by Peter Löcke //
Voldemort. That's the one who must not be named. The first time I saw a Harry Potter movie on the big screen and the child next to me explained to me what the nameless evil wizard was actually called, I spontaneously shouted the name Voldemort into the cinema. Childish. Extremely childish. I know. The movie theater was rightly annoyed. And yet I still enjoyed it.
The Voldemort of politics is the AfD. They are the ones you have to prevent. You can't even talk to them. Contact debt. You know what I mean. AfD politicians and their voters must be ostracized. Why is such exclusion not only seen as legitimate, but even as a morally good deed? Because you have to ostracize people who ostracize themselves. The logic behind this is as follows: I am tolerant, you are not in my eyes. That's why I don't tolerate you. No tolerance of intolerance.
If necessary, a democratic election like the one in Thuringia must be reversed authoritatively by Merkel decree. Democracy had to be defended by undemocratic means. What a squaring of the circle. What illogical logic. Whether politics, the media or fellow human beings - people use exactly the same means that the AfD is accused of using. The AfD and its voters are met with exclusion, defamation and intolerance. Why? Because it is a party that excludes, defames and is intolerant in published opinion.
"We have to confront the AfD with arguments."
This slogan was proclaimed in 2013, when the AfD was born and quickly grew to a size that made it into the parliaments. When I look it up on Wikipedia today, I see: right-wing extremists, climate deniers, homophobes, nationalists, Islamophobes and, more recently, Russia lovers. Phew. If I were still fourteen and at the beginning of forming my political opinion, I wouldn't want to have anything to do with such brutes. But these are not arguments. They are fighting words and defamation. They are statements of fact sold as encyclopaedia facts.
Do you remember Armin Laschet's appearance on Sandra Maischberger in June 2021? The then candidate for chancellor called on the talk show icon with passion and panic to prevent the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt. Forecasts were predicting a neck-and-neck race. They would not get away with another election setback. That much was certain. Two things were astonishing about this appeal. Laschet's appeal was and is definitely not the mandate of the media, especially not the statutory mandate of the public broadcasters. Accordingly, Sandra Maischberger was exceptionally on her toes and indignantly rejected the demand. Even more astonishing was Laschet's stupidity, because this self-revealing appeal was actually completely unnecessary. What Laschet called for was happening anyway. Unofficially. AfD politicians are rarely invited onto talk shows and morning shows. People talk about them and not with them. The rare cases in which Weidel and Co. are invited to a TV studio are like show trials. The interrogating journalists act as public prosecutor, investigating authority and judge all in one. The verdict of right-wing extremism is pronounced even before the trial begins.
What is the situation in the state parliaments and the Bundestag? There is an unwritten law there. Never vote in favor of an AfD motion! Then they become guilty as charged. You are welcome to copy an AfD bill and sell it a month later as your own idea. That works. But never agree with the AfD. Never ever. That would be political and media suicide.
You think I'm a supporter? Are you reading a plea for the AfD here? Not at all. I take a critical view of many things in the AfD. I also consider individual statements to be questionable, right-wing populist and exclusionary. On the one hand. But I think the general approach to the AfD is just as populist and exclusionary. Please understand this column as a criticism of the prevailing double standards and hypocrisy. And as a call for a journalistic equality. It is a plea to talk to each other instead of defaming each other. We have to confront the AfD with arguments? That rarely or never happens. Everyone is invited to start.
After making myself unpopular with both sympathizers and critics of the polarizing party, which is perceived as either blue or brown, a fun fact. There was once a party that had to be prevented at all costs. It was founded in 1980 and still failed to reach the five percent hurdle ten years later. Before elections, all other parties had to distance themselves from these nutters. Contact debt. You know what I mean. Some members were self-confessed enemies of the state and were sometimes monitored by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Some of these enemies of the state from back then hold the highest state offices in 2022. I sympathized with them because I always had compassion for people who were marginalized. This party was an avowed peace party. Critical of NATO. At least until the Kosovo war in 1999. The Voldemort of my youth was the Greens. The ugly duckling from back then has transformed itself into a swan and the Harry Potter of modern times. Or is it really the other way around?
