Austrian far-right party (FPÖ) pledges to clean up pro-Nazi image

Jasup · Feb 15, 2018

http://www.euronews.com/2018/02/15/austrian-far-right-party-pledges-to-clean-up-pro-nazi-image

Austria's far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) has appointed a group of historians to look into its past in a bid to distance itself from its anti-Semitic image.

The party, founded by a former officer in the Schutzstaffel (SS) in the 1950s, entered Austria's coalition government in December 2017 after coming in third in elections in October, with 26% of the vote.

Tuesday's announcement comes after a local party official was forced to step down after it emerged he was vice-chairman of a far-right fraternity that had printed a song celebrating Nazi atrocities.

Lyrics in the book, produced in 1997 by the Germania zu Wiener Neustadt organisation, included "Step on the gas, old Germanics, we can make it to seven million."

https://www.thelocal.at/20180214/fp...ly-justified-and-pledges-to-clean-ups-its-act

"There's been a lot of criticism of the FPÖ, much of it unjustified, some, we have to say, justified," parliamentary group leader Walter Rosenkranz told a press conference.

"We face the latent criticism that within the FPÖ Nazi and neo-Nazi ideas are tolerated.

"No, they are not tolerated and those who think they can impose such ideas on us have nothing to do in the party," Rosenkranz said.

Former FPÖ MP and retired university professor Wilhelm Brauneder will chair the committee, which will invite contributions from researchers and representatives of independent bodies.

These will include the DOW resistance archive centre, which specialises in Nazism and neo-Nazism and has been a powerful critic of the FPÖ.

The human rights group SOS Mitmensch pointed to the fact that Brauneder has had work published in a far-right Austrian magazine, along with another member of the commission, Andreas Mölzer.

Mölzer had to resign as an FPÖ candidate for the European Parliament in 2014 after he reportedly told an event that the EU was in danger of becoming a "conglomerate of niggers, where everything is chaos".

To be frank trying to wash off the nazi image has been a favourite past time for the far-right parties around Europe for the last decade or so. And sadly it's been quite effective. What happens in Austria remains to be seen.

Akira86 · Feb 15, 2018

oh great, so more hair cuts and khakis with polo shirts.

I guess they figure once they finally get that Nazi image clean they can put a bow around it and walk it down Main street.

possibly in a parade format.

Slayven · Feb 15, 2018

They are just taking the dogwhistles out of storage

milch · Feb 15, 2018

I bet "cleaning up the image" =/= "stopping the politics that lead to this image"

It's gonna be a surface level thing.

bobnowhere · Feb 15, 2018

We only used to be Nazis, we promise. Wait, don't look in that room...

DarthGoomba · Feb 15, 2018

Maybe they will call themselves Not-zis? That sends a clear message!

Akira86 · Feb 15, 2018

DarthGoomba said:
Maybe they will call themselves Not-zis? That sends a clear message!

I Can't Believe Its Not Nazis

Low cholesterol, low fat, low calorie white supremacy.

Keasar · Feb 15, 2018

Akira86 said:
I Can't Believe Its Not Nazis

Low cholesterol, low fat, low calorie white supremacy.

Diet Nazi.

Jasup · Feb 15, 2018

milch said:
I bet "cleaning up the image" =/= "stopping the politics that lead to this image"

It's gonna be a surface level thing.

Of course. It's the "Not nazis but #1 with nazis" approach.

GyrosOfWar · Feb 15, 2018

milch said:
I bet "cleaning up the image" =/= "stopping the politics that lead to this image"

It's gonna be a surface level thing.

Right. They want to be perceived as a "normal" party and reign in the outbursts that lead to some of their members having to step down (or just make them look bad in the media), while not changing their politics.

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

Jasup said:
Of course. It's the "Not nazis but #1 with nazis" approach.

That is the stupidest and laziest argument. Of course neonazis are going to vote for the most right-wing party, just like you will have anarchists and the RAF idolizing types voting Die Linke in Germany. That is not the fault of these parties and completely out of their control unless you want to go full totalitarian and limit voting rights.

CaviarMeths · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
That is the stupidest and laziest argument. Of course neonazis are going to vote for the most right-wing party, just like you will have anarchists and the RAF idolizing types voting Die Linke in Germany. That is not the fault of these parties and completely out of their control unless you want to go full totalitarian and limit voting rights.

It's not the fault of far right parties that their policies are exclusively appealing to racists and white nationalists?

Funky Papa · Feb 15, 2018

Guys, totes not the FPO's fault the party keeps getting itself in trouble due to actual Nazi officials, Nazi sympathisers and Nazi appealing policies. Also not the party's fault it's in public communion with Putin. Everybody needs friends.

