In Germany, activists rise up to counter vaccine skeptics
A growing number of people in Germany have joined grassroots initiatives and demonstrations to speak out against vaccination opponents, conspiracy theorists and far-right extremists who have been protesting COVID-19 measures
January 26, 2022, 7:26 AM
5 min read
Share to FacebookShare to TwitterEmail this articlePeople wearing face masks stand next to posters calling for people to stick to coronavirus measures and not demonstrate with right-wing extremists and conspiracy theorists, at a counter-rally against anti-vaccination activists at the Gethsemane Church in Berlin, Germany, Monday, Jan. 24, 2022. A growing number of Germans have recently joined grassroots initiatives, local groups and spontaneous demonstrations to speak out against vaccination opponents, conspiracy theorists and far-right extremists who have led protests against COVID-19 measures in Germany. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
BERLIN -- Stefanie Hoener was at home one night in Berlin when she heard police sirens wailing through her Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood and anti-vaccine protesters shouting angry slurs as they marched down to the Gethsemane Church — a symbol of the peaceful 1989 revolution in East Germany that ended the communist dictatorship.
“That night these people really crossed a line,” Hoener said Monday as she stood with 200 others— many of them neighbors — in front of the red brick church to protect it from anti-vaccine protesters glaring from the other side of the street.
"If today, when everyone is allowed to express themselves freely without having to fear anything, they stand here and say we live in a dictatorship, then I can no longer tolerate that,” Hoener told The Associated Press. “I for one am very happy to have been vaccinated free of charge and to have received financial support from the government during the pandemic.”
The 55-year-old actress is one of a growing number of Germans who have joined grassroots initiatives and spontaneous demonstrations to speak out against vaccination opponents, conspiracy theorists and far-right extremists who have led protests against Germany's COVID-19 measures.
Across the country, the new counter-protesters have turned out in favor of the government's pandemic restrictions and a universal vaccine mandate, which will be debated Wednesday for the first time in German parliament.
Tens of thousands have signed manifestos against illegal anti-vaccine demonstrations in cities including Leipzig, Bautzen and Freiberg. Others have formed human chains in Oldenburg or Rottweil to push back far-right protesters, while dozens of medical students recently held a silent vigil outside a hospital in Dresden to protest a rally by far-right vaccine skeptics.
The silent majority in Germany that has obediently reduced their social contacts, got vaccinated and looked out for each other for close to two years to protect themselves and the most vulnerable from COVID-19 seems fed up by the small but loud minority of coronavirus deniers.
Not all of the anti-vaccine protesters in Germany are outright deniers of the pandemic, some are simply afraid of possible side effects of the vaccines or feel that the country's health authorities have been too pushy. However, radical opponents on the far-right have tried to seize the protest movement for their own purposes.
The new counter-protesters feel that the radical vaccine refusers have been getting outsized media attention and have too much influence on the public debate about how Germany should handle the pandemic.
Even the German president this week called on the country's silent majority to stand up and protect the country's democracy.
“Being the majority is not enough. The majority must become politically recognizable. It must not retreat. The silent center must become more visible, more self-confident and also louder,” President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said at a panel Monday in Berlin.
Stephan Thiel, a theater director, said he was initially hesitant to join the rally in front of Gethsemane Church on Monday because he didn't want to mingle with too many people amid quickly spreading virus infections. At the same time, he also felt he had no choice but to express his opinion.
