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AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

bbc.com

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Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#61

Post by tharmas »

lostlogin wrote: post #35
_mlbt wrote: post #12

I’m not a German so take this with a massive amount of salt, but what makes them extreme-right? Is it the anti-immigrant stance or is there more that I’m missing? They just seem to be regular right wing by American standards.

Regarding the AfD, ‘Senior members have been disgraced for playing down Nazi war crimes and accepting suspicious payments from Russia and China. There were calls to ban the party when it was reported party members were at a meeting of neo-Nazis where a “master plan” to expel millions of people from Germany was discussed, including asylum seekers, foreigners with residency rights and “unassimilated citizens”. The AfD…

>accepting suspicious payments from Russia

Do you really think the Russians would ever support a Neo Nazi party after what happened in WW2?

That's propaganda.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#62

Post by vladvasiliu »

danhor wrote: post #28
incomingpain wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not sure what your point is. The AfD is not the first extreme right party to gain a sizeable number of seats. Firstly I get the nazi thing and the laws are set to prevent another instance. AFD obviously still exists so a court has not banned them. Innocent until proven guilty. The flipside problem is that these anti-nazi measures can be abused, false positive type situation. The measures would of course need to be b…

> AFD obviously still exists so a court has not banned them. Innocent until proven guilty. A court can only ban them after the parliament has voted to ban them. One of the hurdles on getting the parliament to vote on this topic has been the outstanding decision by this body, if it's really "gesichert rechtsextrem". At least in many previous cases surrounding this question (mostly libel cases), courts have argued that…

> There would be no reason to ban a party if they could be ignored (see the NPD)

But this is the problem. It means that a party being illegal isn't such a big deal in and of itself. It's only a problem if it challenges the mainstream parties. You can see why people would think it's just a political maneuver if they're trying to ban X party only when many people vote for them. Bonus points for this party portending to "represent the voiceless" or whatever.

If some party is illegal for whatever reason, it should be banned right away. Just because you can ignore it doesn't mean it should be ignored. It would also be much easier to prevent having a sizeable chunk of the population vote for an "illegal" party and the headaches coming from that once it becomes big enough.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#63

Post by [deleted] »

_mlbt wrote: post #20
LaurensBER wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of their ex-members have been literal Nazis. Something that doesn't go over very well in Germany. The party banned these people but their standpoints are still very controversial, the main issue is that in some aspects they do no support the juridical system. So yeah, regular right wing compared to American standards but I think we can all agree that respecting the trias politica is a good thing in any country.

I’ll be honest, as an American looking in from the outside, this looks like the leftist parties in Germany trying to silence the opposition. If the party is expelling the true extremists like the Neo-Nazi former party members that you mentioned, I don’t see why they should be held responsible for them. This would be like declaring the entire American Republican Party extreme-far right because of a few whack jobs like…

[deleted]

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#64

Post by PurpleRamen »

qoez wrote: post #15

I wish there was tighter rules around what stays on the front page of HN. I come here for tech news or interesting nerdy blog posts not this stuff.

Talking about the situation of potential workplaces/countries is legit here IMHO. There are many tech workers living or planing to live in other countries on this site. And several complaints in the last years about Germany were about the growing hostility from the extreme right. This is a step in a good direction. But it won't solve the problems in general.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#65

Post by tharmas »

dweinus wrote: post #17
_mlbt wrote: post #12

I’m not a German so take this with a massive amount of salt, but what makes them extreme-right? Is it the anti-immigrant stance or is there more that I’m missing? They just seem to be regular right wing by American standards.

> They just seem to be regular right wing by American standards. Correct, both have an agenda of subverting the rule of law to violate human rights of immigrants, under a flag of white nationalism. There is a single word for this.

Strongly disagree. Most right wing populist parties' policies are very pro worker. Right wing parties in USA see these policies as "socialist", anathema.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#66

Post by tharmas »

The more austerity for the people the more popular extremist parties will become. Banning them will just stoke the fire.

The ruling clases are blinded by their greed. Throw the starving people more than a few crumbs and the appeal of extremist parties will drain away. Its politics 101.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#67

Post by PurpleRamen »

_mlbt wrote: post #12

I’m not a German so take this with a massive amount of salt, but what makes them extreme-right? Is it the anti-immigrant stance or is there more that I’m missing? They just seem to be regular right wing by American standards.

Do you consider Trump as regular right wing? Or more extreme? Do you think the deportations of "illegals" happening at the moment are justified? What about deportations on legals non-white people?

The main reason for the classification seems to be their worldview based on "Blood" and what they consider as a "True German", and how they want to deport (or worse) anyone who does not match this view. Their plans are similar to what is happening under Trump now, but some steps further.

And lets not talk about all the other s** around culture and science. But these are not illegal.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#68

Post by Simulacra »

This is ridiculous, it's subjective, and it's really punitive in a political way. The AFD has made huge gains in Germany, the people voted for that, how dare the intelligence service say oh, this is far right. It's the same as if they had said, it was far left. The government has no business in deciding which party can field candidates. That's the voters to choose.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#69

Post by Tadpole9181 »

vladvasiliu wrote: post #59
MaKey wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If everyone's an extremist, that word soon loses its meaning. See: the boy who cried wolf. People are getting tired of this crap and can see trying to outlaw a growing party for "extremism" as a shameless political tactic. Which means actual extremists may go unnoticed. What makes you think that the AfD isn't a right-wing extremist party?

Nothing. They could be literally Hitler or literally Gandi for all I know. I'm not in Germany and I don't follow them. The only contact I have is reading French newspapers about how some "far right" party is gaining traction over there. I did note that now that they're gaining more votes, they've become more extremist (according to the same French media). Bonus points for them being considered somewhat "close" to the…

This is a lot to say that you have no idea what the AfD situation actually is and haven't looked into any of the intelligence reports or even rhetoric/behavior of the party (leaders).

Also:

> But pretty much everybody who says anything else than "we should abolish borders and allow any and all immigrants who wish to come" or even "maybe we should do something about crime" is labeled "fascist", "extreme right", etc.

Really lays your hand out.

Re: AfD classified as extreme-right by German intelligence

#70

Post by Tadpole9181 »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #26
thrance wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This should tell you more about how far right America has gotten. What's your definition of extreme-right and why don't they fit it? Both the GOP and the AFD are acting extra-constitutionally. Trump's administration has shown to Europeans that needed a reminder how dangerous these politics can be.

Is the AfD acting extra-constitutionally? Or are they just proposing to do so? They aren't actually in power, are they? If not, how are they "acting" at all? (Not German, so I don't know. Honest questions from an incomplete understanding.)

I'm sorry, your definition of being extremists requires them to be the dominant party and actively committing a genocide?

They promised they'll do it. They have ideology consistent with doing it. They got caught talking about how they'll do it.

They need to be stopped not only before they are in total control and do it, they need to be stopped before they shift the Overton window.

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