German energy giant RWE has begun dismantling a wind farm to make way for a further expansion of an open-pit lignite coal mine in the western region of North Rhine Westphalia.
I thought renewables were cheaper than coal. How is this possible?
Expanding on this: OP seems to be conflating wind power being cheaper than coal power, with… What? A wind farm being more profitable per unit area than a coal mine?
They’re implemented on the EU level but Germany isn’t exactly unknown for pushing for them. The EP also likes to do it, the commission has more an eye on competition, sometimes those things overlap e.g. pushing train operators to finally implement a unified ticket shop (buying a trip from a single provider, even if the trains are run by different ones, has the consumer benefit that if a train is delayed and you miss a connection you can then take pretty much whatever train to reach your goal. And from the commission’s perspective they want train operators to compete, but not by building walled gardens)
As far as Germany specifically, I think one I heard about ISPs being required to discount customers who fall victim to low bandwidth. In other words, they can’t sell you a 50mb/s contract and then say “sorry, bandwidth is bad here so you will only get 20mb/s.”
Yeah, little online test about it, too, but in the end even that took years and there isn’t really any feasible way to get what you want other than suing the company
The contract for RWE to expand the mine there goes back decades and the wind farm operator knew it would be demolished before they build it. It’s at the end of its life cycle now and had to be demolished one way or another.
German government could either breach their contract with RWE and pay them compensation or allow the destruction of a derelict wind park in exchange of RWE stopping coal extraction 8 years earlier then planned. It’s a job well done by the government.
They are the Government, they can just shut down coal immediately by law. Make all coal extraction immediately illegal, sue RWE for climate destruction, throw the executives in jail. Save the planet.
Is that legal? I’ll tell you the answer, it’s not. They would need to pay massive payouts to RWE for breach of contract. What you’re describing is rule of emotion, not rule of law.
Oh it’s absolutely possible to do it legally in Germany: Land, natural resources and means of productions can be socialised without even having to show that it’s for the common good, and compensation wouldn’t be what RWE is hoping for as the amount will not only take their interests into account but also that of the public. Article 15 GG.
But that article has never been used and I indeed would very much prefer if the first time it’s used it’s expropriating landlords in Berlin.
Another interesting approach would be to take Article 14 (2) seriously and demand that RWE buys carbon credits for every single ton of coal they pull out of there. Sure it’s their coal noone is disputing that but using it comes with an obligation to not hurt, if not serve, the common good.
You're disregarding Art.15 III GG then. Particularly Art. 15 III s. 2,3 GG (of the German version), which regulate reimbursement in the case of nationalisation. Which, again, make it a fairly difficult thing to do. Especially as we all know that Art. 20a GG, which is the only logical argument to base this all on, is just a way of getting out of actually doing something. Pretty much everyone has agreed that it means nothing except for a vague sense of 'direction'.
As for your last point, that could just as easily be interpreted as the energy they produce being in the service of energy production for the entire country, as well as ensuring that coal miners continue to have a job. If that's not a socially beneficial use of coal reserves, not sure what to tell you. Energy self sufficiency is important.
As for your landlord comment, which honestly is an entirely different matter in and of itself, that basically won't fall under 'land, natural resources or means of production', unless one of those Berlin judges decides to do Berlin things.
EDIT (because I forgot the context of what I was replying to)
None of this even takes into account that what the guy above me wrote was about simply 'shutting down coal' tomorrow. Which is a very different thing from taking public ownership, and then running the business into the ground overnight.
which regulate reimbursement in the case of nationalisation.
Which is to be equitable between the interest of the owners and society. That is, in a nutshell, below market value.
that could just as easily be interpreted as the energy they produce being in the service of energy production for the entire country
Yeah no that’s not how externalities work. They’re creating damage with that coal, even to break even it has to be curbed in some way, much less for them to do good. If you want to mount that defence don’t create externalities.
As for your landlord comment, which honestly is an entirely different matter in and of itself, that basically won’t fall under ‘land, natural resources or means of production’,
For those big landlords those apartments are means of production of rent. Wouldn’t work for smaller investors or even private abodes but we’re talking about companies with 2000+ (IIRC) apartments, here.
It’s legal if the Government of Germany makes it legal, and as other posters have pointed out, there are already ways that it could be done legally. Stop supporting fossil fuels.
Literally fucking why. The energy consumption of Germany is hanging by this like geopolitical shoestring. Renewables could make next winter or the winter after mildly affordable for Germans. Yet instead, the German state is expanding this dystopian arm that digs a massive pit in the earth… to burn the most pollutant fuel that we have. Like what? What an incredible act of defiance against the wishes and needs of its people. And that’s coming from an American.
I’ve been schooled as to why this article is a misdirection and propoganda rather than serious need for concern.
I think the problem is that people really don’t like freezing to death in winter when there just happens to not be enough sun or wind. So you need something as a backup. But we’re afraid of nuclear and just happen to have all this coal lying around. That’s the sad why.
Why? Because you all want to hear that lie. That's the whole reason they tell it. Because you pay in clicks for it. Germany bad always sells no matter how braindead the desinformation being poushed is.
Germany is going for a complete coal phase-out by 2030. For this the new government (in office since Dec 2021) renegotiated the already contracted and approved increase of the area coal is digged for, so the last one happened earlier this year. But you have probably heard the story about the viallage of Lützerath "being demolished because stupid Germany started to increase coal digging again" in the media. That's desinformation because in reality they stopped coal digging there, btw saving half a dozen equally small villages scheduled for destruction more than a decade ago already.
