I live on an island. I tend to forget this, but now with the last days of summer still perfect for a swim, I decide to drive an hour out of Berlin to a lake – and I’m instantly reminded of it. The first things I notice: idyllic nature, clean air – and a lot of neo-Nazis. It’s not even hard to recognise them: in many parts of eastern Germany they stroll around with a puffed-out chest and unambiguous symbols tattooed on their arms, printed on their shirts or stuck to their cars.
Of course, in Berlin we have neo-Nazis, too, but their presence is more subtle. It certainly gives you a greater sense of security when you are not constantly confronted with white-pride slogans and you are not the only person of colour in a 500-metre radius. You will always find someone in this island to make eye contact with. Outside, it’s better if you don’t.
But the borders of the island are not only marked by a feeling of safety; they are actual geographical borders. Historically, the western part of Berlin was an exclave of the west, within the German Democratic Republic and framed by walls until 1989.
Today, Berlin is one of three German city-states, along with Bremen and Hamburg, that have their own parliament. Like an island, the city-state of Berlin is located in the middle of a larger federal state, Brandenburg, where state elections will be held on 22 September. While in Berlin’s city parliament the far-right party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has built the smallest political group, current polls predict that in Brandenburg the party will receive about 25% of the votes – its strongest performance in the state since the AfD’s establishment in 2013.
Since the far-right party won the state elections in the east German state of Thuringia last Sunday, and became the second strongest party in Saxony, there is far more at stake for minorities in this country than the hesitation to go for a swim. It rather feels like multicultural and hedonist Berlin is swimming in a muddy soup of racist, misogynist and anti-queer ideology.
Whereas in the past 25 years far-right extremists and neo-Nazis organised, carried out arson attacks and murdered in secret, in recent months we’ve been able to observe a higher and bolder presence of fascists in the German public sphere, especially among young adults. Pride marches in east German cities have been attacked by neo-Nazis, and a rephrased version of Gigi D’Agostino’s pop song L’Amour Toujours went viral and was chanted in clubs all over the country with the neo-Nazi slogan “Germany for the Germans, foreigners out” (“Deutschland den Deutschen, Ausländer raus”).
In Thuringia, which by the way was the first region where Hitler’s Nazi party gained a foothold in government in 1929, 38% of 18- to 24-year-olds voted for the AfD last Sunday, an increase of almost 20 percentage points compared with its result in the previous state election in 2019. Studies show that these young voters are not worried about the fact that German security services class the Thuringia chapter of AfD as rightwing extremist. In fact, many of them don’t even define themselves as rightwing: they identify as centrist. And who can blame them, considering the normalisation of rightwing positions in the German mainstream that has been going on for years?
The centre left-led federal German government is implementing at the moment what the AfD can only promise its voters for now: more and swifter deportations. After the mass stabbing at a street festival in Solingen last month, in which three people were killed, the Social Democratic interior minister, Nancy Faeser, announced changes to asylum rules because the alleged perpetrator was a Syrian asylum seeker.
What Faeser claims is a strategy to prevent Islamist attacks rather appears like another desperate attempt to win back voters from the far right by doing exactly what the AfD would do. As if Islamist extremism can be fought by more restrictions against refugees, many of whom had to flee their countries exactly because they refused to obey Islamist ideology.
As if taking over AfD positions will bring back voters. Why vote for the copy if you can vote for the original? If anything, the past decade has proved that the more traditional political parties cater to anti-immigrant sentiments, the stronger the AfD becomes.
The only exception is the new anti-immigrant “leftist conservative” party led by the ex-communist Sahra Wagenknecht. Her self-named party, Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht, founded just this year, became the rising star in the latest elections, reaching double digits in Thuringia and Saxony.
Wagenknecht’s fight against economic inequality (but only for the Germans!) seems to be just what the former communist eastern German states have been waiting for. According to the polls, Wagenknecht could win 17% of the vote share in Brandenburg on 22 September, which would be her best performance to date.
So the soup surrounding our island of Berlin becomes even murkier, with self-designated leftists who compromise on the basic consensus of anti-fascism. The danger of the waters seeping in seems inevitable, with federal elections coming up next year.
Internationally known for its flourishing arts and culture scene, Berlin already suffers from drastic cuts in public funding by the currently conservative-led senate. A quick look into the AfD’s cultural politics reveals that it intends to wipe out every last project that is slightly progressive, decolonial, queer or critical of German history.
Maybe it’s time for us Berliners to give up on the utopian idea that we are safe on our island – and instead strengthen our ties to the outside world. If we miss the chance to build alliances with the few anti-fascist comrades still drifting in the polluted surroundings, we will all go down in the same toxic waters.
Fatma Aydemir is a Berlin-based author, novelist, playwright and a Guardian Europe columnist
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