The Greens? These are the ones everyone wants to be called today. Every other party would like to be named. Every party except the one that must not be named.
Take a look at the Wikipedia entry for the Greens and compare it with that of the AfD.
Articles identified by name do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the publisher.
English 
German 
Spanish
13 Responses
Wenn ich mir die Redekultur in unserem völlig überbesetzten aber scheinbar permanent unterbelegten Bundestag so anschaue, muss ich feststellen, dass ich die Reden der AfD immer als die besten, weil aufrichtiger und ehrlicher empfinde. Die sog. „Altparteien“ (über diesen Begriff sollte man mal ausgiebig nachdenken, stehen wir doch sonst in allem immer für permanente ErNEUerung!) benehmen sich wie kleine Kinder mit penetrant störenden Zwischenrufen (leider in den wenigsten Fällen durch den/die/das Bundestagsvorsitzende/n/s verhindert) und Protesten. Und dies, obwohl – dessen bin ich mir gewiss – diese die ein oder andere Aussage durchaus für gut und richtig befinden. Also, insgeheim natürlich. Darf man ja nicht offen zugeben. Und genau hier liegt die große Chance der AfD: sie spricht vielen Bürgern aus dem Herzen, während die „Alten“ nur noch abgehoben und distanziert wirken. Ganz zu schweigen von Annalena, unserem rhetorischen Totalausfall! Und in ihrer verzweifelten Lage wählen sie die Grünen, obwohl die längst nicht mehr die Partei sind, die sie mal war. Weil, AfD „darf“ man ja nicht, also hat man anscheinend keine Alternative. Nun, die Grünen sind gerade auf dem besten Weg, sich selbst zu zerlegen. Und welche Alternative haben wir dann? Genau: die richtige!
Was die AfD anbelangt wurden mir die Augen geöffnet durch den jetzt leider viel zu früh verstorbenen Markus Gärtner mit seinen Politik-Spezial-Videos, in denen er auch super Leute aus dieser Partei interviewte. Bis dahin hatte ich sie nicht für voll genommen. Wie auch, bei Der öffentlichen Ausgrenzung? Auch ich hatte mich unbewusst der „öffentlichen Meinung“ angepasst. Wie sehr muss man da zukünftig aufpassen, um nicht wieder in die gleiche Falle zu tappen. Es sollen junge CDU-ler ua zur AfD gewechselt sein. Leider sind sie für mich noch nicht wählbar. Am Liebsten würde ich mir eine Regierung mit guten Vertretern aus ALLEN Parteien zusammenstellen. Das hielte ich für eine interessante Innovation, wenn doch das zZ bestehende Angebot unwählbar geworden ist.
There is no way around this realization: with the renewed collapse of the FDP, there is no longer a party in Germany that will stand up for our free and democratic basic order without any ifs or buts. All parties have been infiltrated by yes-men and followers of green-socialist ideas and concepts - with the exception of the AfD. The fact that this is not a plus point for the AfD is due to the right-wing extremist views of quite a few of its functionaries.
As a voter, you are perplexed by the current party construct and can turn it around as often as you like. For me, there is currently no electable party beyond the 5% hurdle that respects the civil liberties of citizens and is committed to practicable concepts for the future, e.g. in energy and transport policy.
Since non-voting, just like voting for parties below the 5% threshold, has no influence on the size and composition of the Bundestag, non-voting or voting for a minor party does not help either. For me as a voter, the situation in elections is increasingly turning out to be a classic dilemma. There is currently no way out.
Dear Mr. Aßmann, there is already a way out. How long did it take the Greens to get into parliament? By then, Töpfer had long since swum across the Rhine. The parties in the Bundestag had been selling Green ideas as their own long before the Greens finally won seats. Do you think the general vaccination obligation could have been avoided without the unprecedented size and duration of the protests? There are also new parties with no chance at the moment, which are at least taken seriously enough by the state to be able to count on particularly close support. The parties in the grand healthcare coalition are looking closely at the success of their opponents. This means that votes that go there are not wasted, quite the opposite. It goes straight to the chancellor's office. Voting for the AfD on the grounds that the vote would not be wasted is questionable in my view. Even if the AfD got 25%, it would never get government responsibility. Perhaps it's better that way, with our weakened separation of powers and disproportionately high numbers of AfD supporters in the police and military.