It's a complicated thing, this far right stuff. You wouldn't understand.

Jasup · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
That is the stupidest and laziest argument. Of course neonazis are going to vote for the most right-wing party, just like you will have anarchists and the RAF idolizing types voting Die Linke in Germany. That is not the fault of these parties and completely out of their control unless you want to go full totalitarian and limit voting rights.

Well I agree that of course neonazis are going to vote for the most right wing. But I don't agree that it's not the fault of the parties or out of their control. There is some overlap with fringe groups and parties on the extremes of the spectrum, it's not like parties are monoliths but they have internal fractions struggling for power. Sometimes the party holds and sometimes not.

An example would be the Finns party in Finland that got into government, but as the time to select a new chairman came the party selected the openly white supremacist one over the more "politically sound" candidate. This internal divide split the party in two last summer, the Finns now being the more openly racist party and the new "Blue future" being the more moderately xenophobic party. The neo-nazis and their symphatizers didn't originally support the Finns party just because they were the most right-wing, but also because some of them were in prominent places within it.

regenhuber · Feb 15, 2018

CaviarMeths said:
It's not the fault of far right parties that their policies are exclusively appealing to racists and white nationalists?

"Exclusively" LOL
The FPÖ had 26% at the 2017 election in Austria.

Just_a_Mouse · Feb 15, 2018

That last quote. Damn. These nazis are a fringe party with like .1% of the vote, I hope.

regenhuber said:
"Exclusively" LOL
The FPÖ had 26% at the 2017 election in Austria.

Whelp.

Ac30 · Feb 15, 2018

Mölzer had to resign as an FPÖ candidate for the European Parliament in 2014 after he reportedly told an event that the EU was in danger of becoming a "conglomerate of niggers, where everything is chaos".

In America this would probably cost you your job, at least. Not so much in Europe, apparently.

boris_feinbrand · Feb 15, 2018

Funky Papa said:
Guys, totes not the FPO's fault the party keeps getting itself in trouble due to actual Nazi officials, Nazi sympathisers and Nazi appealing policies. Also not the party's fault it's in public communion with Putin. Everybody needs friends.

It's a complicated thing, this far right stuff. You would understand.

Yeah, people should listen to Höbelt and think of the poor Nazis.

Deleted member 2809 · Feb 15, 2018

Ac30 said:
In America this would cost you your job, at least. Not so much in Europe.

*looks at president*
hmmm

Mivey · Feb 15, 2018

I really don't understand why they are doing this. Nothing will come out of it, not with someone heading this comission, who has connections to far-right fringes. (To be fair, finding someone in the FPÖ who doesn't have said connection is probably near impossible, at the federal level anyway.)
I suppose after this, they will tell anybody not to bring up their past again, because they did such a great job with this charade.

Ac30 · Feb 15, 2018

Shugga said:
*looks at president*
hmmm

Even Trump hasn't dropped the n-word yet. Not sure why they think that dude would be a great fit for the commission.

Patiently waiting on Trump saying it though

boris_feinbrand · Feb 15, 2018

Mivey said:
I really don't understand why they are doing this. Nothing will come out of it, not with someone heading this comission, who has connections to far-right fringes. (To be fair, finding someone in the FPÖ who doesn't have said connection is probably near impossible, at the federal level anyway.)
I suppose after this, they will tell anybody not to bring up their past again, because they did such a great job with this charade.

Pretty much. This is nothing but a PR stunt. Alternative history is a huge push for the european Neo Nazis, and the first thing to do is to discredit academic historic research. This is just the latest push. Inspired by Kurz's Diet Nazi image campaign, they try to sell it as some form of honest introspection.

The research has been done already, and it is damning.

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

CaviarMeths said:
It's not the fault of far right parties that their policies are exclusively appealing to racists and white nationalists?

In regards to the bolded, they aren't. Unless you're one of those delusional people who thinks every third voter is a neonazi. And "white nationalists" - we're not in the US. I hate it when people spill their shitty hottakes when they have no clue about the subject matter. FPÖ is anti-immigration, currently against immigration from poor and muslim countries (in the 90s it used to be against yugoslavians primarily). If it makes you feel any better, call it anti-foreigner. Basically similar to most other populist right-wing parties in europe. Also similar in that they are trying their best to disassociate themselves from their nazi pasts and suck up to Israel, in a sort of "enemy of my enemy is my friend" situation. In practice that is what the leadership does, but basically every other week there is some braindead party member on municipial level making a neonazi-style facebook post or similar which always blows up into a scandal. Which is why they are now doing this "nazi past commission" which could be a farce, but that is yet to be seen because afaik it has not been announced who the outside cooperating partners will be. For instance they said they would be willing to work with the DÖW (basically translates to documentation agency of austrian resistance) in clearing up the history, same organisation that worked with clearing up the social democrat parties history for example. Will have to wait and see what happens.

