Talk:Alternative for Germany/Archive 6

Archive 1 Archive 4 Archive 5 Archive 6

Ideology

First off, no worries, not trying to whinge about any of it, just could not think of a proper header... always hate those lol. My question more relates to how much it actually still can be considered merely a right wing party and not a plain far-right one. In other words, is describing them as a "right wing to far-right" party still an accurate description in 2020? The party has moved steadily to the right over the years and 'old' source material just may not reflect the changes (all but one source for 'right wing' are from 2016 as far as i could see, and a lot has happened since).

Sources like this BBC article, this one from DW or this one from The Guardian all from this year, describe the AfD as a far-right party. Some mention about far-right extremism is found in those as well, but not really asking about that. The BBC article is of particular note, i assume, as it is actually posing the very question "How right-wing is nationalist Alternative for Germany?", the other 2 are about different things regarding the party but touch on extremism and general popularity, just to give very brief descriptions... but you lot can read, so why go into detail more. There is also another DW article from late last year, which, while also describing them as 'far-right', does mention how "There is no absolute consensus about how to describe the AfD as a political phenomenon, other than as a party well to the right of the CDU and their Bavarian sister party, the CSU, after Merkel moved the conservatives significantly toward the center.". But stating that of course does not mean they are a mere right wing party either. I kept it at four sources for now as i wanted to hear some opinions on the matter first before wasting any time on it. It seems that i pretty much see them described as far-right universally nowadays, but that may very well just be confirmation bias on my part. But providing more recent sources describing them as a far-right party should be trivial.

Anyway, i did not want to edit the article without having a discussion about it first (would have gotten reverted anyway lol). So, any thoughts on the matter, recent sources confirming/stating otherwise and so on would be appreciated. 2003:D6:2714:37F3:3DC3:76CA:EAD2:7F6A (talk) 21:19, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Oh, and i just wanted to say that i have edited this talk page before, also as an IP editor. But all of those discussions are now archived. Just to be open as my IP changes pretty much every day and you would not see it in my contributions. Have a good one. 2003:D6:2714:37F3:3DC3:76CA:EAD2:7F6A (talk) 21:28, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
So, no response by anyone... i will give it another week or so and then be bold and change it unless there is any reasonable argument here on the talk not to. 84.189.234.59 (talk) 06:16, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
Went ahead and made the change, if the change gets accepted that is. I hope i did not break anything, the infobox was a bit confusing to edit so i hope i did not break anything. Looked ok visually to me on the third try of previewing the page lol. Removed the refs to the outdated material i think. I am uncertain if those were used in other areas/could be used in other areas of the article. So, please give it a look over in that regard. Thanks. 2003:D6:2714:3731:F1D0:8E36:2ABA:21F (talk) 22:39, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
Doh, i forgot that i changed the date on my pc for something, it has been close to 14 days anyway. My date was the 18th... At last it was only this and not something actually important before i noticed. Anyway, close to 14 days since i raised it, not more than. 2003:D6:2714:3731:F1D0:8E36:2ABA:21F (talk) 22:51, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
I accepted the edit per your explanation here and the lack of any objections. That doesn't mean an editor who actually follows the article won't see the change and object, but if so, then the conversation can resume. Schazjmd (talk) 00:18, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
Yeah sure. Obviously not opposed to discussion. Cheers anyway for at the very least getting the ball rolling for building a consenus here on the talk, no matter which way that will turn out in the end. Have a good one. 2003:D6:2714:3731:F1D0:8E36:2ABA:21F (talk) 00:33, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
I agree with the changes. The "right-wing" label as having the same weight as "far-right" (particularly as both being understood as stalled compartments) is really WP:UNDUE and relies on cherry-picking, if not outright misrepresentation. Only looking at scholar sources, the current iteration of this party is overwhelmingly classified within the far-right spectrum (not unlike the article of similar case, Vox, btw), that comprises both the extreme right and the comparatively half-assed radical right.--Asqueladd (talk) 00:47, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
Large enough parts of the party certainly seem to be far-right extremist, given that the entire party in the state of Brandenburg has been put under partial surveillance by domestic intelligence due to suspected extremism since i started this discussion. The party in the state of Thuringia is under partial surveillance for the same reason as well. German language article on Brandenburg here if anyone cares. And keep in mind that surveillance of a political party in Germany has a pretty high barrier due to the countries history. So those are not just political moves but highly bureaucratic processes that lead to partial/full surveillance. Anyway, they are probably closer to extremism nowadays than to just being a right wing party. But i doubt source material would adequately support extremism as a position of the entire party, at least as of now. 2003:D6:2714:3731:F1D0:8E36:2ABA:21F (talk) 01:45, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Arent the guardian and New York Times far-left wing sources?

They tend to lean left of centre, but they're not exactly Marxist. I'd say they're reliable.

And putting parts of a political opponent under partial surveillance by domestic intelligence tells you more about the anti-democratic attitude of the german government than about the AfD.

I could not detect any extremism with the party plattform of the AfD which would not be considered normal in most western conservative parties like the Republican party in the USA or the Tories in the UK.

62.226.82.15 (talk) 03:08, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

And the lack or sources is why extremism is not in the article. You are complaining about something that is not even stated. And no, the NY Times and Guardian are not far-left. Although it is a typical far-right trope to call any media they disagree with far-left. What you can detect or not is completely irrelevant too. And as i stated, surveillance is not something that can just happen because someone does not like them. Do you have any real arguments? Or do you have any reliable sources that explicity go into how the AfD is not far-right? Just a passing mention of something is not good enough, actual in depth and recentish coverage of how they are what you say they are. 2003:D6:2714:37F1:1D80:4E77:2BF1:DB4F (talk) 06:16, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

I think we should keep the right-wing to far-right label rather than moving to a just "far-right" one. Indeed, all sources but one are from 2016 for "right-wing," but that is less because it is difficult to find new sources than that the ideology section was created then and is not often changed/sources aren't often added to it. Indeed, every single source from the "far-right" section is from 2017. Quite a bit has happened since then, too, but we are not just changing it because the sources are out of date because that precedent would require us to constantly create new articles. As for the three articles used to assert that Germany is a far-right party, none of them even attempt to prove it's moved to the far-right in the last 2 years. The DW one makes a point that there is both a radical and a moderate wing - implying the AfD is more of a big tent right-wing party than a far-right party. The only grounds to classify this one as stating the AfD is a far-right party is that it uses the term "far-right party" in the first paragraph. Indeed, the statements of DW about the topic (such as here) seem to be just this: the party has both an extreme "far-right" wing and a more moderate "right-wing" wing. Hence, we classify the AfD as both to include both. In the article by The Guardian, indeed, the writer describes the party as "far-right." However, this article also makes clear that the far-right ones "singled out" by the BvF was Der Flugel, in particular Bjorn Hocke and Andreas Kalbitz. So, clearly, this implies that the Der Flugel is a far-right group within the AfD, not that the AfD itself is far-right. Finally, the BBC article seems to prove the opposite of what it has been said to. Indeed, on a surface level, it seems to claim the AfD is far-right. However, it also says the AfD is of the same "political family" as "France's far-right National Front and Austria's far-right Freedom Party - as well as the populist, anti-Islam Dutch Freedom Party of Geert Wilders." Neither the National Rally (the National Front doesn't exist), the Austrian Freedom Party, nor the Dutch Party for Freedom are classified as "far-right" on Wikipedia - they are all instead classified as "right-wing to far-right." So, if this is part of the same political family as those, this should not be given special treatment and be called "far-right" while all those remain "right-wing to far-right." The definition of far-right in this article seems to be the definition of right-wing to far-right on Wikipedia. This article also seems to go directly against the thesis of the post that the AfD has become far-right in recent years. The assertion here is that the basis for calling the AfD far-right are due to comments (as in Bjorn Hocke's comments about the Holocaust memorial) and policies (as in the policies on Islam) that were taken in 2016-2017, exactly when most of the sources saying the AfD is Right-wing come from. Here is a good source explaining a clear divide between the AfD's ideology and the far-right, from the Brookings Institute, no less. This one, I think, displays well how the AfD is "right-wing to far-right" instead of just far-right because it shows how there are both moderates (right-wingers) trying to fight against extremists (far-right) over the direction of the party. If, in a month or two, the far-right extremists seem to win, it can be argued that the AfD is far-right. However, for now, the internal party war has yet to have a clear winner or loser. So, until then, we should keep it in that purgatory where most populist parties lie instead of changing it to try to argue something that is being fought over has already been decided. --47.137.28.170 (talk) 16:39, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

