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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 ex

by _mlbt 1y ago

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 the Proud Boys. Opposition parties are extremely important to a properly functioning democracy. What is so extreme and dangerous about the actual current AfD party members other than their anti-immigration stance?

LaurensBER 1y ago
I'm not German but it's my understanding that nothing is being banned. This classification allows the German intelligence agencies to be more aggressive in gathering intelligence of any potential misconduct within the AfD. I'll abstain from making any moral judgements about this, I don't feel qualified to do so but I understand that the historical context places a very large role in Germany. Any association with Nazi's is condemned in the harshest way. The AfD has crossed that line several times in the past.
flohofwoe 1y ago
See for yourself: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B6rn_H%C3%B6cke https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B6rn_H%C3%B6cke (even if parts of the AfD may not be openly fascists, they still tolerate them in leading positions)
T0Bi 1y ago
The anti immigration stance is not the problem in itself, it's a symptom of their xenophobic views. "The party's prevailing ethnic and descent-based understanding of the people is not compatible with the free democratic basic order. It aims to exclude certain population groups from equal participation in society, to subject them to unequal treatment that does not conform to the constitution and thus to assign them a legally devalued status. Specifically, the AfD does not consider German citizens with a history of migration from Muslim countries, for example, to be equal members of the German people as defined by the party in ethnic terms." Translated with deepl from https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/pressemitteilungen/DE/2025/pressemitteilung-2025-05-02.html https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/pressemitteilung...
MildlySerious 1y ago
They are not expelling extremists based on extremism. They are expelling extremists based on public fallout. The remaining ones are effectively their spokespeople. Germany has a wide range of political parties that cover the entire political spectrum. A party of extremists is not needed for a strong opposition. What German politics needs is momentum, and the will to actually get stuff done, even if it'll be unpopular. The fact that the AfD managed to use and abuse that mindset to gain popularity does not make them the right ones to make a positive impact. In fact, even putting their extremism aside, their contrarian and anti-progressive "everything new is woke" mentality is the exact opposite of what the country needs, for all I care. I've answered your last question in a sibling comment to yours.[1] [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869432
orwin 1y ago
Their anti rule of law stance, their criticism of parliament, their idolatry of ancestry, genealogy and genetics. Also their retoric: their default stance is the fundamental attribution error (my ingroup failed because we were betrayed/cheated, your outgroup failed because you are lazy/bad/inferior). When your bonapartist (which is cesarism+nationalism basically) ideology is tinted (or tainted I would say, but I'm biased) with that reasoning mistake, you're close to fascism. Some people could call them post-fascists, but to me post-fascism died in Italy in the 80s (not true, I have a post-fascist friend, but they're extremely rare). Because they're too dumb to have real 'thinkers' (and they don't read anyway), they rehash old ideas and dunk everything at the wall to see what stick (which can work l), to me they're closer to proto-fascists (see Balkan nationalists the the late 19th century).
OKRainbowKid 1y ago
The actual leftist parties are part of the opposition. These opposition parties are much more supportive of banning AFD than the incoming centre-right government. So obviously this is not about silencing opposition, but about fighting an extremist right wing movement which is opposing liberal democracy.
deleted 1y ago
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by _mlbt 1y ago

LaurensBER 1y ago

I'm not German but it's my understanding that nothing is being banned. This classification allows the German intelligence agencies to be more aggressive in gathering intelligence of any potential misconduct within the AfD. I'll abstain from making any moral judgements about this, I don't feel qualified to do so but I understand that the historical context places a very large role in Germany. Any association with Nazi's is condemned in the harshest way. The AfD has crossed that line several times in the past.

flohofwoe 1y ago

See for yourself: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B6rn_H%C3%B6cke https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B6rn_H%C3%B6cke (even if parts of the AfD may not be openly fascists, they still tolerate them in leading positions)

T0Bi 1y ago

The anti immigration stance is not the problem in itself, it's a symptom of their xenophobic views. "The party's prevailing ethnic and descent-based understanding of the people is not compatible with the free democratic basic order. It aims to exclude certain population groups from equal participation in society, to subject them to unequal treatment that does not conform to the constitution and thus to assign them a legally devalued status. Specifically, the AfD does not consider German citizens with a history of migration from Muslim countries, for example, to be equal members of the German people as defined by the party in ethnic terms." Translated with deepl from https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/pressemitteilungen/DE/2025/pressemitteilung-2025-05-02.html https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/pressemitteilung...

MildlySerious 1y ago

They are not expelling extremists based on extremism. They are expelling extremists based on public fallout. The remaining ones are effectively their spokespeople. Germany has a wide range of political parties that cover the entire political spectrum. A party of extremists is not needed for a strong opposition. What German politics needs is momentum, and the will to actually get stuff done, even if it'll be unpopular. The fact that the AfD managed to use and abuse that mindset to gain popularity does not make them the right ones to make a positive impact. In fact, even putting their extremism aside, their contrarian and anti-progressive "everything new is woke" mentality is the exact opposite of what the country needs, for all I care. I've answered your last question in a sibling comment to yours.[1] [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869432

orwin 1y ago

Their anti rule of law stance, their criticism of parliament, their idolatry of ancestry, genealogy and genetics. Also their retoric: their default stance is the fundamental attribution error (my ingroup failed because we were betrayed/cheated, your outgroup failed because you are lazy/bad/inferior). When your bonapartist (which is cesarism+nationalism basically) ideology is tinted (or tainted I would say, but I'm biased) with that reasoning mistake, you're close to fascism. Some people could call them post-fascists, but to me post-fascism died in Italy in the 80s (not true, I have a post-fascist friend, but they're extremely rare). Because they're too dumb to have real 'thinkers' (and they don't read anyway), they rehash old ideas and dunk everything at the wall to see what stick (which can work l), to me they're closer to proto-fascists (see Balkan nationalists the the late 19th century).

OKRainbowKid 1y ago

The actual leftist parties are part of the opposition. These opposition parties are much more supportive of banning AFD than the incoming centre-right government. So obviously this is not about silencing opposition, but about fighting an extremist right wing movement which is opposing liberal democracy.

deleted 1y ago

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