Constructions of Threats to the “Volk” in Right-Wing Online Discourses and Their Reinforcement by Cosmopolitan Processes
Chapter
Author(s) / editor(s):
Alina Jugenheimer
Year: 2025
In: Fergal Lenehan, Roman Lietz (eds.) Reimagining Digital Cosmopolitanism Perspectives from a Postmigrant and Postdigital World. Bielefeld: transcript, p. 223-242.
Language(s): EnglishAbstract:
The chapter deals with constructions of threats in (extreme) right-wing online discourses. These include feminism and gender discourses, abortion, immigration and
birth rates, and the chapter focuses on German speaking contexts. It also includes examples of constructions of threats by abortion of the right-catholic website Kath.net. The described threat constructions refer to feminist and human rights achievements, which are regarded as intimidating and endangering. Based on the assumptions of Ulrich Beck concerning cosmopolitanism, I outline how the background of cosmopolitanism can reinforce these threat
constructions. Thereby, emancipatory processes become an even greater threat, as they enable
legal access to abortion, the disturbance of biological and traditional gender roles and ideas of
family, which aggravates the preservation of the “Volk”. This can reinforce existing uncertainties and enable right-wing online narratives to appear efficacious, which may lead to a more
rapid dissemination of those narratives, which may thus be more easily adopted by people.
https://www.transcript-verlag.de/media/pdf/8c/c1/7a/oa97838394753244NLqu8GTYxZvH.pdf
Post created by: Lymor Wolf Goldstein