“The foreigners get out!” – sings smiling young blonde to the rhythm of the chorus of the song L’amour toujours Gigi D'Agostino. It records itself with a phone, in the background there is simply a crowd of dancing people. The girl turns the camera around; a boy appears in the frame in a white shirt. He roars: “Germany for the Germans!” while making a glass of pink wine. Another guy, in the eye of a max thirty-year-old, performs a Roman salute, on his wrist a silver watch shines. He puts his second hand in his mouth, like he's imitating Hitler's mustache.
The video, which became viralem in Germany, was made at the Pony club on Sylt. It is simply a German island in the North Sea, in a vacation period eagerly visited by the German higher class. According to “Bild”, tickets to the controversial event to be held at Pentecost cost EUR 150 without drinks.
The 2001 Eurodance Hit has been doing the German neo-Nazi anthem for any time. In the autumn of last year, another video was circulating on the German net – “Germany for Germans” in Gigi’s accompaniment of the song was sung by a group of men at the harvest festival in 1 of the municipalities of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. akin incidents occurred, among others, at the shooting festival in Lower Saxony, the country discotheque in Hesia and at the boarding school in Schleswig-Holstein.
However, only a organization on Sylt Island shook German public opinion. specified scenes on agrarian discotheques or harvests, especially in East Germany, did not impress anyone. German elites only shocked young people who look like their own children.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the slogans erected at the event "disgusting and unacceptable". president Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Justice Minister Marco Buschmann and Interior Minister Nancy Faeser besides rushed with criticism, as well as a number of publicists and publicists. Pony Club cut off the organization people, and the people of Sylt Island organized a rally against racism. Social Media They flooded a parody of racist singing.
On the incidental Gigi D’Agostino himself spoke, prosecuted by the “Spiegel” journalists for respective months. He besides cut himself off from the fresh connotations of his song and assured that it was a song about love that he felt “to his wife, family, music and dance”.
Three of the participants of the event were accused of incitement to hatred and the usage of “symbols of hostile constitutions”. A fine or 3 months of imprisonment is punishable. According to media reports, respective people identified on the video lost their occupation and a student of 1 of the Hamburg universities was to be suspended.
Sylt's movie added a debate on the radicalization of German youth to the furnace. This 1 warmed up at the end of April erstwhile the investigation came out Youth in Germany 2024. It was apparent that among people aged 14 to 29, the most popular organization became the right-wing populist alternate for Germany (AfD), which can number 22 percent of the vote in this group – more than twice as many as 2 years ago. According to the polls exit poll After the election to the Europarliament in the age group 16-30 AfD wins ex aequo with a CDU score of 17 percent.
Experts agree that the emergence in the popularity of AfD among young people should be linked to large organization results on social media. It's actual that extremist thesis is promoted by algorithms. However, there is something else about Germany – the German political mainstream is doing highly poorly on the Internet. The laughter is aroused by Prime Minister Olaf Scholz, who late founded TikTok. For the most part viral video shows what he has in his boring leather bag: they are glasses, file folders (including any inactive unread, as specified by the Prime Minister), and “it’s something” (as defined by his tablet).
In addition, the investigation shows that young Germans are most afraid about inflation, war and the increase in the influx of refugees. Meanwhile, AfD offers simple solutions to these problems: halt supporting Ukraine, reset relations with Russia, deport migrants. It besides responds to the problem the loneliness of young men, explaining her with a manhood and/or the emancipation of women. "True men are patriots, they besides go out with girls," said AfD MP Maximilian Krah last year in a loud video on TikTok.
For many young Germans, conservative views are a form of rebellion against mainstream. This is simply a shock for the German public – so far young voters have been associated with progressive groups, including the Green party. Therefore, the thought of reducing the active electoral right to sixteen years of age in the Euro-election did not rise any controversy and was voted out by the ruling coalition. As a result, nearly 1 and a half million more young people could go to urn on Sunday than before.
AfD's popularity leap among young people is much clearer than in the full population, which according to exit polli gave to the far right 15.9 percent of the vote (by 4.9 pp. more than in 2019). The dynamic increase in support for the organization last year was stopped. any voters picked up the AfD fresh Alliance Sahry Wagenknecht; others turned, as experts suggest, after a series of media scandals. In January, it was revealed that members of the organization had taken part in a secret gathering with right-wing extremists (remigration was discussed, or mass deportation of migrants), and were besides accused of spying on China and Russia.
AfD, however, goes into denial and radicalizes its message, which has late excluded it from the Euro-Parliamentary Group Identity and Democracy by its leader Marine Le Pen. The words of Maximilian Krah, mentioned earlier, relativising the guilt of SS members for Nazi war crimes, became a direct origin of this. Even more extremist slogans are spoken by the AfD youth group – Junge Alternative. Last year, it was classified by German counterintelligence as a right-wing extremist organization. The explanatory memorandum explained that the movement "proposes the racial concept of a biological society".
What solutions are on the table? Typical German – to ban everything. The debate on the illegalisation of AfD (or although Junge Alternative, which would be easier to carry out) has been going on for months. However, political activity to ban in Germany is difficult, much easier to introduce sanctions against the song. No Hits L’amour toujours Gigi D’Agostiny is to be introduced in the fan region in Stuttgart during the European Football Championship, as well as at the Oktoberfest and Cannstatter Volksfest festivals.
"It's like the far right licks all the fish sandwiches at the party, and we would ban fish consumption in response," comments Samira El Ouassil in "Der Spiegel".
