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[–] fritz_maurentod [S] 0 points 22 points (+22|-0) ago  (edited ago)

One step forward, two steps back

During the summer of 2015 citizens (males and females) were welcoming the refugees arriving at Munich's central train station with cake and teddy-bears. Meanwhile the Saxon mob remembered the 90's and attacked the immigrants (males and females) and the refugee centers both verbally and physically. As a consequence of this, the Plenum of Conne Island decided to join the "Wave of Welcoming Culture" and actively open the location to refugees. In order to make the attendance more appealing, refugees were offered a special entry fee of just 50¢. Furthermore, integration activities started being organized in Conne Island, like skating and bicycling workshops, and German classes. It felt great - we didn't want to stay behind of the overwhelming helpfulness of the German civil society. With the feeling of doing the right thing and confronting the men and women of LEGIDA, the plenum was very concerned for a short while, that we weren't able to reach the refugees fast enough with our offer. In this hurry, we put aside the fact that offering almost free entry to all our events brings some risks with it. Partying together in Conne Island to achieve the integration of young refugees turned out to be a very naive plan. It wasn't enough to place posters during the parties indicating the correct behavior in several languages. Apparently, to explain them the rules of the house and possibilities of participation is a lot more challenging than we thought. We obtained this hindsight very late and thus we were exposed to several unfortunate situations.

Groups of encircling men are amongst the most disliked and - in certain cases - feared by women, lesbians, gays and transgender from any part of the world. It doesn't matter if they are Syrians, Connewitzers, Ghanians , Eilenburgers, Leutschers or Russians, they all have the same in common: the make sexual comments - it doesn't matter if the comments are derogatory or flirty - and sometimes even touch the women that cross their way. On top of their overestimation and lack of social behavior, the take alcohol and other drugs, play loud music, and in the confusing setting of a night club, the relaxing dancing night is promptly turned into running the gauntlet. Those who already experienced being groped in the crotch or were stolen using the dancing trick now think twice whether spending the Saturday night at home watching Netflix isn't a better alternative to the intrusive stares, the comments and groping. This applies even for women that are able to defend themselves and don't feel inferior to men.

Conne Island as well as other clubs of the left spectrum engage in a proactive entry-policy to combat sexism and other discrimination forms on the dancing floor. In Conne Island there has been a support group for victims of sexual violence for several years.

The strongly authoritative and patriarchal socialization in some of the refugees' homelands together with the freedom of the western (party) culture form an explosive mixture. Sexistic flirting and physical attacks have become a common thing in Conne Island and other clubs - also with the consequence that female guests stopped visiting us in order not to be attacked. At this point we have to ask ourselves, if we as a plenum were solidarily enough with the victims.

It also came to our attention that many foreign-looking young men were abusing the "Refugee-50" to gain access to the club in large numbers during the weekends just to cause troubles. The controlling of their refugee status at the entrance is not possible most of the time, and we have no desire to do it either.

The resolution of conflicts during our events is severely obstructed by the language barrier and the lack of confidence the security personnel has when dealing with the migrants since they fear being called racists. We experienced a new quality of incidents - mostly independently of the number of guests (male and females) or the kind of event. Uncommonly for us, the police had to be called more than once, when the scale of physical violence against the security personnel went out of control. Because of this excess, we even thought about stopping our activities for a while. The plenum knew, we could not apply double standards. Sexist, homophobic, racist or antisemitic behavior won't be accepted and cannot be justified by the origin or socialization of a person. The operators of Conne Island and similar projects are faced with the fact that very often uninvolved people turn into a problem. When the security staff escorts out a misbehaving refugee, people often act in an antiracistic impulse and interferes with the security, playing the sexual attacks down ("How could he know, that we treat women differently here?")

It is very difficult for us to explicitly explain our problems, since we don't want to appear racists like the AfD and CDU/CSU. However, the situation is so bad, and wearing for many of the victims and the operators (men and female) of Conne Island that expressing it with words doesn't seem to be appropriate. We think that an internal discussion about this issue within the left party is long due and we don't want to concede the sovereignty of interpretation to the right wing. Several attempts at this in cooperation with other clubs and the Institute of the Future (IfZ) have failed because it's so difficult for most hosts (male and females) to find the right words without agreeing with the racist tenor.

The plenum has spent several months looking for solutions to protect women and LGBTQ while offering a possibility for integration at the same time. As a consequence, we increased the security personnel early in 2016 - especially during dancing events - which also forced us to increase the entry price by 1€ per ticket. The 50¢ rule was modified: from now on, only the refugees who previously registered at the website obtained the reduced price, all the rest must pay the normal entry fee. This solution brought us some relief, but no one was entirely satisfied with it. The discussions about this are far from finalized and the decision taken up to now will be revised according to the developments.

The help call of the alternative-left club White Rabbit in Freibug at the beginning of the year and the reactions of the media and left circles show very clearly how difficult it is to act in solidarity with the refugees, to counter the right-wing sentiment but at the same time to admit that carrying a "Refugee Welcome" tag doesn't automatically solve all the problems and conflicts. The fact is and remains, that sexual attacks, antisemitic, racist and otherwise discriminatory behavior won't be tolerated in Conne Island. Every person who doesn't respect our house rules will be escorted out - independently of his/her origins. This place and its rules, for which we fought for the last 25 years must be preserved - even though and because of the difficult times we are now experiencing.

Conne Island Plenum, October 2016

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[–] srgmpdns 0 points 35 points (+35|-0) ago  (edited ago)

Classic:

It is very difficult for us to explicitly explain our problems, since we don't want to appear racists....

... female guests stopped visiting us in order not to be attacked. At this point we have to ask ourselves, if we as a plenum were solidarily enough with the victims.

Several attempts at this... have failed because it's so difficult for most hosts (male and females) to find the right words without agreeing with the racist tenor.

Sounds like the pendulum swing to the left is just about done.

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[–] Hand_Of_Winter 0 points 16 points (+16|-0) ago 

The left will read this and become depressed. The depressed will read this and become nationalists.

The Left is almost finished.

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[–] Martenzo 0 points 12 points (+12|-0) ago 

This is the endgame of regulating speech. Exactly as written in "1984": the words to express wrongthink will be eradicated from language, crippling people's ability to express their dissent.

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[–] Jaegerjaques 0 points 10 points (+10|-0) ago 

You gotta give credit to the brainwashing though, they legitimately thought putting a bunch of fags and scantily dressed sluts together with a horde of Sub-Saharan Africans would result in them forming a circle and singing Kumbaya. I wonder how many cases of sexual assault and violence had to happen before one of them got the courage to point out that the emperor has no clothes.

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[–] EmmetMcTaggart 0 points 14 points (+14|-0) ago 

That was hilarious.
Thank-you so much for posting.
Really brightened up my day.

"We're not racist but migrants actually are quite rapey. Oops"

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[–] TauCeti 0 points 4 points (+4|-0) ago 

It felt great

With the feeling of doing the right thing and confronting the men and women of LEGIDA

This expresses the whole psychology in a nutshell. Nothing about thinking. Just about feeling morally superior.

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[–] Voat_IN_Reddit_OUT 0 points 3 points (+3|-0) ago 

Appreciate the translation, m8.