You do not need to drown the talk page with barely legible bricks of text rambling about a so-called bias, non-sequitur comparisons with other Wikipedia articles, sources being far-left and whatnot. The history of this party is a story about a rightwards turn in 2015 and a firm current placement at the far-right spectrum (although one authoritative author—Kai Arzheimer—already considered them far-right before their 2015 radicalization). This is perfectly documented and explained in secondary sources authored by authoritative scholars keen on the research of far-right politics in the country: take an example. Whether if (within the overarching far-right) the party fits better as far-right radicals or as far-right extremists is another matter altogether (not actually addressed yet in the article).--Asqueladd (talk) 17:40, 20 June 2020 (UTC)
(ec) Just a few things, in regards to the fluegel, all the personnel are still within the party, in leading roles even. Hoecke in Thuringia, Kalbitz still, or again, in Brandenburg. Court cases ongoing of course but as of now he is a member due a decision by a Berlin court. And those are just the most prominent of the extremists of course, so not even far-right anymore. And while the Guardian article does focus on the now defunct fluegel, that, again, is a case where reality has overtaken the source. The party in two states is now under surveillance just like the fluegel was. There obviously are many sources talking about it, reson being far-right extremism. But you are right that there is a 'war' going on in the party, but that has been going on nearly as long as the party existed. I mean the party started more or less as an economic liberal party coupled with populism. Not quite that anymore of course.
I disagree that a shift in party politics, not just in this case but in every case, should be, to a degree, static. I do understand the difficulty of comparing different sources from different points in time, weighing them up and coming to a consensus on something. And also that it should not happen every week or every other month. But over years that is something that Wikipedia should do. Things change and that change should be reflected. In regards to the BBC article and the part you quote, you compare a reliable source to unreliable Wikipedia articles. And just because the parties are described as something in their articles, really has no bearing on the question here or on what the source itself states. And it very clearly does call the french and austrian parties far-right as well. And Wilders party populist of course. But quite honestly, i know too little about the other parties, the sources in the articles and the developments in the respective parties to have any further opinion on the labels, how accurate they are today etc. Maybe they need adjusting to todays reality as well, maybe they do not. Other stuff exists basically, and those discussion need to happen on those articles.
The Brookings essay makes brief mention of the Afd, talking about the voter base, which really is if no import as the party program and leadership are the important parts, or rather their description in reliable sources is. But does also mention a 'diversity' in leadership (never thought i would use that word when talking about the Afd lol). And that is perhaps relevant, but it goes into little to no detail either. I mean, the essay does call the party "national-socialist" but with quite minimal detail as well. And i would say that is an extremely contentious label to give, should that be given weight for one hardly expanded on sentence as well? But overall the essay talks about populism in Europe. Jobbik of Hungary is mentioned, for example, and described as having a shift in positions, should that shift not also be noted in that article? (probably is noted but i have not looked at the Jobbik article, it should be mentioned anyway). So all in all, that essay says very little on the AfD, but does note there is no total uniformity in the party leadership, the voter part is just irrelevant in my opinion though. So it spends all of 4 sentences or so that may be considered relevant here. And gives hardly any explanations either.
The FT article is paywalled for me so cannot say anything about it.
And just to pick up on your last point again, the party has constantly evolved since it was founded with constant fights of different factions up to the point where now it may not just be a far-right party but turn into an extremist one. And indeed, as you say, we should wait how that turns out until, or even if, we call them extremist. Completely agree on that. But they are far-right now and there is plenty of source material to support that. Is there still recent source material that really goes into how they are still a regular right wing party? And sorry if that is in the FT article, but as i said, paywalled for me.
And as a very minor thing, could you perhaps use section breaks in your reply? It is not very intuitive to do on Wikipedia but of course does help in a discussion like this. No issue if not of course, would just be nice on a personl level. The big text block was a bit hard to navigate in regards to the discussion. But cheers anyway. 2003:D6:2714:3741:D471:A1B0:53F7:22B6 (talk) 18:53, 20 June 2020 (UTC)
As for Asqueladd, the tone's a bit off. The response is not just "I disagree" but "how dare you for disagreeing?" Let's assume best intentions, as per Wikipedia guidelines, and let's try to create an environment in which people don't insult others for their disagreements on particular viewpoints (as you clearly did when you described my perfectly reasonable edit as "barely legible"). It's very bad form. And, I've been seeing this all around this article. Right below, someone else brought up a similar confusion to mine (albeit worded very poorly) and was personally attacked for their post history. This is a very bad precedent I've never seen before on Wikipedia that seems to be the norm around here. Elsewhere in the thread, I've seen someone saying "Do you have any real arguments?" This is supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a form for attacking the character of people you dislike. This entire thread really irks me. Please think about what message you're sending and how you're sending it before you write. (If you wish to chastise anyone for prolonged discussion, why not chastise the person who started the thread, whose post is longer than mine, or the person right below me?) That aside, there's not much of an argument here. It's basically, "you are wrong! There are citations that call it a far-right party!" I do not argue there don't exist sources that call it a far-right party but rather that there are also citations that call it a right-wing party or that argue it is locked in a battle between right-wing and far-right groups. This is also an argument attempting to use wording to avoid what I'm arguing. He is arguing as if someone can be "far-right" without being an extremist or a radical. That is clearly false and most articles use extremist and radical as synonymous with far-right (when talking about the right, of course).
As for the second response, I'm not in full agreement both as to the particulars and the general arguments I made. First of all, I think there's a bit of confusion on my general argument. When I said "right-wing to far-right," I wasn't denying the existence of far-right personnel. I was merely saying that far-right personnel aren't all personnel and that the party is split between right-wing and far-right people (Jorg Meuthen on one end, Bjorn Hocke on the other). So, until the far-right wing controls the party without the right-wing group being a major part of the leadership of the party, we should assume it to be right-wing to far-right and not simply far-right. This is the same reason we consider the National Rally a "right-wing to far-right" party because, while some members tied to leadership roles are holocaust deniers, other parts of the leadership are not, so there are both right-wing and far-right factions. Both of my articles claim this, and I think I've been quite clear about that. My argument is not "the far-right doesn't exist" but rather "it is not solely far-right." I am, of course, not saying we can never change anything on Wikipedia.
Your response to my criticism of the BBC article is very strange. The first thing to point out is that you didn't respond to my point that this BBC article seems to go against the narrative that the AfD has become far-right in recent years, but rather argues it's been far-right since 2016-17. Many of the quotes from senior leaders are taken from 2016-2017, many arguments are about positions the AfD already took in 2016-2017, and there are simply no arguments about it becoming far-right in the past 2 years. If we use this article to argue anything, then we also must use the articles from 2016-2017. The reason why, if this point goes in my favor, this party becomes right-wing to far-right is clear: there are a lot of reputable articles from 2016-2017 that do not agree that this party is far-right that were previously cited on Wikipedia from that time. So, the argument must be that the article has claimed that the party has become far right in the past few years. This BBC article does not agree with that claim, so it should not be used.
As for the question of looking at other Wikipedia articles, I do it because those other articles provide a good way of looking at what Wikipedia policy is for certain kinds of parties. If this article clearly states that this party is similar to two other parties, then we can look at how those other parties dealt with question of whether they are far-right on their talk pages; after all, if the parties are similar, so should Wikipedia's treatment of them. I certainly think that the treatment of different articles on Wikipedia should be consistent and that we should prize that consistency. I realize that this could cause some kind of ad infinitum in which two articles constantly cite consistency with the other one so that they don't have to change, but I still don't think an article comparing one party to another should be used as reason to make one article described differently from others. If there are articles describing the AfD in-itself and how it is far-right without using external examples, that would be much preferred. I would like to see an article that looks like that.
You are right about the Brookings Article. I cited basically, a summary of the longer article, which is a better article. Here is the article, although it's from mid-2019, not 2020 (btw, this is just a good article; I'd recommend reading it even without this thread). The point of the 2020 article is to show that the author still stands by his claims in his article in 2020, to show, basically, that it still applies. The article attempts to eschew the claims that it is a far-right party, claiming that it isn't really coherently "far-right" but rather that it is led by both far-right and right-wing factions, basically splitting party leadership between them. Sorry about the FT article. FT works weirdly; they sometimes move articles between paywall and not-paywall, sometimes based on how you get there. If you look up "Germany's AfD slides in polls" and then click on the first option, it's the same article but not paywalled. I know, it's ridiculous, but that's FT for you. (also, I would just like to point out that the articles from The Guardian and DW are taken as proof the AfD is far-right based on one or two sentences that claim "Germany's far right party has done x," which is, of course, a good application of your point about the Brookings article.)
I also think when a change is made based on "the party has become more right-wing in recent years," it would be good if the articles cited claim that. The claim that the party has become more right-wing since 2017, though, that has been repeated ad nauseam in this thread, is not argued by any citation. Definitely not by The Guardian article, not by the DW article, and, as I have argued before, not really by the BBC article (it has claimed a shift since the Hocke years (2013-2015), but not since the Petry years (2016-2017)). I do believe we can change articles, but not based on a new article that claims a party is far-right but rather by an article that claims it has changed to become far-right. Otherwise, it's not the claim of a shift being argued but rather the original argument over whether an article is right-wing to far-right that is being argued. It feels like the arguments being given are not actually cited in the citations. I would like to see a citation that claims, "the AfD has become more far-right in recent years." Otherwise, it's going to lead to what I'm talking about: a constant appeal to recency and the claim that nothing beyond what was written yesterday works as a citation.
Basically, most articles looking at recent developments conclude that the party is split between the right-wing and far-right factions. Hence "right-wing to far-right." Those articles that claim it is a "far-right" party usually tend to either claim that the party was far-right in 2016-2017 or don't give a reason. Changing the article would require a reason to believe the party has moved further right, to the far-right. No one has provided any such reason. No citation has ever claimed this. More importantly, let's keep civil. At the end of the day, this argument doesn't matter; it's about how a German political party is classified on the English Wikipedia. There's no need to get angry or try to assassinate someone's character over it. --47.137.28.170 (talk) 16:02, 22 June 2020 (UTC)
You don't honestly expect anyone to read and reply to that MASSIVE wall of text, do you? 2003:D6:2714:37A7:DAF:DC30:84A8:237A (talk) 23:43, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

And now we have someone just revert the edit and not take part in discussion. Just a note to a January 2018 RfC in an edit summary. Even if this is rejected, not even a note on the talk page about it is just bad form. As is communicating soley by edit summary. 2003:D6:2714:3743:51A:FEF2:326F:5C23 (talk) 21:11, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Ah well, seems like no one is even interested in talking about it. Please just hat the whole section. I will not edit this or any other page anymore. Fuck this, no one even looks at the talk page and just assumes i don't discuss, do something wrong and so on. And then you have outright nazi trolls in the section below and it is perfectly fine or someone posting INCREDIBLY long comments to stifle discussion, fine as well. Fuck this and good bye. 2003:D6:2714:3743:51A:FEF2:326F:5C23 (talk) 22:27, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

