AfD party leader defends same-sex relationships despite party stance

The leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), Alice Weidel, who lives in a same-sex civil partnership, distanced herself on Sunday from part of a regional party manifesto backing the traditional family model, saying she lives “something different.”

“They can write whatever they like. I live something different,” Weidel said in response to a question from RTL/ntv about the election manifesto of the AfD in the state of Saxony-Anhalt.

The manifesto states: “An intact family consisting of a mother, father and children has been proven to be the best foundation for a child’s healthy development.”

Weidel lives in a registered civil partnership with a woman, with whom she is raising two children.

“If you ask me personally: my children have the best upbringing and the best opportunities,” Weidel said on the sidelines of the AfD party conference in the eastern city of Erfurt.

“We are now living in a completely different reality. So same-sex relationships must be treated equally,” she added.

Weidel nonetheless defended her party’s fundamental stance towards the traditional family model. “When, as a politician, I speak of a societal ideal - and that is currently the traditional family - I can advocate it and there is no contradiction,” she said.

Source: DPA International via Microsoft’s MSN

    • JoKi@feddit.org
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      2 hours ago

      She’s more opportunistic than dumb. She worked in finance and the AfD supports elimination of regulations for economy. IMHO she just tolerates the racist and homophobic stance from her party. And I’m pretty sure, this is more a warning, to keep quiet for legal reasons. And as a gay person she can frame this as critic so it looks like there is some real interest in gay rights. Weidel will never be harmed by any of the AfD politics, since her family lives in Switzerland.

  • kevinsky@feddit.nl
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    6 hours ago

    Look. I recognize you can’t always fully 100% agree with any polical party you vote for, or even work for, but if one of their core values is that they essentially don’t want you to exist, surely this is one of those barriers that just can’t be overcome?

    It’s the same with people that say political differences should not proclude people from being friends, full stop. I agree to an extent, but there are absolutely limits.

    If you vote for a party that’d preferably have for example my wife removed from my country and thusly you’d vote against me having the life I’m leading, you can’t reasonably expect me to just gloss over that in the same way your voting might increase my taxes would.

    Also, this is in the same world where a good amount of people can barely handle supporting different sports teams…

  • Snapz@lemmy.world
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    9 hours ago

    “Hey, stop this! We need to embrace our differences, realize that people are people and come together to hate OTHERS”

  • Gorilladrums@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    People like this are more common than a lot of people think. I actually knew somebody like this in my life.

    Between 2021 and 2023, I dated a girl who was living in some crappy apartment with two other female roommates, one of which was a Hispanic butch lesbian. This woman was something else. She’s hates, HATES trans people and is very vocal about it. Just the thought of their existence makes her seethe. She hates them so much that she’s vocally against pride, the LGBTQ movement, and progressive Democrats because they include and advocate for trans people. She actually votes Republican for the sole purpose of them fruther eroding trans rights.

    I asked once her why she hates trans people so much even though they don’t affect her life in any way, and she told me that she can’t stand the thought of men pretending to be women in order to invade women’s spaces. To her, trans people are mentally ill parasites that need to be oppressed back into oblivion in order to not appropriate femineity and thus muck up her perfect world.

    People like this are not clearly not driven by logic otherwise they wouldn’t be what they are. We often make fun of MAGA types for having incoherent views and voting against their interests, but the more people I meet the more I’m realizing that these types of idiots exist in every demographic. They will proudly uphold their bigotry even if it leads to their own demise.

    • SharkWeek@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      8 hours ago

      I’m willing to bet she never knowingly met a trans woman, even.

      Unfortunately the lesbian community has been a hotbed of terfs in the past … probably still is in places. Which is ironic because I’ve encountered predatory and abusive cis lesbians aplenty, but never had any trouble from a trans person of any flavour

      • mirshafie@europe.pub
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        7 hours ago

        Feminist spaces attract a lot of people who are incredibly insecure. I remember a young woman who was shunned from the feminist community in my city after she brought her newborn son to a female only meeting. One faction was livid that she had invaded their safe space with a future rapist.

        I feel bad for them but I’ve learned not to take them too seriously. At the end of the day, they’re just bigots, not even with a twist.

        • SharkWeek@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          6 hours ago

          The problem with ignoring them is, as per your example, they fuck up spaces that are meant to be inclusive.

