Being Australian gave me street cred at a neo-Nazi rally in Germany | Amos Roberts | Comment is free | The Guardian

13.10.15

Being Australian gave me street cred at a neo-Nazi rally in Germany | Amos Roberts | Comment is free | The Guardian: “My friends, are you fed up to the back teeth with the millions that invade our beautiful country?”

“It’s our country and it will stay the way we want it to stay! The way it was. If we let it slide … they’ll build mosques non-stop! Are you ready for Islamisation?”

I was filming a rally held by the grassroots movement, Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (Pegida), and taken aback by the absence of any other reporters, photographers or cameramen. Turns out they knew better than to gamely elbow their way past skinheads wrapped in the German flag, armed with only a smile and an “Entschuldigung!” (“Excuse me!”). I saw one other camera crew discreetly filming from a safe distance – perhaps the others were hidden on nearby rooftops?

Usually protesters crave media attention but here people turned their backs, pushed my camera away and threatened violence using a variety of gestures I understood all too well. I guessed that some didn’t want to be filmed because there’s a stigma attached to supporting Pegida – a social price to pay if you’re a schoolteacher or public servant. As one of the speakers complained: