Felix Menzel (publicist)

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Felix Menzel (born October 8, 1985 in Karl-Marx-Stadt ) is a German publicist , political activist and karateka . He is the founder, publisher and editor-in-chief of the youth magazine Blaue Narzisse . He is considered a representative of the New Right and one of the key figures of the right-wing extremist Identitarian Movement in Germany.

Life

Studies, sports and family

Felix Menzel attended the Alexander von Humboldt Gymnasium in Chemnitz . After graduating from high school in Saxony in 2005, he completed a master’s degree (MA) in media and communication studies , political science and business administration at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg in neighboring Saxony-Anhalt by 2011 .

He has been practicing karate since 1993 . He won third place ( Kumite ) at the Saxon Youth Championships in 1999 and was German team champion ( Kata and Kumite) in 2000 . Today he is active as a trainer and has the 2nd Dan (black).

Menzel is married and has three children. Initially residing in Chemnitz and Dresden , he currently lives in Meißen .

Fraternity contacts

With a group of classmates, he founded the Pennale fraternity Theodor Körner zu Chemnitz in 2002 , which was the object of observation of the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution in Saxony from 2004 to 2006 . Until 2007 he was chairman of the umbrella organization General Pennäler Ring (APR). He maintains contacts in the DB -organized fraternity milieu to this day . a. Lecturer at the Marburg fraternity Germania , the fraternity Danubia Munich and the fraternity Teutonia Prague zu Würzburg. The latter are representatives of the Burschenschaftliche Gemeinschaft (BG).

In 2010 he insulted the Green politician Claudia Roth in a presentation at the Normannia-Nibelungen fraternity in Bielefeld . Thereupon Roth filed a criminal complaint and stated through its spokesman that the event made “ right-wing extremist worldviews socially acceptable”. In 2012, the Chemnitz District Court sentenced him to a fine of 1,350 euros for insulting him .

Foundation of the "Blue Narcissus" magazine

Blue daffodil logo

While still a student (2004), Menzel founded the Chemnitz youth magazine Blaue Narzisse (BN) with the artist Benjamin Jahn Zschocke, also a member of the Pennal fraternity and former employee of the Chemnitz city council group of the Republicans , of which he is editor-in-chief to this day. At this time, Menzel was also involved in the new right free alliance . The project went online in 2006. It is assigned to the environment of the new right Institute for State Policy (IfS). In addition, since 2010 he has been chairman of the now non-profit association of the Narzisse Verein für Journalismus und Jugendkultur , which also organizes the Rainer Maria Rilke youth culture competition .

In 2008, Bild spokeof a “brown swamp”in relation to the blue daffodil . As a result, Menzel found himselfdenouncedby several articles in Axel Springer AG daily newspapers. He stated that he "firmlyrejectsany form of racial socialism and has nothing to do with xenophobia and anti-Semitism ". He describes himself as a new right or right-wing conservative . The political scientist Arno Klönne agreed with this self-assessment.

With his paper, Menzel supports the PEGIDA demonstrations that have been taking place in Dresden since 2014 . According to Helmut Kellershohn, his magazine is now part of the “ young conservative network” of the IfS milieu.

Speaker, organizer and publicist for the New Right

In 2010, Menzel took part in an event organized by the NPD -near “Bildungswerk für Heimat und National Identity e. V. ”in the hope, as he wrote, of“ an interface between theory and practice ”. At the beginning of February 2011, Menzel and Erik Lehnert took over the moderation of the event “ Reading Sarrazin ” in Eisenach . In 2012, for example, he also took part as a lecturer at the IfS academies and has been the regular author of the new right-wing theoretical organ Secession since October 2009 . In 2013 he initiated the publicly controversial Center for Youth, Identity and Culture in Dresden . After he was already co-organizer of the new right-wing trade fair “zwischentag” founded by Kubitschek in 2013, the sole organization in 2014 at the house of the old Breslau fraternity of the Raczeks in Bonn, which functioned as an alternative quarter, fell into his area of ​​responsibility. In 2015 he was again responsible for the controversial book fair, this time at the Frankonia fraternity in Erlangen . During the intermediate days, exhibitors (publishers, magazines, etc.) from the right-wing extremist spectrum were also repeatedly represented, for example the Identitarian Movement. At the end of February 2016, Menzel wrote on the Blue Narcissus website about an alleged hatred of the Saxons. B. in Clausnitz would have simply shown civil disobedience and in many places "down-to-earth protest" (-> riots against refugees in Clausnitz ). The press, on the other hand, made it clear, according to Menzel, that a “conversion of Germany into an authoritarian multi-ethnic state” was desired, “in which the local population had nothing to report”.