Germany has also shut down it's remaining nuclear reactors that combined -up to their shutdown- produced the miniscule share of ~2% of electricity. In the same time they build up wind- and solarpower. In fact Germany's complete nuclear power (and even at it's peak it was not that much but only looks bigger because electricity demand in the early 1990s was much lower) was replaced with much more capacities in renewable power, so much indeed that they also decreased coal by nearly the same capacity at the same time. Yet, you have probably read dozens of times how "insane Germans think coal is clean energy and shut down all their nuclear to burn more of it".
Wind turbines run about a decade before gear boxes, blades etc. need to be replaced. The whole thing (with replacements) can probably run 25-30 years, but this is rarely done because the improvements in tech make it more worthwhile to completely replace them with more efficient (and nowadays often bigger) models. With that in mind a company build wind turbines next to the digging site knowing that they will need to disassemble them a decade later again (side note: those particular wind mills were also quite problematic and the company went out of business a few years ago), which is shown in the picture. Again, framing this as dismantling wind for more coal power as negotiated by the German Green party is blatant desinformation.
Long story, short. Lobbyists pay good money to push story of insane Greens destroying the country and nature, too. Lobbyists pay good money to push the story of how it's all hopeless to try to get rid of coal as big industry countries like Germany are increasing coal instead. And people love to hate on Germany and eat up that bullshit so for publications it's a double win as this kind of crap also generated clicks like crazy.
PS: And you can also see how the propaganda is working as right here in this thread there's lots of "they are lying about renewables and just plan to continue burning coal forever" and at this point in time I'm not even sure anymore if it's just the usual paid trolls or the brain-washing really is that successful.
I’m afraid that at least partly it’s that successful. I have heard a lot of complaints about how germany manages these, but I never heard this side of the story before.
Because the entire economy of that region depends on coal mining and coal miners. You are aware that closing the mine down tomorrow would instantly land a fairly large group of people into poverty because they have no other marketable job skills other than coal mining, right?
The former government killed 100k jobs in the solar industry when solar power became too cheap for others to compete while whining non-stop about the poor 10k workers in coal mining. They did the same later for wind power and so even now some companies are in trouble as they had to size down so heavily that they can't even get full use out of the boom in wind power now.
Jobs in coal mining are basically an issue for 2-3 local politicians, for everyone else of that former government it's corruption lobbyism and jobs as board members and advisors.
As for why they keep increasing the dig site: It's actually jsut logical. They need coal for another few years and can either increase the area or dig deeper. And the latter is massively more damaging for the environment as it involves a lot of ground water manipulation.
The contract to expand the coal mine was signed a long time ago, it wouldnt be signed now. RWE, who mines the coal there, would have to be compensated if they werent allowed to mine there.
The compensation would probably be so high that its cheaper to just build renewable energy elsewhere, and the wind turbines are at the end of their lifespan anyway.
I just hope that we dont get a right wing government anytime soon that gives out the next stupid contract to mine even more coal there.
Because, in the end we have more coal underground than we ever need or should use, its not a question of finding coal, but instead of how or if we should mine it.
I originally read it as “Germany says ‘Fuck wind as an alternative energy source’ and begins reverting back to coal”, so I figured I’d clarify in case anyone end thought the same thing.
Doesn’t seem like this article indicates that Germans is giving up on alternative energy.
No but it does clearly show prioritization when the 2 conflict, which is the point of contention (as well as using coal at all, if you give a shit about our planetary environment)
I thought renewables were cheaper than coal. How is this possible?
This is one of those in general vs in particular things.
In general, yes coal is way more expensive versus renewable energy. In this particular instance, they’re just expanding the site, all of the really expensive stuff like logistics and transportation are already paid.
This is the same reason just keeping old nuclear plants running is cheaper than building a new one. Each industry has expensive parts and cheap parts. If you’re doing something that only expands the cheap parts then you’ll be able to beat out competitors.
Additionally those turbines are at the end of their lifespan. They would need to be dismantled and rebuilt anyways, since they became structurally unsafe
RWE has no conscience left at all (doubt they ever had one). Coal is scheduled to be faded out by 2030 (recently rescheduled from 2038) and I do wonder if there really was no other option than to demolish those 8 windmills (and the nearby village).
That being said: This is a singular incident caused by long-time contracts of the fading industry. It’s not some paradigm shift in Germany. Coal will be gone soon and new windmills will be build.
Realistically speaking they need to get coal another 5 years. Which means either widening the pit or digging deeper. And the latter is massively more damaging, just for the management of ground water levels needed (also more expensive).
Where’s the step forward though? All I see is two steps back. First they close nuclear power plants, then they mine coal because of some weird bureaucracy. What’s next? Rebuild nordstream?.. Germany sucks, its leaders suck and its businessmen suck. Spineless profiteering bureaucrats the lot of them. I dunno why aren’t there people on the streets trashing up the place.
The problem is, Senvion went out of business in 2019, and customers have been struggling to support their turbines. Apparently the Senvion design is exceptionally dependent on software access. Siemens and others have stepped in to offer support contracts to Senvion turbines in good working order, but with the opportunity to mine more lignite at the site, maybe RWE felt that it was time to spin down the Senvion turbines.
It seems like there may be many factors in this decision.
Thanks for providing this context. From what you say it sounds like a bad initial decision from RWE - tieing themselves in to 'wind turbine as a service’doesn’t seem sensible.
We should be using open source solutions for things like energy security. It’s not like our civilization can run without energy generation. The control ought to be in the hands of people, not corporations.
I’m not sure if that is the wind farm. Looking at the article photos, there are a lot of turbines in the area, so there is probably more than one wind farm adjacent to the coal mine. Even with Senvion out of business, it still feels far too early for them to be pulling down turbines - normally they have about 30 years’ life in them before they’re sold on to another country. However, the article also says they’re only pulling down 7 turbines, so even if it is the same wind farm they’re not fully dismantling it.