Thank you, Mr. Löcke, for venturing onto this thin ice - after all, from now on you are to be classified as a right-wing radical and no longer socially acceptable. As far as I'm concerned, I prefer the predominantly down-to-earth and common-sense views of the AfD to the left-green-queer dripping ideology of the so-called people's parties. Of course, there are also a few people in the AfD with positions that are worth discussing, but they are just as prevalent elsewhere, only on the left. But left-wing extremists are okay, they only mean well, they just want to play.
This affair with Prime Minister Kimmich of the FDP, who resigned from the federal party, was no democratic tour de force. Höcke, leader of the AfD parliamentary group, congratulated Kimmich at the time with an exact imitation of Hitler's servant Hindenburg when he became Reich Chancellor. I'm sure many people noticed that. I don't think this gesture was in the AfD's interest, as it brought the AfD close to the seizure of power in 1933. Höcke also called for participation in the second major lateral thinkers' demonstration in Berlin, although he must have known that this would deter many people from taking part. Some are asking themselves, is he genuine or not genuine? I wish the FDP had stood up for our civil liberties and resisted the free-wheeling corona apostles in the Bundestag as they encroached on fundamental rights. Free Democrats, unfortunately that was nothing. The RTL son-in-law (the one in Sylt, etc.) did not feel compelled to do so. Instead, the AfD made an effort to clarify the situation, at least to have a fact-based discussion on this matter, and the stupid left-wing intellectuals can think of nothing else but to refuse any discussion. As far as I know, Der Freitag is the only left-wing newspaper that gave in after the publication of the investigation report in the Bundestag on corona policy, at least. There are some descendants of people persecuted in the "1000" year Reich who warn us as citizens about fascist tendencies in Germany. They were referring to the federal and state governments, in which all parties except the AfD are represented. The UN issued a devastating report on disproportionate police violence on an unprecedented scale in Germany, with similar findings on press freedom on top of that. The Ukraine crisis is continuing in the same way and we should hope that Annalena, when the true poll results slipped out, is not right about imminent unrest on our streets.
Isn't it the most natural thing in the world for people to want to decide for themselves, to be free to choose which people they let into their private lives and which people they want to barter with and which not? Who do I invite and let into my house, my apartment and who do I not? Who do I want to do things with and who do I not? Which doctor do I want to confide in and ask for advice if I feel unwell and which not? Which product do I prefer to another product? Which service do I want to use and which not? It is no different with the personal choice to place the fate of one's entire life in the hands of others, to submit to the leadership of a person or group of people or to take the fate of one's own life into one's own hands. For half a century now, I have missed the acceptance and tolerance of politically interested and committed fellow human beings towards all people who are not interested in politics and heteronomy. Parties and politicians complain about non-compliance with the rules of the game that politics once simply set for itself and have been arbitrarily tinkering with ever since. Their rules and constantly changing rules are their rules, but not mine. No one has ever asked me whether I would even want to belong to this strange club (the state), whether I would freely choose this system as a service provider for protection and security, which it is supposed to primarily stand for. There is also no provision anywhere in this system for people who are dissatisfied with this alleged protection and security provider and now money, education, health, old age, care, accident, employment provision/provider (service provider) etc. - the expansion can no longer be stopped - to cancel all or at least part of this alleged contract and find and choose another, better provider for products of all kinds themselves.
Because there is no contract.
Because people do not want to leave the company.
Because the entire system is based exclusively on coercion and violence.
So-called non-voters do not not vote, but vote differently, namely against the state and its circus and in favor of freedom, self-determination and personal responsibility. Presumably the dissenting voters now make up the absolute majority in all election rituals, but are of course not represented in the media or in the Bundestag (e.g. by empty seats).
