Kebabs and Votes

### Letter to The Guardian ### 7th May 2024 ### …

Dear Editor,

I read Kate Connolly’s piece (The Guardian, 7th May 2024, link below) on people in Germany bemoaning the price of Kebabs and demanding a “Preisbremse” (a price-brake). I found that all rather amusing.

But, indeed, there certainly is a serious side to this issue and the comment that “some young people have called for the return of Angela Merkel” reminded me of a conversation that I recently had with a friend of mine: She was complaining to me that her twenty-something son and many of his friends plan to vote right-wing at the EU elections June.

That shocked me because I had assumed that “The Youth” were all on the Fridays-for-Future bandwagon and so would be voting Green or left-wing. Apparently not!

My friend went on to explain that her son is disappointed by rising prices, by lack of opportunity, by massively expensive and unavailable housing-options … and I suppose by the perception that a big flow of resources is going to migrants, refugees and to projects (weapons and war?) which don’t benefit him.

And the other question which I ask myself is where is the coverage of this? My friend’s son certainly can’t be an isolated case and, as it is, several prominent figures (e.g. Mr Guterres of the UN) have vocally put their faith in our youth “saving the day”. So why haven’t researchers picked up on this point? Why aren’t we talking about it more?

Are we maybe, very firmly, sticking our heads in the sand?

Yours,
Alan Mitcham

Link to original article: https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/07/germans-grill-olaf-scholz-over-soaring-cost-of-doner-kebabs


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