Menzel was also the author of the youth magazine and online medium idealisten.net of the evangelical news portal Idea . In 2008 he was invited to give the lecture “Fight back with the same weapons” by the Junge Union Hamburg. In 2012, he came to an invitation from the conservative-Catholic Ellwanger Kreis on the subject of “German victims, foreign perpetrators. Violence by foreigners in Germany ”. As an editor, he is responsible for the chronicle section of the related website.

Political Activism and Identitarian Movement

Together with the new right publisher and political activist Götz Kubitschek , he organized the “Conservative-Subversive Action” (KSA). In 2009, both of them demonstrated in “black shirts” in Berlin against the Chancellor's participation in the commemorations for the end of the First World War in France.

In 2013, the Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk researched that Menzel appeared on the Internet as a “contact person for the German offshoot of the” Identitarian Movement , which the latter denied. Menzel stated that he “sympathized” with the movement, although there was no organizational overlap. In addition, he sold numerous stickers of the movement through the Blue Narcissus online shop . Menzel lectured a. a. in the identical Karben project workshop . The educational scientist Benno Hafeneger counted Menzel at the beginning of 2014 to the well networked scene around the identitarians. According to the political scientists Gudrun Hentges , Gürcan Kökgiran and Kristina Nottbohm, Menzel, along with Kubitschek, Martin Lichtmesz and Johannes Schüller, belong to the “movement elite” of the movement in Germany. Even before the movement became known in Germany, those responsible took over the conception of the French movement, as Kökgiran and Nottbohm conclude.

In Italy he got to know - like Kubitschek - the neo-fascist movement CasaPound .

Menzel formulated his goal in the Blue Narcissus 2007, that they wanted to “work on creating a right-wing milieu”. For this they have "chosen the journalistic field of activity". Many of the editors and authors were also involved “in school and student associations or in the Bündische Jugend”.

Publication and reception

"Media rituals and political icons"

In 2009 Menzel wrote the book Media Rituals and Political Icons , which was published in Edition Antaios . It was reviewed by the author Robert Scholz on the Endstation Rechts portal . He summed up: “In order to cross the threshold of perception of the mass media , Felix Menzel, head of 'Blaue Narzisse', calls on his right-wing political milieu to create icons . The student of communication studies packs this appeal in a media criticism that is not a criticism and thus enters a dead end. "

“Young Europe. Scenarios of upheaval "

Together with Philip Stein, he published Young Europe in 2013 . Scenarios of upheaval distributed by Edition Antaios. As a “vision for the future” he sees “ethnic continuity, national identity and self-determination”. The author Jens Kassner reviewed in a user contribution for the left-wing weekly newspaper Der Freitag : “Unfortunately Menzel and Stein try neither to define a nation nor a people. But this vagueness is intentional, as it makes counter-argumentation difficult. After all, they are realistic enough to consider a return of national autarchy to be impossible. Your search for ways out of this built-in rollback is then again typically on the right, that is, based on ethnocentric premises. "