I support this change, and particularly agree with what Asqueladd said. The party is described as "far-right" in most recent sources. The party and its public and journalistic perception has clearly shifted since the old consensus was reached, and since the bulk of the cited sources were written, and to continue relying on them is difficult to justify. This is exemplified by Frauke Petry's departure after the 2017 federal election citing the party's increasing extremism - in light of this, how can one say with a straight face that articles written while she was leader are just as relevant as those written more recently? In addition, the justification given in the page history for reverting this change is weak at best, and the fact that the users who reverted it have not even engaged with this discussion is frankly insulting. If they truly want the article to reflect consensus they should help to create it, or at least try to seriously justify why there is no need for new consensus. Erinthecute (talk) 06:44, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

  • Looking at the sources there is a consensus among political scientists in academic literature that they are far-right. Right wing is a cover all term and the limited number of news outlets that use the cover-all term explicitly refer to them as far-right in other articles contradicting those cited and this is evidence that the term right-wing was used as a cover all term, not a specific position. There is no despute, just the occasional use of a cover all term "right wing to far-right" is a novel interpretation and misreading of sources at best, at worst it is a deliberate and tendentious pushing of opinion in an attempt to sanitise this far-right parties image. Lets stick with the best sources, the academic ones. The party is far-right, they don't turn ultra-nationalist and start calling for bans on immigration on the full moon or after a night on the grog, that is their full time ideological position. End of story. Bacondrum (talk) 02:22, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Right wing claim

All of the sources cited for right wing have explicitly described the AfD as a far-right party.

  • Deutsche Welle [1], [2], [3], [4] this list could go on for pages. Generally speaking this outlet repeatedly refers to them explicitly as far-right and clearly uses right-wing in a general sense.
  • Foreign Affairs [5], [6], [7] this list could also go on for pages. In at least one of these articles they refer to the party as both right wing and far-right, demonstrating the catch all nature of "right-wing".
  • The Independent [8], [9], [10], [11], [12] "gaining support from right-wing organisations, including Germany’s far-right party AfD party" see how right-wing is used in a general sense. Many of these articles use both terms.
  • Sydney Morning Herald[13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18] Could go on forever, the overwhelming majority of their articles describe AfD as far-right explicitly.
  • BBC News [19], [20], [21], [22], [23] etc etc etc.
Clearly the outlets consider the AfD to be far-right and use the term right wing only in a general sense, either that or their editors are schizophrenic. I believe there is evidence of tendentious misrepresenting of sources going on here. As one can clearly see from the sources wider reportage, the claim that AfD's position is contested - that they are seen by some as merely "right-wing" - is a massive misrepresentation. As the claim is not backed by the sources I am going to go ahead a remove this un-sourced claim. Bacondrum (talk) 04:50, 2 September 2020 (UTC)
user:Nillurcheier Hi, as demonstrated above, all sources used to cite "right-wing" actually refer to AfD as explicitly far-right and the cover all term has been cherry picked from their wider reportage, therefor the claim is not verified and is in-fact clearly a misrepresentation of the sources wider reportage on the subject. Bacondrum (talk) 21:10, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

RFC ideological position (news citations)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


If a news media outlet refers to a parties ideological position as say "radical-left" in dozens of articles covering the subject, would it be appropriate to then give a contrary description of the party as "centre-left" based on a single article from the exact same outlet? Is that cherry picking or misrepresenting the outlets broader reporting on the subject? Thanks in advance. Bacondrum (talk) 23:14, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Tricky question since both far-right and far-left are more or less derogatory labels. I see that three labels are used in the article; centre-right, right-wing, and far-right. None of these are precisely defined. And if they were, they would have to be defined in relation to what is right and left in Germany and not in relation to some international standard... In short, calling AfD right-wing (only) seems fair. ImTheIP (talk) 23:14, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Right wing

Back to the right wing claim. I believe this has been added tendentiously. It is not verifiable and is not backed by reliable sources. I believe the terms use and therefore the sources have been misrepresented in an attempt to soften the parties image. If you look at all the sources cited, in wider reportage they describe AfD as far-right, thus I believe right wing is being used in a catch-all sense and not as a specific position. Right wing should be removed. See wider reportage by all sources cited for "right-wing" claim. All of the sources cited for right wing have explicitly described the AfD as a far-right party.

  • Deutsche Welle [24], [25], [26], [27] this list could go on for pages. Generally speaking this outlet repeatedly refers to them explicitly as far-right and clearly uses right-wing in a general sense.
  • Foreign Affairs [28], [29], [30] this list could also go on for pages. In at least one of these articles they refer to the party as both right wing and far-right, demonstrating the catch all nature of "right-wing".
  • The Independent [31], [32], [33], [34], [35] "gaining support from right-wing organisations, including Germany’s far-right party AfD party" see how right-wing is used in a general sense. Many of these articles use both terms.
  • Sydney Morning Herald[36], [37], [38], [39], [40], [41] Could go on forever, the overwhelming majority of their articles describe AfD as far-right explicitly. Bacondrum (talk) 23:35, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
I personally think contentious claims about political positions like this should not rely on a menagerie of news sources, but rather more reliable sources such as political science academics. I think it looks and reads ridiculously especially seeing we go on to say this "Since 2015, the AfD has been increasingly open to working with far-right extremist groups such as Pegida. Parts of the AfD have racist, Islamophobic, anti-Semitic, and xenophobic tendencies linked to far-right movements such as neo-Nazism and the Identitarian movement." Well, how much more mealy mouthed and weaselly can we get? Reliable sources clearly place them on the far-right, and our article does too. Right wing is clearly a catch all term being misrepresented here to tendentiously soften the image of a far-right party with connections to neo-Nazism. Bacondrum (talk) 23:42, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
I think you can be bold and change it. I don't think anyone would mind. ImTheIP (talk) 11:44, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
Please see Talk:Alternative for Germany/Archive 5 (right-wing[9] to far-right[10]) where this received a long discussion by many different editors. There was no consensus to remove right-wing or far-right. This has been discussed multiple times on the article's talk page and many editors have discussed this. We really need a similar large discussion again and a new consensus if we want to change this. Also, the claim of right-wing being used by these sources as a catch-all phrase is your view/interpretation, not necessarily fact. Of course, news sources are typically going to be more inclined to use labels such as far-right over right-wing as its more sensational more likely to garner clicks. Helper201 (talk) 01:48, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
Right-wing is a broad term covering the entire right-wing. There's been no consensus what-so-ever to include right-wing as a position. The previous debates show that there are serious issues with its inclusion. It's being added in a tendentious manner, its use in this manner misrepresents the sources and is a blatant equivocation. You need a consensus to include, failing that you have no grounds for the adding the unverified and disputed claim. Bacondrum (talk) 08:12, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
"Of course, news sources are typically going to be more inclined to use labels such as far-right over right-wing as its more sensational more likely to garner clicks" so the sources are not reliable in your opinion? Or are they reliable only when they say something that you like, and unreliable when their wider reporting doesn't agree with what they are saying? Bacondrum (talk) 08:16, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
I didn't say they are not reliable, I'm just stating why news sources would be more inclined to use one term over another. I have no disagreement over keeping the far-right label. I just do not agree that right-wing is always used in the context of being a catch-all statement or that it should be removed here. There aren't just positions of centre-right and far-right, but there are clearly positions and cases where parties fall somewhere between these two positions, as is the case here. The same could be argued against you in that you just don't like that some sources use the claim of right-wing, so therefore self-define every case where it occurs as the source using it as a catch-all term. This is your interpretation. Helper201 (talk) 19:40, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
Obviously there are many right-wing positions from center-right to far-right...you are wrong - right-wing is a catch all term and there is no dispute about AfD's position, none-at-all. You are obviously trying to sanitize the image of a far-right party in a tendentious manner, I can only assume you are a supporter of the far-right. I can't be bothered fighting POV pushing from far-right activists here anymore. You win, push your bullshit claim that their ideological position n is disputed if you want. Bacondrum (talk) 20:51, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
Then if there are many positions from centre-right to far-right, why do you never bring these up or propose using them? Please try and attempt to find a compromise solution. There's clearly a difference between parties such as the AfD and more extreme parties that are purely far-right, like the National Democratic Party of Germany. To simply label both as purely far-right is disingenuous as it shows absolutely no nuance and makes it seem as if they are both equally as extreme as each other, which they aren't. I am in no way a supporter of the far-right, I'm not on the political right at all. I am concerned about objectivity. There aren't just parties than slightly lean to the left or right, then extreme parties at the far end of either side of the political spectrum, there are clearly parties than can fall in between these positions, either entirely or partly. I have attempted to compromise with you on multiple occasions such as removing the historical ideologies from the ideological section of the infobox on this page and being open to using other terms and seeking alternate ways forward. You seem unwilling to budge on any compromise that isn't just simply removing any and all right-wing labels and only retaining the position of far-right, as you are consistently reading into the same conclusion that every source you are presented with is using the right-wing term in a catch-all manner. Helper201 (talk) 02:57, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
You are proposing a false compromise. Right-wing is a catch all, that's a fact. Follow the sources without using equivocation to cherry pick your own POV and push a moderation fallacy. You are pushing for something that is not true at all, there is no debate about this far-right parties position, they are on the right-wing of the spectrum, and their specific position that side is far-right - your use of right-wing as a specific position is a lie, it is an equivocation - if you are okay with misrepresenting sources like that it's on you, I can't be bothered trying to get the article to actually reflect what sources say anymore. Bacondrum (talk) 07:54, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
All the different right-wing ideologies are right-wing, amazing I know, but what is so hard to understand about that? Nothing. There is not and has never been any debate about the AfD's position. Bacondrum (talk) 08:02, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Ideology section of infobox

