391
submitted 1 year ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world

Ahead of the European election, striking data shows where Gen Z and millennials’ allegiances lie.

Far-right parties are surging across Europe — and young voters are buying in. 

Many parties with anti-immigrant agendas are even seeing support from first-time young voters in the upcoming June 6-9 European Parliament election.

In Belgium, France, Portugal, Germany and Finland, younger voters are backing anti-immigration and anti-establishment parties in numbers equal to and even exceeding older voters, analyses of recent elections and research of young people’s political preferences suggest.

In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders’ anti-immigration far-right Freedom Party won the 2023 election on a campaign that tied affordable housing to restrictions on immigration — a focus that struck a chord with young voters. In Portugal, too, the far-right party Chega, which means “enough” in Portuguese, drew on young people’s frustration with the housing crisis, among other quality-of-life concerns. 

The analysis also points to a split: While young women often reported support for the Greens and other left-leaning parties, anti-migration parties did particularly well among young men. (Though there are some exceptions. See France, below, for example.)

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 221 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

This is so frustrating to watch as an American. I spent much of my youth on the internet getting clowned on by Europeans for the consequences of my country's hard right policies. The UK has been deservedly getting clowned on for the consequences of embracing the Tories. It beggars belief that the same people clowning on the US and UK would then turn around and say to themselves "yes, but it will be different for us, it will work for us, our situation really is different, you don't understand". No, it won't be different. Pretty soon, you're going to be following the path that the Tories set the UK on, marvelling at how dysfunctional your government is, and hearing about how the only solution is even more gibs to the people who are already the most economically advantaged and the private sector. Before you click reply, just consider that you guys deserve to get fucking dunked on, because you guys spent decades laughing at other countries for doing this shit just to say "hmmm... but what if sticking the fork in the electrical socket works out for me?" I'm honestly sad and disappointed for Europe, not least of all because after years of deservedly shitting on the US for being racist, all it took was one big wave of immigration for you guys to hold up blonde dumbasses with bad hair and worse ideas as the solution to all of your problems.

"Oh, great bozo of the European trailer park, what is your wisdom to save our culture from the immigrants?"

"Deregulate sewage plants. You will certainly not regret deregulating sewage plants."

Enjoy your US-style healthcare system in a few years, I guess.

[-] Mrkawfee@lemmy.world 73 points 1 year ago

Europeans have a long history of blaming foreigners for their problems when times are tough. This isn't really anything new.

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 35 points 1 year ago

Humanity has that long history.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] undergroundoverground@lemmy.world 45 points 1 year ago

Unfortunately, American politics is so toxic, its infected nearly every country its come into contact with.

Understanably, american money and election interference is the reason European politics is becoming more americanised. For example, it was regan who radicalised thatcher. It was American and Russian dark money that funded vote leave (brexit). It was the CIA who funded far right groups all over Europe. Its American, far right Christian groups who try to lobby to take away reproductive freedom for women etc. etc.

America is empire now and no ones laughing anymore.

[-] WAKEUPWAKEUPWAKEUP@lemmy.world 23 points 1 year ago

Europe has had so many far right groups throughout history and they haven’t gone anywhere. You can definitely think of a few in recent history, not even mentioning Russia. You can just dismiss this away as some foreign influence, this is a problem the world is facing and it’s a problem with me and you.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 23 points 1 year ago

Must suck living in a place with 450 million people none of which can think for themselves and instead are just vessels for the thoughts of other civilizations

Own up to your own crap if you want to fix it, or don't own it and blame foreigners. See if I care.

load more comments (9 replies)
load more comments (9 replies)
[-] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 34 points 1 year ago

Arguably the hard right foreign policies of the US from the last 10-20 years are responsible for a lot of the migrant waves Europeans are fearing. You guys blew up the middle east...