          I’ve seen this happen in other things that were meant to be empowering and inclusive. In come the purity tests, and out go some of the most vulnerable people.

    • Gladaed@feddit.org
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      7 hours ago

      The afd started out of hate/fear of war refugees of the Arabian spring and euro criticism from the Greek bankruptcy.

      It’s not as much of a contradiction as you would think. It used to be less ultra right with a bourgeois wing that was well educated. There has been a schism since with those people leaving in the face of a blatant radical and extreme right. They always were (far) right, still.

      I tried to be somewhat neutral, speaking from memory and not fact. Feel free to read up if you need citations :)

      • glasratz@feddit.org
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        4 hours ago

        It’s not as much of a contradiction as you would think. It used to be less ultra right with a bourgeois wing that was well educated.

        The emphasis here is on “used to”. It would not have been as much of a contratiction ten years ago, but the times of the retired economy professors are gone. And Weidel herself is a creature of the contemporary ultra-right AfD, so the contradiction is as strong as it seems.

  • thesdev@feddit.org
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    16 hours ago

    AFD’s leader is lesbian? Next thing you’re gonna tell me US president’s wife is an immigrant!

    • glasratz@feddit.org
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      16 hours ago

      Weidel’s a lesbian who doesn’t live in Germany and has a non-white immigrant partner. So she pretty much represents the opposite of what her party stands for or wants to stand for.

      • aloofPenguin@piefed.world
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        15 hours ago

        Makes me wonder why she’s part of a far right party then…

        Unless it’s a thought process like “it’s the others, not me!1!!”

        Does remind me of the whole gay republicans thing in the US (I guess it is the same thing though)

        • sharkweek@sopuli.xyz
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          13 hours ago

          I once met a blonde haired blue eyed gold star lesbian, who would only date other gold star lesbians … it came as no shock at all that she was intensely racist.

          Some people completely lack introspection and empathy, and they won’t change their views until they’re about to be crushed by the machine they themselves have been feeding.

    • moondoggie@lemmy.world
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      13 hours ago

      Or that his grandma was an immigrant 6 months along with his dad who got to be a citizen because of the birthright rules.

  • Archangel1313@lemmy.ca
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    18 hours ago

    “C’mon guys! Can we try and keep the hate directed at other minority groups, please? That’d be great. Thanks.”

      • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
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        12 hours ago

        Even weirder, she herself is the immigrant, living most of the time in her wife’s native (*) Switzerland. She officially lives in Germany to avoid Swiss taxes, but spends little time here, preferring to influence our politics from outside the country.

        /* I don’t think it makes a difference, but Switzerland is weird about citizenship- her wife was born in Sri Lanka and adopted by a Swiss couple. Native is not technically correct, but if they start drawing a distinction, there are bigger problems.

        • glasratz@feddit.org
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          4 hours ago

          but if they start drawing a distinction, there are bigger problems.

          Well, the AfD definitely does. And Switzerland might also at some point, since decisions like that are always just one poll away there.

      • redsand@infosec.pub
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        8 hours ago

        Lesbian ourobourus eating her own ass is poetic somehow. Like Peter Thiel on a solid gold crucifix.

      • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today
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        11 hours ago

        shes the attempt at batesian mimicry for the far right, if she acts and look like far right groups, maybe she wont get eaten, in reality she is pretty defenseless, harmless.

        • cheese_greater@lemmy.world
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          4 hours ago

          I dont get how someone like her even gets involved much less embraced by such a party and political base.

          Heard of self-hating people in parties that should hate them too like Cash Patel and whoever that jackass brown guy who was running before their Primary was but the AfD gay chick leader is an insane development.

          They do love a self-hating speciment tho

    • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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      19 hours ago

      Not really. She doesn’t even live in Germany but in Switzerland. She’s not governed by the laws her party wants to implement.

  • Mereo@piefed.ca
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    17 hours ago

    Wait wait wait… She expected a far right party would accept her reality? In which reality is she in?

  • Mika@piefed.ca
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    14 hours ago

    You might think it’s a contradiction, but it isn’t.

    Law for thee, but not for me.

    Simple as.

  • PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de
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    17 hours ago

    IMO: Purely optics / strategic. She knows that Germany is not homophobic enough for the party to keep getting more voters with their current stance. They used extreme views to get their first, extreme voters, now they are trying to grab the big votes from the center.