White Power

[Superlative]

German neo-Nazis on the march

By Barnaby Phillips in Berlin


As part of Al Jazeera's series on the rise of the right in Europe, Barnaby Phillips travelled to Germany to explore the growing popularity of neo-Nazi groups.

In the small town of Halbe in eastern Germany some of the country's new generation have gathered for march, a march back to old times and back to an ideology of hatred and separation.
Far-right support has grown considerably in eastern areas of Germany

Those taking part are forbidden by strict German laws from displaying Nazi symbols but there is little secret where there affiliation lies or that they are honouring a time that most people recall with revulsion.

The marchers are part of a growing number of the population who dream of what they call a pure Germany, composed only of whites.

Anti-fascist protesters have also travelled to Halbe attempting to disrupt the march but are forced back by police.

Racist attacks

Such gatherings are a dilemma for the German authorities. If they ban marches, they could appear undemocratic, but allowing them may risk seeing support for the far-right support grow, all be it under tight restrictions.

But the rise in popularity of neo-Nazi groups has accompanied another worrying trend, the increase of racist attacks.

A report this week in the Tagesspiegel newspaper revealed that racist attacks committed by neo-Nazis and other far right groups had reached their highest levels since the reunification of Germany in 1990.

The crime rate rose by 14 per cent last year to 18,000 extremist offences according to the report, with 1,100 of those acts of violence, an eight per cent annual increase according to federal police figures.

In one of the most serious incidents in July last year, far right supporters in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt burned the diary of Holocaust victim Anne Frank, causing outrage among German politicians and anti-racist groups.

In another incident in the state later in the year, teenagers forced a 16-year-old classmate to parade around school wearing a sign with an anti-Semitic, Nazi-era slogan.

Such figures and events are alarming, particularly for Germany’s black and African communities with some areas of eastern Germany already no-go areas for them.

In the country’s capital, Berlin, Al Jazeera spoke to Emmanuel Donkor, struggling to make his way after moving to Germany from Ghana.

Instead of seeing his hopes of a brighter future realised he was attacked while waiting on a train station platform a by a white skin-head and his pit-bull terrier.

Political gain

However in the east of Berlin, the presentable face of the far-right can be found.

Udo Voigt has been the leader of the National Democratic Party (NDP) since 1996.

The party has been consistently labelled by successive German governments as descendants of the Nazis but that did not stop its candidates winning 12 seats in the state parliament of the eastern region of Saxony in 2004.

Emmanuel Donkor says passers-by did nothing
to help him when attacked by a white skinhead


It followed that success by winning six of 71 regional parliamentary seats in another eastern state, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern last year.

Voigt and his followers are quick to exploit the economic malaise and unemployment that is prevalent in eastern Germany.

For the NDP closed factories and unemployment are opportunities to win over angry Germans.

Voigt says immigrants must go home and that the German race must stay pure.

"We German people have many qualities- we are hardworking, courageous and faithful," he says. "But if we mix races we will lose these qualities. Because we will then mix our characteristics with the characteristics of other races- and we are opposed to this."

When politicians say races shouldn’t mix, the consequences can be ugly.

Ben Adison knows that. He fled Sierra Leone's civil war but in Germany he was beaten into a coma by a neo-Nazi gang.

Today he feels alone and says that black people are hated in his town.

"Its like 'lets kill them, they are not human beings……I will cut your throat'", he says

The German government plans to pump millions of dollars into promoting tolerance and diversity this year, but at the same time it has also cut funding for several existing programmes aimed at combatting racist attacks such as the ones on Emmanuel Donkor and Ben Adison.


http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/6E650ED8-6860-4D14-988C-26704A0265EC.htm

 

[Vintij]

This kind of neo-nazism goes on in the US too. Its not surprising, there will always be nazi supporters, and KKK type groups. Thought, in america, I really believe we are making progress and less people are becoming tolerant of this kind of behavior. I also dont believe our far right is that extreme, perhaps in the past with slavery and again in the 50s with black hatred. We are making progress, though nobody likes to talk about how our current far right conservatives, used to be against black and white schools, black and white water fountains, black and white busses. They were for slavery and segregation. Im not attacking conservatives now adays because times have changed. Though not in germany, apparantly.

 

[Dirt McGirt]

This kind of neo-nazism goes on in the US too. Its not surprising, there will always be nazi supporters, and KKK type groups. Thought, in america, I really believe we are making progress and less people are becoming tolerant of this kind of behavior. I also dont believe our far right is that extreme, perhaps in the past with slavery and again in the 50s with black hatred. We are making progress, though nobody likes to talk about how our current far right conservatives, used to be against black and white schools, black and white water fountains, black and white busses. They were for slavery and segregation. Im not attacking conservatives now adays because times have changed. Though not in germany, apparantly.

