The abortion demo “March for Life” takes place annually in Berlin. At the weekend, participants stand out with Nazi comparisons.
Berlin – Thousands of people demonstrated for and against abortion on Saturday (September 18, 2021) in Berlin. The number of participants in the annual “March for Life” in the center of the federal capital was in the upper four-digit range in the afternoon, as a police spokesman said.
According to the information, there were no attacks between the different camps. Jörg Reichel, a representative of the German Union of Journalists, reported on Twitter about an attack on a press representative. The man was harassed by two participants, then there was a blow to the camera. At the request of the German Press Agency, however, the attack could not be confirmed by the police.
Protests against “March for Life” in Berlin
The German Bishops’ Conference, among others, had called for the “March for Life”. She criticized the EU Parliament for calling access to abortion a human right. According to their own statements, around 3,000 people took part in counter-protests by the Alliance for Sexual Self-Determination. The police spoke of a “lower four-digit number”. The queer-feminist alliance “What the Fuck” had already called for a protest rally in Berlin on Friday evening (17.09.2021).
At the opening rally for the 17th “March for Life” at the Brandenburg Gate, the chairman of the Federal Association for the Law of Life, Alexandra Linder, called for better state protection against abortions, but also against subsidized suicide. It is the task of the state to protect all children from birth.
Abortion demo in Berlin: Opponents: inside stand out with Nazi comparisons
The posters read, among other things, “No child is unreasonable”, “Abortion is not a solution” and “No children – no future”. The Catholic bishops Wolfgang Ipolt (Görlitz) and Rudolf Voderholzer (Regensburg) as well as the chairman of the Evangelical Alliance in Germany (EAD), Ekkehart Vetter, were welcomed as representatives of the churches.
According to the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND), there were anti-abortion demonstrations: inside National Socialist comparisons. Abortions were compared with the murder of disabled people as “unworthy life” in the Third Reich. “Unborn babies are not raw materials” and “Killing is not a medical art” was also written on the posters.
Politics newsletter
You don’t want to miss any important news from politics? Then subscribe to our new FR policy newsletter!
On Twitter was a picture of a man who was wearing a T-shirt that said “Babycaust” – based on the Holocaust. The police responded to this incident. “At a demo in #Mitte, a man wears a T-shirt with a label that, from the point of view of our operations management, could at least minimize or deny the Holocaust. Our forces are on their way and will take care of the matter, ”wrote the Berlin authority on the short message service.
A few lateral thinkers at the abortion demo in Berlin
In the run-up to the demo, the police were concerned that corona skeptics and lateral thinkers would mix with the demo audience, reported the taz. There were isolated indications of the milieu: For example, a man wore the sticker “Mask Liberation”, a woman had a “QAnon” sticker on her bag, it was said. Overall, however, the fears have largely not come true, according to the police.
At counter-demonstrations, the Alliance for Sexual Self-Determination demanded, among other things, the deletion of paragraph 218 from the penal code, which makes abortion a punishable offense. Unintentionally pregnant women and doctors: inside would have to be decriminalized, it said. The motto of the demonstration was “You have the choice!”. (tvd / dpa / epd)
