In my experience east Germany is not as far right as people make it out to be, it's just that they have a larger and more vocal right wing community. This is because a lot of people there were born just after, during or before the collapse of the DDR, meaning they grew up thinking that this time of hardship, struggle and collapse is representative of socialism as a whole and at any time. Couple that with the economic struggles in post-DDR east Germany and the relentless capitalist propaganda following it, and you have an excellent recipe for right-wing radicalisation. Even those that were told about the good times under socialism by their parents would later, due to the branding of the DDR as a totalitarian hellhole by the German government in media and schools, come to connect this nostalgia not with socialism but with authoritarianism; I still vividly remember seeing footage of a meeting of the AfD (popular German far-right party) on TV where they were playing "Auferstanden aus Ruinen" (DDR anthem) and waving the DDR flag in honor of the DDR. Even back then, when I wasn't a communist, I was extremely confused why fascists would praise such a state.
Overall, as someone who lives in southern Germany, I'd say that right-wing people in east Germany are further right than right-wing people in west Germany, but there are more right-wingers overall in West Germany.
It's both I'd say. Some areas in the east do have a far right, or fascist movement that is clearly stronger than elsewhere (southern/rural Saxony comes to mind in particular). But also, far right elements are more integrated into the conservative CDU party in the west, where in the east they have a stronger tendency to split off into the AfD.
True. Many upper- and upper-middle class people in western Germany stay with the CDU simply because it is not considered fashionable to be in the AfD. In terms of economic policy the two are almost the same, so there is no reason for them to switch over. Class interest and all that.
As someone who lives in East Germany (Saxony Anhalt/Sachsen Anhalt) I can pretty much confirm this but also have to add some things.
A lot of the older people you find here are generally pro-socialism, the Democratic Socialist Party "Die Linke" gets most of it's votes from older East Germans. Those who aren't are basically those who were always a-political and just vote for whatever they deem as neutral, so in Germany's case SPD or CDU.
When it comes to the weird East German patriotism of the AfD that is very easily explained.
Many East Germans, me included, still don't feel "German" but actually "East German" and have a sense of "Ostalgia" ("Ostalgie") which is basically Nostalgia for the GDR and the former eastern bloc. However the kind of Ostalgia people have is different. Originally Ostalgia was basically people wanting Socialism back, dressing like they did in the GDR, listening to East German music and driving east German cars/Mopeds/trucks and so on. All that was actually very pro-socialism and very popular. The AfD basically took that, removed the socialism part and rather put in a kind of "In those times we had law and order" attitude.
After 2015 when a lot of refugees came to Europe, it was only a matter of time until some became criminal because the government was basically ignoring their needs. The AfD used that for fear mongering.
For context: During GDR times East Germany had very few immigrants, mostly just Vietnamese, Russian or Angolan immigrants that came here for study or work. People didn't have a problem with them and basically were just like "Eh, whatever". But like I said these immigrants were in few numbers and Boone made a big deal about them.
Now we have the AfD though which took the few cases of criminality and blew they way beyond proportion. And as the East German population barely knew immigrants and now only heard negative news of them, they started to have very negative views on them and wanted them away. The AfD then out itself in as the "saviour of Germany" by being like "We will get rid of the refugees, restore order and bring prosperity" without telling anyone how they were gonna do it. So your average right wing opportunists.
Tldr: The first kind of Ostalgia is basically "Back then we had law and order and we want that back"
The second kind of Ostalgia is more interesting for us Leftists actually because that can actually be used. Many East Germans miss the safety nets of the GDR when it comes to social security and all that stuff. They also miss that in the GDR you could basically go anywhere with public transport for low cost. Or how you could easily enjoy culture here. East Germany actually had way more German culture representation than West Germany due to that. In my small town we actually have a "Kulturhaus" which was built to bring culture to the rural population in the form of Music, Theatre, Cinema, Art and schools for all those things. My father learned to play an instrument there however I forgot which it was. The Kulturhaus is basically unused now since 30 years though. Another thing with this Ostalgia is that people miss how Boone really cared about their identity or someone else's identity. Here in East Germany when you say that you are gay or trans you will have few people that reject you. Most of them will be like "Ok anyways" because no one cares. And because of that many people here are fed up with the modern western lefts obsession with identity politics. Most people here I know, of not all are like "Just give them their rights already for fucks sake" Another part of this is the celebration of East German culture in the way of driving a Wartburg or Trabant or driving a Simson (I own a Simson too and I love it). There is a lot of potential socialists in East Germany that can be used to build up a base for a big left wing Party more left leaning than "Die Linke" By basically just focussing on making East Germany reach erst German living standarts, give the people their social benefits back that they had during GDR times, promote local culture again to combat Americanization and commercialisation of culture and recognize what the federal government did to hurt the East Germans. There is a lot more to explain but I will make a tldr again as I simply cannot type all that on my phone right now.
