That's hefty. I've been to Dachau, too. I still have tears in my eyes by time of writing.
My hope: this times will never ever come back.
As a member of a democratic society of Germany, I see it as my duty to go to elections and do what ever can be done legally to minimize the possibilities of right wing coming into power.
I have to accept that others may have different views on this topic. That includes others voting for right wing parties.
But, no one will ever stop me from speaking up! From openly exercising criticism. From going to demonstrations.
I'm against all war. I'm against killing people because they are different or have something I don't like. I'm again patriotism. All sorts of patriotism should be punished in my eyes - because it's the beginning of every worse! Nazis are uber-patriots. Party "alternative for Germany" is full of patriotic thinking.
Each other parties, that support patriotism are right wing.
On the left side, it's not the patriotism which is a problem, but rather the thinking that communism and forced "sharing of wealth" are THE ONLY way to go. It's very extreme, too.
So, I will fight the extremes without weapons, but with my spoken words as my deadliest weapon.
As someone old enough to have experienced the outcome of dictorship in Europe during the mid 1970's, those voters have no clue what they are getting into.
One would expect that with enough information about Salazar, Franco, DDR, Gaulle, Greek junta,... people would have learned, but no, they want those guys back.
> Calling Alternative for Germany "Nazis" is nonsense.
>
> Countries have a right to set their own immigration policies, and many Europeans aren't happy with their respective countries' policies. So, they're voting for change, as is their right.
There are a lot of hyperbolic uses of the term, but the AfD is more and more openly fascist. Currently circulating in the media is a conference between AfD politicians and far right activists about how millions of people including germans with migrant parents could be deported to africa. That's not some kind of immigration policy, that's one more part of their plans for "racial purity".
Even more..
> Calling Alternative for Germany "Nazis" is nonsense. > > Countries have a right to set their own immigration policies, and many Europeans aren't happy with their respective countries' policies. So, they're voting for change, as is their right.
It's not like that we in Germany do not have immigration laws. So, what that people vote for?
> Countries have a right to set their own immigration policies, and many Europeans aren't happy with their respective countries' policies. So, they're voting for change, as is their right.
Why mix in Europe into that? We decided to be part of Europe and we have quite good experiences with that. Within Europe each one member of the European community is free to travel and work (with still some stoppers, like if you can't afford your life in xx, you have to leave after 3 months back to your European home country.)
That's the laws on European level, that the members needs to follow. All members wanted that laws once when forming the European ideas and laws.
So.. reading that all the countries should have a right to set their own rules.. yes! They should. In Europe it has been decided together with the member countries to have the immigration laws like they are. They used their opportunities to set their immigration laws on European level.
May be, the writer of such sentences uses his opportunity to spread some EU-xit ideas supported by "every country should have.." .. yes .. But we're a community! And each try to break that bond - you guess, is the agenda of the right wing. They can't push their ideas, because EU law will be broken then. So, first break EU.. lol
The AfD had a large secret meeting with right extremists discussing "re-migration" policy this last November, and many members have close ties to Neo-Nazis.
By this they mean expulsion of all people -including citizens- who don't "look German" and people who support them. If this is not fascist, I don't know what is.
Last november, leading figures of the AfD met with Neo-Nazis to discuss plans on 're-migration'. AfD is without a doubt a fascist party, and would love to turn Germany back into a reactionary hellhole.
You may be dont see it. But they are Nazis. It's not like "all the voters for them are Nazis" or "all the party members are Nazis", but they are. Who supports the basic ideas of "Germans should be Germans first and the state is German and all the Germans should be on they own" is a Nazi. It's easy like that.
We have a lot right wing parties and organizations in Germany. Look up Wikipedia for that .. In former times, for example, THE REPS (die Republikaner) attracted a lot of Nazis and Patriots and right wing thinking. BUT!
they did not have a chance to get into the legislation, nor, the opposition. Luckily, not enough voters for that.
So. What to do?
There is a new party founded called the alternative for Germany. The thinking there is conservative. A lot of people are conservative and the other parties in legislation offer not "enough of conservatism".
So basically, alternative for Germany is the proper party for such people. But still, it's not enough to be voted in to legislation.