[-] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 13 points 1 year ago

Yep. Dunno what else to say, we're absolutely responsible.

load more comments (4 replies)
[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You think the EU didn't have a hand in that? Who did Libya again? Who was famous for doing stuff in Northern and Western Africa? Who drew the lines that fucked half the world? Who insisted on keeping their colonies until it was absolutely too late to stop strong man rebellions from becoming dictatorships?

The US is in the picture, but it's not alone by a long shot.

load more comments (10 replies)
load more comments (5 replies)
[-] tables@kbin.social 25 points 1 year ago

This comment shows a large misunderstanding of european culture, policits, everything really. And I mean this with no offense, but there's no nice way to say it.

The people who were - and still are - clowning on Americans for their politics are a different group than the people currently voting far right. You're not dunking on the people you think you are. It's tragically funny in a way because internet active and mostly left leaning circles still spend a lot of their time dunking on american politics while failing to see the growing trend of far right acceptance in Europe.

Europeans also aren't a singular entity. The comparison of the US vs Europe is almost always bad IMO, as much as people of the internet love to make it - both americans and europeans alike - because the differences between two neighboring european countries are often larger than those between the two most culturally different US states. The country next over is so radically different to mine in terms of politics, economic choices, language, culture, that the only thing making us both "European" is a similar looking ID card and similar looking road signs. When I cross the border and order a coffee they look at me strange and then serve me what I would expect to get at an american coffee shop.

Europe is facing some of the same problems of the US politically speaking. Summing it up to "getting one big wave of immigration" is naive to say the least. There's a growing discontent with traditional and more moderate parties, which have fundamentally failed to solve what many people see as big issues in their lives. There's a housing crisis, an ever increasing wealth gap - which even left leaning socialist european parties, which were in power for decades in countries such as mine, have done next to nothing to prevent. There's a perceived decrease in security - which is real in some places, while false in others but amplified by social media -, a bunch of high profile corruption cases all throughout Europe - often associated with high ranking members in more moderate parties. In short, there's an ever increasing number of real issues which traditional parties have fundamentally failed to solve. Some because they're genuinely complex issues, others because of sheer incompetence.

The media in Europe has spent the last few years treating far right parties the same way the media in the US initially treated Trump - painting them and their followers as crazy people which should be ridiculed and often pushing aside whatever issue they pushed as their political flag. The problem is that far right parties in Europe often pick very real problems as their political flags - such as corruption in the case of my country. They offer no actual solutions to the problems, of course, but the attitude of the media helps them paint the idea that the media and traditional parties are aligned in protecting corrupt individuals and that the only way to tackle the problem is to vote for extreme parties. Whatever the "main" political flag is varies from country to country, but the logic is always the same: Problem exists -> problem is pushed aside by media and traditional parties for whatever reason -> far right party picks up problem as their political flag even though they offer no solutions -> people vote for far right party after years of seeing problem be apparently ignored.

The last part on healthcare makes little sense as well. Public or partly public health services are culturally ingrained in a lot of European countries and many of the far right parties have been very outspoken about defending these services - not because they like their existence I'm sure, but because these healthcare systems are too popular to openly attack. A common attribute in a lot of European far right parties is that though they often claim to despise "the left" and make big claims about socialism having destroyed everything and etc, they'll quickly incorporate any left leaning measure they perceive as popular - often defending measures which are so far left that you won't even find them in the political plans of far left parties. Far right parties in Europe will incorporate anything they see as popular in their political plans - which they then use as a promotion point, arguing that they are "above" the left and right divide, instead focusing on whatever is "better for the country".

Add to all of this a fundamental failure in left wing and moderate right wing parties to address many of these issues, even while being in power for decades in the came of some European countries, and the constant attempts by these same parties to silence anyone who so much as mentions hot topics like immigration - often by labeling them as racists, fascists, etc and what you get is a growing distrust in these parties.

[-] AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 20 points 1 year ago

The people who were - and still are - clowning on Americans for their politics are a different group than the people currently voting far right. You’re not dunking on the people you think you are.

