The Solingen stabbings

Introduction, disclaimers, terminology

On 2024-08-23, not long after the Southport events (see portions of my “various” page ([1])), a similar event took place in Solingen, Germany, where (to my latest information) eleven visitors to a festival were stabbed or otherwise injured, of which three, to date, have died. Below, I deal with some aspects of the stabbings and some of the contrasts with Southport.

Beware that there are still many question marks and that investigations are on-going. I relate my understanding of the current state of published information with corresponding reservations.

As a clarification to Leftist readers, nothing in formulations that e.g. point to “very problematic elements among the Muslim immigrants” should be construed as statements about “all” or “the majority” of the group at hand. Depending on the exact statement, context, and drawing of borders, even “many” need not apply.

While legal and illegal immigrants, asylum seekers, and refugees are only partially overlapping, and need differing political treatment, I will group them under “immigrants” in the continuation. Ditto, m.m., “immigration”, “immigration policy”, and other similar terms. This to keep the text simple. The above “Muslim immigrants”, e.g., should be understood as “Muslim legal or illegal immigrants, refugees, and/or asylum seekers”.

Main text

A few points of interest:

1. While the tragedy in Solingen does appear to have been an Islamist act of terrorism perpetrated by a Syrian who was in the country illegally, nothing like the protests in the U.K. followed. (With reservations, cf. [1], for how correct the U.K. reporting was.) Note that the protests post-Southport are alleged to have resulted from disinformation that turned a second-generation immigrant, citizen, and legal resident into someone similar in kind (but not detail) to the Solingen perpetrator, with the presumption that the protests would not have followed, had the identity of the perpetrator not been distorted. (A complication is that, in my encounters, U.K. media have been adamant about claims around the Southport perpetrator being incorrect, but have been very vague or contradictory on what those incorrect claims actually were.)

   Another difference, however, is that the Southport murderer targeted children, which might also have affected reactions. (The dead victims of Solingen were all adults in their 50s or 60s; I have no recollection of mention of ages or age groups for the survivors.)

   ---

   Side-note:

   ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attacks and has given such a motivation. I have yet to see specific statements from the perpetrator as to motives and affiliations. However, with an eye at e.g. short-term public reactions and influence on politicians, the ISIS claims might be more relevant, even should they ultimately be false.

   The reporting on the legal status of the perpetrator has been confused. At a minimum, however, it seems that he (a) entered the country illegally, and (b) would have been sent back to Bulgaria (as the country of first entry/whatnot) to have his asylum application handled, had not the German authorities screwed up his deportation.

   ---

2. The German political establishment, including on the Left, is now increasingly taking stances that would very recently (and very unfairly) have been condemned as “far Right”, that deportation orders should actually be followed through in a reasonable time frame (or at all), that there are very problematic elements among the Muslim immigrants, and similar—even, in some cases, that the scope of immigration must be revisited. This, of course, without in any way, shape, or form acknowledging that various immigration-policy critics had a point in the past.

   And, yes, at least in Germany, the main complaints have often been directed at immigration policy, not immigration per se or immigrants per se—much unlike the impression that the Left, newspapers, and the like try to create. That immigration policy and mishandling is the problem, not necessarily immigration, is certainly my own point of view. (Indeed, I am an immigrant.)

3. In the overlap between these two points, the question arises whether the post-Southport protests might not have ruined a chance to change attitudes among Leftist politicians in the U.K.: With protests as they were, the Left had a chance to harp about how evil all “Right-wingers” were and to stigmatize immigration criticism; with other types of protests, the likes of Keir Starmer might have seen the political benefits of adapting to the massive popular dissatisfaction.

4. In Germany, exactly this is likely to play in, in that the AfD (which has arisen and flowered more as a we-do-not-like-how-the-establishment-ignores-us or a we-do-not-like-how-the-government(s)-mishandle-the-country party than as anything “far Right”) has gained ever more support and that the point might have come where the traditional parties can no longer work around it by extra- or anti-democratic means.