Edit: Actually I think you’re right about the site. It looks like it might be these turbines they’re pulling down, and I imagine the motorcross site could be included in the project also.
Yeah, but look up the story on the Senvion turbines. Basically, Senvion operators have had to pay big money for service contracts with 3rd parties since Senvion went out of business.
I’m not sure that’s the right wind farm. According to this guardian article, it’s actually the Keyenberg wind farm that’s being dismantled, a retired site from 2001.
Apparently the site is retired because the operator’s permit ends in 2023. Making way eventually for the mine expansion was part of the original deal allowing the land to be used for wind turbines, and so it’s not indicative of any change in climate policy from the German government. Additionally the turbines are somewhat outdated, having only a sixth of the power output of a modern one. They would have to tear down and modernise the turbines anyway even if not for the mine.
However from a publicity standpoint it’s not an ideal move. Could have given up on the lignite and put new wind turbines in instead, perhaps.
The demolitions are part of a deal brokered last year between Robert Habeck, the Green party's minister for economy and climate action and Mona Neubaur, who is the economy minister for North Rhine Westphalia, to allow the expansion of the mine.
In return, RWE had to agree to phase out coal in 2030, eight years before the previous deadline. "It's a good day for climate protection," Habeck said at the time.
What’s the timeline for getting this expansion built? And what’s the lifecycle of the plant? I understand there are energy scarcity concerns, but how is this the most economical option when it’s ~7 years until they’re supposed to phase out coal?
I mean, that’s probably actually it. Short term profits are all shareholders care about. We’ve seen that time and time again where businesses will absolutely mutilate themselves just so shareholders can enjoy a short term price spike. This is just a pump and dump but for the energy industry.
The wind turbines are already at the end of their lifespan and they knew RWE had the license to expand the mine there when the wind turbines where build.
Of course it’s economical for RWE, they are not building a new mine. Just continuing their mining operation there for another 7 years.
That’s possible, particularly if different parties are in power at that time. However the article also notes that lignite is becoming less economically viable and may need to be wound up anyway in 2030.
I’m guessing their bracing for winter without Russian oil. Which will hopefully be transitory, but also sort of delays the inevitable. If they can’t survive a winter without fossil fuels they need to figure it out quick.
I suspect that they have no intention of phasing out coal, or there are certain unrealistic requirements that have to be met before the “agreement” to end coal is enforced. It’s just pageantry, Germany has no intention of ending coal dependence.
This expansion is the last one although actually many more in the next decades were already approved and contracted, which got renegotiated with the energy companies. But of course this was already mispresented earlier this year when everyone reported on Germany destroying the village of Lützerath for their newly started coal digging when it was actually the last one (with half a dozen more similiar small villages originally scheduled for destruction more than a decade ago). But lobbyists pay to push lies and publications love the clicks for the popular outrage about evil Germans. Who cares for facts, anyway...
Those wind power plants were originally build with the knowledge that they have to be disassembeled in less than a decade again. Also those models proved to be very problematic and the company building them went out of business after only 4 years (since then there was only some auxiliary technical support from other companies).
Counter question: How economical is it to stop digging up coal today when the phase-out is 7 years away. They can either increase the pit or dig deeper. The latter is not only more expensive but also more damaging (pumping groundwater away from the hole etc.).
PS: A decade is also the usual life time of a wind power plant nowadays... After that time the gear boxes and blades need to be replaced and the foundation needs to be checked because of constant micro vibrations... In theory the installation itself could run up to 30 years but the technical development is still moving ahead so fast that replacing the whole thing with a newer and more efficient (also often bigger) model usually makes more sense than replacing parts to keep them running. So for now wind turbines are rather short-lived as their replacements see constant substantial improvements.
The bombing of the Nordstream pipeline upended germany-cool 's energy plan and necessitated a quick replacement because Europe doesn’t have much other sources of fuel in itself.
It really isn’t Germany is subsidizing coal by 1.7bn € every year. Like all currently coal producing countries give huge subsidies to their coal industry because they’d just immediately shut down.
German energy giant RWE has begun dismantling a wind farm to make way for a further expansion of an open-pit lignite coal mine in the western region of North Rhine Westphalia.
The text written by the OP is a rhetorical question about what I quoted, not a description. To read it you had to read the quoted text too, or decide to skip it for some reason.
Maybe they should support more ukkkrainepigmask-off nazis, sanctions against other fuel resources and further terrorist attacks against peaceful infrastructure by their so called amerikkka “allies”.
the only people trivializing fascism are those who see fascism symbology like the swastika, Black Sun, various nordic runes, etc on the soldiers they’re egging on and go “doesn’t look like anything to me!” while advocating for the double genocide theory
Have you any pictures of Azov with swastika, black sun, or such after they got integrated into the national guard?
Or is that just a convenient propaganda line to make you support an imperial aggressor fielding tons of fascist militias, itself being a mafia state slowly but surely turning fascist?
Hey rember when they just got those new leopard tanks and some rascal painted a bunch of iron crosses on them, which libs insisted was from obscure world War 1 battalion and not where literally everybody knows the iron cross from, to the point the German government said they weren’t gonna keep giving them weapons if that shit didn’t stop
The Balkenkreuz goes back to the Teutonic Order. The Nazis used it a lot which is why the Bundeswehr didn’t, but that doesn’t mean that painting a cross in a rush makes you a Nazi.
Seriously, what do you think soldiers in the field trying to not get shot at by their own guys are thinking about. I’ll give you a hint: Whether it’s more important to be camouflaged to the enemy or identifiable for friendlies, that’s it. Ukraine is using a simplified version of the Cossack Cross for that purpose, it’s a native part of their symbolism and easily distinguishable from the stuff Russians use. If everything that looks like a cross is now a Balkenkreuz and therefore Nazi you might want to take it up with various Christian Churches.
