Germans under 25 gave the AfD 16% of their vote in the European elections, with particular support in the east

Germans under 25 gave the AfD 16% of their vote in the European elections, with particular support in the east

Paul Friedrich, 16, could not wait to cast his first ballot and had no doubt which German party had earned his support in the watershed European elections.

“Correct, I voted AfD,” he said proudly in the bustle of the commuter railway station in Brandenburg an der Havel, an hour from central Berlin.

The far-right Alternative für Deutschland made particularly stunning gains on Sunday among young voters. For the first time in a national poll, 16- and 17-year-olds could cast their ballots – a reform that had been strongly backed by left-leaning parties.

After overwhelmingly supporting the Greens five years ago, Germans under 25 gave the AfD 16% of their vote – an 11-point rise – helping place the party second behind the opposition CDU-CSU conservatives and well ahead of the Social Democrats of the chancellor, Olaf Scholz.

The AfD tapped deep wells of support in the former communist east, winning in every state including Brandenburg, where it claimed 27.5% of the vote.

…

And his concerns echo those of many teenagers and twentysomethings in town: fears of war spreading in Europe, inflation, economic decline, “unchecked” immigration and, above all, violent crime, which they say is rampant when they use public transport or hang out in public spaces at night.

  • @[email protected]English
    2•7 months ago

    Those are the same department of costs if you operate a store. Either you have some amount of theft or you have security that prevents theft. Either way you’ll have to put the costs on your customers. If your customers feel your prices are too high that just means you are doing a bad job at balancing the two.

    At a societal level it’s kinda the same. You can invest a lot of money into police or you can invest into social programs so that stealing doesn’t seem like a good option to most. You’ll have to balance the two.

    On both levels it’s you the individual that has to bear the costs.

    • @ZK686English
      -7•7 months ago

      I think you have it backwards. Social programs don’t help, because that takes an effort by the individual to get involved and be part of something. Most criminals and people who are going to commit crime, are not going to get involved in a social program. I don’t know how old you are, but when I was younger, I was absolutely afraid to steal because I didn’t want to go to jail. It seems nowadays, that fear isn’t there. I would argue more police presence is what a country like the United States needs. People forget just how big, and how many freedoms we have. Hoping that all these people, from all different walks of life and backgrounds, follow all the same laws, isn’t going to cut it. We need strict laws, more police, so that people know that crime, no matter the level, is not tolerated anywhere in the United States. I want to live in a country where people are afraid to break the law. I know that sounds crazy…

      • @[email protected]English
        3•7 months ago

        Sorry I’m not a native speaker I guess social program isn’t quite the word I was looking for. It’s more of a distribution of wealth thing, and distributing it more evenly is what I meant by social programs.

        There is a clear correlation between individual wealth and criminal activity. The more poor people a society produces the more potential for crime exists. This is partially rooted in the fact that if you are poor and you don’t see a perspective for a positive turnaround, jailtime suddenly loses its impact.

        I think It’s not like back in your youth there were way more police, more likely there are a lot more people disappointed and disillusioned by the system so they stopped caring.

        I don’t think just spending more money on police will fix that unless you employ enough police people to physically stop crime as it happens which isn’t going to be economical at all. I think restoring people’s faith in the system by improving the wealth distribution would be way more efficient.

        I’m not in the USA but I want to live in society where most people choose to abide by the law out of respect for the rules that provide wealth to us all. Not out of fear. If you need fear to control a big portion of your population you are doing it wrong. (Of course you’ll always need some police there will always be people that will not want to follow the laws but I’m talking about the general case)

      • @StinkyOnionsEnglish
        2•6 months ago

        I want to live in a country where people are afraid to break the law. I know that sounds crazy…

        So you want fascism.