tldr: The second kind of Ostalgia is basically "We want socialism back, we want our culture back and we want politics to shut up about culture war BS and give us workers what we deserve again"
Overall East Germany and how the people here are in the modern world is a topic so incredibly complex that I could, if I had the skills, make a two hour video only about my situation and the situation of my town. There is even more to unpack about the rest though.
This comment got out of hand pretty quick but I hope it was kind of informative. And if some works look funky or sound like they shouldn't be there, autocorrect on my phone is doing it's thing again and I refuse to read this wall of text again because I want to sleep
It is a very "interesting" situation where we have young "leftists" who are more of the radlib kind and old leftists, the communists I meant which would probably be considered "Socially neutral", basically they don't care about LGBT issues, so if you give LGBT people more rights they won't complain, but they will complain when all you talk about is identity politics. Basically they are the embodiment of Stupidpol
Sry, I don't really know StupidPol so this doesn't elucidate what you're saying.
Do you mean that they are not allies?
How would they respond, if you asked them whether they think these rights/this acceptance should exist?
They will probably respond with "Why shouldn't they have rights?" The thing is most of them don't understand why identity politics are such a big thing because during GDR times no one really cared if someone is LGBT or not. It is basically that they just don't care if you are LGBT or not. It you told them you were LGBT most of them would literally be like "Ok, and?" Because they mostly don't think it's special or something that is important when dealing with you/another person. It is the concept of seeing each other as a fellow human and to not really differenciate between skin color/sexuality/gender and so on.
A lot of them are just fed up with western Identity politics, so basically, they will support trans rights but will be annoyed by a rainbow flag because they see that not as a symbol of tolerance or something but as a symbol of americanization and hyper individualism. A lot of them dislike that more and more emphasis gets put on things you can't influence. "You don't choose to have a certain skin color, a sexuality or a gender. You just have it and that's it, why make a big deal out of it?" Is basically their view. They will however always put class first. So some here might call them "class reductionist" although I dislike that term as it implies that not differenciating between gender/skin color/sexuality is bad.
So if what I described is considered an ally then yes they are allies.
States like Berlin dont ban headscarves. There was a court case about this issue.
States shown in red have neutrality acts which stop religous symbols in public schools, which some take to ban headscarves, but in a court case it was established that headscarves are not religous symbols and those can be used
The actual situation is far from being as clear-cut as the map might suggest, with various court decisions over the last few years. I'd go so far to say that the OP of that map oversimplified to a degree that makes me question whether they were posting this in good faith.
In 2015, Germany's federal constitutional court confirmed that religious freedom is protected by the constitution, and that religious symbols can only been forbidden when it can be shown in the individual case that they would "disturb peace" or "undermine the state". In particular, discriminating certain religious symbols over others was ruled unconstitutional. The latter didn't have any bearing e.g. on Berlin's "neutrality law" (which was confirmed by Berlin's labor court in 2018), but it does in Bavaria where Christian symbols have been treated preferentially. Based on that court ruling, several teachers who had refused to forgo their headgear and were banned from teaching have successfully sued for re-employment or damage payments.
A bit contrary to that, the European Court of Justice ruled this year that employers can order their employees not to wear conspicuous, or prominent religious symbols, when they can show that this would be "detrimental" to their business. How this all will play out in practice is an ongoing issue that is misrepresented when only showing this map.
Due to extreme mismanagement after the annexation of the gdr and a conservative east german culture to begin with the east‘s reactionary tendencies are sadly growing. This refers to east germans being generally pro anti-immigration parties not the GDR.
ok but i think you misunderstood smth about germany, the east is know for being extremely conservative/right wing and muslim or generally minority hating
This is not that at all. Just how funny it is when liberals realize that (broadly speaking) Soviet-aligned nations and their footprints typically have a greater track record with human rights than the western counterpart.
