Defamation and attempts to divide the farmer protest movement

by Marita Brune-Koch

(16 February 2024) For almost two months now, farmers have been protesting on Germany’s streets against the fact that it is becoming increasingly difficult for them to make ends meet with their farms. In the beginning, the major protests were very prominent in the media. Suddenly they disappeared – not the protests, which continued, but the reports in the media. They were replaced by an omnipresent coverage of the demonstrations “against far-right”. This is quite contrary to the fact that farmers from many European countries are united in their protest: reports are reaching us from the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Italy, and Poland, but in the public media and the mainstream press we hear and read virtually nothing about it. Obviously, this tactic is not enough; the protests still seem too dangerous for those in power. So, they are being helped along with a tried and tested means: with the label “right-wing” the farmers are now to be divided and silenced.

The preliminary climax of this disgusting smear campaign is marked by an NDR (Northern German Broadcasting) interview with a research assistant at the University of Göttingen. She divides the farming community into good and bad organisations. The good ones are – how could it be otherwise – rather green. The others are everything the chamber of horrors has to offer in terms of slander: right-wing, right-wing extremist, right-wing populist. She uses the word “right-wing” in these combinations at least 10 times in an interview that lasts a mere three minutes. She doesn’t provide a single piece of evidence, not a single example. She doesn’t substantiate anything; she doesn’t even have a study to show for – nothing.

The interviewer, who interviews her sympathetically, even asks her: “What do you base this on?” In response, the interviewed person continues to ramble on, weaving in expressions like “right-wing” 6 times plus “conspiracy theory” once, but not a single clear, factual statement, let alone any evidence. She repeatedly denounces various organisations and associations explicitly by name. And these are precisely the ones that make clear demands, point out existing links and establish and strengthen human connections among farmers and with other protesters from the SME sector.

Public defamation of a person

The interview reaches the height of perfidy when the “research assistant” personally defames the farmer Anthony Lee, to publicly crucify him. Anthony Lee is a German farmer who plays an important role in the protest movement, who has an informing, motivating and unifying effect. He is a good speaker, expresses himself clearly, doesn’t accept any orders to be quiet but always speaks to the point and calls a spade a spade.

However, this young “research assistant” who has so far been supported by the state and has presumably never set up anything of her own or taken on some responsibility and never run any business, for example, she takes it upon herself to trash a committed farmer, a citizen and family man in the media. That is so nasty, so cowardly. She has nothing to counter him with in terms of content, not a single argument. But she is on the side of those in power. And they don’t really want to change a thing in agricultural policy. It’s about pushing through Ursula von der Leyen's Green Deal, about pushing through programmes such as “From Farm to Fork”, about ensuring that the government in Germany can continue to pursue its ideological goals unhindered by citizens, whatever the cost.

Never ever give up

It is imperative that farmers, craftsmen, entrepreneurs, and all other citizens who want to maintain or restore secure, democratic, and economically stable conditions join forces so that the backbone of the German economy, the SME sector, is not further destroyed.

And perhaps we should also consider taking legal action: In my opinion, what this young lady is trumpeting to the world with the help of NDR has nothing to do with science, but a lot with defamation of character.

(Translation “Swiss Standpoint”)