In Germany, Gen Z protests against the ‘Merz doctrine’

Watching the hundreds of thousands of peaceful students march past, more than a few people made no secret of their dissatisfaction at Gen Z’s all-too-disciplined civil disobedience.

“The turnout is incredible. It’s still hard to believe how many people took to the streets with us, peacefully.” Lina Friedrich, a spokesperson for the Gen Z movement, is wide-eyed at the sight of the more than 11,000 people who gathered in front of the Brandenburg Gate on Saturday, October 31, to demonstrate “for housing, schools and social welfare, and against military conscription,” which the Merz government has reintroduced. According to the police, “the young people drawn to the demonstrations called in more than 30 German cities were fewer than expected,” but law enforcement is glossing over the other prediction it got spectacularly wrong: Gen Z did not lay waste to Germany, as the advance warnings trumpeted by most of the national press had imagined it would. Even the German counterparts of Italy’s maranza seem to not have gotten any opportunity – here they are still labeled “those in hoods” or, at most, given the old-time moniker of “black bloc.”

Watching the hundreds of thousands of........

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