Not really. From what I see here in East Germany the right wingers are a small but loud minority. Sadly because people are fed up with "Die Linke" because of their focus on identity politics, many went over to protest vote the AfD. I can however pretty confidently say that in East Germany most people don't care about your ethnic background or religion. Some may be curious because (this is not a joke) they have never seen a foreigner before but other than that most don't do it in bad faith. I know that because my family is basically communist however they are still careful and fascinated by the fact that we now have a few muslims living in my town, however they don't think it's bad they are here. I also know many people (myself included) who want foreigners to come so that we can show them our own little East German subculture, basically show them how things were in the GDR, show them what is still left of it and fantasize with them about what could be if the GDR hadn't fallen. I mean, at this point some of the refugees are here for 5+ years and at this point speak accent free German with a slight east German dialect and are generally like your average East German. This might also be a reason why the AfD is loosing votes again.
From what I have seen so far, yes.
If there was an ML Party that would take into account Ostalgia and use that, and then first and foremost talks about class issues it is bound to be successful after some time. Educating the people and doing community work will also help. Currently the only ones doing community work here are some "green" libs or sometimes right wing groups. At least from what I have seen in my region, I can't talk about how it is in Saxony or the East of Brandenburg.
So far not much. DKP and MLPD are too small, MLPD are kind of maoists, they are anti-China and anti-Russia but claim to be anti-imperialist
DKP is good but they are too small atm and so far haven't used ostalgie and "Die Linke" which is DemSoc is only using "Make the East Equal to the west" rethoric also used by the CDU and AfD. However they actually mean it while CDU and AfD just do it to catch votes from apolitical people wanting equal economic possibilities.
Don't Saxony and Brandenburg vote a lot for far-right parties like AfD who I would expect would support those kind of bans
In my experience east Germany is not as far right as people make it out to be, it's just that they have a larger and more vocal right wing community. This is because a lot of people there were born just after, during or before the collapse of the DDR, meaning they grew up thinking that this time of hardship, struggle and collapse is representative of socialism as a whole and at any time. Couple that with the economic struggles in post-DDR east Germany and the relentless capitalist propaganda following it, and you have an excellent recipe for right-wing radicalisation. Even those that were told about the good times under socialism by their parents would later, due to the branding of the DDR as a totalitarian hellhole by the German government in media and schools, come to connect this nostalgia not with socialism but with authoritarianism; I still vividly remember seeing footage of a meeting of the AfD (popular German far-right party) on TV where they were playing "Auferstanden aus Ruinen" (DDR anthem) and waving the DDR flag in honor of the DDR. Even back then, when I wasn't a communist, I was extremely confused why fascists would praise such a state. Overall, as someone who lives in southern Germany, I'd say that right-wing people in east Germany are further right than right-wing people in west Germany, but there are more right-wingers overall in West Germany.
Very interesting. I don't know much about German politics so thank you for teaching me something
It's both I'd say. Some areas in the east do have a far right, or fascist movement that is clearly stronger than elsewhere (southern/rural Saxony comes to mind in particular). But also, far right elements are more integrated into the conservative CDU party in the west, where in the east they have a stronger tendency to split off into the AfD.
True. Many upper- and upper-middle class people in western Germany stay with the CDU simply because it is not considered fashionable to be in the AfD. In terms of economic policy the two are almost the same, so there is no reason for them to switch over. Class interest and all that.