Oh and just for the record you’ll get arrested in Germany for showing the Z in a Russia/Ukraine context, including as a St. George Ribbon.
Lmao this response is up there with “the black sun isn’t nazi it’s an ancient symbol” and “azov’s wolfsangel is actually an N and an I which stands for ‘Idea of the Nation’”.
You’re a fascist mate and should stop fucking pretending otherwise. You’re the worst crypto-fascist I’ve ever seen.
Lmao this response is up there with “the black sun isn’t nazi it’s an ancient symbol”.
Is not a thing I have ever, or would ever, say. Or opinion I ever had, or would ever have. You’ve got a very active imagination. The black sun was invented whole-cloth by Nazi mystics.
You know why I know such stuff? Because I fucking know Nazi symbology, unlike random US libs online larping as leftists on hexbear. The kind of anti-intellectuals seeing runes and hearing Faroese and then calling Tyr (the band) Nazis and shit. Not helpful, in fact, harmful.
The Balkenkreuz goes back to the Teutonic Order. The Nazis used it a lot which is why the Bundeswehr didn’t, but that doesn’t mean that painting a cross in a rush makes you a Nazi.
This is “swastikas are Buddhist symbols” level of mental gymnastics.
Panzergrenadierbattalion 13 of the Bundeswehr (1980-1992, dissolved because cold war over). You’ll find it in more insignia not to mention coat of arms of towns but that one is closest to Azov in the sense that it’s simply a singular Wolfsangel. At least among the ones I could find within 10 seconds of googling.
The Wolfsangel is not a Nazi symbol as such. If you want to outlaw everything the Nazis ever used then nothing would be left, including the Antifa flags because they totally did try to appropriate those. They’re getting off on that shit and you seem to be willing to play right into their hands.
Arguing “well actshually they used a bunch of different symbols” is more Nazi apologia since very few symbols were used as widely by the Nazis as the swastika or the wolfsangel. There’s a reason you don’t see neo-Nazis tattooing antifa flags on their bodies.
In the US, that might be true. Germany doesn’t recognise it as such (page 82, “only illegal in connection with outlawed organisations, otherwise legal”), and neither does Ukraine. Context matters.
You can consider it more akin to the Iron Cross, just less common, which the ADL has a much better take on: “[…] an Iron Cross in isolation (i.e., without a superimposed swastika or without other accompanying hate symbols) cannot be determined to be a hate symbol. Care must therefore be used to correctly interpret this symbol in whatever context in which it may be found.”
So they change their flag from one symbol widely used by Nazis to another symbol widely used by Nazis, but somehow that doesn’t make them Nazis.
Care must therefore be used to correctly interpret this symbol in whatever context in which it may be found
The context is it’s a widely-known Nazi symbol on a flag for a battalion whose members frequently express neo-Nazi views. What other fucking context do you need?
No the interior ministry kept the non-Nazi part of their emblem. They also kept the name, which also isn’t Nazi but the name of the Azov Sea (east of Crimea, north of the Kerch straight). When Azov got integrated into state structure tons of Nazis left because they didn’t want to be under state control and be told what they could and couldn’t do politically etc, some stayed but the state imposed strict “don’t do Nazi things” controls. In the beginning (2016 or such) it was about 20% Nazis left over so even back then a minority, there’s been churn and growth since then so it should be quite a bit lower by now.
The old pre-national guard Azov was definitely a Nazi cesspool, yes, and alas one of the very few capable fighting forces at the start of the Russian invasion (for the record, that’s 2014). Then regular people joined because they also wanted to fight and could look past the iffiness, that’s why Azov already hadn’t been purely Nazi at the time the Ukrainian state integrated and denazified them.
But all that nuance is lost in both Russian propaganda and also western media, where some libs found themselves a juicy topic to sell clicks with.
They didn’t move from the Swastika the Wolfsangel was part of the Azov logo from the very start.
Pre-integration: The letters “Azov”, Wolfsangel, black sun, some waves, and the Ukrainian trident.
Post-integration: The letters “Azov”, Wolfsangel.
…the trident also vanished, presumably because https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Guard_of_Ukraine#/media/File:%D0%9F%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%87_%D0%9D%D0%93%D0%A3_%D1%821.svg. Inb4 “waah that’s a torch Nazis used torches the Ukrainian National Guard is Nazis”.
The black sun got removed in 2015, this is the new one. But, go on, spin random bullshit.
The Azov Brigade’s official magazine is titled “Black Sun newspaper” which it produces and distributes to several tens of thousands within the Ukrainian military still uses the black sun, because it’s literally the fucking name of the publication.
Yeah no that’s indefensible and the original editor in chief is nuts (google translate from the Ukrainian wikipedia page):
This is an old Ukrainian sign, which means a force aimed at destroying all the old and restoring the new. There is another version of its origin: the black sun is the period of the year when water acquires special life-giving qualities. This usually happened at night, when there was no sun, but since the nutritional properties were always associated only with it, our ancestors nicknamed this time the black sun. There is no hint of hostile ideology here, this is our Ukrainian symbol, which has a sacred meaning.
— Mark Melnyk (“Viry”), editor-in-chief of the publication
Could neither find out how official the whole thing was, either, and especially not in the crucial post-incorporation times. They might just have continued to operate independently.
Still, though: Is current-day Azov out there doing Nazi things? Ultimately that’s the only question that matters. Of course from the Russian perspective yes it is according to Russian propaganda everyone opposed to Russia (and that includes being opposed to being invaded) is a Nazi.
