Indeed. The NPD is stupid enough to be a true wink-wink Neo-Nazi party. To be legally safe in Germany, you can still advocate all the same bigoted policies, you just have to disassociate yourself from the actual Hitler worshipers, and very slightly modulate your rhetoric which incites racial hatred.
I belong to an ethnic minority in Germany and had real Nazis, not Neo-Nazis, as neighbors growing up. Just because you don't know how racist the average German views are, doesn't mean it isn't so.
- CDU, which is politically the closest to the Republicans, is by far the strongest party now
- AFD, actual Neo-Nazis, are the second strongest party in recent polls
- East Germany is basically a giant No-Go area for PoC, with a couple of exceptions.
I don't think the GOP/NDP comparison is apt, because Germany attempted to ban the NDP completely and the NDP works continuously with literal Nazis. If the KKK had a political party of its own, that would be comparable. There are only a few thousand members of the KKK left, though, so that is unlikely to occur.
I think that for the same percentage to identify with Nazi ideology it would require millions of people to be so comfortable with it that they would openly give Nazi affiliated parties their support.
I don't think millions of people support Neo-Nazis in the US.
Yes, and they've excommunicated him from the party as well as every other Nazi sympathizer. The Democratic Party had KKK members too in the past. Is it fair to call them a neo-Nazi Party too?
As I said, they are more dangerous than straight nazis, because they dress normally, have job and are overall much more presentable.
NPD, Rebulikaner and so on have much less potential, because most people even with far-right views would still avoid to be associated with grunting skinheads and risk to be socially excluded.
My view on them is a bit different than yours. I don't think that we necessarily have to talk to them. They often live in their own world with their own conspiracies and mistrust the press, the state, the West and so on. I doubt that talking to them would give us any great insights. So the "die Sorgen der Menschen ernst nehmen" meme ("to take the worries of the people seriously"), politicians played for a while is bullshit.
I do think so that especially since they do not have a very nuanced view on the world at all, we should analyze them very carefully. They are not just evil nazis. There are so many reasons for them (and other populists, see Trump, Brexit etc.) existing:
- one crisis after another (financial, Euro, refugees)
- rising complexity of the world
- their conspiracies regarding NSA/CIA have an actual basis
- stagnation of the West
- lived behind a wall for decades with no immigrants at all
- feeling to be left behind Western Germany
- and many more possible explanations
I also think that not every right idea is bad. The most liberal regulations do not give you anything if the whole system collapses under you. Britain is already gone, we should be really careful now. I think the people badly want control over what's going on, so they are turning to easy answers and to smaller circles. Out of globalization, the EU, the US, back to Russia (in case of Eastern Germany), the country, the family and so on.
We need the planned immigration law. We should help refugees (even though we should have complied with the Dublin regulations), but I don't think there is anything wrong with copying the places Germans immigrate to and specifying clear rules about what kind of people from outside the EU we want to let in.
Unfortunately the EU has no actual leadership, so Merkel has to step in as the defacto leader, take Hollande by the hand and make some bold moves to show the people that the EU can act and is in fact a successful model. Maybe even pissing of the US a bit and rejecting TTIP to show strength.
Germany's AfD party is on the rise [1]. They seem pretty far-right ultra-nationalist to me. They want to erase holocaust history because it makes Germany look weak lol. People are already doing it [2]. I've also read that Germany has a neo-nazi issue in the military [3].
Also the American anti-immigration movement that Trump fostered is directly inspired by European anti-migrant far-right movements like Marie LePen, AfD, UKIP, PVV. Steve Bannon studied these groups and brought that message to the Trump campaign. Prior to Trump, migration was not a hardcore right-wing polarization platform in the US, but it was in Europe.
I've actually met ex-nazis in Germany and I don't believe the causality you're proposing holds up.
Yes, neo-nazis think the "jews" are running the country and keeping them down, but this is no different from how the antifa think the "fascists" are doing the same.
The recent rise of nationalism in Germany actually has more to do with both major parties having become indistinguishable in many cases and "moderates" flocking to the extremes to "punish" the government.
It's a lot like trolls on 4chan spreading racist memes "for the lulz" until they end up having become actual white supremacists participating in Nazi rallies instead of merely shitposting on the Internet.
Right-leaning "moderates" vote for the right-wing extremists (NPD if you're really angry or AfD if you are more of a realist) out of spite and then fall for the rhetoric as they continue exposing themselves to their messages.
The only effective treatment against this disease seems to be constant exposure to other people with other ideas coming from other walks of life.
Yes, there's an East/West divide in neo-Nazi density in Germany, but it's also very much a rural/metropolitan divide. If all the people around you look, talk and think like you, everything different becomes a threat to your way of life.
Absolutely. Neo Nazis have been a fringe group for decades and never caused much trouble. Now I actually feel some affinity to them because I see them as an underdog being beaten down. That's how you get supporters - get oppressed. In fact that's how the original Nazi movement started in the first place - a vent to Germans' frustrations at being oppressed by the winners of WWI.
I read it. Unfortunately you haven't even read the definition on wikipedia. Please do.
Also, by reciting slogans, almost ubiquitously used in all neo-nazi groups/parties, isn't helping your argument. A little history lesson wouldn't hurt. I understand you are not one of them, but your opinions have the opposite effect.
Are you being serious? The Nazi party is based on doing horrible shit to minorities. That's the ideology, that's what the leadership believed and that's the reason why people joined them.
Hooligans salute Hitler, AfD supporters and "concerned citizens" go "tee-hee, how bold". That's the AfD, and that's what matters.
edit: oh, and the harmless image that's spread here on HN, combined with silent downvotes, that's just great. If you don't want a response, don't belittle a party you apparently know nothing about, in a country you don't even speak the language of.
Neo-Nazism is not Nazism. That's also a false equivalence. Racial / tribal superiority has been with humanity in one form or another since before we were even human. Neo-Nazism is just a modern interpretation / flavor of that idea. Actual Nazism was far, far more destructive than a bunch of people clamoring about whatever they were clamoring about.
When Neo-Nazis are violent, the actual violence shouldn't be tolerated, but to ban thoughts is something completely different.
FWIW, I never understood why US citizens would carry a Nazi flag, when they know damn well people in their family were directly affected by it in one way or another.
I'm a german who spent 6+ years of his school life continuously learning about nazis, lived for the first 25 years of his life in a town where i saw people in nazi attire on my way home or shopping every single day and always kept a key ring at the read, and is from a voting district that voted 20%+ for a party whose leadership explicitly hires neo nazis as security for demonstrations, a town where the lamp posts on the 200m way from my apartment to the shopping centers call for violence against foreigners.
And i have to say:
Those guys are nazis. They believe in fascism being the good and right way of the world. They hate people who're unlike them.
I agree with you that we should be wary and stick to sound ideals. The other day I read a column by Bloomberg View columnist Leonid Bershidsky arguing, "Right-Wing Populists Are Running Out of Time,"
so perhaps danger of a neo-Nazi movement is lessening while we stay wary and stick to ideals.
By the way, Bershinky's very latest column directly discusses Godwin's Law, the main topic of this thread, and is titled "Comparisons to Hitler Can Be Useful. Discuss."
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