An innocent abroad

Grace Snell decided to spend two months in Germany at the perfect time, at least from a news perspective. While she was there, Germany held what political analysts described as a historic election: For the first time since the Nazis, a far-right party finished second place in the country’s federal election. You can read more about the rise of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in Grace’s story “Fourth reich?” in this issue. I asked her to share more of what she learned during her trip.

As part of your reporting, you attended an AfD campaign event and counterprotest. I was worried about your safety! But what you experienced was a lot different than what we expected. What happened? Mainstream media often paints the AfD as a neo-Nazi extremist party, so I expected its rally to feel sinister and possibly even turn violent. Instead, I saw a handful of salt-of-the-earth folks milling about, smoking cigarettes and eating bratwurst as Simon & Garfunkel blared in the background. Volunteers handed out ­flyers and pinwheels, and attendees waved German flags, something you rarely see at other German political gatherings. Police had fenced off the area—a line of demarcation most passersby hastily skirted. Those who did venture across kept a low profile, shaking their heads when asked for comment or refusing to give their full names.

About an hour later, the counterprotesters showed up. A wall of humanity snaking into the square and outnumbering the AfD supporters 5 to 1. They waved rainbow banners and cardboard signs, chanting in deafening unison, “Nazis out! Nazis out!” Police wearing riot gear stood watchful and at the ready. I felt an odd sense of dissonance seeing the same protesters talking about inclusion shouting slurs at political opponents. And it was strange to realize the counterprotester side felt more threatening to me than the AfD rally.

AfD party leaders and their supporters often are dismissed as neo-Nazis. How does that affect the political debate? For many Germans, negotiating with the AfD is a nonstarter. They rightly take their Nazi history very seriously. Anything that looks or smells like right-wing nationalism sounds instant alarm bells. But, from my reporting, it also seems to stifle conservative expression and debate in the country. For decades, Germany enjoyed near-consensus on most political matters, to the extent former Chancellor Angela Merkel declared her policies alternativlos—“without alternative.” The Alternative for Germany party arose in sharp protest to that assumption.

Your story mentioned the ongoing divide between East and West Germany. Are the differences between them noticeable even to a casual observer? Former East Germany still lags behind the West economically, and as retired Pastor Steve Henderson noted, people there tend to be more guarded. And at the AfD rally, I noticed fewer people in the East seemed to speak English than their Western neighbors.