There's way too much listed here. Any ideas on how to cut it down? Ezhao02 (talk) 13:14, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

You're right, it needs reducing urgently. We should list just three ideologies at most, as ideally should be the case for all political party Infoboxes. Right-wing populism, National conservatism and either German nationalism or Ultranationalism (in that order) would be my picks.--Autospark (talk) 13:48, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
What is wrong with listing many ideologies? Pruning the list risks introducing bias as it is not clear how to determine which entries to keep and which to remove. ImTheIP (talk) 23:55, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
It's silly, that kind of detail belongs in the body. The info box is supposed to give a concise overview and not go into excessive detail as per guidelines
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Infobox#What_should_an_infobox_contain?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Infobox#What_should_an_infobox_not_contain?
  • I went ahead and trimmed it, still has a massive WP:CITATIONOVERKILL problem. As per guidelines the infobox shouldn't require many/any citations at all, ideally. Also, this "historic" crap needs to stop - the party was founded in 2013 for gods sake - it is less than a decade old, it barely has any history. I've never seen a "historic" section like this, look at the Labour Party (UK) for example, 120 years old and there is no "historic" section. Bacondrum (talk) 00:36, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, the history section was overkill. I do think that Social conservatism should be kept - it's one of the main ideologies for AfD. ImTheIP (talk) 00:50, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
I don't object to that Bacondrum (talk) 02:15, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
Social conservatism is redundant, as that's inherently part of right-wing populism. If we're going to list any form of conservatism, it should be national conservatism. I agree that the "historical" part of the Infobox section should be removed, as the early incarnation of AfD was very short-lived. In addition, anti-Islam and anti-immigration should also be removed from the current Infobox, as both are political positions rather than distinct ideologies, and (again) both are in effect already covered by right-wing populism.--Autospark (talk) 15:43, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
Sounds reasonable to me. Bacondrum (talk) 23:22, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
I disagree with mass removing cited ideologies. WP:CITATIONOVERKILL is for when citations make what is stated difficult to read or breaks up the text. With the exception of anti-Islam, which we could cut some of the citations out for, the infobox is easy to read, navigate and understand. I don't see any advantage to removing cited content. The reason anti-Islam has so many citations is due to edit warring over the matter. I have sort compromise and removed the historical ideologies. As it currently stands the infobox is easy to read and navigate. Limiting the ideology list to just German nationalism, right-wing populism and Euroscepticism waters down the extremity of the party and unnecessarily limits and constrains the information given. Helper201 (talk) 03:21, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
Well, there's been an ongoing discussion among a number of editors and we all agreed to trim the section in accourdance with guidelines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Infobox#What_should_an_infobox_contain? and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Infobox#What_should_an_infobox_not_contain?. A compromise is not the answer to everything, you seem to have a habit of offering false compromise with the compromise being to include your unverifiable/misinterpreted/cherry picked POV. I think it's time these tendentious false compromises were stopped at far-right articles. Bacondrum (talk) 02:59, 27 September 2020 (UTC)
Actually, no, you didn't all agree to one position. ImTheIP advocated keeping social conservativism, which you ignored and removed. Also, see - WP:DEMOCRACY. Please read Wikipedia:Consensus, including WP:CONLIMITED. This is two editors agreeing on mass removing cited material supplied by many more editors over a long period of time. This clearly contradicts the line "Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale". You haven't even looked into the idea of a compromise, nor has it even been discussed at all, that's the point of a talk page - discussion. Whether and/or to what extent the infobox brakes/broke the guidelines of Help:Infobox is also highly subjective. How much is excessive and who decides this? There has been no discussion on even what should be kept and why, and what shouldn't and why. Your personal vendetta against me to assume negative intentions does not give you the authority to override, mischaracterise or ignore the points I bring up for discussion. These positions have been added by multiple editors and have numerous citations and the article's formation including the ideologies in the infobox have took place with much surrounding discussion from many editors over years of editing and all the claims are supported by reliable sources. To just come in and rough shot mass remove cited content without even allowing adequate time for discussion is not helpful. Take a look at Talk:Greta Thunberg/Archive 9#Picture change, where I proposed a new image. At the request of other editors, I allowed the discussion to stay open for a month without changing the picture. Change should come after consensus; you don't have the right to change it and then constantly revert to your own position. You propose the change, then if it is disagreed upon you come to the talk page and wait for a consensus, THEN change it, not the other way around. Helper201 (talk) 08:16, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Infobox

As per MOS:INFOBOX if the lede makes a claim, the infobox should reflect that, yeah? It shouldn't offer an alternative to the descriptor used in the lede, an alternative that contradicts the existing consensus? Bacondrum (talk) 00:22, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

It already reflects this in the 'ideology' section of the infobox. There is no need to restate something that isn't a position in the 'position' section of the infobox.--Jay942942 (talk) 00:52, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
The article describes their position as "Alternative for Germany (German: Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) is a right-wing populist political party, often characterized as far-right" with citations. The info box is supposed to reflect this, end of story. You can't negate consensus in this manner as per WP:GAME. Bacondrum (talk) 01:16, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
The first part of that lede description, "right-wing populist" is likely referring to the ideology (not the position) of the party, since that phrase was already in the 'ideology' part of the infobox before this consensus was reached, and that phrase is almost always included in the 'ideology' section of infoboxes and not the 'position' section. The second part, 'far-right', yes, is referring to the position. They're in separate clauses. I'm not negating any consensus. If you really want "right wing populist" in the 'position' section, then do you still support it remaining in the 'ideology' section? As for the 'far-right' thing – since I know you've discussed this with people on other talk pages – I don't object to that being there, and wouldn't mind if you or another editor changed the entire position of the party to 'far-right' like the consensus you formed on National Rally and Vox (political party). It's just bizarre to have something that isn't recognized as a 'position' on the rest of WP being recognized as one here. If you want to push to change conventions and normalise the use of 'right wing populist' as a position on Wikipedia, I suggest also raising this on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Politics/Political parties, since I imagine your argument would be relevant to a lot more parties beyond AfD.--Jay942942 (talk) 12:34, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

RFC is the AfD's ideological position disputed?

The majority of sources used in this article describe the party as far-right, a few describe them as simply right-wing. However, the right wing descriptor is used in the article to claim a dispute (right-wing to far-right) regarding the AfD's specific idiological position. So, do the sources presented below:

  • (A) Dispute the AfD's ideological positioning on the far-right or
  • (B) Simply use a catch all term for the entire right-wing

Bacondrum (talk) 23:48, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

Survey

  • B There is no evidence what-so-ever that the AfD's position on the far-right is disputed in reliable sources. Right-wing is not a specific position, it is a broad term for the entire right-wing. All five outlets cited for the claim (Deutsche Welle, Foreign Affairs, The Independent, the Sydney Morning Herald and the BBC) have referred to them as far-right in their broader reportage as demonstrated here:
Same sources explicitly describe the AfD as a far-right party in wider reportage:
  • Deutsche Welle [42], [43], [44], [45] this list could go on for pages. Generally speaking this outlet repeatedly refers to them explicitly as far-right and clearly uses right-wing in a general sense.
  • Foreign Affairs [46], [47], [48] this list could also go on for pages. In at least one of these articles they refer to the party as both right wing and far-right, demonstrating the catch all nature of "right-wing".
  • The Independent [49], [50], [51], [52], [53] "gaining support from right-wing organisations, including Germany’s far-right party AfD party" see how right-wing is used in a general sense. Many of these articles use both terms.
  • Sydney Morning Herald[54], [55], [56], [57], [58], [59] Could go on forever, the overwhelming majority of their articles describe AfD as far-right explicitly.
  • BBC News [60], [61], [62], [63], [64] etc etc etc.
I personally think we should be looking to academia not news reports for such claims regardless. The current misrepresenting of the broad term right-wing in news reportage is not evidence of a dispute about their ideological position and the claim is fallacious in the extreme, IMO. It reads ridiculously, the far-right is right-wing, it's a tautology. Bacondrum (talk) 23:59, 4 October 2020 (UTC)
Bacondrum, the far right is right wing, but not all right wing parties are far right. It's not a tautology. DGG ( talk ) 00:39, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
Hi DGG The far-right is right-wing. So if "right-wing to far-right" is not a tautology, it's damn close to being one. certainly reads oddly. Regardless, I don't think this odd sounding claim is backed by sources. Bacondrum (talk) 01:25, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
  • B: I agree that the description "right-wing" is not mutually exclusive with "far-right", and that the appropriate term for a party that has been described as both "right-wing" and "far-right" in several reliable sources is "far-right", not "right-wing to far-right". (This isn't the first time I've seen this basic dispute show up; we might want to do a more general RfC later.) Loki (talk) 00:57, 7 October 2020 (UTC)
  • B I think the second option might be a more appropriate option, it means: "(B) Simply use a catch all term for the entire right-wing". Ali Ahwazi (talk) 09:28, 9 October 2020 (UTC)
  • More academic sources use "right-wing populist" than "far right".[1][2][3][4][5] "Far right" can be a broad category: there is a big difference between AfD and Kotleba, Golden Dawn, or even Confederation, although all of them are considered far right. (t · c) buidhe 08:34, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Arzheimer, Kai (4 May 2015). "The AfD: Finally a Successful Right-Wing Populist Eurosceptic Party for Germany?". West European Politics. 38 (3): 535–556. doi:10.1080/01402382.2015.1004230.
  2. ^ Lux, Thomas (June 2018). "Die AfD und die unteren Statuslagen. Eine Forschungsnotiz zu Holger Lengfelds Studie Die „Alternative für Deutschland": eine Partei für Modernisierungsverlierer?". KZfSS Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie. 70 (2): 255–273. doi:10.1007/s11577-018-0521-2.
  3. ^ Schmitt-Beck, Rüdiger (2 January 2017). "The 'Alternative für Deutschland in the Electorate': Between Single-Issue and Right-Wing Populist Party". German Politics. 26 (1): 124–148. doi:10.1080/09644008.2016.1184650.
  4. ^ Jankowski, Michael; Schneider, Sebastian; Tepe, Markus (November 2017). "Ideological alternative? Analyzing Alternative für Deutschland candidates' ideal points via black box scaling". Party Politics. 23 (6): 704–716. doi:10.1177/1354068815625230.
  5. ^ Jesse, Eckhard (2019). "Das Aufkommen der Alternative für Deutschland". Rechtspopulismus in Einwanderungsgesellschaften: Die politische Auseinandersetzung um Migration und Integration (in German). Springer Fachmedien. pp. 97–131. ISBN 978-3-658-23401-0.
  • Not a great RfC question - Do the sources listed use a catch all term for the entire right-wing? Absolutely. Does that mean that we can assume that they support a more specific term? No. Does it mean that we can ignore sources which use the more general term and use the more specific term only? Absolutely not. The appropriate term for a party that has been described as both "right-wing" and "far-right" in several reliable sources depends on the proportion of sources which use either of those descriptions (and also the quality of those sources) - e.g. if 99% of the sources use "right-wing" and 1% use "far-right" then "far-right" is clearly not the correct term for us to use; of course, the converse is also true. I think also that some of the respondents may find a confusion between the question asking what the sources do and a question of what we should do in the article text. And I share buidhe's thought on academic sources using "right-wing populist". - Ryk72 talk 01:27, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
[Responses moved to discussion section below] Loki (talk) 18:05, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

  • [Ryk72's response above was here.]
I guess the simplest way to ask would be: Is there a dispute about AfD's political position evidenced in reliable sources? I'm open to "right-wing populist", that's an actual position. As I've pointed out "right-wing to far-right" makes no sense, if that's not a tautology its very similar in its faulty logic - the far-right is right wing. That's the issue for me, this odd phrasing is justified by others as reflecting a dispute among reliable sources, when in fact there is none. Bacondrum (talk) 02:32, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
Entirely agree on the oddness of the phrasing - one is a superset of the other - but there are at least a couple of ways to fix that. I'm not sure that there needs to be a dispute, though - difference, inconsistency or discrepancy would suffice - Ryk72 talk 16:25, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
I would say the first sentence might be something like: "Alternative for Germany (German: Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) is a right-wing populist political party, often characterized as far right, known for its opposition to the European Union, multiculturalism, and immigration." (these are AfD's main issues) (t · c) buidhe 16:05, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
Assuming sourcing, I think that's quite good; well phrased. I'd perhaps only split the last clause out into a separate sentence; in exactly the same position; but only perhaps. - Ryk72 talk 16:25, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
Agreed, this is much better, reflects sourcing and does not misrepresent a dispute where there is little or none. And the phrasing is much more logical. Bacondrum (talk) 21:50, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
I oppose the above. The intro should simply read "Alternative for Germany (German: Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) is a right-wing populist political party in Germany, often characterised as far right". Being anti-EU, anti-multiculturalism and anti-immigration are standard, typical features of right-wing populist and far-right parties across Europe, and adding that merely makes the intro weighed down with redundant information that should instead be elaborated upon in the article body.--Autospark (talk) 15:07, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
To a certain extent, this is the case. However, these parties differ in what issues they emphasize most. Some extreme right parties focus more on other issues, such as being anti-LGBT, anti-Roma, or anti-Nato—or, in other eras, anti-Jewish, irredentism against other countries, or anti-communist. I do think it's worth mentioning the top few issues in the first two sentences. (t · c) buidhe 17:24, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
I support buidhe's suggested lead in its entirety. Yes, those are common positions for European far-right parties, but we shouldn't assume the reader is familiar enough with European politics to know that. Loki (talk) 15:17, 16 October 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I also support buidhe's suggested lead in its entirety. If there is a dispute it certainly isn't that the far-right is right-wing. "right-wing populist political party, often characterized as far right" actually reflects what little dispute there is between sources. The specific issues they focus on are obviously highly pertinent to the lede. Bacondrum (talk) 23:29, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks buidhe I think that's a massive improvement. Bacondrum (talk) 22:57, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

It seems the consensus here is for the lede, not the 'position' section of the infobox. Nowhere else on Wikipedia do they put "populist" in the position section of an infobox. I'm fairly ambivalent as to what exactly should be in there, but it should be a position of some kind, like "right-wing", "right-wing to far-right", "far-right", whatever people decide is appropriate.--Jay942942 (talk) 23:54, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
Right wing is not a specific position, it's a broad grouping of ideological positions, a cover all - the entire right-wing is...well, right wing. right-wing populist is absolutely a well known and specific ideological position. The infobox is supposed to reflect the article. Wikipedia is not a reliable source. Bacondrum (talk) 00:47, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
Please read the section on 'consistency' in WP:INFOBOX. It is absolutely relevant to consider how infoboxes on similar article pages are written when deciding what to enter in this one. Unless you are suggesting the AfD is unique in having a right-wing populist "position"?--Jay942942 (talk) 00:59, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
Please read the guidelines again, carefully. The article describes their position as, and I quote "right-wing populist political party, often characterized as far-right" with citations. The info box is supposed to reflect this. I think this might be a case of Wikipedia:Competence is required. Bacondrum (talk) 01:10, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
I'm not going to engage with personal attacks. There's no consensus here for the political position you entered. The consensus here was regarding the lede, and it was natural to infer the 'ideology' section of the infobox should reflect that, but not the 'position', given that's not been done elsewhere on Wikipedia before. Changing the 'position' section of the infobox is an extraordinary act that would almost certainly need a new Talk page consensus. You'll see when other people revert you, as one already has. Pinging the people you made a consensus with to confirm that their consensus was regarding the lede (and likely by extension the 'ideology' section of the infobox), but not the 'position' section of the infobox: @Buidhe, Autospark, Ryk72, LokiTheLiar, and Vif12vf: --Jay942942 (talk) 12:24, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
I'm sorry, I did not mean it as a personal insult. It's just that right-wing populism is a political position, it's what our article states and it is well sourced. I personally think it should say simply far-right, but the consensus was right-wing populist often characterized as far-right. The lede should reflect the article, end of story. Lots of articles have different positions, because political parties have different positions. Bacondrum (talk) 21:15, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
I think you might be talking past each other a bit. The infobox contains two fields: a section for political ideologies, under which we already list right-wing populism along with a ton of other ideologies, and a section for political position, which appears to be intended to be position on a conventional left-right spectrum without other qualifications.
I agree that I would like to avoid mentioning "populism" in the position field though I'm not totally opposed. My personal view is that the most accurate description of AfD for the purposes of that field is "far-right". I'd accept "right-wing" if the consensus is against me. I don't think "right-wing to far-right" (what we currently have) makes any sense: IMO this is like saying someone is between California and Los Angeles. Loki (talk) 18:00, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
I support only having far-right. I mean ideally we could stop all the arguments over position by only having a few option, from non-controversial, broad descriptors like left or right wing. But that is obviously a bigger conversation. Bacondrum (talk) 21:39, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
Agreed that having either only "right wing" or only "far right" resolves questions of linguistic inconsistencies. Per WP:DUE, the question of which is dependent on the support for each in the corpus of reliable sources. WP:RSCONTEXT inclines us to filter that by defocusing passing mentions; giving "reliable sources which deal primarily or significantly with the topic". WP:RSOPINION requires us to attribute opinions, either specifically or generally (as we have done in the lead section). WP:IMPARTIAL requires us not to reflect source bias in the language used in our articles. So, what do reliable sources which deal primarily or significantly with the subject, and which are not opinion or opinionated, say? - Ryk72 talk 21:48, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
I am okay with just far-right as well. I would suggest adding a "radical right" content note too in the style of what was done with the National Rally and Vox pages, but it's not essential.--Jay942942 (talk) 12:35, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Political Orientation of AFD

@Jay942942, Bacondrum, Marko8726, Dave wolf544, Tastypotato0932, Volunteer Marek, Helper201, Grasshopperweeb, LokiTheLiar, MWD115, Saxones288, Vif12vf, Buidhe, Aréat, Nillurcheier, Ezhao02, Vacant0, and Braganza:

Should the party be described as:

  • Right-wing
  • Right-wing to far-right
  • Far-right
  • Other option ?