The magazine is produced by Azov’s political wing, the National Corps as of 2016, which has currently suspended activity during the war. It will spin up its political wing again afterwards. Links and references in the other comment I sent here.
the azov.press domain certainly is dysfunctional
This started redirecting to Nackor.org in 2016 when the National Corps was started.
Oh and I can prove Azov are still distributing this free taster archive of the magazine via nackor.org, which is where the previous azov.press site migrated to later on. Here is a January 2022 archived page where you can see Azov are still giving away that selection of the magazine for free via their political spinoff the “National Corps”, this is one of several of their party websites: web.archive.org/web/…/z-dnem-sobornosti-ukraini
nackor.org, which is where the previous azov.press site migrated to later on.
nackor.org is a gambling website now it seems. Certainly not a news outlet, certainly not from the outside.
Reference for National Corps being directly linked to Azov
Wikipedia. Yes they’re certainly linked the National Corps is the home of Azov’s Nazis.
…squinting at things and considering that National Corps ceased activity in 2022 (to go to the front) it doesn’t seem too unlikely that they gave up on nackor.org and the successor to the Black Sun. I guess (really, guess) that it was run by National Corps for the longest time after Azov got integrated.
Anyhow are you seeing those election results. I can’t blame Ukrainians for not being too worried about them getting into power.
nackor.org is a gambling website now it seems. Certainly not a news outlet, certainly not from the outside.
This is just a landing page that is displayed by the server host when a site can’t be accessed. It’s probably just down, wayback has archives as recently this month.
Anyhow are you seeing those election results. I can’t blame Ukrainians for not being too worried about them getting into power.
This is an american’s childlike view of politics, in particular it is one that has no understanding of political vanguardism and how absolutely tiny quantities of people can have incredibly outsized influences politically. The UK was pushed into leaving the EU by a political party with 0.2% of the seats that year on year received just 3% of the vote.
What you need to do is not view fascists as one political party, they’re several spread out over multiple channels performing vanguardism through multiple methods because it has a far stronger effect. The goal is not to win elections. The goal is to create political forces in motion that move fascists through positions of power in all ways. Liberals think of institutions in the form of “win election and then you get to do your manifesto” but power doesn’t just come from elections. Power comes from all elements of a state. The police. The administrative positions. The civil service. The judiciary. The businesses. Small local electoral positions. The media. The military. Etc etc etc. All of these elements can be hijacked without winning any major elections in any way whatsoever. They allow you to turn a country into whatever you want to turn it into because you are the voice of the country regardless of what you consider to be the intended “power” positions.
In essence, if you control the zeitgeist it doesn’t matter who wins elections, all politicians are stuck following the zeitgeist, they are subservient to it. If they do not serve the zeitgeist then they simply get tossed out… or killed.
Instead of leaning on these metrics I suggest an alternate method for getting a picture of the influence that fascists currently have in Ukraine and that is looking at the opinions of the total population now vs historic on various topics. One in particular I think you’ll find quite alarming is the shift in public opinion of Bandera, who I reckon you’re quite familiar with. See this article from a major Ukrainian polling agency. It finds that in 2012 support for Stepan Bandera was only 22%, this is a very good measure for us for what kind of influence the fascists had in Ukraine pre-2014 when the Maidan revolution occurred. Today, after the changes and promotion of his fascist beliefs, the lionisation of him and the remaking of Ukraine that has been underway since Maidan, that support is now 74%. Quote:
In particular, the attitudes that gradually improved are the ones towards Ivan Mazepa (44% in 2012 and 76% in 2022), Simon Petliura (26% in 2012 and 49% in 2022) and Stepan Bandera (22% in 2012 and 74% in 2022).
For any bystanders interested in why this metric is valuable. Stepan Bandera was leader of the OUN (Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists), this organisation collaborated with the nazis in ww2 and killed tens of thousands of jews during the holocaust, it was regarded by the Nazi SS as extreme and particularly brutal even by their standards and I should not need to explain to anyone how evil the SS were.
This is what vanguardism can achieve. You do not need elections to become the dominant ideology of a country. You take over various non-electoral parts of the structure and become the zeitgeist itself and this is all while ignoring the fact that fascists exist within the main parties as well, you see this with your own eyes in America where people at all levels of the structure are having a major influence in the fascist direction, in both electoral and non-electoral positions.
You need to reassess in your head what power actually means. There are many ways to wield it. Liberals often have a misguided perspective that politics = elections when the reality is quite different, elections are a steam valve for society to let off what would be revolutionary energy every few years through a process of giving people “choice”. They’re not what power is though when the choice is created through far greater forces of influence developed across society on multiple fronts. For a more marxist interpretation of them as a whole this is a strong video.
I additionally strongly recommend the (now suppressed and hard to find) documentary Ukraine on Fire (not to be confused with the propaganda film created to drown it out, Winter On Fire) which released before the war so it’s largely free of the fog of war propaganda. It’s not marxist but gives a fairly good overview of Maidan and influences within it.
There’s another documentary I want to re-find too but am struggling with, might edit if I do find it. There’s also another video I wanted to include in this of the far right occupying the rada, locking the doors and refusing to leave until the vote they want is performed. I can’t find this but if I mention it here someone might remember what it’s in, it’s a good example of what power you can have without electoralism.
This is just a landing page that is displayed by the server host when a site can’t be accessed. It’s probably just down, wayback has archives as recently this month.
Domain registrant is Domains by proxy, nothing to get there. The logo though is favbet which is a Ukrainian gambling company. Seems like they took over the domain to direct traffic their way, it’s exactly the kind of slimy but legal thing you’d expect gambling companies to do.
Last magazine landing page on wayback is June 2022, first gambling landing page June 2023. Domain must’ve lapsed somewhere in between, which tracks with National Corps getting out of politics.
