Ahead of the European election, striking data shows where Gen Z and millennials’ allegiances lie.

Far-right parties are surging across Europe — and young voters are buying in.

Many parties with anti-immigrant agendas are even seeing support from first-time young voters in the upcoming June 6-9 European Parliament election.

In Belgium, France, Portugal, Germany and Finland, younger voters are backing anti-immigration and anti-establishment parties in numbers equal to and even exceeding older voters, analyses of recent elections and research of young people’s political preferences suggest.

In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders’ anti-immigration far-right Freedom Party won the 2023 election on a campaign that tied affordable housing to restrictions on immigration — a focus that struck a chord with young voters. In Portugal, too, the far-right party Chega, which means “enough” in Portuguese, drew on young people’s frustration with the housing crisis, among other quality-of-life concerns.

The analysis also points to a split: While young women often reported support for the Greens and other left-leaning parties, anti-migration parties did particularly well among young men. (Though there are some exceptions. See France, below, for example.)

  • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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    7 months ago

    People are losing faith with the failing status quo, so some are (incorrectly) adopting a highly reactionary position to cling to what they percieved has been lost, rather than progressing along to Socialism.

    This is a consequence of the long term failings of Capitalism, coupled with weak leftist movements and a lack of general theory-reading.

    • cygon@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      That what I read out of it, too.

      Disillusion with our future is setting in (and to what part it’s due to the negative news cycle, the growing gap between rich and poor, social media propaganda or other things can be argued).

      But there was, and is, no large, left movement with an attractive message to pick up those people, and right wingers both own all the big media and have long been conditioned to blame liberals and the left at large for all of their problems.

      During the Occupy Wallstreet days, I had hope, but what once was a movement of angry people with a good cause feels like it has since been replaced by a movement of even angrier people fighting those that want to fix things.

    • yamanii@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      A socialized capitalism will always be coopted by the ones with more money in pursuit of even more money.

        • John_McMurray@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          Yes I already said it was unpleasant yet effective. You felt the need to repeat it for some reason

          • Cosmicomical@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            Because that’s a bullshit take. Effective at what exactly? Oppressing people? Killing minorities? Certainly not effective at making people’s lives better, unless you are part of the ruling class.

            • John_McMurray@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              Yeah so you’re having an ideological discussion while I’m having a historical one. However, fascism does tend to make the general populations lives better than the average under socialism. Either way you can’t speak all that freely but less likely to starve than under communism.

              (You’re ignoring how good socialist governments were at offing minorities and undesirables for “the common good”. Fuck man, socialism is like fascism on steroids)