In recent decades, the fashion of the right-wing extremist has made a continuous development towards ever greater ambiguity. Even in the 90s it was easy to tell who was a fascist. The brutal neo-Nazi scene dominated. These were the baseball bat years. Symbols of National Socialism were openly worn. The identifying features were clear: combat boots, a bald head and somewhere a Nazi rune or a swastika. This scene still exists. At right-wing rock festivals, neo-Nazis repeatedly blatantly display fascist symbols.
But the right-wing scene has actually become more sophisticated and discreet. The “Identitarian Movement” was founded in the 2010s. She understood that majorities could no longer be won with a clear commitment to the National Socialist era. So they packaged their ideology in a slightly smarter way. People relied on ambiguity – even in fashion. People left things in suspense and hid behind ironic attitudes. The dress code of the left was copied. Because with the ’68 movement they had shown how to assert their style efficiently.
“Nipster”? It’s only when you start talking that you realize: Nazi!
Since then, the extreme right and Antifa have often been difficult to tell apart. Often there are only subtle distinguishing features that signal who belongs to which scene. Nazis can now even look like real hipsters. This is how the term “Nipster” was born, a combination of the two terms “Nazi” and “Hipster”. Only when the “Nipster” opens his mouth do you know whose brainchild he is.
In the increasingly successful AfD, the extreme right has finally found a right-wing populist bourgeois party that allows it to tap into democratic majorities. But of course you shouldn’t scare future voters with right-wing extremist codes. The majority can be found in the middle class. So the parliamentary arm of the right-wing extremists has to camouflage itself as much as possible. The game with codes needs to be refined again. In democratic parliaments, right-wing fashion messages can only be sent very discreetly: with a haircut or an innocuous accessory that is given a completely new semiotic charge.