The far-right Professor Jorg Baberowski has once again insulted and threatened students of Humboldt University. On Twitter and Facebook, Baberowski is inciting his right-wing extremist milieu against student representatives and the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) club.
On Sunday, Baberowski published a Facebook post of a photo of a statement by the IYSSE at Humboldt. The IYSSE statement had examined Baberowski’s plans to establish a new research center on “dictatorships as alternative orders.” Baberowski’s post states: “At Humboldt University, the Stalinists are allowed to do what they like and nobody stops them. Who will put a stop to these criminals?” On Twitter, he added: “These madmen belong in the asylum!”
As someone who studies Stalinism, and who glorified Stalin and Pol Pot while a member of the Maoist KBW in his youth, Baberowski knows that tens of thousands of Trotskyists perished in the struggle against it. The fact that he insults the Trotskyist IYSSE as “Stalinist” only demonstrates the slanderous methods that Baberowski employs to suppress any criticism of his right-wing extremist agenda.
Even a student representative in the Academic Senate at Humboldt, who himself is not an IYSSE member, is denounced by Baberowski as “brainsick” and a “left-wing extremist” because he published excerpts from Baberowksi’s application for his research center that were already publicly available.
His tirades against students are not new, but they are becoming ever-more aggressive. On November 27, he posted a tweet in advance of an IYSSE meeting to introduce the recently-published book, Why are they back? [Warum sind sie wieder da?]. The book examines the rise of the far-right extremist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and the return of fascistic tendencies in Germany.
The IYSSE are “criminal, violent and vicious,” Baberowski tweeted, and, “their leader is a psychopath.” On his Facebook page, he wrote: “Not only are criminal Stalinists allowed to perform their hate speech at Humboldt University. They can even do it in the best auditoriums at the best times. The university bureau is silent and refuses to defend professors who are persecuted by these criminals.”
After Baberowski made these threats, twenty members of the AfD, its youth organization Young Alternative (JA) and other right-wing groups came to the IYSSE meeting. They sought to disrupt the lecture with shouts and heckling and tried to sing the German national anthem. They refused to leave when requested to do so, and instead photographed other attendees and threatened them.
On December 13, the student parliament condemned this assault “in the strongest terms.” “By attempting to disrupt a student event,” right-wing extremists had escalated their attacks on critical and anti-racist students. More threats are coming. It is the duty and responsibility of the university administration to call Baberowski to order and protect students and clubs at Humboldt University from the provocations and attacks of right-wing extremists.