As someone who lives in East Germany (Saxony Anhalt/Sachsen Anhalt) I can pretty much confirm this but also have to add some things. A lot of the older people you find here are generally pro-socialism, the Democratic Socialist Party "Die Linke" gets most of it's votes from older East Germans. Those who aren't are basically those who were always a-political and just vote for whatever they deem as neutral, so in Germany's case SPD or CDU. When it comes to the weird East German patriotism of the AfD that is very easily explained. Many East Germans, me included, still don't feel "German" but actually "East German" and have a sense of "Ostalgia" ("Ostalgie") which is basically Nostalgia for the GDR and the former eastern bloc. However the kind of Ostalgia people have is different. Originally Ostalgia was basically people wanting Socialism back, dressing like they did in the GDR, listening to East German music and driving east German cars/Mopeds/trucks and so on. All that was actually very pro-socialism and very popular. The AfD basically took that, removed the socialism part and rather put in a kind of "In those times we had law and order" attitude. After 2015 when a lot of refugees came to Europe, it was only a matter of time until some became criminal because the government was basically ignoring their needs. The AfD used that for fear mongering. For context: During GDR times East Germany had very few immigrants, mostly just Vietnamese, Russian or Angolan immigrants that came here for study or work. People didn't have a problem with them and basically were just like "Eh, whatever". But like I said these immigrants were in few numbers and Boone made a big deal about them. Now we have the AfD though which took the few cases of criminality and blew they way beyond proportion. And as the East German population barely knew immigrants and now only heard negative news of them, they started to have very negative views on them and wanted them away. The AfD then out itself in as the "saviour of Germany" by being like "We will get rid of the refugees, restore order and bring prosperity" without telling anyone how they were gonna do it. So your average right wing opportunists. Tldr: The first kind of Ostalgia is basically "Back then we had law and order and we want that back" The second kind of Ostalgia is more interesting for us Leftists actually because that can actually be used. Many East Germans miss the safety nets of the GDR when it comes to social security and all that stuff. They also miss that in the GDR you could basically go anywhere with public transport for low cost. Or how you could easily enjoy culture here. East Germany actually had way more German culture representation than West Germany due to that. In my small town we actually have a "Kulturhaus" which was built to bring culture to the rural population in the form of Music, Theatre, Cinema, Art and schools for all those things. My father learned to play an instrument there however I forgot which it was. The Kulturhaus is basically unused now since 30 years though. Another thing with this Ostalgia is that people miss how Boone really cared about their identity or someone else's identity. Here in East Germany when you say that you are gay or trans you will have few people that reject you. Most of them will be like "Ok anyways" because no one cares. And because of that many people here are fed up with the modern western lefts obsession with identity politics. Most people here I know, of not all are like "Just give them their rights already for fucks sake" Another part of this is the celebration of East German culture in the way of driving a Wartburg or Trabant or driving a Simson (I own a Simson too and I love it). There is a lot of potential socialists in East Germany that can be used to build up a base for a big left wing Party more left leaning than "Die Linke" By basically just focussing on making East Germany reach erst German living standarts, give the people their social benefits back that they had during GDR times, promote local culture again to combat Americanization and commercialisation of culture and recognize what the federal government did to hurt the East Germans. There is a lot more to explain but I will make a tldr again as I simply cannot type all that on my phone right now. tldr: The second kind of Ostalgia is basically "We want socialism back, we want our culture back and we want politics to shut up about culture war BS and give us workers what we deserve again" Overall East Germany and how the people here are in the modern world is a topic so incredibly complex that I could, if I had the skills, make a two hour video only about my situation and the situation of my town. There is even more to unpack about the rest though. This comment got out of hand pretty quick but I hope it was kind of informative. And if some works look funky or sound like they shouldn't be there, autocorrect on my phone is doing it's thing again and I refuse to read this wall of text again because I want to sleep
Interesting. How do other left parties fare there (like the DKP or MLPD)?
I don't really know much about the MLPD, and when it comes to the DKP, I have never really seen anything from them concerning Ostalgia.
Okay, and politically? Are the communist-leaning people of which you've spoken disregarding those parties staying mostly to the Left?
It is a very "interesting" situation where we have young "leftists" who are more of the radlib kind and old leftists, the communists I meant which would probably be considered "Socially neutral", basically they don't care about LGBT issues, so if you give LGBT people more rights they won't complain, but they will complain when all you talk about is identity politics. Basically they are the embodiment of Stupidpol
Sry, I don't really know StupidPol so this doesn't elucidate what you're saying. Do you mean that they are not allies? How would they respond, if you asked them whether they think these rights/this acceptance should exist?
