Anti-migrant, anti-Islam FPÖ could emerge as most voted for party in Sunday’s parliamentary poll
After winning the EU elections in June, Austria’s far-right Freedom party (FPÖ) seized the moment, calling for the appointment of a EU “remigration” commissioner to be tasked with the forced return of migrants and citizens with a migration background to their countries of origin.
The muted reaction that followed was a sharp contrast to Germany, where months earlier, allegations that members of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) had attended a meeting at which they discussed remigration dominated headlines and prompted tens of thousands to take to the streets in protest.
The difference was not lost on Farid Hafez, a senior researcher at Georgetown University. In Austria, “there was no outcry,” he said. “This is the normalisation of racism that the far right has achieved and that has become a very normal part of daily Austrian politics.”
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
… time again throughout history, bad things and terrible ideas only come about due to the ignorance and inaction of individuals who think that a movement may be good for them but deep down know that they are not morally right, so instead they choose to do nothing in the hopes that their most secret thoughts and beliefs might come true but if they don’t, they can plausibly deny everything.