the right" defends individuality and classical liberalism among other western values. I don't see nationalism so much, but rather defense of western culture and values.
That is just plain untrue. They deport criminal migrants or migrants that are not under international asylum law. And we are talking about few thousands per year.
> I bet those poor people are also disproportionately non-white!
Yes, simply based on the fact that only non-European citizens can be deported. But what is interesting is that they are also disproportionately non-east-asian.
Not necessarily. Many refugees are from Ukraine, they can freely move to Germany, work there and apply for social benefits. I think Germany really needs similar rules for other countries, particularly in Africa and Middle East!
That would prove they are not far right once for all!
The AfD has gotten louder and stronger last year, and it's reaching further and further into other parties' voter bases, fueled by growing economic problems and contentious immigration policies.