This is an american’s childlike view of politics, in particular it is one that has no understanding of political vanguardism and how absolutely tiny quantities of people can have incredibly outsized influences politically. The UK was pushed into leaving the EU by a political party with 0.2% of the seats that year on year received just 3% of the vote.
Dude calling me a yank was uncalled for. I’m German, have a look at the AfD when you want to know what having issues with Nazis looks like. (Or, for that matter, the Republican party). And Ukraine, much unlike the UK (or USA) doesn’t have a FPTP system, it’s proportional so poll numbers actually mean something. Also that vanguard that pushed for Brexit was Etonians not wanting to declare their taxes, the EU had new rules on tax havens coming up.
Also as a body politic the Brits are muppets. They fucking had a referendum on introducing proportional representation and voted against it, can you believe that. Egged on by Russian assets when it comes to Brexit I wouldn’t deny it but they’re perfectly capable of being bellends all on their own.
In essence, if you control the zeitgeist it doesn’t matter who wins elections,
And, do they? Svoboda, Right Sector, all are deeply unpopular in Ukraine. The people’s consensus is some liberal democratic EU-aligned thing, and safety from Russia, not a far-right resurgence. Poroshenko types, that is, electable kind of ring wing, is limited to “gays are icky church good” type of conservatism, but without wanting to murder them. And the SBU currently has its hands full sniffing out Russian collaborators so they’re probably not very interested in what a splattering of Nazis with close to zero public backing do at the printing press.
Stepan Bandera
Bandera is a complicated topic, and not distinguishing between Bandera the Nazi (collaborator) and antisemite and Bandera the national hero is disingenuous. Ukraine also has the lowest rate of antisemitism among eastern European states and a Jew is President, witch actually higher approval ratings than Bandera. But yes I’d very much prefer Makhno… alas he wasn’t terribly successful and whose fault was that, I give you a hint: That of a vanguard.
I kind of view Bandera in the same way as Churchill who, by all means, was a monster of a politician. And not in the positive way ask e.g. Bengals. Or take the founding fathers as worshipped by Americans, (nearly? not sure about the details) all of them slave owners in one way or the other yet we don’t commonly call people with a Washington boner advocates of slavery. Stauffenberg was a monarchist yet he’s getting honoured by the Bundeswehr, trying to assassinate Hitler washes over his iffy politics.
You need to reassess in your head what power actually means.
You’re talking to an Anarchist. And recommend Marxist analysis. I think I’ll pass on being educated by a Marxist on, of all things, power.
Last magazine landing page on wayback is June 2022, first gambling landing page June 2023. Domain must’ve lapsed somewhere in between, which tracks with National Corps getting out of politics.
None of this really matters. You’re overly focused on “they stopped”. The fascists haven’t disappeared nor have they stopped promoting their views within society. Moving to different tactics isn’t a win for anyone, it’s like a person playing peekaboo by hiding behind their hands but somehow liberals actually think they’ve disappeared.
Also as a body politic the Brits are muppets. They fucking had a referendum on introducing proportional representation and voted against it, can you believe that.
Yes. I was there. The liberals caused it by calling for it immediately after Nick Clegg betrayed their voters on his one and only promise of not fucking over student fees, with students making up the majority of the base. The response to the proportional representation vote was largely coloured by the response to Clegg.
Egged on by Russian assets when it comes to Brexit I wouldn’t deny it but they’re perfectly capable of being bellends all on their own.
Nah not really. Libs love this shit but both we marxists and conservative eurosceptics had been promoting euroscepticism for 30+ years. The greatest foreign influence was american capitalists seeking to strip the country, which they’re still doing.
And, do they? Svoboda, Right Sector, all are deeply unpopular in Ukraine.
No. Again you are making a mistake. Votes are not popularity. 35% of people here in the UK support socialism (not social democracy, socialism) but that doesn’t translate to a socialist party getting those votes. Not because of a lack of popular but because there is considerable complexity in who gets those votes. If you’re German you know this, you know the voters leaving SPD for AfD aren’t doing so because AfD they agree with all of its politics but because they don’t see any other viable options to use and they want to punish the major parties to send a message.
Bandera is a complicated topic, and not distinguishing between Bandera the Nazi (collaborator) and antisemite and Bandera the national hero is disingenuous.
No it’s not. You are literally falling for the fascist propaganda now. This is one of many methods the fascists in ukraine have successfully laundered his image. You should be very concerned that if it is possible for the Ukrainian nationalists to do this with Bandera it is also possible for the German nationalists to do this with Hitler.
Ukraine also has the lowest rate of antisemitism among eastern European states and a Jew is President, witch actually higher approval ratings than Bandera.
Again irrelevant. Ukrainian fascism isn’t nazism. Much like Italian fascism was not, nor was Spanish nor Chilean, nor Indian etc etc. Fascism conforms to the national conditions and presents itself differently each time. The use of the word “nazis” here is just to communicate the level of threat really. Their main concern at the current point in time is eliminating the Russian ethnicity alongside the Roma, whose camps they have consistently destroyed and murdered throughout this war. Moving onto other targets like the high proportion of greeks in Donbass would follow, there have been a number of Greeks in donbass who have spoken out about the Ukrainians attacking them, particularly in mariupol they did not like them (you don’t need to watch all of this it’s just the only place I know of for this particular clip from Greek tv I wanted to share, the first 5 mins or so is worth your time though).
I kind of view Bandera in the same way as Churchill who, by all means, was a monster of a politician. And not in the positive way ask e.g. Bengals. Or take the founding fathers as worshipped by Americans, (nearly? not sure about the details) all of them slave owners in one way or the other yet we don’t commonly call people with a Washington boner advocates of slavery. Stauffenberg was a monarchist yet he’s getting honoured by the Bundeswehr, trying to assassinate Hitler washes over his iffy politics.
