Incidents at a school in the eastern German state of Brandenburg have given rise to fears over far-right sentiment in the classroom. Officials have expressed dismay, encouraging teachers not to shrink from hate.
Incidents at a school in the eastern German state of Brandenburg have given rise to fears over far-right sentiment in the classroom. Officials have expressed dismay, encouraging teachers not to shrink from hate.
My German friends have told me for years that Nazis never went away. They are not “far-right”, they’re not neo-Nazis, they are Nazis. Gotta call them by their real name. Because this is real in Germany and also internationally and it should not be played down, like AfD is doing.
Nah they’re neo-nazis, and both old guard nazis, as in “actually once an NSDAP and SS member”, and neo-nazis, as in “too young for that” are nazis.
The old guard is definitely dying out by now so pretty much any nazi nowadays is a neo-nazi so the distinction becomes less meaningful. 20 years ago the situation was quite different where you still saw the mentor/mentee relationship between those two groups.
The thing is that the neo-nazi description is also correct as members of the actual “neo-nazi” movement formerly spread all over Western Germany moved to East Germany after 1990 to organize there (and given the much lower population numbers finally become a substantial amount of the population).
This is semantics and playing it down. The term Neo-Nazi is used for any post-war “militant, social or political movement” and it’s just bullshit, because they simply never went away. They didn’t “pop up” after the second world war, they remained and it’s important to understand that. They were not eradicated, many people are still supporting the same ideology and would follow Hitler now if he someone got back alive.
It is indeed semantics as our definitoon of neo-nazi seem to differ:
That the common definition I’m used to so we are indeed talking about neo-nazis. Or are you assuming those are either old enough to be actual nazis or learned their views from birth in direct line from their nazi families (to categorize them as orginal nazis) instead of part of a resurgent movement using parts of the same ideology?
PS: Also you seem to assume that far-right or neo-nazi is playing something down. It isn’t. Every form of hateful far-right ideology, nazism or fascism is equally despicable. The “real” neo-nazis only get “bonus” points for also openly venerating a former genocidal regime…
If this is the quote from Wikipedia then you left out an important part:
Personally I think, mixing the two terms together is perfectly fine as the only major distinction is that the original Nazis were the members of the NSDAP and neo-Nazis are not. A distinction that is not really that relevant anymore especially when talking about the ideology, which is the same.
Where can I read more about neo nazis spreading to east Germany after 1990?
Google is your friend as that topic is widely discussed for years (so “neo nazis germany 1990 reunion” or something alike should get you enough).
But for a start (and one of the first hits i got): NY Times, 2020