{"id":30247,"date":"2020-12-29T14:34:01","date_gmt":"2020-12-29T22:34:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=30247"},"modified":"2020-12-29T14:34:01","modified_gmt":"2020-12-29T22:34:01","slug":"xenophobia-is-the-new-norm-in-germany","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=30247","title":{"rendered":"XENOPHOBIA IS THE NEW \u201cNORM\u201d IN GERMANY"},"content":{"rendered":"
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by\u00a0Ethnic Media Services<\/a><\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0Dec 29, 2020<\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0From Our Partners<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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By Katerina Machmer, Ethnic Media Services<\/strong><\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s Note: Katerina Machmer, a recent graduate in journalism at California State University-Northridge, covers immigrant issues in Europe for EMS.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Munich, Germany \u2013 A democratically elected party in the German government is normalizing far-right perspectives in Germany, alarming advocates for pluralism and diversity.<\/p>\n

The AfD (\u201cAlternative f\u00fcr Deutschland\u201d, or \u201cAlternative for Germany\u201d), the largest opposition party with the third largest faction in parliament, is fanning anti-immigrant sentiment. In an interview with the influential magazine DER SPIEGEL, former Obama advisor Ben Rhodes compared AfD\u2019s polemics against immigrants to that of the Republican Party under President Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing endorsed by the AfD, xenophobia has become more socially acceptable in recent times,\u201d \u00a0warns Tina Adomako, originally from Ghana and board member of the organization\u00a0Neue Deutsche Medienmacher<\/em>, which promotes race relations in German media.<\/p>\n

As a party, the AfD fuels \u201ceveryday racism,\u201d agrees Robert L\u00fcdecke, publicity and press representative of the\u00a0Amadeu Antonio<\/em>\u00a0Foundation<\/em>. The latter is named after an Angolan contract worker who, in 1990, was murdered by far-right youths in the town of Eberswalde near Berlin. In his memory, the foundation champions pluralism and democracy in Germany while fighting right-wing extremism, racism and anti-Semitism.<\/p>\n

Recent studies back Robert L\u00fcdecke\u2019s claims about the AfD: 94% of the party\u2019s members endorse xenophobic attitudes, believing \u201cforeigners\u201d have only come to benefit from social welfare and that they should be sent back to their home countries when jobs are scarce in Germany.<\/p>\n

At the same time, public opinion polls show that most Germans strongly endorse democratic values and oppose right-wing hate speech.<\/p>\n

After a refugee camp in Moria, Greece, burned down in September, many asked the government to take in refugees despite opposition from members of the European Union to accommodate people in need. Robert L\u00fcdecke thinks that as in 2015, when Germany welcomed roughly a million refugees, \u201cmany Germans still not only believe we have the capacity to accept refugees but also that we have a responsibility to do so\u201d.<\/p>\n

Germany still doesn\u2019t embrace its growing diversity, advocates say.\u00a0 \u201cIt took us long to accept our status as an immigrant society,\u201d explains Tina Adomako.<\/p>\n

Racist comments directed at journalists of color are \u201ccommonplace,\u201d she adds. Black people in particular are still not seen as Germans \u201cregardless of whether they or their parents were born here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMinorities do not have a voice unless they organize themselves,\u201d \u00a0says Robert L\u00fcdecke. Germans with an immigrant background have little representation in public discourse and are routinely stereotyped or negatively portrayed by general market news media, reinforcing their status as \u201cother.\u201d<\/p>\n

Interviewed by the influential German news magazine DER SPIEGEL, Obama advisor Ben Rhodes compared the AfD to the Republican Party, noting that both espouse extremist views and have members who reject science and spread conspiracy theories.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the AfD has mobilized demonstrations against regulations to fight COVID-19 in Germany. At the protests, active supporters of the country\u2019s far-right scene joined forces with conspiracy theorists. Robert L\u00fcdecke worries that \u201cthis dangerous milieu could fuel the next terrorist attack by right-wing extremists in Germany.\u201d<\/p>\n

L\u00fcdecke, however, believes that Germany\u2019s democracy is strong enough to withstand these forces, and points to citizen initiatives initiated in the past years to support newcomers and advance their integration.<\/p>\n

The fact that Germans with an immigrant background increasingly fight for their rights boosts a growing consciousness about Germans of color, adds Tina Adomako.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by\u00a0Ethnic Media Services\u00a0|\u00a0Dec 29, 2020\u00a0|\u00a0From Our...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30247"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30247\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30248,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30247\/revisions\/30248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}