But that's sort of the point they were making, isn't it? Left-leaning Europeans giving Americans across the spectrum shit for right-leaning politics even though the majority in all cases is slim and vulnerable to reversal?

load more comments (8 replies)
load more comments (8 replies)
load more comments (26 replies)
[-] De_Narm@lemmy.world 109 points 1 year ago

That's not actually all that surprising. The far-right, at least in Germany, is far more prominent on social media. It sucks but I don't think we can prevent that. We have a lot of complex problems but social media favors short answers instead of complex ones. A lot of younger people simply lack the critical thinking to see these simple answers for what they are - bullshit. And I can't blame them, they have been exposed to this bullshit for most of their lives.

[-] Xanis@lemmy.world 39 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I don't know how it is in Germany, though I am convinced our methods in the U.S to educate and school kids and teens actively hurt critical thinking skills. They're not taught to make decisions. They're taught to follow set rules, ask for permission, and be ashamed if they fail. They're not taught to learn, they're taught to work.

[-] slouching_employer@lemmy.one 16 points 1 year ago

They're taught to follow set rules, ask for permission, and be ashamed if they fail. They're not taught to learn, they're taught to work.

This might be even more ingrained in German culture.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 31 points 1 year ago

I was coming in here to suggest this. The right around the world, almost certainly with the aid of Russia's massive troll farm, has really stepped up its game in terms of internet outreach to young people.

[-] cmbabul@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

I do agree that social media is a huge driver of our societal problems and not fixing them, but I think you have the order reversed, social media is extremely effective at transmitting short, easy answers to our problems because that’s what people gravitate to on the whole. Especially extremely scared and desperate people, and young people especially see a lot of reasons to be afraid about what the future is going to look like.

We haven’t even really gotten to ecoFascism yet, but I think it’s inevitable to rise as things continue marching forward without dramatic societal changes

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] moon@lemmy.ml 67 points 1 year ago

It's amazing that it needs to be said, but Boomer politics won't die with boomers. We'll still have the same problems, but people will be more desperate as we will have fewer solutions and resources to throw at them than previous generations

[-] AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago

Also worth pointing out that only a slight majority of boomers are very conservative. If you look at the demographics of the last couple presidential elections, you'll see that only slightly more boomers voted conservative than liberal, and only slightly more younger folks voted liberal than conservative.

There's this impression that the distinction is much more significant than it actually is. As a liberal boomer, I'm a little sensitive about it.

load more comments (3 replies)
[-] JimSamtanko@lemm.ee 64 points 1 year ago

There’s a lot of them right here on lemmy. If you don’t know what to look for, they’re the ones yelling at everyone not to vote. They’re the ones you’ll see on every post that’s critical of Biden, but they’re nowhere to be found n any news critical of Trump.

They’re the ones that either disappear, or resort to personal attacks when you simply ask them who else can win the White House if not Biden.

They’re all over lemmy. They are just counting on you not being aware of it.

[-] dumbass@leminal.space 23 points 1 year ago

who else can win the White House if not Biden.

[-] Leg@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

I'd vote for him.

load more comments (17 replies)
[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 56 points 1 year ago

People are losing faith with the failing status quo, so some are (incorrectly) adopting a highly reactionary position to cling to what they percieved has been lost, rather than progressing along to Socialism.

This is a consequence of the long term failings of Capitalism, coupled with weak leftist movements and a lack of general theory-reading.

load more comments (31 replies)
[-] CrowAirbrush@lemmy.world 46 points 1 year ago

My young coworkers seem to believe that 250k refugees of which 100k got a house are the reason we have a housing shortage of well over 400k.

These kids are worse off than i am when it comes to housing, so how surprising is it that they vote far right.

One of them asked me: "so, you're not racist?" Nah "shame, really". Motherfucker forgot my family isn't from here and i've often been treated like subhuman trash for being a foreigner despite being born here and speaking the language like it is my own (because it is).