Churchill is a monster who should have been regarded as one, but was not because war. There’s a considerable difference between laundering someone without a reason and this.
If anything if you want a hero of Ukrainian nationalism then the real hero of Ukrainian nationalism is Lenin who created the country entirely.
Stauffenberg was a monarchist yet he’s getting honoured by the Bundeswehr, trying to assassinate Hitler washes over his iffy politics.
You’re being naive again. This is an excuse to honour him, because the people pushing the honouring know what kind of laundering effect it has on the figure and the ideology that figure represents.
You’re talking to an Anarchist. And recommend Marxist analysis. I think I’ll pass on being educated by a Marxist on, of all things, power.
I grew up in squats and spent 30 years of my life as an anarchist. We probably don’t differ politically as much as you think. I am an ML because we have a timelimit from the climate crisis that is going to see millions of refugees pour into europe very soon. The destabilisation this will cause will be on the scale of nothing we’ve ever seen before and only ML theory has the track record of revolution needed to save at least a some people in the coming chaos when the opportunities to seize states begin. You saw what just tens of thousands of Syrian refugees did to stability in Europe with your own eyes, in particular you must have seen this in Germany. You should know as well as I do exactly what tens of millions will cause. As an anarchist I could not sit by knowing my ideological toolkit was not equipped to try and deal with the death that is coming, and I could not sit around and think myself a moral person knowing exactly what the future holds yet not doing everything in my power to help people. The correct toolkit for the time limits we have is marxism leninism. Will I go back to the black afterwards? Possibly. I’ll cross that bridge when it comes as we have no idea what things will look like in the aftermath of it all.
I know full well why you’re an anarchist. But I really do ask you to wrestle with the question of what is equipped to save the most lives in all of this. States suck, we all dislike them, we’re all in the left because we want them abolished, marxists and anarchists both. But lives are what matter here.
If you’re German you know this, you know the voters leaving SPD for AfD aren’t doing so because AfD they agree with all of its politics but because they don’t see any other viable options to use and they want to punish the major parties to send a message.
Yeah and we don’t consider protests votes to be Nazis. 2/3rd of the current AfD poll numbers are protest votes btw, 47% want the party outlawed (and among the 47% who don’t are plenty saying “they should be dealt with otherwise”), and 10% of people polled to vote for the AfD want the AfD outlawed.
Back to Ukraine: Svoboda has exactly one seat. They can’t really be hateful Nazis people don’t like that, and they can’t go undercover as patriots either because being a patriot really isn’t a distinguishing factor while the whole democratic spectrum from left to right is fighting at the front.
No it’s not. You are literally falling for the fascist propaganda now. This is one of many methods the fascists in ukraine have successfully laundered his image. You should be very concerned that if it is possible for the Ukrainian nationalists to do this with Bandera it is also possible for the German nationalists to do this with Hitler.
I’ll be concerned if those 70% percent actually come even close to expressing fascist ideas. Again, back to the founding fathers: How many percent in the US see them positively, how many advocate for slavery?
You’re falling in a type of “big man” trap. Just because there was a (or more) big men in the past, and they did stuff, and now their memory is recalled, doesn’t mean that all of their memory is recalled. This is not Bandera controlling people, it’s people looking for some figure to represent national identity and, well, Bandera very much was a nationalist. Currently alive people project things into the past, not the other way around.
Back to Hitler and Germany: No. The conservatives have Bismarck and also Stauffenberg and such, leftists, if patriotic at all, are regionalists.
The use of the word “nazis” here is just to communicate the level of threat really.
No. The choice of words is due to Russian narratives saying “Anyone who opposes us is a Nazi”. I’ve seen too much Russian talking points being uncritically parroted by hexbears to believe otherwise. You know the type, “Kiev is ruled by Nazis” stuff.
Again irrelevant. Ukrainian fascism isn’t nazism.
Svoboda in particular was deeply anti-semitic before they toned it down because nobody liked it. Non-Antisemitic fascists also don’t tend to don Germanic symbolism, but that’s circumstantial.
Moving onto other targets like the high proportion of greeks in Donbass would follow, there have been a number of Greeks in donbass who have spoken out about the Ukrainians attacking them
From all I know that could be a Golden Dawn guy hating Ukrainians. The plural of anecdote is not data and that’s not even a plural. Generally speaking the idea of Ukraine as a multiethnic, and naturally multiethnic state, is very solidly anchored in Ukraine.
…even among the right. Which is why Svoboda and their more ethnophobic lines don’t fly well at all, attracting if at all protest votes. The consensus enemy is the Kremlin, and with the Kremlin actually attacking the previous split between ethnic Russians (“we need to try harder to be friends with them”) and the rest vanished. The Kremlin, unsurprisingly, interprets that as everyone being Nazi because if you’re marching on Moscow (figuratively speaking) you’re a Nazi because that’s what Nazis do.
If Ukraine is oh so Russophobic why do they have a Russian president, and why are very large portions of the army speaking Russian? Including Azov, btw.
You’re being naive again. This is an excuse to honour him, because the people pushing the honouring know what kind of laundering effect it has on the figure and the ideology that figure represents.
Nah it’s choosing an actual patriot over a madman, and giving cultural legitimisation, within the Bundeswehr, to, if need be, assassinate a mad man at the top of the chain of command as an extreme but justified way of fulfilling their oath, to valiantly defend justice and the freedom of the German people. There’s no suitable democrat who, in a position like Stauffenberg’s, tried a similar thing otherwise that guy would be honoured. Bundeswehr tradition is anything but random.