More and more people are turning their backs on this spectacle of injustice, but what should not be must not be.
That is why people have remained silent to this day, especially about the so-called non-voters, preferring instead to write, discuss and talk about the little arguments between the sandbox children (politicians).
You can do it, but you don't have to.
Dear Mrs. Schmidt,
Thank you for your contribution.
You absolutely speak from my soul.
Auch ich empfinde es als unerträglich, nicht frei und unbehelligt leben zu können, nur weil ein „Staat“ unter scheinheiligen Scheinargumenten Anspruch auf ein Territorium erhebt, in dem ich mich zufällig niedergelassen habe.
I don't even own my apartment, because the state, which I don't want, is extorting property tax, among other things, as a loan fee, forcing me to disclose intimate information and probably registering compulsory mortgages again in the future.
My opinion: if we don't get away from this party and state terror, especially in these times of all-encompassing digitalization and surveillance, it will end in a totalitarian, enslaved catastrophe for most people.
Best regards
Mathias Babel
„Kann ein richtiger Satz falsch sein, nur weil der Falsche ihn sagt?“, diese Frage habe ich hinlänglich mehreren meiner politisch interessierten Freunde gestellt. Die Antwort lautete durchweg „Ja!“ Ich war nie ein Freund der AfD, in den vergangenen zweieinhalb Jahren habe ich aber viel Richtiges von Vertretern der AfD gehört, zu Coronamaßnahmen, zu Energiekrise oder zum Ukrainekrieg. War ich also vorher in meiner Ablehnung der AfD gegenüber ein Opfer der Manipulation von Medien und Zeitgeist? Eindeutig ja. Muss ich meine Ansichten dieser Partei gegenüber nun revidieren? Nein, ich muss keine Freundin dieser Partei werden. Revidieren muss ich vielmehr das Procedere meiner Meinungsbildung. Auch ich war über lange Zeit eine Sympathisantin der Grünen, diese Meinung habe ich inzwischen revidiert. Was gestern für schlecht befunden wurde, kann morgen schon als das Gute gepriesen werden- und umgekehrt. Den eigenen Kompass dabei zu finden, ist nicht immer einfach.
Dazu noch Bertolt Brecht aus „Der Jasager und der Neinsager“: „Wer A sagt, der muss nicht B sagen, er kann erkennen, dass A falsch ist..“ und: „Und ich will sofort umkehren, der neuen Lage entsprechend. Auch euch bitte ich umzukehren und mich heimzubringen. Euer Lernen kann durchaus warten. Wenn es drüben etwas zu lernen gibt, was ich hoffe, so könnte es nur das sein, dass man in unserer Lage umkehren muss. Und was den alten Brauch betrifft, so sehe ich keine Vernunft an ihm. Ich brauche vielmehr einen neuen großen Brauch, den wir sofort einführen müssen, nämlich den Brauch, in jeder neuen Lage neu nachzudenken.“
So simple, so good!
Liebe Ines, du sprichst auch für mich. Mein Leben lang habe ich Grün gewählt, weil sie eine kritische Friedenspartei war, die die seit 60 Jahren ungelösten Probleme, welche durch die Nutzung der Atomenergie entstanden sind, letztendlich erfolgreich bekämpft haben. Erst als der Faktor Macht hinzukam, änderten sich die Werte der Partei. Wahrscheinlich sind wir alle, wenn wir die, mit der Macht einhergehenden, Privilegien erst einmal gekostet haben, verführbar und unsere Werte gehen den „Bach“ runter. Die Grüne Partei wird viel tun müssen, um mein verloren gegangenes Vertrauen zurück zu gewinnen.
Zum Artikel noch ein Gedanke: Es wurden in der Vergangenheit nicht nur die Grünen ausgegrenzt, sondern auch die Linken, mit denen nach der Wende von unseren Medien als Sprachrohr der „Altparteien“ niemand reden wollte.