[-] pepperonisalami@sh.itjust.works 22 points 1 year ago

They asked you if you're not racist, as if it's normal to be racist??

It's sad to see how people get manipulated to the point that they can't understand that even a natural population growth without immigration can cause a housing crisis, if we don't build and maintain the houses. And immigrants come to work anyway, which provides a disproportionately high value to the economy compared to what most of them are paid.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[-] wewbull@feddit.uk 44 points 1 year ago

A lot of people vote far-right out of despair. A "things are shit and can't get any worse" mentality.

The best defence against the right is government that actually works for the people.

[-] TigrisMorte@kbin.social 50 points 1 year ago

Which is why the right work so hard to assure Gov. does not work.

[-] Kata1yst@kbin.social 27 points 1 year ago

And why they dismantle the systems they're tasked with protecting the moment they can.

[-] AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago

This is exactly, literally true. The hard right folks in all branches of government are always throwing wrenches in the machine and then complaining that we have to get rid of the machine because it doesn't work.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] echodot@feddit.uk 31 points 1 year ago

Trust me you don't want a conservative government. They won't fix the problem they'll just seek to line their own pockets and then by doing so make everything worse.

[-] Peddlephile@lemm.ee 19 points 1 year ago

When people find themselves in stress, they will always vote conservative to ensure their own survival. Right now, many young people can't afford housing, they have to spend more time working than living. This is not surprising.

[-] Starkstruck@lemmy.world 25 points 1 year ago

Which makes no fucking sense since conservatives just make those issues worse.

[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 year ago

Reactionary viewpoints are a result of crumbling and decaying societies. They cling to what once was, rather than trying to progress onward to Socialism.

Reactionaries are wrong, of course, but the origin of these viewpoints currently is from Capitalism's failures.

load more comments (3 replies)
[-] hark@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago

Probably because things are getting worse but liberal parties are more concerned with keeping up the status quo than actually improving things, so you get a lot of apathy and people taking a gamble which will not pan out well.

[-] vividspecter@lemm.ee 16 points 1 year ago

Prominent gender gaps in the results, which is entirely unsurprising (men much more likely to vote far right than women). I think the left-right breakdown could be more explicit too, as in many cases the left wing votes are being split between a bunch of parties, with the right wing settling on only one or two. That's still in an issue in countries that use FPTP voting systems, of course.

[-] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

In the EU.

In America, it's starkly divided by generational lines, with the remainder being down to race, education, wealth and urbanness, which actually makes me think what's going on in Europe is a somewhat unrelated phenomenon.

load more comments (9 replies)
[-] verdantbanana@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

some younger people like me are not allowed to vote because of bipartisan policies and laws

quit blaming us for everybody refusing to vote better people in

not our fault y'all refuse to vote better

[-] mindlight@lemm.ee 22 points 1 year ago

It sounds like you're an American citizen. As such you're really not very relevant in the European election....

[-] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 13 points 1 year ago

That sounds pretty shit. I'm pretty ignorant of EU voting laws, what kind of laws prevent young folks from voting? Is it a high voting age or are there even more restrictions?

[-] TigrisMorte@kbin.social 13 points 1 year ago

100% the fault of anyone that does not Vote.

load more comments (8 replies)
[-] Noedel@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago

I'm not surprised by the male/female gap. The past decade, young men have been told that white men are the worst thing to be. The left has not provided any role models for young men.

The right has many.

[-] Socsa@sh.itjust.works 15 points 1 year ago

As a white dude I don't feel like this at all. There are plenty of outspoken progressive men all over popular media, and at every level of society. It only feels this way because progressive messaging asks men to do a lot more soul searching, while conservative messaging is effectively information warfare designed to validate low effort biases and reinforce historical power structures.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (15 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›
this post was submitted on 29 May 2024
391 points (100.0% liked)

World News

48183 readers
1901 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News !news@lemmy.world

Politics !politics@lemmy.world

World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS