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So... big win for AfD last night: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy4zejgz3z9o. How important is this?
Since I'm not one to closely follow European politics, at first I thought this meant that they had won control of the entire national parliament. But then I noticed that, no, it's just one state election, and they're still short of a majority. In every other state, they have far less support, and every other party is still maintaining a rule to never work with them, so the AfD is still effectively shut out of power everywhere.
I suppose it's another sign of their trajectory, though. They seem to win more and more votes in every election. I remember when, not long ago, they were an extreme minority fringe party. Now they get enough votes that it's difficult for the other parties to form a coalition without them.
Is this a sign that the people of Germany are secretly longing to Nazi again? I doubt it. They seem to still be, on the whole, an extremely leftist-liberal nation. Pro-immigration, pro-welfare, anti-militarism, anti-nationalism, and anti-nuke. So I wonder how much this surge in support for AfD is driven by immigration, or how much of it is just them being the only real conservative party that gives voters an alternative to the status quo?
I also wonder what the AfD would actually do if they came into power? There's a big range between "slightly restrict immigration" and "force all the immigrants to pack up and go home." I suspect they haven't entirely figured it out themselves, since for now they're still just a protest vote. Not to mention how they'd have to figure out their policy on every single other policy issue. It's easy to make big promises when you have no actual power to deliver on them.
But I don't know! Maybe I'm wrong. I really don't know much about German politics, I just saw this and I thought it was interesting. Anyone else have thoughts?
Europe is seeing an increased support for anti-immigration policies. Not only is there a desire to limit future migration and increase requirements for applicants, a significant amount of people want to kick out people who managed to achieve citizenship without assimilating, alongside descendants who also did not assimilate. As I understand it, this kicking out of citizens who should not have gotten citizenship in the first place is the goal of AfD and similar parties on the continent.
This makes sense to me on some level; If you hate all of western society and want to rebuild the caliphate, then you have no business here. The middle east can have you back for all I care.
On the other hand, this seems like a slippery slope that draws into question what citizenship even is. Making it possible to kick out people recognized as citizens seems like a dangerous Chesterton's fence to tear down. For one, it gives the government the ultimate power to kick out citizens it dislikes. This seems like a real danger to a democracy where people are supposed to have disagreements and come to agreements through dialogue. It also draws into question what it even means to be German in the first place. Would anyone be safe if such a law was allowed? Is there any amount of generations that a family can live in Germany after which it becomes German? Or will everyone have to watch what they say in fear that their opinions may one day be recognized as against the national interest?
It makes sense then, that the existing conservative parties would be concerned about a newcomer which wants to make such radical changes. At the same time though, I don't understand why they seem so disinterested in at least limiting future immigration. There is a real concern here from a substantial proportion of the population, and political parties are supposed to represent their constituents. If the established parties would take on the more reasonable parts of AfD policies (limiting immigration and increasing requirements for applicants), that would probably net them a lot of voters and weaken AfD, without having to concede to the more extremist demands of kicking out legal citizens.
Having blood ties to the area from before 1969 (that includes marriage). Simple definition. Minor exception for people that actually assimilated. Any son of Mustafa that is named Gunter, baptized into Christianity, wears Lederhosen and eats pork bratwurst with a lot of mustard and prodigious amounts of beer should have way to stay.
Also there a lot of people in Germany that are not citizens anyway.
It's always fun to hypothesise about all the things you could build after cutting down a (Schelling/Chesterton) fence, but the thing with a fence is that it holds back people on both sides. Do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that will blow once "strip citizenship from someone on the enemy team" is on the political menu?
More generally, I find it kind of fascinating to see this enthusiasm, time and time again, of oppressed political fringe groups that briefly get within swinging range of power to make their first move be "empower the state to move against my opponents in unprecedented ways"; when the tide recedes, it always winds up being used against them, to much pikachu-facing and gnashing of teeth.
The fence is down. If we can grant citizenship to infinity foreigners, then the blowing wind is sending them back.
I don't believe any law or norm or principle or logical consistency would stop the extremists on the other side from trying to denaturalize me if they thought they could get away with it.
Of course, but if you successfully denaturalize their allies, surely they will be more likely to think that they can get away with denaturalizing you.
Your argumentation is one of many that roughly has the shape of "the other party has already escalated maximally, there is nothing to lose from escalating back". I see this deployed left and right in internal culture wars, and even in real some-holds-barred wars like Ukraine/Russia. Yet, in each of those, it always turns out the other side did actually have more to escalate back with, and the cycle continues. Do you actually think/feel that you have nothing to lose, in your current situation?
Sorry, there's a big fence here called "natural born citizen". They would have to be crazy to think about tearing it down.
It's not an escalation. It's an undoing of a previous escalation. A deescalation, even.
No, I think I have everything to lose. Which is why I want to win.
And again, beating this same drum for the thousandth time, this sort of argument only ever goes one way. No one even bothers trying this sort of argumentation on leftists because everyone knows they don't give a fuck. Mainstream, high level elected Democrats support open borders, mass replacement migration, packing the Supreme Court, abolishing the filibuster and their more extreme flanks are talking about abolishing the Senate.
It is an absurdity to look at that and then tut-tut about conservatives wanting to send back ethno-narcissists and communists who got a piece of paper two years ago.
They are crazy, and they will if they can. The attempt to flood the country with unwanted paper citizens is an attempt to do exactly this, in fact. The insistence that Mahmood who broke into the country a few years ago is EXACTLY as German as you is an attempt to dilute the concept out of existence. Equating blood citizenship and paper citizenship serves only to devalue the former.
Moreover, though, yes I don't think deporting their pets would cause any noticeable change in their plans.
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