To assuage you a bit. The AfD is a paper tiger inflated by the media. I’m not saying there is no chance for them to ever reach power, but right now it’s not very likely. They lack something important: competent people in local politics. They don’t care about local politics, they often lack the shoes to fill posts, or have people nobody likes, or have people whose only competence is to wail on immigrants.
“Shitty candidate who only gets taken seriously because of the media coverage” is a trap many of my fellow Americans fell into in 2016. Don’t make the same mistake we did and stomp them out while you have the chance.
You’re correct, but current Germany’s democracy is way more robust than US was. A party can’t just rise to power with the power of bullshit, not quickly anyway. A party has to play with others, it is almost impossible to have all the power, so crazy people can’t just usurp the country. AfD tries to appear less crazy than they are, but the evil shines through, so nobody wants to play ball with them
Yeah that’s a good point… having a coalition government system like lot of our Western contemporaries would definitely have helped the Trump situation, if not outright prevented it.
We’re lucky that the allies did such a wonderful job of correting their own mistakes and making our system more robust after WW2 (not /s, seriously good job).
Yeah, it’s a shame that they did such a good job in Germany but weren’t able to import it back to their own countries. Imagine if it was as hard for right wing populists to get the power in the US, Russia, UK…
Media control over time is exactly how you build a base though. It’s very fair to be concerned about the monster they could grow into in the future, especially with all the different news sources getting picked up by billionaires. By the time they’re running the school boards and town halls it’ll be too late.
The mouthpieces are replaceable. Considering how fast the AfD is radicalising it is likely they’ll sabotage themselves before ever gaining real relevance. It’s much more important to look at what put them there in the first place.
The way I see right wing misinformation pop up more and more as “sponsored” content here in Germany is worrying. The next far right party that eventually pops up will likely have a much bigger politically active base. And I don’t want to think about the influence global warming will have…
To assuage you a bit. The AfD is a paper tiger inflated by the media. I’m not saying there is no chance for them to ever reach power, but right now it’s not very likely. They lack something important: competent people in local politics. They don’t care about local politics, they often lack the shoes to fill posts, or have people nobody likes, or have people whose only competence is to wail on immigrants.
As long as they stay united while left parties splinter, there will always be a chance of an AfD forming the government.
Here in Estonia our pseudonazi party got some power and it all fizzled out. All the infighting really didn’t help them.
They get a few parliament seats still, but the success they had 5-10 years ago seems gone.
“Shitty candidate who only gets taken seriously because of the media coverage” is a trap many of my fellow Americans fell into in 2016. Don’t make the same mistake we did and stomp them out while you have the chance.
You’re correct, but current Germany’s democracy is way more robust than US was. A party can’t just rise to power with the power of bullshit, not quickly anyway. A party has to play with others, it is almost impossible to have all the power, so crazy people can’t just usurp the country. AfD tries to appear less crazy than they are, but the evil shines through, so nobody wants to play ball with them
Yeah that’s a good point… having a coalition government system like lot of our Western contemporaries would definitely have helped the Trump situation, if not outright prevented it.
We’re lucky that the allies did such a wonderful job of correting their own mistakes and making our system more robust after WW2 (not /s, seriously good job).
Yeah, it’s a shame that they did such a good job in Germany but weren’t able to import it back to their own countries. Imagine if it was as hard for right wing populists to get the power in the US, Russia, UK…
Media control over time is exactly how you build a base though. It’s very fair to be concerned about the monster they could grow into in the future, especially with all the different news sources getting picked up by billionaires. By the time they’re running the school boards and town halls it’ll be too late.
Yup that is the thing to be concerned about.
The mouthpieces are replaceable. Considering how fast the AfD is radicalising it is likely they’ll sabotage themselves before ever gaining real relevance. It’s much more important to look at what put them there in the first place.
The way I see right wing misinformation pop up more and more as “sponsored” content here in Germany is worrying. The next far right party that eventually pops up will likely have a much bigger politically active base. And I don’t want to think about the influence global warming will have…
And yet they’re very present on the federal stage.