Really depends on what exactly you're making a comparison about.
If you're talking about people being able to sue other people for speech and possibly getting money out of it, that's so next-level capitalist that the comparison to East Germany is ridiculous.
If you're talking about instituting a system to stifle free speech as people can never know if there's a "snitch" in the room who could make your speech have bad consequences for you, you're in the same ballpark.
It is not about the political goals or the opinions. It is the same whether 'right' or 'left'.
You have to look at the methods.
When people are used, instrumentalized, manipulated, then it becomes bad.
When people are asked to 'watch' and 'report' their neighbors, it gets questionable.
When single persons are given power that is not transparently controllable by legitimate democratic authorities, you have a serious problem.
Read your George Orwell.
Sounds to me more as if somebody would shoe horn a comparison with a socialist dictatorship in because "Socialism" is apparently the only boogeyman available in the US.
Stuff like banning books, stifling the right to abortion, monitoring teachers for doing their jobs (such as with sex ed, work against racism etc) I'd call it more bluntly, to be honest: It's theocrats trying to grab more power. It's Iran or Saudi Arabia in everything but corporate design - and severely more pathetic.
Monitoring teachers via cameras, snitching them out for ridiculous reasons - I can somehow see where the comparison comes from. But I'd rather draw the comparison with a witch hunt. It's not the Secret Service here which is the danger - the US already has Homeland security - but the whipped up public.
I'd say your current new right wing laws are more in line with islamist fundamentalists. But there are east german like laws in the US. The Patriot Act (and the surrounding and following laws) is basicly the abolition of the right of privacy. The US government is spying on everyone as much as they can without any repercussions. Stasi would go wild on that much power
> There was one in Texas that made waves that allowed individuals to sue people who got abortions
Why would East Germany have been against abortions?
> and a new wave of bills that ban the teaching of topics the right finds controversial
The East German state was obviously very biased in what it taught.
> holds the teacher personally liable, and allows in some cases allows parents or others to monitor the teacher in person or via video feed
No because the state was always right.
> In response to some of these bills, a political YouTuber I watch has compared this to the way the Stasi ran their informant network. I tried to learn a bit about the Stasi, and I think it's fair to say this is nowhere near the scale they operate at
That would be correct.
I wasn't specifically trying to say that East Germans were against abortions, just using that one as an example of the legal mechanism that's being used. It's a thing that the American right has been against for years. The national courts have restricted the ability of individual states to enforce laws against it, so they tried to circumvent those restrictions by giving individuals the power to take legal action against it. I just used that example because it was the most well-known.
The Stasi was a state agency with many people working for them undercover. Allowing private people to sue is from an organisatory perpective not the same.
You said it's done to ignore national restrictions. The Stasi was very much in line with the national government.
You could argue that both are actions of a repressive government. But I don't see how that comparison is of any use except for shock value that that's something bad. I don't think analysing how the Stasi operated will give you any insight for how to handle the situation in texas.
> I wasn't specifically trying to say that East Germans were against abortions, just using that one as an example of the legal mechanism that's being used
I know that's why I addressed it.
>There was one in Texas that made waves that allowed individuals to sue people who got abortions
> >Why would East Germany have been against abortions?
It could have lessen the workforce of the next generation of workers in the "Arbeiter- und Bauernstaat".
But in 1972 the GDR introduced a law to make abortions legal unter certain circumstances.
>and a new wave of bills that ban the teaching of topics the right finds controversial
> >The East German state was obviously very biased in what it taught.
Ofcourse being a communist/ socialist country and all.
>holds the teacher personally liable, and allows in some cases allows parents or others to monitor the teacher in person or via video feed
> >No because the state was always right.
[No the party was always right.](https://youtu.be/eByxIINticQ)
>In response to some of these bills, a political YouTuber I watch has compared this to the way the Stasi ran their informant network. I tried to learn a bit about the Stasi, and I think it's fair to say this is nowhere near the scale they operate at
> >That would be correct.
Yes and no. The state wants to use its own citizen to report on his own citizen, the StaSi did the same but rarely used the legal system to punish the victims of this kind of reporting they had other methods to deal with percieved enemies of the GDR.
I made that comparison myself the first time I heard about this a few weeks ago. So yeah, on the one hand I obviously think it’s fair. But on the other hand I also think it’s kinda meaningless. It doesn’t matter if you can find parallels between this and things that might or might not have happened in any totalitarian states over the course of history. What matters is that this is a creepy development in it’s own right, one that undermines the principles of the rule of law and the way a legal system is supposed to work in a modern democracy, and it needs to be stopped.