It remains the same: the argument must count, not the person who makes it. Unfortunately, our democracy is light years away from this. This is another reason why we have been bobbing along for two and a half years in a state of evidence-free cluelessness and - despite the law in force - are depriving people of their INCREDIBLE dignity (which all state authorities are obliged to respect and protect) with these measures. Without free discourse, our society will become poorer and our democracy will be put to the test.
Machen Sie doch mal diesen Test: Der Kanzler oder ein Minister oder ein Kabinettsmitglied (Bundestag oder Landtag) tritt im TV mit einer Rede oder einem Redebeitrag auf, oder ein AfD-Mitglied ans Rednerpult. Danach fragen Sie sich oder einen Mitsitzenden: „Was genau hat er oder Sie jetzt gesagt.Fasse das in zwei drei Sätzen zusammen.“ Im ersten Fall haben Sie meistens den Sinn der Rede -aus unterschiedlichen Gründen..- nicht verstanden, sollen aber den Inhalt glauben (als braver Staatsbürger). Im zweiten Fall haben Sie meistens den Sinn verstanden, dürfen aber den Inhalt nicht glauben ( als braver Staatsbürger ). Beispiel etwa eine Rede von Annalena Baerbock und eine von Alice Weidel……In meinen früheren Jahren als Grundschullehrerin schrieben wir in der vierten Klasse noch 10 Aufsätze: Erlebniserzählung, Personenbeschreibung, Sachbeschreibung, persönlicher Brief, sachlicher Brief, Verfassen eines Rezeptes, einer Gebrauchsanleitung, Protokoll. Beurteilt wurden jeweils -mit eigener in Rot geschriebener Begründung- Inhalt, sprachlicher Ausdruck, Rechtschreibung. Das ist lange her. Zu lange…..Heute laufen übrigens bei den größeren Schülern etliche Lehrer unter der Rubrik Laberheini oder Labertussi……
As a paragon of curiosity and at the same time an "expert" (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer:WinnieSchneider) I was happy to follow the last sentence and uncovered something remarkable behind Wikipedia's backdrop, namely naked figures on the internally raging culture war, which surprised even me in their clarity. The original impulse was merely similar to Peter Löcke's in the movie theater, namely to create a little confusion among the viewers here and to link to comparably old versions of the two Wikipedia entries, such as the two, three or five thousandth version since the respective creation. Fiddlesticks: Die Grünen has not yet been changed 5,000 times, but only 4,741 times, although the lemma is already almost 18 years old (October 17, 2004). The scope currently amounts to 88,466 characters in 11,329 words. The AfD, on the other hand, or the electoral initiative that preceded its foundation, was recognized with its first words less than 10 years ago (18.11.2012), but has since been changed a whopping 11,491 times, i.e. far more than twice as often as the Greens, and with 169,220 characters in 21,546 words to date, it uses almost twice as many words. The number of "reverted edits", which are primarily intended to eliminate so-called "vandalism", i.e. disruptive edits that are often used for internal "edit wars" between authors, is also significantly high for the AfD at 1,857, while the Greens have "reverted" less than half as many at 830 edits. The interventions of the "administrators", who were given special rights for the sake of greater responsibility, are even more striking: according to the "logbook", they intervened in the Afd article no less than 140 times, 125 of which were "protective"; in the case of the Greens, the admins only considered it necessary to intervene 48 times over the years, 33 of which were for page protection. In contrast, there is an interesting disparity between the 1,505 editors of the AfD article and the 1,915 different "authors" of the Green Party article:
■ https://xtools.wmflabs.org/articleinfo/de.wikipedia.org/Bündnis_90/Die_Grünen (technical statistics for the Green lemma https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bündnis_90/Die_Grünen - plus the logbook https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spezial:Logbuch&page=Bündnis_90%2FDie_Grünen)
■ https://xtools.wmflabs.org/articleinfo/de.wikipedia.org/Alternative_für_Deutschland (technical statistics for the AfD lemma https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_für_Deutschland - plus the logbook https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spezial:Logbuch&limit=500&page=Alternative_für_Deutschland)