PS : Sorry in advance to notify so many contributors, but we really need a maximum of votes to avoid further conflicts on infobox. Martopa (talk) 15:48, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

  • Right-wing to far-right or Far-right with a note explaining radical/extreme right like at Vox (political party) or National Rally. None of the major reliable sources denies that the party has xenophobic and racist views (and probably sexist views), but their members aren't violent (arguably not anti-democratic) and don't glorify Mussolini, Hitler, Ferenc Szalasi, Pétain etc. contrary to National Democratic Party of Germany or Italian Forza Nuova for example. --Martopa (talk) 15:48, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
  • This is a dumb RfC, we already discussed the question above and came to a consensus based on how academic sources describe the party's political orientation. (t · c) buidhe 15:50, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
@Buidhe: Yes it is true you are right, however when you quickly look at the main article's history, there are still conflicts (I am not talking about anonymous IPs but discrepancies between Marko8726 and Bacondrum or between Bacondrum and Grasshopperweeb for example). --Martopa (talk) 16:11, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Martopa, I still don't see any evidence of adequate WP:RFCBEFORE on your part. Can't this be resolved in some other way than holding a RfC? (t · c) buidhe 16:15, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Buidhe Yes, I rushed a little too much, I often tend to think that voting helps to clarify, but it's true that Wikipedia is not a democracy. However it is not always easy to discuss on this matter because some editors (@MWD115: who regularly whitewashes these kind of parties for example) never participate on corresponding talk's pages, in his particular case MWD115 doesn't even respond on his own talk page. --Martopa (talk) 16:29, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Martopa, I would suggest removing the RfC tag. If some editor never responds on the talk page, it doesn't matter, you can easily revert their edit and point them to the above discussion where we came to a consensus on this issue. If indeed they are consistently whitewashing far-right parties against consensus you can gather compelling evidence and try to have them topic banned at WP:ANI. (t · c) buidhe 16:32, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Buidhe Ok, I'll take it off. Should the title of the section also be rephrased in this case ? I would never understand all those editors who are not satisfied with the current version of these political parties' pages, without ever trying to discuss so that their preferred version obtains a consensus, they let their chance pass. --Martopa (talk) 16:58, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Martopa, Sure, I would just delete the part of it that says "RfC". There's no problem with bold editing as long as editors cite reliable sources and make the case why the changes are right, but that doesn't seem to be the case here. (t · c) buidhe 17:02, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
More as a service than an opinion: The German Wikipedia says "ist eine rechtspopulistische, in Teilen rechtsextreme politische Partei" which translates to "is a right-wing populistic, partly far-right political party". It can't be completely wrong to follow this description in the English speaking Wikipedia as well. Nillurcheier (talk) 17:06, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
Martopa:::::Buidhe I would like to add I do not "whitewash" these parties, I don't support any political party and studied global populism. I wanted to make these pages more objective if anything, as they seemed biased in the opposite direction by trumping up the more controversial elements of the party or replying on sources that only talk about how racist/far-right/xenophobic the parties are (which are genuine elements in their policies or what members have said) but it was done in a way that was not written in a balanced tone, hence why I added people like Hans-Georg Betz who write objectively, or add what the party had to say as a response, which in a neutral article should be taken into account even if we disagree with what the party stands for ideologically.
@MWD115: I partly agree with you, but on this kind of controversial pages where conflicts are regular, if you do not go to the talk's page, your edits will be systematically reverted (by Bacondrum in this case but not only him) because it will be seen/perceived as an attempt to "sanitize/normalize" these parties, even if it's not your intention and that the current versions do not correspond to reality. For example on the page Pauline Hanson's One Nation where I pinged you (November 2020), you never responded and only a minority of editors participated on party's position RFC. Currently the page of this Australian party is blocked only on the "far-right racist" version and a new consensus can never be achieved if editors like you do not explain your edits (and eventually vote on RFCs) when you have the opportunity, it's the only solution if you want to change these situations and "neutralize" the articles in question. This is what I have been trying to explain to you on your talk page for 2 days. --Martopa (talk) 13:10, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right or Far-right with a note explaining radical/extreme right like at Vox (political party) or National Rally. I agree with Martopa here: the main reason I initially opposed listing only "far-right" was due to the lack of a distinction between radical right and extreme right. I believe that the note sufficiently addresses this distinction, but I also would not oppose "right-wing to far right". However, I do believe that the note is necessary, especially if only "far-right" is listed. Ezhao02 (talk) 17:19, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Far-right - "Right-wing to far-right" is a tautology, the far-right is right wing. No evidence of any dispute about their position has been presented - overwhelming majority of academic and news sources describe them as far-right. When we start to see academics and reporters saying something like "AfD are not far-right, this is an unfair descriptor, they are in-fact centrists"...neo-liberals, communists or whatever...then we have evidence in reliable sources of a contested descriptor. As it stands there is a firm consensus among reliable sources that they are on the far-right of the right-wing. I personally think much of this "Right-wing to far-right" nonsense is an attempt to white wash the party. Bacondrum 21:18, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right. There are plenty of sources that simply describe the party as right-wing and those that describe it as far-right, both should thus be represented. The party is clearly not a purely far-right party like the National Democratic Party of Germany is. It is not ultranationalist, neo-Nazi or fascist. It may have far-right elements within it but to describe the party as purely, simply and only far-right is inaccurate and misrepresentative. To just call the party only far-right makes it seem indistinguishable from parties like the German NPD, which is clearly to the right of the AfD. Helper201 (talk) 07:20, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
The far-right is right wing, it's a tautology, simply omitting the "far" part is not an indication that the source is contesting the far-right descriptor found in an almost interminable number of reliable academic and news sources. Bacondrum 07:32, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right Only a faction Der Flügel is far-right, the other politians are either right-wing or between right-wing and far-right. Marko8726 (talk) 11:47, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Far-right with a note explaining radical/extreme right like at Vox (political party) or National Rally. As Bacondrum wrote above, "No evidence of any dispute about their position has been presented - overwhelming majority of academic and news sources describe them as far-right." Saxones288 (talk) 03:30, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Far-right: "Right-wing to far-right" does not make sense. Far-right is a strict subset of right-wing. Calling them "right-wing to far-right" is like describing a location as "between California and Los Angeles". Loki (talk) 07:21, 19 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right as sourced and described in the German Wikipedia. Nillurcheier (talk) 09:47, 19 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Far-right with an explanatory caveat about the radical right, as suggested by Saxones288.--Autospark (talk) 10:14, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right with an explanation about radical right, if there are references about them being right-wing then add them back, you can't call AfD a solely far-right party because of its extremist factions. Vacant0 (talk) 12:55, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
    • I did some research about AfD and because of it I'm changing my vote to Far-right. Vacant0 (talk) 12:59, 6 March 2021 (UTC)
  • This discussion is coming to essentially the same conclusion as the previous https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Alternative_for_Germany#RFC_is_the_AfD's_ideological_position_disputed? Consensus was and remains that there is no evidence that the the descriptor "far-right" is contested in any way. Bacondrum 21:37, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
    • Bacondrum, the matter has been discussed extensively long before you brought it up (Talk:Alternative for Germany/Archive 5), wherein there was no consensus to use only far-right. You yourself have admitted against your own claim that right-wing to far-right is not always a tautology as you first claimed. It all depends on context and the author. Some do classify right-wing and far-right as separate positions on the political spectrum wherein right-wing is not as far down the political spectrum as far-right but further along than centre-right. I think most people will agree there are political parties that are further to the right than the centre-right but that doesn't automatically make them purely or simply far-right. Helper201 (talk) 23:34, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
nonsense. Show me a single source disputing the widely used descriptor “far-right” failing that it’s a tautology...there are many positions between centre right and far right, none of which have been presented. The claim is POV nonsense, original research. An unverified claim. Bacondrum 00:11, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Far-right - How many times is this going to be relitigated? A trout to Martopa for starting this up again. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:52, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
A trout indeed. Bacondrum 00:11, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
  • While i told myself not to make another edit here after the way it went mid last year, which put me well off this toxic hell hole (but at least the Nazi troll from Heide finally had their IP rangeblocked after many years lol). Looked at the news today, had to laugh and it made me think of this article. Had not even looked at it since mid last year. But it seems even the german government believes that the party is not just far right, but an actual danger to democracy and is well on its way to be designated an extremist group. And just to clarify, it still is 'only' a suspected extremist group, but that is pretty much just a necessary step on the ladder. It is a very involved process. There surely are an abundance of more sources on that, i just took the obvious english language media source as it only happened today. Said designation is not something that can happen on a whim or without foundation and is all around not something any bureaucrat can just do. Given Germanys history, the barriers for things of that nature, like surveillance of a political party by intelligence services, are very high. But do go on whitewashing the article, i expect nothing less. And i do apologise to those who actully are trying to uphold the standards of Wikipedia through verifiable and reliably sourced information. But as is obvious, a fair few are not interested in that but rather whitewashing. And as a sidenote, i am still so glad to have made the decision to take a step away from the incredibly toxic atmosphere that is Wikipedia. Have a good one anyway. 85.16.47.249 (talk) 19:44, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
thanks for the link, I couldn't agree more, the BBC had this to say about AfD "Some of the party's rhetoric has been tinged with Nazi overtones...The party's leader in the eastern state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, once described Berlin's Holocaust memorial as a "monument of shame" and called for a "180-degree turnaround" in Germany's handling of its Nazi past. Picking up the same theme, Alexander Gauland trivialised the Nazi era as "just a speck of bird's muck in more than 1,000 years of successful Germany history"." https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-37274201 It's a appalling to me that any one would attempt to soften this extremist party's image Bacondrum 20:09, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
No worries, thank you for getting the troll rangeblocked last year by the way. Even went through the AN archives to find the thread lol (had to use your contributions to find it; felt almost like detective work haha; and yes, lockdown is boring :P). They were doing that for many many years and i had to deal with them a few times over the years. And finally someone stopped them. So, i had quite a few laughs today in my lonely and boring lockdown life haha. Not a bad day overall. And to not just use this as a forum, i will keep an eye on this for a few more days, if anyone wants additional german language sources, i would be willing to help out in that regard. But it does seem rather straight forward so i am unsure if it even is needed. And there should be quite a few english language sources as well on the designation as a suspected extremist group, obviously. But anyway, the offer stands for the next few days. Then i will get the hell away from here again lol. Have a good one. 85.16.47.249 (talk) 20:41, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Far right. This discussion is more or less over, but it's absurd that people are still trying to argue the extremists are only a minority of the party. If anyone has any doubts at this point, they can take it up with the BfV. Also, regarding the distinction between radical and extreme right, it's worth noting that that distinction was coined in the context of German politics - and the BfV specifically monitors extreme right groups. At this point, it's more accurate to say that AfD is divided between radical right and extreme right factions, with the latter becoming more powerful with time. Already in 2019, up to 40% of party membership supported Der Flügel,[1][2] and this was stronger in the eastern states (in Saxony, support was potentially up to 70%).[3] Of course, the extremist presence has only continued to grow since then.[4] Where are the moderates? Where is this mythical moderate national-conservative faction who balance out the extremists and justify the label "right-wing to far-right"? I'd love to know. Erinthecute (talk) 09:53, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Right-wing to far-right per NPOV, i see many sources calling them just right wing. We have space in infobox to add them both. Shadow4dark (talk) 14:04, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Direct democracy

You should include this in the info box.

