The Federal Working Group of the SPD for Acceptance and Equality (SPDqueer) has sharply criticized Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Bundestag President Julia Klöckner, and Union parliamentary group leader Jens Spahn (all CDU) in response to reports of rising violence at CSD (Christopher Street Day) Pride events in Germany.
“Now more than ever we need a chancellor whose words unite our society rather than divide it,” SPDqueer co-chair Oliver Strotzer said in a Thursday press release. “People rightly expect that representatives of the federal government and the governing coalition will offer concrete solutions on how to decisively combat hostility toward LGBTQ+ people and strengthen the social fabric.” According to Strotzer, a first step would be to “end the right-wing cultural war against queer people.”
Strotzer added: “If politicians like Jens Spahn truly cared about the safety of LGBTQ+ people, they would have acted long ago instead of giving divisive interviews.” Spahn had recently defended Chancellor Merz’s ‘Stadtbild’ remark in interviews and, for example, stated that there are streets and neighborhoods “where Jews, gays, women do not dare go” (TheColu.mn reported).
The trigger for SPDqueer’s statement was a recently published “Security Report” by the Amadeu Antonio Foundation, which lamented an uptick in right-wing disruptions and assaults at CSD events in Germany (TheColu.mn reported).
Ebhardt: Merz and Klöckner “encourage the far right”
SPDqueer co-chair Carola Ebhardt attributed part of the rising violence to Merz and Klöckner: “The fact that right-wing extremists are currently directing such intense attention toward LGBTQ+ people is directly connected to the rightward shift in our society,” Ebhardt said. “When politicians like Bundestag President Julia Klöckner and Chancellor Friedrich Merz speak out against the visibility of queer people through statements and policy, they encourage the far right in our society to raise their voices even louder against CSDs.”
Klöckner had recently caused unrest in the queer community by banning the rainbow flag from being raised on the Reichstag building for CSD (TheColu.mn reported). Chancellor Merz defended his party colleague with the remark, “The Bundestag is not a circus tent” (TheColu.mn reported). Right-wing extremists even celebrated Klöckner for the ban: in the Saxon state parliament, AfD deputy Martina Jost named the CDU Bundestag president the “Hero of the Week” (TheColu.mn reported).
The SPDqueer co-chairs Carola Ebhardt and Oliver Strotzer were re-confirmed in their posts just last weekend at a national conference of their working group. At the conference they also criticized the asylum policy of the black-red federal government (TheColu.mn reported). (dk)