That's totally inaccurate. You can be arrested for displaying a swastika, pledging allegiance to Hitler or denying the Holocaust in Germany. Their free speech is very limited compared to here.

 

[Vintij]

That's totally inaccurate. You can be arrested for displaying a swastika, pledging allegiance to Hitler or denying the Holocaust in Germany. Their free speech is very limited compared to here.

So thats why the crime rate went up. Well I would expect it to continue to rise, if this neo-nazi era continues. If the crime rate falls, we know that it is declining. Thats exluding non race related crimes.

 

[Dirt McGirt]

So, the people in this article were arrested? What happend to them?

I'm not sure who the people were in this article, but yes you can be arrested for displaying certain elements or symbols of naziism. Like extremists in every country, Neo-nazis exist in Germany. But to imply that Germany permits or tolerates this type of behavior is far from the truth. They have very strict laws on hate speech.

 

[Gunny]

So thats why the crime rate went up. Well I would expect it to continue to rise, if this neo-nazi era continues. If the crime rate falls, we know that it is declining. Thats exluding non race related crimes.

So you blindly attribute Germany's crime rate to neo-Nazi's?

 

[UnAmericanYOU]

Fascism is NOT extreme right:

Everyone thinks he knows what fascism is, except for the people who study it.

Indeed, this has become something of an inside joke in the academic literature. “Such is the welter of divergent opinion surrounding the nature of the term,” writes Roger Griffin in his introduction to The Nature of Fascism, “that it is almost de rigueur to open contributions to the debate on fascism with some such observation.” One of the main reasons the scholarly compass hasn’t been fixed is that the magnetic pull of Marxism distorted its reading for so many years. Marxist theory — which operated as a secular gospel for an army of intellectuals — predicted that the capitalist ruling classes would mount a “last gasp” attack on the progressive historical juggernaut of Communism. When fascism popped up, some Communists said, in effect, “Aha! Marx’s prophecy has been fulfilled!” Others recognized that fascism and, even more acutely, National Socialism were dangerous competitors to Bolshevism. National Socialism, which allowed Germans (or Romanians, Frenchmen, etc.) to be both nationalistic chauvinists and socialists, was very appealing to people who liked left-wing economics but rejected an “international” socialism run out of the Kremlin.

As a result, Stalin ordered every loyal party member and organ to paint fascism as a right-wing phenomenon and ban the word “socialist” from any discussion of avowedly socialist fascist groups. Indeed, for a brief time Stalin’s doctrine of “social fascism” held that any ideology or movement that was not loyal to Moscow was fascist. The rationale was that if you weren’t helping the One True Faith, you were helping the capitalists. FDR, John Dewey, W. E. B. Du Bois, the American Federation of Labor, the Socialist Party of America and its president Norman Thomas — all were “social fascists,” according to the Communist Party of the United States of America.

Particularly since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Marxist notion of fascism as a capitalistic tool of the ruling classes has fallen into disrepute among scholars — though it continues to thrive in the more moonbatty domains of the Internet.
(Source: Jonah Goldberg, All About 'Fascism', National Review, September 25. 2006.)

That is a pop-culture myth the left really wants to believe:

In his 1974 book, LEFTISM: From de Sade and Marx to Hitler and Marcuse, Professor Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn details the natural progression of leftism from The French Revolution to Socialism to Communism to Marxism to Fascist Nationalism to National Socialism to Socialist Racism to what he calls "False Liberalism" - modern American liberalism. Here are some interesting tidbits from that book:

The original myth that the Nazis were considered to be on the right was that they were misplaced on the right in the Reichstag (pg. 37).

George Bernard Shaw described Mussolini as a "progressive" (pg 159).

"One need only to read the pertinent passages about Italian fascism in the very interesting diaries of Victor Serge, a dissident Russian Communist, to understand the deep and lasting connection between the national and international leftist ideologies, socialism-communism and fascism." (pg. 159) "At heart Mussolini was always a Socialist." (pg. 161)

"Dr. Goebbels asked in 1932: 'Where would we take the moral right from to fight the idea of the proletarian struggle between the classes, if the bourgeois class-state were not first destroyed and replaced by a new Socialist structure of German community?'" (pg. 175) "The leftist character of Nazism was also apparent in its attitude towards Christianity." (pg. 175)

"The fundamentally leftist and identitarian character of National Socialism can certainly not be questioned. The Marxists tried to prove that Nazism was "financed by the rich." (pg. 176) "The economic order under the Nazis, indeed, was Socialistic, also from an economic point of view, because in a totalitarian state the factory owner or banker no longer holds genuine property. He is merely a steward, the tolerated representative of an almighty government which can expropriate him at the drop of a hat. Not by accident was the Nazi flag the red banner." (pg. 177)

Germany today is socialism in decay.

 

[William Joyce]

The sentiment in Germany probably has parallels to the U.S. --- shove multiculturalism down people's throats too much, and they rebel. Multiculturalism is quickly revealed as just anti-white, not "inclusiveness."

