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May 24, 2024 - 7:00am
“Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad” has become something of a worn-out trope, but it comes to mind when observing the current state of Germany. Berlin’s self-destructive energy policy has received plenty of attention, but now the madness is spreading to other sectors.
Take the recently passed “Self-Determination Act”, which allows an individual to change their gender simply by declaring it at a civil registration office. Such a change, however, can become null and void in the case of war and the introduction of mandatory military service, a condition under which a person’s biological male sex would determine whether they serve in the army, regardless of any previous legal recognition as a woman.
The changes don’t stop there. Last week, a law was approved that would downgrade the possession of child sexual abuse material from a felony crime to a misdemeanour. Supposedly, this was done to “respond appropriately and with the necessary flexibility to the large proportion of juvenile offenders”, but it remains unclear why German lawmakers did not simply address this issue separately, instead opting for future leniency towards all offenders regardless of age.
At least as concerning is a proposed legal reform involving an overhaul of the disciplinary law for public servants, with steps taken to remove those deemed “extremists” or engage in activities which are “hostile towards the constitution”.
What makes this law so worrying is that there is no clear definition of what kind of behaviour would fall under the cited categories, with much room left for interpretation. Essentially, this now grants the government the power to punish anyone who dissents, a tendency clearly present in the current administration. That’s because members of the coalition government, including Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, have shown how thin-skinned they are through numerous lawsuits under the existing legal framework against those who have engaged in humorous or satirical depictions of current ministers.
One case involved an impersonation of Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, while another featured a German who rented billboards which poked fun at Green ministers. For now, the courts have sided with freedom of expression, but there is a growing tendency to move power from the courts to the bureaucracy.
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SubscribeThe man who has the best blow-by-blow commentary of these issues is Eugyppius, a Bavarian academic who writes an excellent Substack.
I would encourage anyone to check him out: eugyppius.com
Agree, it’s excellent.
I went and read an article out of curiosity. Wow, what low-effort trash. I share his sentiment but this is just some guy ranting without providing any value or information. Very surprised this recommendation is getting so much approval on here.
You read one article?
I’d encourage you to look again. His insights into the pandemic were among the best of anyone writing. And his careful reading of the German news means he can follow Germany’s descent into illiberalism, and write about it in excellent, witty English, in a way I think is unique.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Arguably much of the Western world has been on this path (marching through the institutions too) for some time. It is so difficult to argue with ‘good intentions’… but here we are. Perhaps ‘populism’ is the resistance to this slow slide into madness.
You would have thought that Germany would have been inoculated against this social disease, but perhaps ‘events’ have slipped living memory.
It’s hard to imagine what good intentions would be behind downgrading possession of child sexual abuse materials by adults, or suing journalists for critiquing those in power. It’s time we stopped taking these people at their own valuation.
If you believe (kid yourself) that pictures of child sexual abuse material are the right of an oppressed minority’s tastes, or that criticising those in power is an unwelcome delay on the road to Utopia, you can convince yourself of your good intentions.
Rubbish, of course, but it is never set out so uncompromisingly at first, and then the madness ratchets up, slowly.
The Right has to stop being on the defensive, and stop engaging the Progressive Left on their own ground. What is being proposed here is not “kind”, “tolerant”, “democratic” or “inclusive” and does not come with good intentions. Arguments cannot be won if they are allowed to be framed in a deceptive way.
Agreed. But the Progressives have chosen their words carefully for maximum support for their views. The Right find it very difficult to argue with the Progressives using the Progressives’ reframed words. It’s a trap! Completely ignore accusations of racism, fascism etc. Responding directly to these accusations leaves the argument in the Progressives half of the pitch and they are practiced in blunting such debates.
If the Reactionaries(?) want to have a good argument then they have to pick their own words.
Ultimately, is there just something in the Teutonic DNA that tends towards this type of authoritarianism? It’s like a genetic expression that’s managed to skip a generation or two.
No…it has always been there just not as overt as now…
You are too kind. Turns out, power always wins over conscience.
Those who seek power almost always defeat those who want to just be left alone. Same as it ever was…
But these aren’t good intentions…
Quite so. But you are looking on from ‘outside’. The view is entirely different from ‘inside’.
Ask a gang member why they killed a rival gang member and they will tell you they did it to protect their gang’s ‘honour’.
The decay and the decline continues in the ‘West’
Who will stop this shitshow? Certainly not Socialism!
Certainly not “the West”… but it will be…
Unfortunately, however sick we are of the fake Conservative government, this is the sort of thing we can expect to face from a Starmer government.
Not sure how the proposed new law sits in relation to the German constitutional requirement for citizens to not to be “discriminated against or favoured because of one’s sex, descent, race, language, homeland and origin, faith, religious or political views”.
And it’s not just Germany.
Is that it extreme to support or be a member of a legal political party such as Alternative for Germany (AfD) — which was yesterday expelled from the Identity and Democracy group in the European Parliament — or should this already be grounds for getting sacked from the civil service?
Would membership of a far left party be grounds for getting sacked from the civil service?
Almost certainly not.
Democracy is another word that has gradually shifted its meaning. When these people say they are “protecting democracy”, by saying “democracy” they are not referring to one particular a system of government characterized by certain principles in general, but to the the specific current power structure that has resulted from democratic processes in the past. That is what they want to protect. So the word “democracy”, via the process of pars pro toto, becomes a metonym, simply meaning “the status quo (from which we benefit)”
Bleak. Scratch the surface and the authoritarian Prussian ethos rears it head again. Germans are embarrassing themselves.
The West is sleepwalking towards a new autocracy fully advocated by “progressives.” For they employ quite the argument in favor of ever-increasing restrictions against dissent, “defending democracy!”