You saw what just tens of thousands of Syrian refugees did to stability in Europe with your own eyes, in particular you must have seen this in Germany.
Syria had little to nothing to do with it things have been brewing in the east for quite a while now. Remember Lichtenhagen? Among other reasons naive eastern Die Linke politicians saying “fascism can’t reach the east because we’re all good socialists”. Prime Marxist analysis, right there, we’ve been telling them from the start that they’re full of shit and got called Besserwessis for it. The issue with the east is that they don’t have decades-long civil society experience combatting fascists because back in the days all politics was party matter, and the party said there were no fascists. The percentage of people with closed right-extreme world view is actually higher in the west than in the east, yet in the east they’re making political inroads (and yes Bernd Höcke is a Wessi. Westphale).
Yeah and we don’t consider protests votes to be Nazis. 2/3rd of the current AfD poll numbers are protest votes btw, 47% want the party outlawed (and among the 47% who don’t are plenty saying “they should be dealt with otherwise”), and 10% of people polled to vote for the AfD want the AfD outlawed.
It doesn’t matter what purpose a protest vote has if it’s advancing nazi agendas and change in society. People don’t need to be nazis to be influenced by nazis.
Back to Ukraine: Svoboda has exactly one seat. They can’t really be hateful Nazis people don’t like that, and they can’t go undercover as patriots either because being a patriot really isn’t a distinguishing factor while the whole democratic spectrum from left to right is fighting at the front.
Once again ignoring all the fascists in the major parties just because their party line isn’t “we’re fascists”. It’s like you fucking liberals can’t understand that taking off a nazi uniform doesn’t actually mean you stopped being a nazi.
From all I know that could be a Golden Dawn guy hating Ukrainians. The plural of anecdote is not data and that’s not even a plural. Generally speaking the idea of Ukraine as a multiethnic, and naturally multiethnic state, is very solidly anchored in Ukraine.
It’s a war. You’re not getting data until 20 years after its finished. Multiethnic? You are out of your fucking mind. Pogroms and mass exterminations have been common since the start of the war. You’re not an anarchist, you are a nazi and it is blatantly fucking obvious that you’re here playing games and being a silly fuck. It is a considerable waste of time talking to you, eat my ass and kindly follow your leader.
It doesn’t matter what purpose a protest vote has if it’s advancing nazi agendas and change in society. People don’t need to be nazis to be influenced by nazis.
They’re not Nazis. Or, differently put, dismissing them as Nazis plays right into the hand of Nazis: Protest voters have a reason they’re protesting, there’s things that other parties aren’t addressing, haven’t been addressing for ages, and those voters are pissed.
And you’d understand that if you actually, once in your life, went to a bar and talked to actual blue collar folks, instead of having your head up your own ideologically pure ass. You know, workers. The guys you’re supposedly fighting for.
The current failure of the government isn’t necessarily even policy – it’s primarily communication, and not signalling an actual turning point. The new heating law does not bankrupt poor homeowners, but they had the genius ideas of having drafts that didn’t even include mentions of financial aid. Sure heat pumps are cheaper in the long term but first you have to be able to afford the investment, and many poor home owners don’t.
That kind of stuff is what really worries people – that they’ll lose the little economical stability they do have, lose the little property they do own., as the saying goes, Erst das Fressen, dann die Moral. The FDP doesn’t care in the first place, the Greens have to be reminded by the SPD (Greens aren’t a left party as such) but would not block, either, and the SPD has its head far enough up its own image of itself as worker’s party that it’s not talking to actual workers before setting policy. Vanguard blindness in a sense.
Inflation? Well, it’s not too bad. Some relief would be good, if you can’t get that past the FDP just do what the French do and bully supermarkets. Not much to bully when it comes to the discounters but it’s also the sentiment that counts.
Asylum? Actually, that’s not the issue the issue is housing. An issue they’re working on and as the previous government really fucked it up it’s slow to start (actual lack of building capacity) but again, communication is shit. Berlin’s SPD trying to sabotage the expropriation of landlords doesn’t help, that is the exact shit that pisses off the east. At the same time they’re co-responsible for the situation as is as they failed to put pressure on the CDU in the Merkel years.
In short: The issue isn’t the people being Nazis. The issue is the people being to the left of the government but Die Linke not being an option, either, the east already tried that and I don’t mean the GDR times. Three decades of unification and the federal republic is less social then before that’s straight up their fault. People have the impression that the party cares more about random sexual minorities than workers, and yes it’s true, of course you can, should, and must do both and people wouldn’t mind, issue is they didn’t do anything for workers.
Remember how fascism is a failed revolution? That right there.
Pogroms and mass exterminations have been common since the start of the war.
[citation needed]. Well you don’t need to find those for Russian atrocities those have been well-documented. Show me a Bucha committed by Ukrainians, I’ll wait. Show Russian soldiers who were castrated as POWs.
You’re not an anarchist, you are a nazi and it is blatantly fucking obvious that you’re here playing games and being a silly fuck.
This is a small site. The owner of the wind turbines had to phase them out due to them being at the end of their lifespan. As there is coal under them. A deal was stipulated a VERY long time ago where when the wind turbines would have had to be removed, an expansion of a coal mine would be built there at the agreement that it will be dismantled by 2030. We are talking about “multiple years” time ago, before the 2030 deadline.
The actual reality of replacing nuclear and reducing coal with renewables.
Also the historic low of fossil fuels after nuclear shutdown (those old reactors not able to react well to changes in supply/demand actually got already existing renewables shut down at times and indirectly increased fossil fuel use slightly...)
The "costly" renewables that are actually so dirt cheap that nothing else can really compete and so lobbyists pay a lot of money to push a lie? Those renewables?
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