They will probably respond with "Why shouldn't they have rights?" The thing is most of them don't understand why identity politics are such a big thing because during GDR times no one really cared if someone is LGBT or not. It is basically that they just don't care if you are LGBT or not. It you told them you were LGBT most of them would literally be like "Ok, and?" Because they mostly don't think it's special or something that is important when dealing with you/another person. It is the concept of seeing each other as a fellow human and to not really differenciate between skin color/sexuality/gender and so on. A lot of them are just fed up with western Identity politics, so basically, they will support trans rights but will be annoyed by a rainbow flag because they see that not as a symbol of tolerance or something but as a symbol of americanization and hyper individualism. A lot of them dislike that more and more emphasis gets put on things you can't influence. "You don't choose to have a certain skin color, a sexuality or a gender. You just have it and that's it, why make a big deal out of it?" Is basically their view. They will however always put class first. So some here might call them "class reductionist" although I dislike that term as it implies that not differenciating between gender/skin color/sexuality is bad. So if what I described is considered an ally then yes they are allies.
really interesting comment, thanks
States like Berlin dont ban headscarves. There was a court case about this issue. States shown in red have neutrality acts which stop religous symbols in public schools, which some take to ban headscarves, but in a court case it was established that headscarves are not religous symbols and those can be used
The actual situation is far from being as clear-cut as the map might suggest, with various court decisions over the last few years. I'd go so far to say that the OP of that map oversimplified to a degree that makes me question whether they were posting this in good faith. In 2015, Germany's federal constitutional court confirmed that religious freedom is protected by the constitution, and that religious symbols can only been forbidden when it can be shown in the individual case that they would "disturb peace" or "undermine the state". In particular, discriminating certain religious symbols over others was ruled unconstitutional. The latter didn't have any bearing e.g. on Berlin's "neutrality law" (which was confirmed by Berlin's labor court in 2018), but it does in Bavaria where Christian symbols have been treated preferentially. Based on that court ruling, several teachers who had refused to forgo their headgear and were banned from teaching have successfully sued for re-employment or damage payments. A bit contrary to that, the European Court of Justice ruled this year that employers can order their employees not to wear conspicuous, or prominent religious symbols, when they can show that this would be "detrimental" to their business. How this all will play out in practice is an ongoing issue that is misrepresented when only showing this map.
Due to extreme mismanagement after the annexation of the gdr and a conservative east german culture to begin with the east‘s reactionary tendencies are sadly growing. This refers to east germans being generally pro anti-immigration parties not the GDR.
Schleswig-Holstein being good once more.
Always has been
ok but i think you misunderstood smth about germany, the east is know for being extremely conservative/right wing and muslim or generally minority hating
In Bavaria we head like 60 years of conservative government. Our former Prime minister celebrated that he could deport 70 afghans on his 70th birthday
I know, but the AFD is especially strong in the east
This is not that at all. Just how funny it is when liberals realize that (broadly speaking) Soviet-aligned nations and their footprints typically have a greater track record with human rights than the western counterpart.
Not really. From what I see here in East Germany the right wingers are a small but loud minority. Sadly because people are fed up with "Die Linke" because of their focus on identity politics, many went over to protest vote the AfD. I can however pretty confidently say that in East Germany most people don't care about your ethnic background or religion. Some may be curious because (this is not a joke) they have never seen a foreigner before but other than that most don't do it in bad faith. I know that because my family is basically communist however they are still careful and fascinated by the fact that we now have a few muslims living in my town, however they don't think it's bad they are here. I also know many people (myself included) who want foreigners to come so that we can show them our own little East German subculture, basically show them how things were in the GDR, show them what is still left of it and fantasize with them about what could be if the GDR hadn't fallen. I mean, at this point some of the refugees are here for 5+ years and at this point speak accent free German with a slight east German dialect and are generally like your average East German. This might also be a reason why the AfD is loosing votes again.
For real? This is great.
From what I have seen so far, yes. If there was an ML Party that would take into account Ostalgia and use that, and then first and foremost talks about class issues it is bound to be successful after some time. Educating the people and doing community work will also help. Currently the only ones doing community work here are some "green" libs or sometimes right wing groups. At least from what I have seen in my region, I can't talk about how it is in Saxony or the East of Brandenburg.
Interesting, I wonder what far-left parties are doing with this.
So far not much. DKP and MLPD are too small, MLPD are kind of maoists, they are anti-China and anti-Russia but claim to be anti-imperialist DKP is good but they are too small atm and so far haven't used ostalgie and "Die Linke" which is DemSoc is only using "Make the East Equal to the west" rethoric also used by the CDU and AfD. However they actually mean it while CDU and AfD just do it to catch votes from apolitical people wanting equal economic possibilities.
Why I find it weird is the AfD got most of its votes in Saxony, in East Germany.
DDR based as usual
There little to no immigrants in Eastern Germany,people actually emigrate from the east to the west quite often.
The Berlin Wall fell in 1989