80.131.56.37 (talk) 01:32, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

No need to put this party into the segment "Antisemitism in Germany"

This party clearly supports both jewish life in Germany and Israel abroad. Stupid strawman.

62.226.87.182 (talk) 03:34, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Antisemitism is rife in the party. Here are just a few reliable sources supporting this claim:
Robby.is.on (talk) 11:17, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Left-wing framing bullshit bingo in the introduction

"right-wing populist", "right", "far-right", you mentioned all the far-left smear terms in the introduction. Good job if you wanna run as speaker for a communist party in Germany such as "Die Linke" but hardly credible for an objective wikipedia article.

There are multiple parties to the right of the AfD and this party basically stands for the same positions as Nigel Farage in Britain or the Republican party in the US. You dont smear either of them as "far-right". And from the view point of the far-left even the centre would look "far-right".

62.226.87.182 (talk) 03:32, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

As editors, our personal opinions are irrelevant, Wikipedia is meant to reflect reliable sources. The descriptions you mention are supported by inline citations from high-quality sources. For example, the dozen or articles that back the "far-right" description are from The Economist, Reuters, BBC, New York Times, Deutsche Welle etc., none of these sources are far-left or associated with "Die Linke". Robby.is.on (talk) 11:12, 16 November 2021 (UTC)
I agree our personal opinions are irrelevant, but so are publications by opposition parties. The source on what they are has to come from AfD themselves, this is a political party not an abstract impressionist painting. 174.138.220.211 (talk) 16:24, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
The word "right" is mentioned 14 times in intro and infobox, four times just in the first paragraph of the intro. I think the reader is WELL INFORMED by now, can we please stop adding this. And what is the point of putting "far" as a qualifier, and who determines this distance? Please insert citation needed on all the "far" qualifiers since this does not translate well into other languages. 174.138.220.211 (talk) 16:23, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
"The source on what they are has to come from AfD themselves. That's a misunderstanding of the Wikipedia sourcing principles, 174.138.220.211. If Wikipedia articles went by how political parties and other organizations describe themselves, they would all have wonderful policies for the benefit of all mankind. That's why we don't let them self-describe. See WP:SELFSOURCE: entitites can only be used as sources on themselves if the material is not unduly self-serving (which the programs and manifestos of political parties certainly are), and the great majority of any article must be drawn from independent secondary sources. Bishonen | tålk 16:38, 2 January 2022 (UTC).

"Left" and "Right" as ad hominem fallacies

Can we focus on the facts about the facts, and not the facts about the opinions?

I think Wikipedia might needs to review its policy on reliable sources. There was a time when the "left" supported these views, and we can cite those too. I don't want to go into an edit war here, but why does an encyclopaedia have an entire first paragraph dedicated to name-calling, if its not just an attempt to dissuade the casual reader from critical thinking?

Populist, sure. I love Wikipedia for NPOV... but Neutral runs through the middle and can only see the middle, and should pay no mind to the chants of the master manipulators (also lots of research on how politicians manipulate, and we're not above manipulation, if we were that wouldn't have worked.).... and just focus on the facts about the facts, not the facts about the opinions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 102.219.79.151 (talk) 05:40, 26 March 2022 (UTC)

Political ideologies listed in Infobox

We really need to reduce the list in the Infobox down to just three core ideologies. "Anti-Islam", "Anti-immigration" and "Anti-communism" need removing first of all, as they are either policy trends, superfluous ("Anti-immigration" is redundant with "right-wing populism" already listed) or irrelevant ("Anti-communism"). My two to keep would simply be "right-wing populism" and "national conservatism", although "German nationalism" would be an acceptable third ideology as a compromise (if admittedly it overlaps with national conservatism). Anything else should really be described in the Ideology section of the main article, where relevant referenced sources are available.--Autospark (talk) 15:19, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

I would prefer if we keep those two including "ultranationalism"[1][2] --Vacant0 (talk) 10:59, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "The 1619 Project and the far-right fear of history". The Washington Post. 20 August 2019. A leader of Germany's ultranationalist AfD party in 2017 bemoaned how the country's focus on atoning ...
  2. ^ "Frankenstein pact puts AfD in coalition". The Times. 23 July 2019. A married couple have run into trouble for forging the first local pact between Angela Merkel's party and the ultranationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD) in defiance of the chancellor.
I wouldn't objet to that, but would prefer scholarly sources over two journalistic sources to back that up, if any can be found.--Autospark (talk) 21:57, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
@Autospark: I was able to find more journalistic sources that back up the "ultranationalist" claim, however, I wasn't able to find scholarly ones. We can re-write the lead and include these sources if you want to. I would agree to keep "German nationalism, National conservatism and Right-wing populism" in the infobox. --Vacant0 (talk) 12:39, 4 September 2021 (UTC)
Agree with this. Nine items is not reasonable. "Social conservatism" (uncited), "economic liberalism", "anti-immigration", and "anti-communism" (one citation each) all need to go. I could take or leave "anti-Islam" and "Hard Euroscepticism" since both are well-cited and the former is a major part of the party's platform and image, but "right-wing populism", "German nationalism", and "national conservatism" should be the core of the ideology section. Erinthecute (talk) 10:05, 11 September 2021 (UTC)
I see Davide King's recent bold edits to the Infobox and lede, and generally support the edits, with the proviso of national conservatism being listed in the Infobox as the second ideology to right-wing populism. That is a satisfactory compromise.--Autospark (talk) 14:17, 23 October 2021 (UTC)
Autospark, I appreciate that and I am fine by that too; however, are you sure it is not really redundant like the others I have removed? From the academic sources, it can be categorized as a right-wing populist, e.g. this source used to support national conservatism as one of the main ideologies calls it a typical radical right-wing populist party. I think we should have in the infobox how the party is commonly identified as (right-wing populist vis-à-vis socialist/social-democratic, left-wing populist, liberal, and the like, i.e. the familles spirituelles, which is very common in academic sources for European parties), and have in the lead other common descriptions like German nationalist and national-conservative. In short, I am not convinced that national conservatism is due for the infobox (as the same source said, it is a typical right-wing populist party) but I am not going to lose sleep about it. Davide King (talk) 14:29, 23 October 2021 (UTC)
I think that Radical Right Populism in Germany shows how right-wing populism is enough and national conservatism is better seen as a wing or 'faction' rather than ideology, where we should put the main one and how academics identified the party (we can use the lead and the body to explain and add further descriptions). I did propose to add such parameters to reflect this but that has not happened, and I think national conservatism is undue as the main ideology of a radical-right populist party. Davide King (talk) 22:23, 25 October 2021 (UTC)
Well, Davide King, I’d prefer both (but only two) ideologies were listed, namely right-wing populism and national conservatism, but I’m prepared to compromise with just “right-wing populism” as at least it’s the most well-referenced, and we should be attempting to continue to reduce the number of ideologies listed in Infoboxes.—Autospark (talk) 11:54, 27 October 2021 (UTC)

Currently there is only "right-wing populism" stated as ideology and this is quite an understatement and doesn't reflect the right-wing extremism of the party. The Party is still under going a radicalization, their youth organization has now clear facist tendencies. There has to be "German Nationalism", "Anti-Islam", "(Hard) Euroscepticism", "Anti-Migration". Virtroxiam (talk) 23:08, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

That is because how scholars characterize it, and right-wing populism does include radical right-wing populism, which is the category of this party, and the infobox is not supposed to be a soapboax (German nationalism, anti-Islam, anti-EU, etc. is all reported in the lead, which is a much better place to discuss it rather than bloat the infobox with any political positions, when we are supposed to put ideologies (e.g. right-wing populism, not any -ism). Far-right as a position in the infobox, with a note, also already makes it clear the party's extreme nature. As for its youth party, we have its own article for it. Davide King (talk) 16:49, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
@Davide King: Do you think that I should request extended protection for this page? It is continued to be vandalized. Vacant0 (talk) 21:56, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
@Davide King: @Vacant0: Maybe you should start to write the correct ideology, like other Far-Right Party have it all around Wikipedia, like Freedom Party of Austria or National Rally. There is currently clearly in comaparison to other Partys the wrong ideology mentioned in the article. "Right-Wing populism" is very unspecific and seems like an attempt to portray the party as non-extremist as possible. What is going on here? Virtroxiam (talk) 05:00, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
Both of those two parties are also right-wing populist; we really need to stop to treat the infobox as a soapbox to list any -ism and policy rather than main ideology. 'Right-wing populism' is, in fact, very specific and is the categorization given by scholarly sources. How much radical it is and everything else is better discussed in the lead and body, not the infobox. Davide King (talk) 14:09, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
But "Right-wing populism" is not the main ideology. Right-wing populism can be anything from liberal-conservatism to far right, even the nazi party, which would be very wrong. It is extremely unspecific. The Ideology section for parties is a shortcut to get information about the broad political orientation of a party, including for most right-wing parties there is a distinction between economically liberal, like the Swiss People's Party and economic nationalism/protectionism, like National Rally, and other very specific ideologies, like the Swiss People's Party supports isolationism, which is traditionally strong in Switzerland. "Right-wing populism" says nothing, then you could just delete the whole ideology section, that would be even better then misleading state is has right now, especially when it's compared to the ideology sections of other parties. Most parties actually have a short ideology section, right-wing/far-right parties are mostly a necessary exception including the Alternative for Germany. Virtroxiam (talk) 10:32, 16 January 2022 (UTC)
The Ideology section in the infobox on this page continues to be wrong and gives the wrong picture about the party and is not in line with virtually all other parties. Virtroxiam (talk) 23:58, 10 April 2022 (UTC)

"radical right" sounds more like straw man fallacy argument

Right it is with some libertarian leanings on economic issues, "radical right" are parties like NPD, DVU, "Die Rechte" in german domestic politics.

