• DarkThoughts@fedia.io
    6·
    5 months ago

    That is, you might be personally fine off economically, but you’re seeing abandoned buildings all over the place, the trams are run down, and the schools have leaky roofs because the municipality has no money because half of the population moved west and all the infrastructure is oversized.

    Same thing in the West. Infrastructure is not that far behind in the East actually, so this is a bit of a myth. Generally German infrastructure has been suffering a lot over the past couple decades, also thanks to the 16 years of the Union not wanting to spend money on anything important. But I guess voters forgot that already.

    • trollercoaster@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      5·
      5 months ago

      also thanks to the 16 years of the Union not wanting to spend money on anything important.

      Actually that’s way too short sighted, Austerity became German state religion much longer ago. Neoliberal sell-out and wholesale neglect of public property and infrastructure started under Helmut Kohl, and was seamlessly continued under Schröder to be equally seamlessly continued under Merkel and Scholz just went on with it, too. There is no large political party in Germany that is innocent of this crime.

      Now that they have collectively sold out and run down the country and are doing little to nothing to remedy their past mistakes crimes, they are acting surprised that this is driving people into the arms of Nazi demagogues.

      It’s still deplorable to vote for the Nazi scum that is the AfD, but propaganda is a powerful tool and the Nazis are deliberately targeting those who have been shat on by the political establishment for decades by now. That their propaganda is a bunch of lies and they are only going to sell out the country and its people some more doesn’t matter. People are stupid and easy to convince with propaganda. Keep in mind how the education system is a part of the public infrastructure that has been continuously and systematically neglected and sold out for almost half a century by now.

    • barsoap@lemm.eeOPEnglish
      1·
      5 months ago

      Over here in SH urbanisation is actually reversing a bit. Only a bit, but on average villages aren’t dealing with a draining population any more. Lots of really small places that have issues, but OTOH the people there drive regularly to some village populous enough to have a supermarket and see that it’s quite stable. Just don’t ever visit Neumünster.

      And I also think that plays into the “great replacement” perception: There’s a difference when a place of say 20k gets 100 refugees and that’s it vs. getting 100 refugees and 1000 leaving to work elsewhere. Still nowhere close to rightoid conspiracy narratives, of course, but the incline of the curve looks quite different, it’s much easier to spin a narrative out of such a situation.