Question of trust – In Scholz we trust?

You don’t even know Olaf Scholz like that. First the shy referee shows the foul player Christian Lindner the red card and sends parts of the traffic light team into the dressing room. Then he gets emotional: This Monday he wants to ask the question of trust. Afterwards he will also have to leave the field.

While the parliamentary hooligans immediately shout in the feature pages that democracy is in crisis, the “nd” takes a more calm approach to the end of the government. Trust, what’s that supposed to mean? Does that even exist anymore? And what does it mean for leftists?

The research begins with Googling “trust” and “Marx.” It ends quickly but surprisingly – on katholisch.de. After some terrorist attacks in 2016, Cardinal Marx said: As leftists we must trust and cannot allow fear to dominate our lives or something like that. How nice! Yes, we too should live as fearlessly as corrupt chancellors, criminal capitalists and child-abusing cardinals who can firmly trust that they will get away with impunity. But that is known and has
not yet the depth that people expect here.

So keep researching! Best on these little paper hangers on the tea bags from this Eso brand. There’s always something about trust there. Only not this time, what a shame. Today it says: “Give us the strength to get up again and again.” Also a good message for leftists! We have to dig out the Basic Law to find out more. Article 68 is about trust. If the Chancellor loses it, there will be new elections. Democrats love this trick. Political journalists are not like that. They have to put their vacation plans for the next few months in the bin.

Currently, not only Scholz, whom no straight-thinking person has ever trusted, but also other politicians are in such trouble. But other countries do it cooler than we do: with votes of no confidence. This is the second instrument that constitutions have to get rid of a head of government.

In France, the left, together with the fascists, have just withdrawn their trust from their Prime Minister Michel Barnier. And in Canada, the Conservatives have already initiated three votes against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but he survived all of them. The initiative comes from below, i.e. from the MPs. Here they preferred to wait for the boss to overthrow the government from above. Typical.

Another problem facing the German nation, besides its leaders, is its people. As the representative Shell youth study from this year shows, young people have “great trust in the state and democracy.” How can that be? If you are a politics teacher reading this, I ask you to have your class discuss the question of the extent to which citizens’ trust in politics is the ideological glue that cements existing power relations. Only those who answer yes will be transferred. Anyone who says something like: Trust is created in civil society when the hand that feeds me and the hand that beats me appear at the same time every day.

But since nowadays you can’t even trust that teachers read newspapers, back to the central question of this reflection essay: What does trust mean for leftists? As inappropriate as it is from a left-wing perspective to trust politicians like Scholz or interns like Lindner, it is a shame if democracy and the rule of law will soon be completely gone. The vote of confidence and new elections could be the last thing we can really enjoy.

nd.DieWoche – our weekly newsletter

With our weekly newsletter nd.DailyWords look at the most important topics of the week and read them Highlights our Saturday edition on Friday. Get your free subscription here.

The worst thing about all of this is not that Scholz will then have more time to work with banks to bring in tax revenue from cash-strapped coffers, or that Merz, in a black-green-yellow coalition, could lose the trust of Swabian householders if he suddenly abolishes the debt brake . The bad thing is – serious tone on – that leftists have nothing to counter all this. They are the ones that many no longer trust. This is the truly painful development of these dark times.

Sure, people used to ask themselves from time to time: Why should we trust leftists to build a different society if they can’t even clean the toilets in their autonomous center? Today people are happy about dirty toilets in AZ that have not yet been gentrified.

The bourgeois parties are doing their best to destroy the trust of the people – motorway tolls, mask deals, cum-ex and, and, and. But the ungrateful leftists simply don’t appreciate it! They don’t go to the barricades, they don’t say anything. Do they still exist? The only people who benefit from this and stir up distrust against those at the top are the right-wing extremists. Unfortunately, this is not with justified criticism of the rule, but with dangerous anti-Semitic stories.

And what are the left doing? They trust neither parliaments nor the police (and why should they!), but rather their partners. Then they have children and/or depression. Or argument. For example about Israel/Palestine. That probably destroyed some trust in the scene.

But so that everyone doesn’t fall away from the faith just before Christmas, there’s good news: Even if there is no reason, leftists still have faith. (They still exist.) This is shown by another survey. It’s not as representative as Shell’s, but it’s straight from her circle of friends: an ex-tram driver only trusts her own wife and people who keep rats as animals. The retired chemist feels something similar: Since Ströbele no longer cycles to the Bundestag, he only trusts his cat, which meows at the same time every day when it wants to eat. A young journalist trusts the BVG app “because it automatically downloads the new Germany ticket every month.”

A former health department employee writes that she trusts her party, the Left, at the local level. At least one left-wing lawyer names his collective as the object of his trust. A producer of punk music says: »I don’t trust anything or anyone. Not even in myself. I find people who say that about themselves sickening.” And a trade unionist replies: “I actually only trust capitalism.” It has proven to be pretty stable so far.

If this were one of those psychology podcasts, a friendly female voice, hearing that not everything went smoothly in her life, would say something like: Trust is a two-way street. Whether it exists depends not only on the objects to which it is intended to refer, but also on the subjects, i.e. ourselves. Can you trust? Do you trust yourself? Maybe she’s right. Maybe it’s time for leftists to trust themselves again.

We-don’t-give-each-other anything

Our Christmas campaign not only brings the joy of reading, but also warmth and festivity into the house. With the three-month trial subscription you get a pair of left socks from Socks with attitude and a bottle of sparkling wine Social Sector – perfect for a relaxed winter time. A gift that informs, warms and supports the dropout program EXIT Germany supports. Order a we-don’t-give-each-other gift now.