Weltanschauung (worldview)

An incident at a Munich train station sparked much uproar in Germany recently. Roland Koch, the governor of the western state of Hesse told that Germany has too many "criminal young foreigners" and that immigrants must accept the country's Christian culture. According to Spiegel Online:

"Koch was responding to the brutal assault on a 76-year-old German man by two young men, one Greek and one Turkish, in Munich on December 20. The pensioner had asked them to stop smoking on a subway train, where smoking is prohibited.

The incident was filmed on security cameras and led to a nationwide outcry during Christmas, with calls for tougher sentencing for young offenders and the expulsion of foreign criminals.

The case has re-opened a decades-old debate about immigration in Germany, which has some 15 million people with an immigrant background, around 18 percent of the population."

However Koch did not mention anything about the attack on Eight Indian men in the eastern German town of Mügeln last August by a 50 person strong mob. These were ordinary citizens,not some organized, right-wing neo-Nazis who stirred up the pogrom-like mood. While many point out that the immigrant criminals should be expelled they seem to ignore the fact that no punishment was given to these group of people. All the 50 men were arrested but released within one hour except the leader. He was later indicted and a 600 Euro fine was imposed on him. Since he is in social security he has declared that he is unable to pay the money so the state will repay the fine within one year.

Moreover Spiegel Online reports:

The right-wing website "Störtebeker-Netz" has even praised the chasing of the eight Indians as "a small popular uprising." Small towns, the website continues, are the ones "that have largely been spared multicultural progress so far," which is why the people in these places still exhibit "a healthy popular sensibility." In other words, the neo-Nazis are encouraged by what happened in Mügeln.

In the city Pretzien, a town 20 kilometers (12 miles) southeast of the eastern city of Magdeburg at a village festival and bonfire a member of a right wing organization suddenly demanded that revelers "throw everything foreign into the fire.":

A US flag was tossed into the flames, followed by a paperback edition of the "Diary of Anne Frank." "It's all lies and deception," the man throwing the items into the fire apparently said. The mayor and about 80 people attending the event looked on but said nothing.

The far right NPD which states that "African, Asian or Oriental" can never become German, chimes in with Koch:

"Germany must remain the land of the Germans, so that our children don't suffer the same fate as the (American) Indians who were unable to stop the immigrants and now live on reservations."

Koch goes even further this time:

"In residential estates with a high proportion of immigrants there must be clear rules and of course consequences if they are not respected," wrote Koch. "German must be the language in everyday life and it must be clear that the slaughtering (of animals) in the kitchen or unusual ideas about waste disposal run counter to our principles."

The anti-immigrant NPD is a legitimate political party and receives public funding even though many of its views are derived from Nazi ideology.

It seems we are witnessing a new version of the Weltanshauung (world view) ideology which was used in propaganda by the Nazis.