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Michael Bartsch, Andreas Speit : Entligung des Deutschen Geistes . In: taz , August 13, 2013, p. 7.
  2. ^ Board of Directors , Tenno-Karate-Do Chemnitz eV, accessed on October 19, 2013.
  3. ↑ Interview with Blue Narcissus: We have sown what the AfD can harvest today. . blauarzisse.de, August 22, 2019.
  4. ↑ Answer of the Saxon State Ministry of the Interior to the minor question of the MPs Kerstin Köditz , parliamentary group DIE LINKE, Drs. 5/13924, topic: “Pennale Burschenschaft Theodor Körner zu Chemnitz”, p. 1–3, here: p. 1 f.
  5. ^ A b Felix Krebs: Hamburg's striking offspring . Malfunction report , June 29, 2013.
  6. ↑ a b c Benno Hafeneger : The Identitarians. Temporary phenomenon or new movement? (= Expertise for Democracy . 1/2014). Friedrich Ebert Foundation , Forum Berlin, Berlin 2014, p. 3.
  7. ↑ List of speakers , Burschenschaft Danubia Munich, accessed on October 7, 2014.
  8. ↑ In the network of right-wing agitators from "Politically Incorrect" . In: Main-Post , March 23, 2015.
  9. ↑ a b c Hubertus Gärtner: Roth reports criminal charges against Menzel . In: Neue Westfälische , December 17, 2010.
  10. ^ Fine for insulting Claudia Roth . In: Neue Westfälische , May 28, 2012.
  11. ^ Helmut Kellershohn : Strategic Options of Young Conservatism . In: Regina Wamper , Helmut Kellershohn, Martin Dietzsch (eds.): Right discourse piracy. Strategies for appropriating left codes, symbols and forms of action (= Edition DISS . Vol. 28). Unrast, Münster 2010, ISBN 978-3-89771-757-2 , p. 23.
  12. ^ Mathias Brodkorb : Young Freedom 2.0 - The young conservative project www.blauenarzisse.de . Fault report , February 21, 2008.
  13. ^ A b Gideon Botsch : The extreme right in the Federal Republic of Germany. 1949 to today (= compact history ). WBG, Darmstadt 2012, ISBN 978-3-534-23832-3 , p. 135.
  14. ^ A b c Helmut Kellershohn: The Institute for State Policy and the Young Conservative Hegemony Project . In: Stephan Braun , Alexander Geisler, Martin Gerster (eds.): Strategies of the extreme right: Backgrounds - Analyzes - Answers . 2nd updated and expanded edition, Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-658-01983-9 , p. 441.
  15. ↑ Helmut Kellershohn : Resistance and Provocation. Strategic options in the vicinity of the “Institute for State Policy” . In: Stephan Braun , Alexander Geisler, Martin Gerster : Strategies of the extreme right. Background - analyzes - answers . VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2009, ISBN 978-3-531-15911-9 , p. 261 f.
  16. ^ A b Hubertus Gärtner: Burschenschaft invites right-wing extremists . In: Neue Westfälische , December 17, 2010.
  17. ^ A b Marc Felix Serrao: News from the net . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , May 17, 2010, p. 12.
  18. ↑ Maik Baumgärtner, Jörg Diehl, Frank Hornig, Maximilian Popp, Sven Röbel, Jörg Schindler, Wolf Wiedmann-Schmidt, Steffen Winter: New German Wave . In: Der Spiegel , 52/2014, December 15, 2014, pp. 23–26.
  19. ↑ Christoph Hägele: “Leftists are also welcome” (interview). In: Franconian Day , December 20, 2014, p. 2.
  20. ^ Lars Geiges , Stine Marg , Franz Walter : Pegida. The dirty side of civil society? (= X texts ). Transcript, Bielefeld 2015, ISBN 978-3-8376-3192-0 , p. 142.
  21. ↑ a b Julian Barlen: "When does it crash?" - AfD candidate Arppe starts election campaign with the "danger of a multiethnic state". www.endstation-rechts.de, March 17, 2016
  22. ↑ Patrick Keßler: The “New Right” in the gray area between right-wing extremism and conservatism? Protagonists, programmatic and positioning movements. LIT Verlag, Berlin 2018, p. 161
  23. ↑ Patrick Keßler, p. 161
  24. ↑ Patrick Keßler, p. 160
  25. ^ A b Jan Bielicki: Identitarian Movement . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , July 3, 2013, p. 11.
  26. ↑ a b Julian Bruns, Kathrin Glösel, Natascha Strobl : Die Identitären. Handbook on the youth movement of the New Right in Europe . Unrast, Münster 2014, ISBN 978-3-89771-549-3 , p. 151 f.
  27. ↑ Tomas Sager : New rights outside the door . Look to the right , July 24, 2014.
  28. ↑ Achim Pollmeier , Kim Otto , Peter Onneken (Red.): Alternative for Germany - How a party is tilting more and more to the right ( Memento from September 12, 2014 in the web archive archive.today ). Monitor ( ARD ), September 11, 2014.
  29. ^ Nikolaus Pelke: Right book fair in Erlangen - city organizes counter demonstration . infranken.de, July 5, 2015.
  30. ^ Andreas Speit : Right-wing extremists . In: taz , July 6, 2015, p. 6.
  31. ↑ Ulli Jentsch, Eike Sanders ( apabiz ): “Germany drifts off”. Christian anti-feminism and “life protection” organizations in Berlin . In: Familienplanungszentrum - BALANCE (ed.): The new radicalism of anti-abortionists in (inter) national space. Is women's sexual self-determination at risk today? AG-SPAK-Bücher, Neu-Ulm 2012, ISBN 978-3-940865-32-8 , p. 42.
  32. ↑ Andreas Speit: Junge Union is getting creative . In: taz , September 25, 2008, p. 28.
  33. ↑ Andreas Speit: Young Union on the wrong track . In: taz , October 16, 2008, p. 22.
  34. ↑ Josephine Lütke: CDU is checking how the 'Ellwang Circle' is on the right . In: Schwäbische Zeitung , June 30, 2012, p. 1.
  35. ↑ Julian Bruns, Kathrin Glösel, Natasha Strobl: The identitary. Handbook on the youth movement of the New Right in Europe . Unrast, Münster 2014, ISBN 978-3-89771-549-3 , p. 143.
  36. ↑ Volker Weiß : The "Conservative Revolution". Spiritual place of remembrance of the "New Right" . In: Martin Langebach , Michael Sturm (ed.): Places of Remembrance of the Extreme Right (= Edition right-wing extremism . 101). Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-658-00130-8 , p. 113.
  37. ↑ Cornelius Pollmer: The tower cellar . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , July 3, 2013, p. 11.
  38. ↑ Gudrun Hentges , Gürcan Kökgiran, Kristina Nottbohm: The Identitarian Movement Germany (IBD) - Movement or Virtual Phenomenon? . In: Research Journal Social Movements , Supplement to Issue 3/2014, p. 13.
  39. ^ Roland Sieber: Neo-Nazis take over the “Identitarian Movement” . Malfunction reporter , December 16, 2012 (see also publikative.org )
  40. ↑ Gürcan Kökgiran, Kristina Nottbohm: Semiologische Guerrilla from the right? Discursive appropriation and reinterpretation strategies of the Identitarian Movement Germany . In: Gudrun Hentges , Christina Nottbohm, Mechtild M. Jansen, Jamila Adamou (eds.): Language - Power - Racism . Metropol, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-86331-121-6 , p. 330 f.
  41. ^ Helmut Kellershohn : The Institute for State Policy and the Young Conservative Hegemony Project . In: Stephan Braun , Alexander Geisler, Martin Gerster (eds.): Strategies of the extreme right: Backgrounds - Analyzes - Answers . 2nd updated and expanded edition, Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-658-01983-9 , p. 454.
  42. ↑ Patrick Keßler, p. 162
  43. ↑ Robert Scholz: Succumb to the system - Felix Menzel on "Media Rituals and Political Icons" . Right end of the line , March 23, 2009.
  44. ^ Karl S. Eduard: German Europe Concepts . In: Derrechte Rand 147/2014, p. 6.
  45. ↑ Jens Kassner: Black-brown severe weather forecasts . freitag.de , May 9, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Menzel, Felix
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publicist, political activist and karateka
DATE OF BIRTH October 8, 1985
PLACE OF BIRTH Karl-Marx-Stadt , German Democratic Republic