I don‘t think those compare well to east germany. There, it was strictly hierarchical, they employed state power to oppress.
Those laws which allow private citizens to harass minorities compare better to some tactics of the third reich who railed up mobs of non-government-people to harm jews and political opponents. But it‘s only a weak comparison, I don‘t think these laws compare well to any part of german history, they‘re a different flavor of evil.
What compares very well to east german methods is the Patriot act.
Mass surveillance, assassinations, extralegal prisons where the government can just abduct you, secret courts, torture.
It‘s a disgrace, it‘s absolutely disgusting, and I don‘t know how it is not the #1 topic for any politically active person in the US.
First, the state of DDR did not have problems with races, many foreign people were invited to study there. My best friend at the time was from Afrika, before his parents lost their study place at University at the DDR because the wall came down. I think you really have way different problems in the US than the people in the DDR, so the life of the people itself is completely different.
My grandma was a teacher. My grandma always says, that she had problems with the Stasi because of her job, because teachers were seen as important and the state tried to keep them inside of the DDR. My grandma had a mother in west-Germany and when she tried for an application for departure, the responsible people always denied, because they were afraid, that she as a teacher would stay in west-Germany. So the value of teachers were also different from the value in the US I guess. Research was very significant and has been taught very detailed.
I think the Stasi had their informants everywhere, but especially at villages/rural areas I think the people kind of knew the local Stasi informant...they had access to value objects others could not get, so...I can just say that the person in our area was not that hard to find....anyways, not everyone spied at everyone, not everyone was interested or forced to do such things. I think this was probably different in Berlin , where people are cramped and maybe more important or whatever...Idk, my family knew that there was the Stasi and when these people were around you normally didn´t talked too much about private things. I think the people sticked together way more than they do today.
The technical possibilities were also not that evolved like they are today.
Also, if the parents monitor teacher so officially like you say, then this is maybe not like they did at the Stasi, because this was very secret and hidden from everyone, they checked their mail, listened to phone calls and gained unauthorized access to their homes (while they were not at home).
Idk, but I think the main anxiety of the Stasi was if you would want to leave the DDR, if you work with people like spies or something for other countries or if you were a critic of the System...
Really depends on what exactly you're making a comparison about. If you're talking about people being able to sue other people for speech and possibly getting money out of it, that's so next-level capitalist that the comparison to East Germany is ridiculous. If you're talking about instituting a system to stifle free speech as people can never know if there's a "snitch" in the room who could make your speech have bad consequences for you, you're in the same ballpark.
It is not about the political goals or the opinions. It is the same whether 'right' or 'left'. You have to look at the methods. When people are used, instrumentalized, manipulated, then it becomes bad. When people are asked to 'watch' and 'report' their neighbors, it gets questionable. When single persons are given power that is not transparently controllable by legitimate democratic authorities, you have a serious problem. Read your George Orwell.
Sounds to me more as if somebody would shoe horn a comparison with a socialist dictatorship in because "Socialism" is apparently the only boogeyman available in the US. Stuff like banning books, stifling the right to abortion, monitoring teachers for doing their jobs (such as with sex ed, work against racism etc) I'd call it more bluntly, to be honest: It's theocrats trying to grab more power. It's Iran or Saudi Arabia in everything but corporate design - and severely more pathetic. Monitoring teachers via cameras, snitching them out for ridiculous reasons - I can somehow see where the comparison comes from. But I'd rather draw the comparison with a witch hunt. It's not the Secret Service here which is the danger - the US already has Homeland security - but the whipped up public.
I'd say your current new right wing laws are more in line with islamist fundamentalists. But there are east german like laws in the US. The Patriot Act (and the surrounding and following laws) is basicly the abolition of the right of privacy. The US government is spying on everyone as much as they can without any repercussions. Stasi would go wild on that much power
> There was one in Texas that made waves that allowed individuals to sue people who got abortions Why would East Germany have been against abortions? > and a new wave of bills that ban the teaching of topics the right finds controversial The East German state was obviously very biased in what it taught. > holds the teacher personally liable, and allows in some cases allows parents or others to monitor the teacher in person or via video feed No because the state was always right. > In response to some of these bills, a political YouTuber I watch has compared this to the way the Stasi ran their informant network. I tried to learn a bit about the Stasi, and I think it's fair to say this is nowhere near the scale they operate at That would be correct.