And yes, of course. The most Far-Right and Far-Left parties are naturally going to attract people from respective individual fringe groups.

Dehnus · Feb 15, 2018

Jasup said:
http://www.euronews.com/2018/02/15/austrian-far-right-party-pledges-to-clean-up-pro-nazi-image

https://www.thelocal.at/20180214/fp...ly-justified-and-pledges-to-clean-ups-its-act

To be frank trying to wash off the nazi image has been a favourite past time for the far-right parties around Europe for the last decade or so. And sadly it's been quite effective. What happens in Austria remains to be seen.

They just replace one anti antisemitism, with the other. Hatred for Arabic/North African looking Muslims. Basically the same shit, especially since much of the rules in Islam are similar to strict Talmudic rules, so they only need to change a few things in old antiSemitic cartoons. Like the David's star becomes a moon, and the kippah becomes a fez.. DONE!

I mean you never see Asians in their ads when they talk about Islam, and the largest Islamic republic in the world is Indonesia. Nope, it's always the people that look strikingly similar to their old cartoons about Jewish people. They just found a loophole, a bunch of Semites you can hate freely, without being called Anti Semite. Of course it isn't far from the surface, like if you keep digging a bit? You'll soon find that "good ol' fashioned anti semitism". Just mention Soros among these people, an 80+ year old man who probably wears adult diapers by now, and they'll start foaming at the mouth.

It's all about controlling the narrative.

And that is even WITHOUT their hatred for black people and gay people, or using them as a shield (like they do with women, gay refugees and christian Arabs, they hate them just as much, but if they can use them as a shield....yup, they'll use it).

And want to know the worst? The people in these countries consider themselves so much smarter than US citizens, and question "How could they elect Trump!?", then turn around and elect a similar person whom they consider to be "very smart!" XD. Not even noticing that it's the same tactic just slightly altered to that specific region, the extreme right holds conventions to help each other out with this stuff. If it wasn't so tragic, it would be hilarious. :(.

Dehnus · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
In regards to the bolded, they aren't. Unless you're one of those delusional people who thinks every third voter is a neonazi. And "white nationalists" - we're not in the US. I hate it when people spill their shitty hottakes when they have no clue about the subject matter. FPÖ is anti-immigration, currently against immigration from poor and muslim countries (in the 90s it used to be against yugoslavians primarily). If it makes you feel any better, call it anti-foreigner. Basically similar to most other populist right-wing parties in europe. Also similar in that they are trying their best to disassociate themselves from their nazi pasts and suck up to Israel, in a sort of "enemy of my enemy is my friend" situation. In practice that is what the leadership does, but basically every other week there is some braindead party member on municipial level making a neonazi-style facebook post or similar which always blows up into a scandal. Which is why they are now doing this "nazi past commission" which could be a farce, but that is yet to be seen because afaik it has not been announced who the outside cooperating partners will be. For instance they said they would be willing to work with the DÖW (basically translates to documentation agency of austrian resistance) in clearing up the history, same organisation that worked with clearing up the social democrat parties history for example. Will have to wait and see what happens.

And yes, of course. The most Far-Right and Far-Left parties are naturally going to attract people from respective individual fringe groups.

Hey, whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep better at night, this is exactly what they also tell themselves in the USA. You are just as stupid, you just don't see it as you're looking outside. And what you're stating here is just a party version of what Poland does with it's new "Blame the Germans for everything... erm. I mean"GERMAN DEATH CAMPS!"":P.

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

Dehnus said:
Hey, whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep better at night, this is exactly what they also tell themselves in the USA. You are just as stupid, you just don't see it as you're looking outside. And what you're stating here is just a party version of what Poland does with it's new "Blame the Germans for everything... erm. I mean"GERMAN DEATH CAMPS!"":P.

Did you misquote me or something? Or what are you responding to particularly? Your post seems all over the place, not sure what to reply

CaviarMeths · Feb 15, 2018

regenhuber said:
"Exclusively" LOL
The FPÖ had 26% at the 2017 election in Austria.

And 26% is... considered a high percentage of nationalists in any ethnically homogeneous state?

regenhuber · Feb 15, 2018

CaviarMeths said:
And 26% is... considered a high percentage of nationalists in any ethnically homogeneous state?

Do you really believe 1 in 4 Austrians is a racist?
As far as "ethnically homogeneous" is concerned, tons of Austrians have Eastern European roots. 13.2 % (2015 number from wikipedia) are foreigners.

Irminsul · Feb 15, 2018

Slayven said:
They are just taking the dogwhistles out of storage

Nah, the FPÖ doesn't deal so much in dogwhistling. It's much more regular whistling (see: joking about another million gassed jews), but it's also always "unfortunate isolated incidents" (there's a couple dozen of them, though).

That's not really surprising, as the FPÖ is the successor of the "Verband der Unabhängigen" (VdU), which was founded by literal Nazis, as in, the original ones.

ilium · Feb 15, 2018

With Brauneder, Mölzer and Kabas on the committee I expect very little of substance.

Brauneder is only doing this to add material to his German-Austria erotica archive anyway

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

Irminsul said:
Nah, the FPÖ doesn't deal so much in dogwhistling. It's much more regular whistling (see: joking about another million gassed jews), but it's also always "unfortunate isolated incidents" (there's a couple dozen of them, though).

This is exactly the kind of shitty muddying I'm talking about. You're just throwing everything together and shouting nazi. FPÖ didn't have shit to do with the creation of said songbook itself, which was created in 1997 and actually published by a (since it went public, former) SPÖ member (!). The scandal blew up because the FPÖ Lower Austria candidate was a member of the fraternity where that songbook was found (and while he probably must have had knowledge about the content, it is not possible he had anything to do with the creation). Your conclusion is correct, that similar incidents happen often (most frequently, low level members posting nazi shit on facebook), far too often for it to be just mere single incidents.

That's not really surprising, as the FPÖ is the successor of the "Verband der Unabhängigen" (VdU), which was founded by literal Nazis, as in, the original ones.

Again you are incorrect and spreading misinformation. The original two founders of the VdU were not Nazis, hell one of them, while at first being a NSDAP member when it was still illegal in Austria, later joined the resistance. Their goal was to appeal to both liberals (who did not feel represented by SPÖ or ÖVP) and former nazis (which may sound outrageous, but was pretty much something everyone was more or less doing - many high-ranking former nazis joined the SPÖ or SPÖ-affiliated organizations for example; similar tendencies in germany at the time). As such there were two wings of the party, however the latter one took over which led to the foundation/renaming of the FPÖ. If you want to brush up your knowledge:
https://diepresse.com/home/meinung/...Die-FPOe-und-ihr-nicht-ganz-unbekanntes-Wesen

Dehnus · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
Did you misquote me or something? Or what are you responding to particularly? Your post seems all over the place, not sure what to reply

I'm a bit sick of euros talking smack about the USA, and then we elect our own version of Trump mere weeks later. The way you rationalize it, is exactly the same as the centrist on the USA do.

hydrophilic attack · Feb 15, 2018

regenhuber said:
Do you really believe 1 in 4 Austrians is a racist?
As far as "ethnically homogeneous" is concerned, tons of Austrians have Eastern European roots. 13.2 % (2015 number from wikipedia) are foreigners.

one in four austrians may not be racist but one in four austrians is clearly ok with voting for the racist party

i'm not sure how much of a difference this hair-splitting makes?

Cheapstare · Feb 15, 2018

If there's one thing that I hate about neo-nazis is that they're too unpolished.

regenhuber · Feb 15, 2018

hydrophilic attack said:
one in four austrians may not be racist but one in four austrians is clearly ok with voting for the racist party

i'm not sure how much of a difference this hair-splitting makes?

Because calling people racist is a pretty big insult and leads nowhere....

Define "racist party". Seems to be a "catch all phrase" these days. Or point out the racist policies, the FPÖ has implemented.
AFAIK from talking to Austrians I met at the ski slopes recently, Sebastian Kurz is running the show.
The only thing that changed, is that people are allowed to smoke in bars again.

hydrophilic attack · Feb 15, 2018

regenhuber said:
Because calling people racist is a pretty big insult and leads nowhere....

right but i'm talking on an international internet message board where none of them will see my posts so i don't really think that's a huge problem?

Define "racist party". Seems to be a "catch all phrase" these days. Or point out the racist policies, the FPÖ has implemented.
AFAIK from talking to Austrians I met at the ski slopes recently, Sebastian Kurz is running the show.
The only thing that changed, is that people are allowed to smoke in bars again.

how about "party using racist propaganda and proposing racist policies against muslims"

mael · Feb 15, 2018

regenhuber said:
Because calling people racist is a pretty big insult and leads nowhere....

We all know that's the worst punishment one can inflict on another person.

Squarehard · Feb 15, 2018

Yeah, I don't see this happening.

saenima · Feb 15, 2018

It's still a fucking turd.

