umverteilen! Demo

“Why are we here?” was written on a street note, and in a way, it summed up my feelings during the umverteilen! demo¹ two weeks ago. I had hoped that enough people would show up to a demonstration that wasn’t organized by the far right.² However, the turnout was disappointing - whether you take the official police number of 3,000 or the activists’ number of 7,000, both are just too low given the ongoing crisis. It showed me that the mood and support for leftist politics are dwindling. It feels a bit like lying to yourself to call this demonstration a success. For me, it was a small who’s who of the left scene, but the original target group was missing. Despite widespread concerns about inflation, the rent crisis, and especially the energy price shock, I didn’t get the feeling that those most affected showed up. In my eyes, that’s really sad.

For weeks, activists had carried out various pre-activities: neighborhood meetings, flyers in Spätis, painting banners together, and smaller demos - but it wasn’t enough, it seems. At least one good thing: it showed that the left scene isn’t totally absent, and there were some interesting blocks in the demo, like the care block I briefly saw, where employees from hospitals and nursing professions gathered.

One thing irritated me, though: the route of the demo via Unter den Linden and especially Friedrichstraße. If you don’t plan to loot the Rolex stores to make a statement, then why go through this area and not somewhere people are actually affected by the crisis? While I was taking photos, I walked on the sidewalk with all the tourists and rich people, and - yeah - of course, solidarity was nowhere to be found. Tourists made videos and laughed at the demonstrators as if they were part of a street clown parade. The rich just made their usual shocked faces of disgust. I grinned (and rolled my eyes) when a lady in her fur coat (a walking cliché) observed the demo and said, “Poor police…” Yeah, sure, as if that was the biggest problem here…

My personal highlight, though, was the big “tax the rich” painted on the old walls of the Federal Ministry of Finance.³

I hope the demonstration will lead to new connections and actions - maybe a boost for the “Deutsche Wohnen enteignen”⁴ movement or the crisis alliance “Genug ist Genug”⁵ - and that, despite the very similar demands, each group doesn’t just go off and do its own thing again.