 

[Dirt McGirt]

The sentiment in Germany probably has parallels to the U.S. --- shove multiculturalism down people's throats too much, and they rebel.

Or you just have a lot of bored, young, unemployed losers with low self esteem who just want to be a part of something. I bet you most of those neo-nazi types join up for the free pussy.

 

[Igor Peters]

Freedom of speech in Germany.
(source wikipedia)
Germany

Freedom of expression is granted by Article 5 of the German Basic Law[4]:

(1) Every person shall have the right freely to express and disseminate his opinions in speech, writing, and pictures and to inform himself without hindrance from generally accessible sources. Freedom of the press and freedom of reporting by means of broadcasts and films shall be guaranteed. There shall be no censorship.


(2) These rights shall find their limits in the provisions of general laws, in provisions for the protection of young persons, and in the right to personal honor.


(3) Art and scholarship, research, and teaching shall be free. The freedom of teaching shall not release any person from allegiance to the constitution.


The most important and sometimes controversial regulations limiting freedom of speech and freedom of the press can be found in the Criminal code:

* Insult is punishable under Section 185. Satire and similar forms of art enjoy more freedom but have to respect human dignity (Article 1 of the Basic law).
* Malicious Gossip and Defamation (Section 186 and 187). Utterances about facts (opposed to personal judgement) are allowed if they are true and can be proven. Yet journalists are free to investigate without evidence because they are justified by Safeguarding Legitimate Interests (Section 193).
* Hate speech may be punishable if against segments of the population and in a manner that is capable of disturbing the public peace (Section 130 [Agitation of the People]), including racist agitation and antisemitism.
* Holocaust denial is punishable according to Section 130 subsection 3.
* Dissemination of Means of Propaganda of Unconstitutional Organizations (Section 86).
* Use of Symbols of Unconstitutional Organizations (Section 86a) as the Swastika.
* Disparagement of

* the Federal President (Section 90).
* the State and its Symbols (Section 90a).


* Insult to Organs and Representatives of Foreign States (Section 103).
* Rewarding and Approving Crimes (Section 140).
* Casting False Suspicion (Section 164).
* Insulting of Faiths, Religious Societies and Organizations Dedicated to a Philosophy of Life (Section 166)
* Dissemination of Pornographic Writings (Section 184).


Not quite as generous as in the USA but not to shabby.

 

[William Joyce]

Basically, you can say whatever you want, unless you're a white German. Sounds fair to me.

I have an idea for the Germans: since the right-wing whites are so much trouble, maybe you could build some, I don't know, central "camps" for them, we'll call it, and put them there. Pass a few laws keeping them out of office. Maybe some will have be dealt with more harshly. Who's in?

 

[Igor Peters]

Those white Germans who communicate in a more sophiscated fashion than waving swastikas around without a legal loophole to back them up seem to be doing rather well.

 

[GeeWhiz]

Fascism is NOT extreme right:

That is a pop-culture myth the left really wants to believe:

Germany today is socialism in decay.

The book you quoted was written by a screwball. Take a look at this:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_von_Kuehnelt-Leddihn

Erik Maria Ritter von Kuehnelt-Leddihn (July 31, 1909–May 26, 1999) was an Austrian Catholic aristocrat intellectual who described himself as an "extreme conservative arch-liberal." Kuehnelt-Leddihn often argued that majority rule in democracies is a threat to individual liberties, and declared himself a monarchist

He endeavored to explain the intricacies of monarchist concepts and the systems of Europe, cultural movements such as Hussitism and Protestantism, and what he perceived as the disastrous effects of an American policy derived from anti-monarchical feelings and a concomitant ignorance of European culture and history.

Contrary to the common historical view, Kuehnelt-Leddihn asserted that Nazism was a leftist, democratic movement ultimately rooted in the French Revolution that unleashed forces of egalitarianism, identitarianism, materialism and centralization.

In Liberty or Equality, his magnum opus, von Kuehnelt-Leddihn contrasted monarchy with democracy and presented his arguments for the superiority of monarchy: diversity is upheld better in monarchical countries than in democracies, monarchism is not based on party rule, and it "fits organically into the ecclesiastic and familistic pattern of Christian society".

 

[Dirt McGirt]

Basically, you can say whatever you want, unless you're a white German. Sounds fair to me.

I have an idea for the Germans: since the right-wing whites are so much trouble, maybe you could build some, I don't know, central "camps" for them, we'll call it, and put them there. Pass a few laws keeping them out of office. Maybe some will have be dealt with more harshly. Who's in?

That's odd.

I never took you for being against the concept of incarceration....guess I was mistaken.

 

[Igor Peters]

By the way.
A number of political scientists see facism less as a distinctive political ideology and more as a collection of techniques to grab (and maintain) power in (somewhat) democratic countries.