   Another likely reason is the events in and around Israel since last October in combination with the alleged motives of the perpetrator, to exact vengeance for Palestinians, and his means, to kill innocent Germans. Not only does this hitting out at innocents make sympathies for various militant Islamist groups impossible to defend, but the anti-Semitic angle plays right into the German feelings of guilt over the Shoah and how the German Overton-windows and whatnots preclude tolerance of anything anti-Semitic. A twist is how this is usually used to attack the alleged “far Right” (while anti-Semitism has a long Leftist tradition) but now brings the Left to a halt.

   A third might be that the point of “too much” has come for even Leftist tolerance of misbehaving immigrants, and/or the point where they have to acknowledge a truth that they have tried to deny, be it towards others or towards themselves. (Note that Leftists usually have more opinions than information and understanding, and tend to be weak thinkers.) This explanation might be over-optimistic, however.

5. (Disclaimer: the following is unusually speculative.)

   A potentially interesting complication is that the attacks took place during a “Festival der Vielfalt”. While I have seen no clear explanation of this festival, the name could be translated as “diversity festival”, in which case (a) it likely pushed a message of Leftist populism, (b) the attack came from one of the “diverse”. (Nominally, it was part of the 650th-anniversary celebrations of Solingen; however, this does not preclude such Leftist agendas. On the contrary, the modern Left seems to deliberately strive to shove in a Leftist message and/or reality distortion everywhere that it conceivably can—and the grossly unethical abuse of public resources for PC/woke propaganda is particularly common.)

   The former could have shifted Leftist perceptions, as immigrants are “supposed” to support the Left in the eyes of the Left. The latter is a twist that could have affected larger parts of the political spectrum, as “diversity” suddenly seems more like a problem than the claimed asset.

6. An unfortunate misdevelopment is that the politicians partially try to blame weapon laws, and demand greater restrictions on the carrying of knives in public. This could do little to avoid tragedies like in Solingen, assuming a premeditated (as opposed to a spur of the moment) attack: someone setting out to kill innocents is unlikely to give two hoots about whether he carries a knife legally or illegally and, unlike an AR-15, the vast majority of knives can be carried without visible signs that could lead to a police intervention. A further restriction would, then, do little or nothing to solve the problem—but it would harm those who have “bona fide” reasons to carry knives. (Exactly what these reasons might be will depend on the type of restrictions and what exceptions might be explicitly foreseen in the law. However, a typical case would be those that might need knives for professional reasons and might face complications when moving from one place of work to another or might perform their work in public.) Also note that a ban on possession of even more dangerous knives (consider cooking without a sharp knife) would be much trickier to implement than a ban on guns—and how a ban on carrying knives would be toothless without a ban on possession (for reasons like the above). For that matter, a screwdriver can make for a lethal stabbing implement.

   If anything, events like in Solingen might point to a futility in the bans on guns. Bring the right type of slashing or stabbing instruments and considerably more than the three victims of Solingen can be killed. In my understanding, even as is, three died and another eight were wounded, often badly. What, then, could a more skilled and cool-headed perpetrator achieve? With the right approach and a little luck, half-a-dozen lethal stabbing wounds might be inflected even before an awareness arises that an attack in on-going. Or what if someone comes in with a straight razor (especially, against children or the elderly) and begins to cut throats?

   A particular point is that gun-shot wounds, in my impression, have a lower death rate than stab wounds. Both with regard to number and fate of victims, a comparison between Solingen and the attempted Trump association can be telling, if with the reservation that Crooks, presumably, had as primary goal to kill Trump, not to maximize the number of victims: The one perpetrator killed three out of eleven victims; the other one out of four. Moreover, while Crooks had the advantage of being able to strike from a distance, he still died, himself; the Solingen perpetrator is still alive and even, if temporarily, got away with the deed—and someone else might have done so permanently. (Being explicit about such a “someone else” is tricky because of conflicts in sources: some say that he gave himself up, and we should substitute someone who does not; some that he was apprehended while outside in bloodied clothes, and we should substitute someone more careful.)

   I also point to older discussions about the use of poison and cars as alternatives to guns. (TODO import from Wordpress and link.)

Excursion on Solingen

Solingen borders on Wuppertal, where I live; and I have, if on rare occasions, been there.

It has a long history of blade manufacture (knives, scissors, etc.) and, in a sad coincidence, is sometimes referred to as “Klingenstadt” (“Blade City”; as with Detroit and “Motor City”).