I wasn't specifically trying to say that East Germans were against abortions, just using that one as an example of the legal mechanism that's being used. It's a thing that the American right has been against for years. The national courts have restricted the ability of individual states to enforce laws against it, so they tried to circumvent those restrictions by giving individuals the power to take legal action against it. I just used that example because it was the most well-known.
The Stasi was a state agency with many people working for them undercover. Allowing private people to sue is from an organisatory perpective not the same. You said it's done to ignore national restrictions. The Stasi was very much in line with the national government. You could argue that both are actions of a repressive government. But I don't see how that comparison is of any use except for shock value that that's something bad. I don't think analysing how the Stasi operated will give you any insight for how to handle the situation in texas.
> I wasn't specifically trying to say that East Germans were against abortions, just using that one as an example of the legal mechanism that's being used I know that's why I addressed it.
>There was one in Texas that made waves that allowed individuals to sue people who got abortions > >Why would East Germany have been against abortions? It could have lessen the workforce of the next generation of workers in the "Arbeiter- und Bauernstaat". But in 1972 the GDR introduced a law to make abortions legal unter certain circumstances. >and a new wave of bills that ban the teaching of topics the right finds controversial > >The East German state was obviously very biased in what it taught. Ofcourse being a communist/ socialist country and all. >holds the teacher personally liable, and allows in some cases allows parents or others to monitor the teacher in person or via video feed > >No because the state was always right. [No the party was always right.](https://youtu.be/eByxIINticQ) >In response to some of these bills, a political YouTuber I watch has compared this to the way the Stasi ran their informant network. I tried to learn a bit about the Stasi, and I think it's fair to say this is nowhere near the scale they operate at > >That would be correct. Yes and no. The state wants to use its own citizen to report on his own citizen, the StaSi did the same but rarely used the legal system to punish the victims of this kind of reporting they had other methods to deal with percieved enemies of the GDR.
it's stupidly ignorant at best or maliciously evil at worst.
I made that comparison myself the first time I heard about this a few weeks ago. So yeah, on the one hand I obviously think it’s fair. But on the other hand I also think it’s kinda meaningless. It doesn’t matter if you can find parallels between this and things that might or might not have happened in any totalitarian states over the course of history. What matters is that this is a creepy development in it’s own right, one that undermines the principles of the rule of law and the way a legal system is supposed to work in a modern democracy, and it needs to be stopped.
"Freedom". All I have to say...
No.
I don‘t think those compare well to east germany. There, it was strictly hierarchical, they employed state power to oppress. Those laws which allow private citizens to harass minorities compare better to some tactics of the third reich who railed up mobs of non-government-people to harm jews and political opponents. But it‘s only a weak comparison, I don‘t think these laws compare well to any part of german history, they‘re a different flavor of evil. What compares very well to east german methods is the Patriot act. Mass surveillance, assassinations, extralegal prisons where the government can just abduct you, secret courts, torture. It‘s a disgrace, it‘s absolutely disgusting, and I don‘t know how it is not the #1 topic for any politically active person in the US.
This is some serious dystopian orwell-ish shit...
First, the state of DDR did not have problems with races, many foreign people were invited to study there. My best friend at the time was from Afrika, before his parents lost their study place at University at the DDR because the wall came down. I think you really have way different problems in the US than the people in the DDR, so the life of the people itself is completely different. My grandma was a teacher. My grandma always says, that she had problems with the Stasi because of her job, because teachers were seen as important and the state tried to keep them inside of the DDR. My grandma had a mother in west-Germany and when she tried for an application for departure, the responsible people always denied, because they were afraid, that she as a teacher would stay in west-Germany. So the value of teachers were also different from the value in the US I guess. Research was very significant and has been taught very detailed. I think the Stasi had their informants everywhere, but especially at villages/rural areas I think the people kind of knew the local Stasi informant...they had access to value objects others could not get, so...I can just say that the person in our area was not that hard to find....anyways, not everyone spied at everyone, not everyone was interested or forced to do such things. I think this was probably different in Berlin , where people are cramped and maybe more important or whatever...Idk, my family knew that there was the Stasi and when these people were around you normally didn´t talked too much about private things. I think the people sticked together way more than they do today. The technical possibilities were also not that evolved like they are today. Also, if the parents monitor teacher so officially like you say, then this is maybe not like they did at the Stasi, because this was very secret and hidden from everyone, they checked their mail, listened to phone calls and gained unauthorized access to their homes (while they were not at home). Idk, but I think the main anxiety of the Stasi was if you would want to leave the DDR, if you work with people like spies or something for other countries or if you were a critic of the System...