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Springer boss Mathias Döpfner
Photo: Bernd von Jutrczenka / picture alliance / dpa
What did Mathias Döpfner know about the lifestyle of the »Bild« editor-in-chief Julian Reichelt - and when did he know it? Did he find his dealings with young women in the editorial department reprehensible for a long time - or did his promotion practice, which is apparently based on sexual favors, only bother him when he wanted to get into the US market with Springer and a publication in the New York Times called Politico -Deal at risk? And how did Döpfner feel about the almost sect-like boy band of die-hard yes-sayers that Reichelt had gathered around him in the »Bild« editorial team?
All of these questions affect the moral constitution of a man who is not only chairman of the board and major shareholder of the Springer Group, but also chairs the BDZV, the association of German newspaper publishers, and in this role regularly gives speeches on the integrity of the press.
But there is also a much more explosive question in the room, far more important than that according to Döpfner's moral compass: Is the most powerful media manager in the country possibly a political muddle?
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Ex- »Bild« editor-in-chief: Why Julian Reichelt had to go
The question arises after a quote from a private conversation between Döpfner and Benjamin von Stuckrad-Barre became public in the course of Reichelt research.
The writer was long considered closely connected to Döpfner, but because of the way he handled Reichelt's affairs he had fallen out.
When people were still in contact with each other, Döpfner and Stuckrad-Barre once discussed (the time is unknown) via short messages about a comment by Reichelt, who sharply settled the corona policy of the federal government.
In Reichelt's defense, Döpfner wrote that he was "the last and only journalist in Germany who still bravely revolted against the new GDR authoritarian state." Most of the other journalists, wrote Döpfner, had become "propaganda assistants."
That is a diction that one would expect at a Pegida get-together after the third beer - and not from the CEO of Springer Verlag, who has no reason to complain about those up there because he is one of them himself is at the top, one from the top.
It is not without a certain comedy how Döpfner now distances himself from his own statement.
First he had Springer-Verlag publish a press release stating that the chairman of the board did not consider the Federal Republic to be comparable to the GDR.
"That would be completely absurd and should be obvious to anyone who follows Döpfner's journalistic statements."
On Wednesday, Döpfner himself sent a video message to the employees of Springer Verlag. The clip opens with Döpfner's reference to his imminent departure to the USA, where he would like to visit the new acquisition Politico - that sounds like the legendary, self-important "I'm on my way to becoming an emir" by Federal President Christian Wulff, who was soon to be there.
Döpfner then gives Springer's view of the Reichelt case. And finally, clearly clearing his throat, he talks about his GDR slip: “A private text message is not a tweet, it is not a post, it is not a public speech. And if you quote something out of context in a private conversation, you ignore polemics, irony, exaggeration. ”He attaches importance to the fact that this is private and not treated like a quotation. "That is a border crossing," says Döpfner, and while one is still wondering whether tears are welling up in his eyes because of this terrible breach of trust or whether he has to resist laughing because he is concerned with the "picture" and its transgressions but earned good money every day, he's already crossed the Atlantic. To the Politico.
Now you can understand that Döpfner would rather leave private matters private.
But now his statements have now become public, and one may wonder how stable Döpfner considers the local democracy to be.
What he wrote to Stuckrad-Barre may have been meant in an exaggerated and ironic way.
But all of this does not rule out the fact that this is essentially a truthful statement by Döpfner.
So let's follow the advice of Springer's press release - and look in Döpfner's journalistic statements for evidence of a drift into the realm of conspiracy.
And here you have to first establish: What Döpfner said publicly about a possible transformation of the Federal Republic into a real socialist state does not sound like his message to Stuckrad-Barre.
On November 2, 2019, a long conversation with Döpfner about freedom of expression appeared in SPIEGEL, including the debate about the climate activists of Extinction Rebellion and the allegation that they wanted to establish an eco-dictatorship. Döpfner thinks the sharp argument is okay: “Well, that's good. If you think that politicians and journalists are showing enough courage and non-conformism here. But why do 41 percent in the new federal states say that they no longer have more freedom of expression than they used to? Why do 58 percent of East Germans say, according to a "Zeit" survey, that they do not feel better protected from the arbitrariness of the state today than they did in the GDR era? That is objectively nonsense. "
However, in this conversation there is also a statement that can be read completely new in the light of the current debate about Döpfner. »On the one hand you demand that the phrasing be as succulent and authentic as possible, regardless of political correctness, on the other hand you demand more sensitivity and willingness to listen. Isn't that a contradiction? ”The colleagues ask the Springer boss. His answer: “I don't think so. If I behave honestly and authentically, my counterpart can deal with it much better and can argue against it without rejecting me as a person. If I don't trust someone to say what they think, this type of dialogue is impossible. But I think the debate we have been having so far does not go far enough. "
One can safely assume that Döpfner trusted his then intimate partner Stuckrad-Barre a lot more than two SPIEGEL journalists - and possibly behaved "honestly and authentically" towards him and continued the debate than he did in SPIEGEL wanted to.
But Döpfner cannot be said to be close to the AfD either, in whose followers the topos of the return of the GDR under Merkel is more widespread than anywhere else. After the terrorist murders in Hanau, where a right-wing extremist shot and killed nine people from Hanau with a migration background on February 19, 2020, he found clear words in the “Welt” for the responsibility of right-wing populists: “The AfD is not to blame for everything, and above all you can do it discuss which developments made such a party possible in the first place. But that there is a connection between right-wing hate preachers and right-wing extremist acts of violence is indisputable «.
