Workers Radio Federation of Germany

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The Arbeiter-Radio-Bund Deutschlands was founded in 1924 as a Arbeiter-Radio-Klub Germany . It was the union of radio consumers and hobbyists from the environment of the social democratic and communist labor movement . In 1929 the communist Free Radio Association of Germany split off. Both organizations were banned at the beginning of the Nazi era in 1933.

history

The workers radio movement was part of the workers culture movement within the socialist milieu . On April 10, 1924, the Arbeiter-Radio-Klub Germany was founded.

Buying and owning a radio was an expensive hobby that few could afford even in the Roaring 20s . The clubs offered help to build radios yourself. In addition, the "Audion test" could be taken at the associations of radio friends, which also included the Arbeiter-Radio-Bund, which was necessary until 1925 to operate a receiver without an RTV test stamp.

In addition, the organization pursued clear political positions, some of which were in opposition to Hans Bredow's broadcast policy . In the club magazine “Der neue Rundfunk” the organization was differentiated from the “bourgeois” amateur and handicraft clubs. The merger saw radio not as a mere entertainment medium, but "as a technical aid that is suitable to manifest the cultural will of the rising class [meaning the working class] and, through its establishment, to convey the progress of the human spirit to its class members."

The organization's first Reich Conference also took place in 1926. There the workers' organizations were asked to have their own transmitter. At the same time the aim was to have a greater influence on the programming of the existing stations. In addition, they called for a lowering of the participation fees and an end to the broadcast of services on the radio.

The club was renamed in 1928 in Arbeiter-Radio-Bund Deutschlands. Since then, the association magazine has been called “Arbeiterfunk”. At that time, there were 210 local groups of the organization. It is estimated that the association had 10,000 members.

The fourth Reich Conference of the Federation took place in the same year. There, for the first time, the demand for a workers station was waived.

This question sparked an internal dispute, the one in 1929 about the split off of the communist Free Radio Association of Germany. The KPD also supported them with technical assistance, for example by setting up loudspeaker systems.

The Free Radio Association was banned on February 26, 1933 by the new National Socialist leadership. The Arbeiter-Radio-Bund was banned with the SPD in July 1933.

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