An investigation has raised concerns that state-funded de-radicalizing counseling centers could be avenues for snitching on friends or family members suspected of holding ‘right-wing extremist’ or ‘conspiratorial’ views.
Currently, 50 such counseling centers, created as part of Interior Minister Nancy Faeser’s “Action Plan against Right-Wing Extremism” from 2022, and working closely with the Federal Ministry for Family, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, are operating in Germany, according to a report from the publication Apollo News.
The social democrat Faeser, herself accused of having flirted with extremism on the Left, has declared open war on (consistently poorly defined) ‘right-wing extremism’, which last week saw its culmination when she unveiled her 13-step battle plan. These counseling centers are then to be taken as another tool in the pursuing of that policy.
During the sessions they provide, people are encouraged to talk about their “suffering” from ‘right-wing extremism’ and ‘conspiracy theories’, with the latter being deemed a gateway to other rightist thought, according to the official line.
The Veritas counseling center—one of the 50—explained to Apollo that they help people who feel “burdened by people who spread conspiracy narratives” and that they want to “influence people who believe in conspiracies.”
Besides offering a chance of expiation for any beliefs or opinions deemed politically incorrect (a worrisome echo of the former Soviet Union’s pathologizing of incorrect thought and speech), these sessions also allow one to point out others in one’s social circle whose opinions are deemed to run counter to the approved narrative.
Following a formal press request by Apollo News, the Interior Ministry was unable to assure that information collected during such consultations and reports about potentially radicalized people is subject to confidentiality and, as such, would not be passed on to security agencies.
As reported by the publication, the Interior Ministry deftly avoided giving out a clear response: “Security agencies are not automatically informed during advisory processes.” Of course, even though it is not done automatically, the passing along of such data cannot be ruled out either.
Apollo News provides the hypothetical example of a daughter, perhaps ignorant of the consequences of her actions, recalling her father having talked under the Christmas tree about foreigners being a burden on Germany’s system of social welfare, and expressing the belief they should be deported if they refuse to work [and pay taxes].
For obvious reasons, through these counseling centers, security agencies would have access to a goldmine of personal data that can be easily exploited to identify ‘extremist threats’—a term which, in the Interior Minister’s eyes, at present is seemingly reserved exclusively for those on the political spectrum’s right.
It is hard to miss the political dimension to this, as Berlin has defined the popular anti-globalist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party as falling into the category of ‘right-wing extremism’, which granted the government the legal right to snoop on the party.