The restriction that one could discuss "which developments made such a party possible in the first place" makes one suspicious. It is only hinted at what Döpfner has been doing for years, what one, reading his texts and speeches from the past few years, could trivially describe as his fimmel, or more aptly: as barely concealed Islamophobia. Döpfner is afraid of a creeping takeover of the Christian West by Islam.
For the Springer boss, our society is on the brink, and it has been there for years. As early as November 2015, after the attacks in Paris, he confronted the Western democracies with a decision: »Submission or fight? And if Kampf: how? ”For him there is a threat of“ disinhibition of right and left nationalists and racists ”:“ Today's unrestricted openness to the world is only the vanguard of a new wave of the ugliest xenophobia. In the end there is a state crisis and riots up to and including civil war. "What is needed is" a radicalization of the center of society. " And "it takes strong leadership".
Apparently shortly after its publication, Döpfner had read Michel Houellebecq's "Submission," a novel about a university lecturer who, for the sake of convenience, adapts to the new conditions in a creeping Islamicized France.
He will quote from it again and again in his texts and speeches as if this dystopia were an actual future scenario.
This was also the case in 2017 in his speech to the BDZV, where at the beginning there was so much about the Islamist danger and the threat posed by artificial intelligence that the speaker apparently noticed it himself and paused: »Do you think I'm exaggerating?
Is the picture too apocalyptic for you?
Or are you just increasingly unsure of what I'm getting at with describing all these threats and changes? "
Then he wants to get out - after all, he stands in front of newspaper publishers, somehow on the educational function of the quality press. Significantly, however, one of his numerous Islamophobic examples does not withstand a journalistic review: The anecdote about the abolition of the pork sausage in the outdoor pool in Neuss for reasons of submission is not true: it was abolished simply due to a lack of demand.
A year later Döpfner appears again at the BDZV, and times have not gotten better. For Döpfner, however, it is not so much the increasing right-wing extremism that is problematic; rather, he considers the reporting on it to be worthy of criticism. He puts a question mark on the existence of the “Hetzjagd von Chemnitz” (and thus moves into the vicinity of the constitutional protection chief Hans-Georg Maaßen, who was later shot because of it) and whispers that the media are too close to the state: “When it comes to research, some have it However, departments at some newspapers and television stations are apparently naturalized to rely on the government without asking. "
Mathias Döpfner then went completely into the spiritual and moral offside in a text that was again published in Die Welt after the attack in Halle. The fact that a right-wing radical tried on October 9, 2019 to storm the synagogue, which was well attended on the holiday of Yom Kippur, and murdered as many Jews as possible there, but then failed at the massive entrance door and apparently at random a passer-by and a visitor to a kebab shop Snacks shot does not prompt Döpfner to issue a warning about right-wing extremism. Rather, it is too harsh press scolding: »Germany's political and media elites sleep the sleep of the self-righteous and dream the dream of political correctness. Wouldn't you like this calm to be disturbed? "
Döpfner justified this criticism, which was surprising in connection with the occasion, with numerous omissions by the scolded institutions, for example with the reference to the fact that Deutschlandfunk did not report large enough about a machete murder, that after the notorious New Year's Eve in Cologne only three men were convicted of sexual offenses alleged that the state did not act when Kuwait Airways refused to transport Israeli citizens in 2017 and that was not sanctioned by a German court. The comparatively harmless example of a HSV soccer player who may have played under a false name and date of birth is also worth mentioning.
All of this occurs to Mathias Döpfner after a right-wing radical tried to murder Jews in Halle. No Islamist far and wide had anything to do with the matter. But Döpfner, once on the move, then unwaveringly analyzes the "main causes of racism and xenophobia". Point one: "A refugee policy that is very dubious under the rule of law and hardly distinguishes between war refugees and economic refugees, that is, people in existential need whom we have to help, and people in precarious economic circumstances whom we cannot help indiscriminately." Police and overwhelmed judiciary, point four: »A political elite that suppresses realities or is withdrawn from them, that talks instead of acts and often promises far more than it delivers.And which does not passionately defend the liberal basic order and our constitution against imported or immanent intolerance, but lives tolerance towards intolerance. "
Firstly, it clearly misses the issue and, secondly, there is no other way of putting it, flawless right-wing populist gossip.
In the end, Döpfner makes himself comfortable at the regulars' table and demands "urgent spiritual guidance".
This was evidently denied to the Springer chief before the publication of this errant text.
Probably Mathias Döpfner does not seriously see the return of the GDR approaching.
Nevertheless, after reading his speeches and texts from the past few years, a person can be recognized who is haunted by great fears, especially of Islam.
A person who apparently has little confidence in the institutions of this country: not in its politicians, not in its courts.
And not in his media either, unless they belong to Springer.
By the way, Döpfner's quote from the GDR, as »NYT« columnist Ben Smith published it on Twitter, goes even further.
After the Springer boss had praised Reichelt and declared the rest of the media to be “propaganda assistants”, he came back to his editor-in-chief: “You make many powerful enemies every day.
And we always have to distinguish very precisely where the opposition comes from. "
Mathias Döpfner sees himself and Springer and the whole country in a great defensive battle, surrounded by enemies.
And Julian Reichelt, the former war reporter with the cot in the office, was his soldier in the trenches.
He was his faithful creature.
