GERMANY: Fascists’ Meetings & more – 18th Jan 2024

Hallo from BA! This is the Rorshok Germany Update from the 18th of January twenty twenty-four A quick summary of what's going down in Germany.

Last wednesday, the 10th of January, a collective of investigative journalists called CORRECTIV uncovered a clandestine meeting of high-ranking party members of the Alternative for Germany, or AFD, and fascist extremists. Also attending the meeting were politicians from the conservative Christian Democratic Union or CDU, and most notably rich businessmen, such as the owner of the burger chain “Hans im Glück”. The participants discussed plans of large-scale deportations of foreigners, in their eyes “badly assimilated Germans” and political opponents. The investigation started debates on whether the AFD should be forbidden. Proponents of the ban say that the plans discussed at the meeting clearly show the anti-democratic character of the party. To read CORRECTIV’s article in English, follow the link in the show notes.

Over the weekend, several major German cities saw big demonstrations demanding a ban on the AFD party. In Berlin alone 25,000 people took to the streets. Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Annalena Baerbock, the foreign minister, were among the participants. This caused some frustration both among protestors and on the internet, since the chancellor is in the best position to start the legal procedures to impose a ban, but has done nothing in that direction. Other demonstrations took place in Kiel, Saarbrücken and more are planned for this week.

Another demonstration took place in Berlin on Sunday the 14th. This was the annual demonstration that commemorates the murders of Rosa Luxenburg and Karl Liebknecht, prominent figures and intellectuals of the workers' movement in the early 20th century. While in the last years the demonstrations have mostly been peaceful, several cases of police brutality overshadowed this year’s commemoration ceremony. The demonstration deviated from its purpose, as some people chanted “From the River to the sea, Palestine will be free”, a slogan that in Germany is seen as a call for eradicating the state of Israel. It is thus prosecuted as something akin to “hate-speech”, so the police attacked. Several people were injured and had to be taken to the hospital.

Speaking of the war, Germany’s position on the Israel-Hamas conflict has always been to stand by Israel and affirm its right to self-defense. On Friday the 12th, South Africa charged Israel with genocide at the International Court of Justice, or ICJ. However, Germany has announced that it would continue to support Israel and stand by its side as a third party. Coincidentally the 12th is also the anniversary of the German genocide against Herero and Nama in modern-day Namibia. While Germany was defending Israel at the ICJ, it did not issue any statement in commemoration of the genocide in Namibia. This led to strong critiques and irritation from Namibia, which accused Germany of double standards.

Coming back to domestic politics: In eastern Thuringia in the Saale-Orda district elections for district administrator, the candidate of the AFD was leading in the polls, but couldn’t secure an absolute majority. Record turn-outs of 65.5% on Sunday the 14th led to over 45% for the AFD candidate and 33% for the CDU candidate. Since nobody was able to cross the 50% threshold needed, a runoff election will take place on the 28th. Both candidates campaigned more on national politics, such as an anti-immigration stance and liberal market politics. Local issues, like plans to build a bike lane, played a smaller role. Now, the other candidates are campaigning against the AFD, hoping to secure a win for the CDU.

In previous shows we have talked about how right-wing extremists, liberals, and conservatives have called for extreme cuts in social welfare. Well, Hubertus Heil, the social democratic minister of work, has now given them what they want. A law is expected to pass this week that will allow the state to completely cut funding from people who are out of work and are not “willing” to take a job. NGOs have repeatedly pointed out that the majority of people this law will apply to, can’t work due to severe mental health issues. The ministry commented that cutting the funding will also serve as a deterrent to people who currently have jobs, but are thinking of quitting. It still isn’t clear if the law is constitutional, so there might be lawsuits once it is enacted.

In other news, a new Oxfam study shines a light on the growing inequality worldwide. According to this study, the richest five men worldwide more than doubled their assets since twenty twenty. In twenty twenty, they collectively owned around 405 Billion US Dollars, today it’s around 869 Billion US Dollars. In the same period, the poorest 5 Billion people lost around 20 Billion US Dollars. In Germany, the richest five increased their assets from 89 Billion to 155 Billion US Dollars, in spite of inflation. The top 1% in Germany currently hold around 80 % of all assets in Germany, which makes the nation one of the most unequal countries in Europe.

Moving on, the government has announced that the promised “Climate-Money” will not come during this legislative cycle. The Climate-Money is a specific amount of money that every German citizen would get to help carry the load of rising prices due to higher taxes on gas and other price changes that are planned due to the ecological transformation of Germany’s industry. At first, there was a system to wire money to everybody’s bank accounts, but now it seems that this mechanism won’t even be finished next year, and that the payout won’t take place until twenty twenty-six, when the national elections will be held.

Next up, a prominent German Youtuber has accused the STRG_F YouTube channel of bad journalism practices like bad research and framing. STRG_F (named after the search command on the keyboard CTRL_F) belongs to the network FUNK, which is part of the public broadcasting networks of ARD & ZDF. STRG_F apologized, but that only drew more criticism, since their apology didn’t address the actual problems, and opened them up to more accusations. Since then, the leadership at FUNK has apologized again and announced that they would launch a network-wide internal review of their practices.

In health-related news, health insurances have been covering homeopathy for a while now, but Karl Lauterbach, the health minister, is planning to cut it out. Homeopathy is a branch of medicine that relies on undetectably low doses of acting ingredients, and there’s no scientific evidence to support its efficacy.

And to close this edition: The floods that have been ravaging big parts of the country are ebbing off (pun intended). National security services have announced that the situation in almost all parts of the country isn’t critical anymore. People can start going back to their homes, if their houses aren’t severely damaged. The government has also announced that it will not pause the debt brake again, to help rebuild the damaged areas. The debt brake is a mechanism in the German constitution that prohibits the government from taking on new debt. It does allow pausing in cases of unforeseen disasters, and was already paused three years ago following floods.

Aaaaand that’s it for this week!

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Ciao!