The problem with that, each one and each member knows it - if you want to get in to legislation, you need more voters. You can't get more people to think conservative within the population, so you have to form an alliance with other extreme thinking conservatives. And so, you'll put the right wing ideas into your program to attract such.
"Together we're strong!" - it's an unspoken secret.
Also, if you look at the history of that party, it's scandals and it's inner fights for power and positioning and who left, who joined, who's is leading where - you will come into conclusions, they are Nazis.
And maybe, it needs a definition from my side, it's not that ones Nazis meant, which has been fought by the alliance of the West and East. They should be extincted by now. But they awful ideas prosper furthermore and always find some poor one to think they are a solution to his own problems. I use Nazi as a term for patriots, for the ones who say "we first".
"anti-fascists" have many of the same characteristics as Nazis. Authoritarian in nature and willing to use violence to suppress the opinions of people they dislike. It's not surprising that the grandson of an actual Nazi has become one.
update: The truth hurts. You can't support violence and not get called out for it.
The only way you can get away with this equivocation is by using vague phrases like "willing to use violence to suppress the opinions of people they dislike" to hide the differences, and assuming that all uses of violence are morally equivalent. Back here in reality, the crucial difference between fascists and anti-fascists is that fascists seek to suppress the rights (not just speech) of races they consider inferior and people they consider degenerate and a drag on society who have done nothing wrong and not instigated anything, through violence, whereas anti-fascists retaliate against people who explicitly hold bigoted views because of the beliefs espoused by them. Possibly using violence in retaliation to those who hold a deeply dangerous and bigoted ideology is very different then holding a deeply dangerous and bigoted ideology and targeting people just based on that bigotry.
Again, you're taking refuge in vagueness to erase meaningful difference. What did they consider dangerous ideology, and what do anti fascists? Furthermore, that was far from the only thing they did or believed. The fascists considered different people just existing and being themselves and taking part in society and doing art "dangerous ideology." Anti fascists target an actual group of ideologies that's been proven to do harm.
Agree. Saw recently that ANTIFA was trying to protest a comedian's appearance at a venue in Portland and some members were threatening violence if they appeared. That's certainly pro-censorship and in the vein of not allowing people who disagree with you to have the same rights as you, but I don't know if it fits the textbook definition of fascism.
It's actually a pretty tricky situation, often called the Paradox of Tolerance.
Presumably you'd not be in favor of censoring somebody merely for disagreeing with you on a political topic.
But what if those political views and stated goal was to remove your right to vote in democracy? Obviously you'd speak up against that view with your own voice, but what if that's not enough? Do you just cross your fingers and hope they don't get enough traction?
What if escalates even more, what if they actively want to impose the death penalty on you, and have the state execute you? Would you actively fight against censorship of the people whoms stated goal is to have you dead? Would you call people evil fascists if they wanted to censor those who want actively want them dead?
For a lot of people, these aren't hypothetical. It actually has happened before in history 77 years ago in Nazi Germany, and it's hopelessly naive to think that it's just impossible for something similar to ever happen again. There is a sizable part of the world who thinks that gay people deserve the death penalty for being gay, right now, today.
Yeah, protesting a comedian and randos threatening violence on the internet is totally the same as mudering millions to stop Judeo-Bolshevism or cultural Marxism or whatever garbage fascists are spewing.
My hope: this times will never ever come back.
As a member of a democratic society of Germany, I see it as my duty to go to elections and do what ever can be done legally to minimize the possibilities of right wing coming into power.
I have to accept that others may have different views on this topic. That includes others voting for right wing parties.
But, no one will ever stop me from speaking up! From openly exercising criticism. From going to demonstrations.
I'm against all war. I'm against killing people because they are different or have something I don't like. I'm again patriotism. All sorts of patriotism should be punished in my eyes - because it's the beginning of every worse! Nazis are uber-patriots. Party "alternative for Germany" is full of patriotic thinking. Each other parties, that support patriotism are right wing.
On the left side, it's not the patriotism which is a problem, but rather the thinking that communism and forced "sharing of wealth" are THE ONLY way to go. It's very extreme, too.
So, I will fight the extremes without weapons, but with my spoken words as my deadliest weapon.
No More!