And with a "radical right" position you would not been able to get up to 13 percent in public polls. 93.206.57.30 (talk) 21:04, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

Should I add Islamophobia in the ideology section?

Reason: in their official website they said that "Islam doesn't belong in Germany"

https://www.afd.de/grundsatzprogramm/ איתן קרסנטי (talk) 11:54, 13 August 2022 (UTC)

No. Consensus regarding that section was reached already, you can read it above. Vacant0 (talk) 12:30, 13 August 2022 (UTC)
Yes. The current "right-wing populism" does not correctly describe the party. "Right-wing populism" might be a right-leaning party, but the AfD is far-right. We could also just put "left-wing populism" for every left party, but then the ideology section does not make any sense anymore. Virtroxiam (talk) 11:29, 10 September 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 11:07, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

Add Direct democracy as an ideology in infobox

https://www.afd.de/grundsatzprogramm/#1 איתן קרסנטי (talk) 06:23, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

That's a primary source and not an ideology. There is also a consensus to only include "Right-wing populism" though. Vacant0 (talk) 11:46, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Template:Alternative for Germany

We should make a template for this page. an example that we should use is the template used on the Sweden Democrats page. Zyxrq (talk) 15:43, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Left-wing smear terms and double standards

Why do you use left-wing terms such as "right-wing populists" while calling in the english wikipedia article the far-left extremist party "Die Linke" democratic socialist and thereby using the claims and terms this party is making about itself? The AfD is not refering to themselves as "right-wing populists" and if you engage in using smear terms for one political side please do it for the other side as well. Otherwise you are a partisan heck. 80.131.62.133 (talk) 02:12, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

We draw on the most reliable sources available for our descriptions, and that is the consensus description of AfD. If you feel the article Die Linke needs improvement, then discuss it on the talk page of that article; but be prepared to provide neutral, reliable sources. --Orange Mike | Talk 02:25, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
As Orangemike says. We do not rely on the self-descriptions of organizations and movements, but on how they are described by reliable sources which study, report on, and evaluate them. There are all sorts of reasons why organizations and movements might be deceptive (or even self-deceptive) in their self-descriptions, so they are not considered to be reliable for that purpose
Incidentally, "partisan hacks" of any political persuasion generally do not last here very long. Wikipedia editors are pretty good about discerning editorial bias on the part of POV (point-of-view) editors, as we call them, and they don't remain undiscovered for long. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:01, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 15 May 2023

Last sentence of first paragraph has a spelling error. "within the family of European political parties which dose not oppose democracy" Should be "does not" 216.237.223.234 (talk) 16:18, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

  Done Vacant0 (talk) 16:20, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Point of view

This article uses charged language ("Islamophobia," "red-baiting") in describing its subject and is not neutral. It parrots cited sources that clearly have agendas opposing the subject of the article. 128.92.214.166 (talk) 06:34, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

Fascist wing

The party has an neo-fascist wing. 2A02:3030:818:15F6:1:0:E14F:1A15 (talk) 17:44, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

AFD Political position - Right wing to Far right -

In the Infobox the AFD should be stated as a right-wing to far-right party. The article itself calls this party a broadly right wing party and there are many sources that say that there are two factions. The moderates and the far right. Even if today the far right faction may be the bigger of the two the article should still reflect the reality of there still being a large moderate faction. Also to note at the time of writing this, the AFD is the second most popular party in Germany polling at 20%. https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/germany/ .right-wing to far-right sources.; Why has the Right-Wing AfD become so Popular in Germany? https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-explains-the-remarkable-rise-of-germanys-afd/ https://www.dw.com/en/afd-head-alexander-gauland-could-face-legal-action-over-nazi-bird-shit-remark/a-44099059 https://www.dw.com/en/afd-what-you-need-to-know-about-germanys-far-right-party/a-37208199 Zyxrq (talk) 21:54, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

And the sources used to say it's a far right party are mainly short articles who only include far right in the headline with no justification, hence a violation of WP:Headlines Crainsaw (talk) 20:28, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
This was already thoroughly discussed numerous times and even the RfC's confirmed that far-right should be only present in the infobox. The fact is that AfD is most commonly identified as a far-right or a radical right party by scholars and journalists. Sources that describe AfD as right-wing do exist, but it is undue for right-wing to be included in the infobox, for now. Vacant0 (talk) 21:27, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
Agree with Vacant0. A consensus has already been reached on the issue after lengthy deliberation, and should stay.-- Autospark (talk) 07:19, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

If you go through the headings sources, a lot of them say that there is a moderate faction of the party. Meaning not far right so that should at least be mentioned in the heading and Infobox right?. If not the Infobox, it should at least be mentioned in the heading because a vast amount of sources that claim this party is far right admit it to having a sufficient moderate faction of the political party.Zyxrq (talk) 23:43, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

I would actually remove "far-right" and replace it with "right-wing" altogether. --Checco (talk) 12:42, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
I think there are multiple factions within the AfD, and the political positions only mentions the far right and radical right groups. Which should be kept, but there are also centre conservatives, and right-wingers in the party which should be mentioned Crainsaw (talk) 13:16, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
It is not about what you would do or think. It is about what reliable sources say. Nillurcheier (talk) 17:02, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
@Nillurcheier there are multiple German media sources which agree with me, I'll provide references soon. Crainsaw (talk) 17:33, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
That material could be added to the article, but changing the position parameter in the infobox would be undue. Vacant0 (talk) 20:30, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

I honestly dont think it would be undue. The sources that say the party is far-right also give enough examples/explanations for us to use right-wing in the Infobox. Those are my thoughts.--Zyxrq (talk) 21:37, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Vacant0 that the current consensus should stand. I personally would need to see some compelling evidence that the AfD has considerably moderated its political position to consider otherwise.— Autospark (talk) 15:40, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
I think it is quite a long-shot to describe right-wing parties as far-right, when most left-wing parties are described simply as left-wing. AfD surely has far-right factions as well as centre-right ones, but it is broadly a right-wing party. --Checco (talk) 18:18, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
Changing the political position to right-wing doesn't mean the party is considerably moderated in its political position. Right wing is a term which includes the far-right and Centre-right. For example, we can do something similar in which German National People's Party article dose with the political position in the Infobox. Doing something similar and Saying the party is right-wing in the infobox will maintain Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, and in my opinion increase it. This also doesn't mean we have to change the heading that much. If we do change it we can say, The AfD's ideology is often considered to be positioned on the radical right, a subset of the far-right, within the family of European political parties which does not oppose democracy. Zyxrq (talk) 22:07, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Right-Wing?

The AfD is a far-right party (they're often described as fascist and have an openly fascist wing known as Der Flügel). They are clearly far-right or radical-right, and this is how every mainstream masthead I've looked at describes them from Deutsche Welle, the Guardian, New York Times, Politico, the BBC, Foreign Policy, Reuters, Al Jazeera, CNN...the list goes on and on. This article describing them as merely right-wing is farcical. I don't like to say this, but it's fairly obvious that there have been editors acting in bad faith here, as the AfD are clearly far-right and the vast majority of news outlets describe them as such. It'd be like if the Ron DeSantis article described him as a radical leftist, the current claim in this article is that ridiculous. The current claim is absolutely laughable. I know Wikipedia is not a reliable source, but this article is blatantly misleading. Tambor de Tocino (talk) 01:49, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

To quote myself "Changing the political position right-wing doesn't mean the party is considerably moderated in its political position. Right-wing is a term which includes the far-right and Centre-right.'' One big Reason I support changing the infobox to say right-wing in its political position is for the very reason that the terms Far-right and Far-left are used too loosely, which makes it easier for people to make bad faith edites. Also most of those mainstream sources say there is a significant moderate faction. Zyxrq (talk) 00:26, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Also The AFD and Der Flügel from what I know are not openly fascist. But Dr Flügel has worked with people/Organizations further into the Far Right.Zyxrq (talk) 02:11, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

East Centric

AFD polls higher in many west german states than the greens 176.72.13.94 (talk) 11:39, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

"Split from the CDU" is inaccurate

There never was a formal split between the two parties. Some of the founders of the party were former members of the CDU thats it.

It is not accurate to say that the AfD split off of the CDU it was founded Independently by former members 2A01:599:B10:A592:63EC:24CA:CA57:CE1C (talk) 23:06, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 September 2023

Update member numbers to 34,000 https://www.borkenerzeitung.de/welt/in-ausland/politik-inland/Mehr-Menschen-werden-Mitglied-bei-AfD-494546.html 84.15.186.65 (talk) 19:24, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

  Already done here. HouseBlastertalk 19:45, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Right wing ideology

Why is my edit constantly reverted? I added their ideological position as “Right-wing to Far-right”, and the “right-wing” part is always removed. Doesn’t some part of the AfD count as average right wing? Firekong1 (talk) 17:50, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Any source for "split from CDU" ?

The party didnt split from the CDU this is simply not correct. Some current party members were former CDU members thats it. There werent a bunch of parliament from the CDU who joined the AfD If you wanna know how an actual party split looks like take a look at the new German "BSW" party who actually split from DIE LINKE Kogger120 (talk) 17:13, 13 January 2024 (UTC)