Maybe you know that I was born and grew up in Germany; I've mentioned it several times. Although I’m a US citizen now and have no intention to return, news about German culture and politics still interest me. Some things there have changed tremendously, the weather for example! When I was a kid, summers were cold, grey, and rainy, with one week of sunshine if we were lucky. Should the thermometer reach 86 F, or 30℃elsius, everybody would complain about the unbearable heat and wilt away. These days, temperatures can get up to 100F. Torrential rains and hurricanes happen almost every year.
Climate change is taking place everywhere, of course, and more surprising perhaps is Germany’s current demographics. When I lived there, even when I went to university in Munich, almost everybody was white. Yes, there were some “guest workers” from Turkey and other Southern European countries such as Italy and Greece, but a significantly different skin color? I visited Paris when I was 16, that’s the first time I saw people with various shades of brown skin. Where I grew up the population was absolutely homogeneous, they spoke German only, and their ancestors were German.
Not any more. According to the German Federal Office for Statistics, 24.3% of the population had a history of immigration in 2022. This includes people who immigrated to Germany since 1950 and their direct descendants. Some politicians of the current government look different from the typical blond-haired, blue-eyed Germanic stereotype, and it’s not unusual any more to meet members of all kinds of different ethnic backgrounds just about anywhere one goes.
Which had a backlash, because Germany has its share of right-wing, xenophobic Nazi-fucks. They even have their own party, the Alternative for Germany (Alternative für Deutschland). They’re nationalistic, reject the European Union, and strongly oppose immigration. In the 2021 general election in Germany they were the fifth-largest party, and in the regions which used to be East Germany they’re even more popular. But when news about a secret meeting of far-right neo-nazis and other extremists, which included some members of the AfD, was leaked to the press, Germans had enough, and more than one million people took to the streets to protest.
The report by the investigative media organization CORRECTIV revealed something so ghastly and hideous, it dropped like a bombshell. Some right-wing extremists had met at a hotel in Potsdam to discuss plans to deport millions of immigrants and refugees, even those with German citizenship. The “masterplan” was presented by Martin Sellner, a far-right Austrian and founder of the Austrian branch of the nationalist and neo-fascist Identitarian movement. Sellner has been denied entry to the United Kingdom as well as to the United States because of suspicion to be a member of a terrorist organization.
Actually, the Identitarian movement is nothing new but was founded in 2012, based on hate of foreigners and racist ideology. Germany’s domestic intelligence agency had declared it to be "a verified extreme right movement against the liberal democratic constitution."1 What drove Germans, young and old, en masse into the streets was the revelation that several politicians belonging to the AfD – a party that’s part of the German government – were participating in Potsdam.
The many demonstrations that took and are still taking place all over Germany are directed against the AfD party, but also make a strong statement for democracy. Most Germans are horrified by the atrocities of the recent Nazi past and don’t want anything remotely similar ever to happen again. And that’s true for the government as well. Unlike the United States, the German Federal Government consists of a coalition of several parties, currently the Social Democrats, the Greens, and Free Democratic Party (with neo-liberal leaning). Despite their many differences, they quickly came together and were united in their condemnation of the extreme-right tendency of the AfD. Even Chancellor Olaf Scholz joined a demonstration in Potsdam:
Right-wing extremists are attacking our democracy. They want to destroy our sense of unity. That’s why we are all called upon to take a clear and firm stance. For unity, for tolerance, for our democratic Germany – and for more than 20 million citizens with a migrant background…. ‘Never Again’ is now. 2
From Scholz’s speech on January 20.
Some German legislators even asked for a ban of the AfD, although the general consensus is that a ban would ultimately benefit the party, and nobody wants that. Actually, the many anti-AfD, pro-democracy rallies already had some noticeable effects: an election in the eastern German state of Thuringia, a traditionally conservative area, resulted in the unexpected loss of the AfD candidate. AfD candidate Thrum had led the race safely before the Correctiv report was released — he dominated the general election two weeks ago with 45.7% of the vote compared to Herrgott's 33.3% — but only gained 47.6% of the vote to Herrgott's 52.4% on Sunday.
Of course, my big question is: what has to happen here in the US before people massively rally for democracy?
In Texas, members of the Republican Party are free to associate with Nazi sympathizers who espouse or tolerate antisemitism and deny the Holocaust, the party’s executive committee decided on December 4 last year.3 SAY WHAT? And people just let this happen? All the vile MAGA crap, the rabid GOP faction in the House – and reasonable Republicans don’t stand up? Maybe they don’t exist any more.
82 years ago, on January 20, 1942, senior officials of Hitler’s National Socialist party met in Wannsee, a suburb of Berlin. They discussed and planned the systematic eradication of all European Jews. They used terminology such as “evacuation”, “natural reduction”, and “possible solutions”, all euphemisms for murder and genocide. Germans see sobering parallels when the euphemistic term “remigration” is mentioned. And they won’t stand for it; instead, they stand up for Democracy.
Compare this to Republican extremist Marjorie Taylor Greene who just called for “completely eradicating Trump skeptics from the GOP”.4 And she announced that Trump would initiate “mass deportations” on his first day if reelected. But nobody bats an eyelash; certainly no Republican. Although even mainstream media warn of rising fascism and its danger to our democracy, although people wring their hands and are worried, nothing happens.
I don’t know what can be done here, but I wish people would put their heads together and plan something. Brainstorm; throw out lots of ideas and see what sticks. It’s almost as if people are tired and apathetic, which is understandable after 2016 - 2020. However, we certainly have to find our second wind and get more fired up if we want to prevent another such four years.
good point / interesting post / everything runs in a circle doesn't it ?? a wheel within a wheel as old ezekiel put it / in america we haven't experienced the full effect of fascism yet / we don't know how dangerous it is / we've been playing footsie with it for a while / getting cozy / i dunno do you think marching in the streets would help ??