German teenagers and young adults find themselves increasingly unsatisfied and likely to vote for the far right, according to a survey. Fears about prosperity are highlighted as a possible cause.
Young people are more likely to vote for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) than previously, a study on Tuesday showed.
Authors of the “Youth in Germany 2024” study said that under-30s were increasingly disgruntled with their social and economic situation, and that fears about future prosperity were driving a shift to the right.
The AfD’s signature issue is a hard-line anti-immigration stance, and the data showed that migration was among young people’s main concerns.
…
The online study, conducted in January and February, found that young people were becoming increasingly dissatisfied, especially with their social and economic situation, compared with previous years.
After the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the authors said economic and political worries for example due to inflation, high rents, the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East or the division of society had taken center stage.
I know I am throwing stones in glass houses because I am saying this as a person from the US, but wow Germany is a really scary country, it seems like the culture is always extremely primed to radicalize its young men into serious violence around an obsession with masculine and machine strength/purity.
The US is a scarier country in most respects, and certainly has the same issue, but Germany is a much older culture and these brainworms seem to have ingrained deeper into their cultural mindset in some ways.
Are leftist movements growing to a similar degree among young people in Germany?
There is currently a massive movement against the far-right in Germany
Revently a meeting was leaked, where the AfD went just mask-out-the-window and openly talked about deportation (They call it “Remigration”) of German Citicens who are the children of immigrants.
After that the vague threats to society have become tangible for a lot of people. Now an ever increasing ammount of the general public is turning against the AfD, who is further slipping into fascism as a reaction, prompting usuql fascist infighting and splitting.
Unlike in the US our judicial system is not quite as bad, but, with all things German, burocratic processes are quite slow. Also a lot of parties dont want to cooperate with the AfD in any regard, even the center-right (CDU) is having issues.
From the outside it looks bleaker then it is in reality, but the danger is still very real
I compared these numbers to the general population (Source: https://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/ )
Support for the far right AfD is about 5 percentage points lower than among the general population (12% vs 17%)
For the conservative CDU/CSU it is 10 pp lower (20% vs 30%)
For the Social Democrats it is 3 pp lower (12% vs 15%)
For the liberal FDP it is 4 pp higher (8% vs 4%)
For the Greens it is about 4 pp higher (18% vs 14%)
For the Wagenknecht alliance, a weird mix of far right and far left, it is about the same (5%)
Unfortunately this article doesn’t mention the socialist left, which for the general population sits at around 3%
So, to conclude (and from my own experience) youths in Germany don’t deviate that much from the general population in terms of their political views. They tend to be less conservative and xenophobic. Most of them are somewhere in the center, having slightly more liberal tendencies than the general population.
Germany isn’t as progressive and nice as their PR department tells you. I got sick of hearing about how perfect Germany is for years, knowing it was all bullshit. They’re barely just now catching up on decriminalizing pot.
I believe a part of their public admin is still in paper too? Not fully digital.
Correct me if wrong
Canada is this way too. I needed a new passport and it took 8 weeks of faxes, forms, mail in forms, visits to government offices where everything runs on paper.
Meanwhile my cousin from Central America, went to his country’s government office, applied and walked out with a passport the same day and it was all done digitally.
As a Canadian I’m appalled and how shit our outdated system is.
A Part? Most of it. You can still fax shit to your amt. Its insane.
What PR department?
Which European countries have a more progressive policy regarding cannabis?
And people focusing on such a worthless topic as pot are not much better.
Yeah those worthless criminal records fucking with people, worthless people in prison cause of a plant. But yeah I guess if you don’t give a shit about people, it’s a worthless issue
You don’t end up in prison for smoking weed but OK
Far right parties in Europe:
https://i.redd.it/8k6dmkhapwvc1.jpeg
Polls for AFD in Germany are currently about twice that.
That’s irrelevant, the idea that modern day Germany is uniquely fertile ground for far right parties is easily disproven
That may very well be, but I don’t see how your link is relevant either.
It proves exactly what I just wrote?
I must have higher standards for what constitutes proof than you have.
It’s not that I disagree with your point or agree with the post you were replying to. I just don’t see how your image supports or refutes any of it.
You don’t see how other countries having similar or more popular far right parties is proof that Germany is not uniquely far right?
You posted an outdated picture without explanation, and now you changed your own description of what point you’re trying to make (“uniquely fertile ground” vs “uniquely far right”), and now you’re trying to turn this around on me.
No, I don’t see how an outdated picture that doesn’t reflect the current reality proves or refutes anything.
For the record, again, I don’t necessarily disagree with you, I don’t think Germany has unique circumstances or w/e that make it especially vulnerable to far right ideology. I just think you’re doing an awful job and bringing your point across.
And now I’ll stop replying with multiple paragraphs to your one-line comments, obviously you’re not putting much effort into them.