Deleted member 10908 · Feb 15, 2018

regenhuber said:
Do you really believe 1 in 4 Austrians is a racist?
As far as "ethnically homogeneous" is concerned, tons of Austrians have Eastern European roots. 13.2 % (2015 number from wikipedia) are foreigners.

People around here believe 1 in 2 Americans are racist...

L Thammy · Feb 15, 2018

Is this the kind of thing where clean up their image so they can position themselves as a legitimate alternative to the normal right wing?

Lunar15 · Feb 15, 2018

You can put lipstick on a fascist pig, but it's still a fascist pig.

Dr.Phibes · Feb 15, 2018

hydrophilic attack said:
right but i'm talking on an international internet message board where none of them will see my posts so i don't really think that's a huge problem?

how about "party using racist propaganda and proposing racist policies against muslims"

Don't mention the immigrants!

Alucrid · Feb 15, 2018

i'm not really sure how looking into their past is supposed to clear them of their current pro nazi image.

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

hydrophilic attack said:
right but i'm talking on an international internet message board where none of them will see my posts so i don't really think that's a huge problem?

how about "party using racist propaganda and proposing racist policies against muslims"

Posting one very biased article that essentially boils down to "i-islamophobia!" (a term, which according even to its' creator, the Thinktank Runnymede Trust, has been perverted and weaponized by islamists as a deflection measure) doesn't strengthen your argument and frankly I don't have the time or patience to have the same old moving-in-circles immigration/integration in europe debate for the billionth time. Sure it was addressed a lot in the election, because they were smart. People did not like the existance of the current parallel societies, people did not like the mass immigration of 2015, people did not like the terror attacks all over europe and people did not like reading about constant ISIS mass atrocities. If you want to win an election it is the most logical thing to adress that and introduce more restrictive policies. What happens if you pretend like it's all fine is what you can see when you look at basically any social democratic party in europe nowadays. Losing and in some instances essentially ceasing to exist. In regards to FPÖ of course they are the most populist, use the most outrageous and sometimes scandalous phrases and prey more on the insecurities than others. That's what right-wing populist parties do. I don't see what their stance in regards to muslim parallel societies/immigration has to do with this history panel though, as the nazi part comes specifically from the parties' history and antisemitism scandals.

m_dorian · Feb 15, 2018

rob305 said:
People around here believe 1 in 2 Americans are racist...

Can you back up your statement, please.?

And yes, if you vote for a party with a racist agenda, you are a racist. Its like voting for a communist party, that makes you at least a communist sympathiser.

hydrophilic attack · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
Posting one very biased article that essentially boils down to "i-islamophobia!" (a term, which according even to its' creator, the Thinktank Runnymede Trust, has been perverted and weaponized by islamists as a deflection measure) doesn't strengthen your argument and frankly I don't have the time or patience to have the same old moving-in-circles immigration/integration in europe debate for the billionth time. Sure it was addressed a lot in the election, because they were smart. People did not like the existance of the current parallel societies, people did not like the mass immigration of 2015, people did not like the terror attacks all over europe and people did not like reading about constant ISIS mass atrocities. If you want to win an election it is the most logical thing to adress that and introduce more restrictive policies. What happens if you pretend like it's all fine is what you can see when you look at basically any social democratic party in europe nowadays. Losing and in some instances essentially ceasing to exist. In regards to FPÖ of course they are the most populist, use the most outrageous and sometimes scandalous phrases and prey more on the insecurities than others.

Social Democrats are doing just fine in Sweden, and the way we have kept the racist parties down is to make it political suicide for centre-right parties to even consider collaborating with them and by calling out racist propaganda for what it is instead of hand-wringing and excusing it like you are doing in this very post

FrequentFlyer · Feb 15, 2018

hydrophilic attack said:
Social Democrats are doing just fine in Sweden, and the way we have kept the racist parties down is to make it political suicide for centre-right parties to even consider collaborating with them and by calling out racist propaganda for what it is instead of hand-wringing and excusing it like you are doing in this very post

Congratulations, you found one.*

*Assuming that having to form a minority government can be considered "doing just fine".

Deleted member 4552 · Feb 15, 2018

I think accusations of Nazism are a bit ridiculous, this is Austria, not Germany, come on.

hydrophilic attack · Feb 15, 2018

FrequentFlyer said:
Congratulations, you found one.

I'm talking about the one I know intimately because that's the country I'm from

The countries where the racist parties did well were the countries where the Centre-Right was allowed to ally with the racist parties

Austrian far-right party (FPÖ) pledges to clean up pro-Nazi image

Never read a comic in his life

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