In upcoming state elections to be held on September 6, polls suggest the Alternative for Germany (AfD) could win an absolute majority in the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt. Based on the far-right’s cultural policy program, museums, theaters and cultural institutions in the region say that artistic freedom is one of the far-right party’s targets. The AfD has announced that artists and institutions would be required to sign a declaration pledging “not to hold in contempt Germany and its culture” if they want to obtain state funding. Many of these organizations and individuals heavily rely on these subsidies. The AfD’s interpretation of disrespect to German culture also ambiguously includes what the party calls “anti-German art.” Hans-Thomas Tillschneider is the cultural policy spokesperson for the AfD in Saxony-AnhaltImage: Heiko Rebsch/dpa/picture alliance “We declared in our government program that we no longer intend to spend public funds on promoting anti-German art,” said Hans-Thomas Tillschneider, cultural policy...

The seven members and one supporter of the “Last Wave of Defense” (Letzte Verteidigungswelle) group were found guilty of crimes with the aim of bringing about the collapse of Germany’s political system through attacks on migrants and “political opponents.” The judge in the Hamburg Higher Regional Court said the group’s name reflected their deeply racist and violent mindset. “We are the wave that washes the filth out of our country,” the group had written in pamphlets. The young men sentenced on Wednesday were aged between 14 and 21 when they committed the crimes. They were sentenced under juvenile criminal law to youth prison terms ranging from one and a half to five years. The sentence for the youngest defendant — one and a half years in prison — was suspended. They had been charged with membership in, or support of, a terrorist organization. The convictions also covered offenses including attempted murder, arson,...

A former mayor in Bavaria has been fined €7,200 (nearly $8,300) after secretly monitoring his secretary with a hidden camera for about a year. The Landsberg district court issued the penalty just below the threshold at which a conviction is normally entered on a criminal record. Court director Alexander Kessler called the case an “incredible incident” and said the relatively limited sentence was only possible because the former mayor had reached a compensation agreement with the victim shortly before the ruling. He has agreed to pay his former employee €10,000 in compensation. The then-mayor of Reichling had installed a camera beneath a desk in his employee’s office, allowing him to monitor her, visitors and phone calls. He could stream both video and audio to his phone and sometimes made recordings. The surveillance was discovered in October 2025, after which police searched both the town hall and the mayor’s home. The scandal...

Susanna was just 28 years old when she was diagnosed with bowel cancer. Andre developed lung cancer when he was only 34. Both of them have turned to social media to talk about their fight against the disease. Neither of them are medical outliers — not anymore. The German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) has reported a sharp increase in gastrointestinal cancer cases for patients between the ages of 20 and 39. In the US, researchers have observed a similar development, with an even higher disease ratio than in Germany. Younger people are also increasingly being diagnosed with other types of cancers, including those that affect patients’ bone marrow or uterus.  Cancer is usually regarded as an age-related disease. According to the German Cancer Aid non-profit, the average age for men and women with cancer is around 69. Cancer cells form when certain sections of the genetic sequence mutate and can no longer be...

I feel it. You probably do, too. Someone posts a crying selfie, proposes at a wedding, or confidently sings off-key at karaoke and we cringe. We cringe when we see something so awkward, embarrassing, or painfully lacking in self-awareness that it makes us recoil. But we’re attracted to it at the same time because — perhaps — we’ve experienced similar situations ourselves or we know and care about people who have embarrassed themselves and we felt empathy. And that’s why cringe is also known in psychology as secondhand or vicarious embarrassment. We feel it on behalf of other people as well as their feeling it themselves. And sometimes we just enjoy watching other people suffer in a socially awkward situation. Cringe has an online community: There are cringe compilations, reaction channels on cringe, comedy and other formats built on people’s most cringeworthy moments. And people appear to be hooked. Stefan...

Eric Stehr was unsure what to think when he first saw fake videos about himself. He describes his reaction as “mixed feelings,” somewhere between amusement and concern, laughter, and helplessness. “I don’t want something like that online,” he told DW. “But at the same time, I know there’s nothing I can do about it.” A German student, Stehr is running for the state parliament in Saxony-Anhalt as a candidate for the socialist Left party. Being second on the party list, he has a good chance of winning a seat in the election on September 6. But social media posts about him have falsely claimed that: The false reports have been cleverly designed so that they appear to come from major German media outlets, including the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Stern TV, ARD and Spiegel TV. But the videos are as false as the allegations they make. Fake videos on X are making false allegations...

DB chief Evelyn Palla wants to move away from the culture of ”organized irresponsibility" by empowering new decision-makers within the railway operator. Brass musicians in Bavaria hope to set a new record. DW has more. Deutsche Welle

Several German cities are holding Pride events a week after a deadly attack on a march in Berlin. A forest fire is burning out of control in Bavaria. DW has more. Deutsche Welle

August 1, 2001, marked a turning point: with the Civil Partnership Act, same-sex couples in Germany gained a legal framework for the registration of their partnerships. However, another 16 years would pass before marriage itself became an option. “The Civil Partnership Act was a milestone for the legal recognition of same-sex couples in Germany and laid the foundation for opening up marriage,” Alexander Vogt of the national board of “Queere Vielfalt e.V.” (Queer diversity) told DW. “It introduced a legally secure partnership with rights similar to those of marriage — such as inheritance, maintenance, and residency rights — though it remained discriminatory in many areas – like adoption or tax law. Nevertheless, it gave us a foot in the door — a solid base from which further rights could be secured, usually by appealing to the Federal Constitutional Court.” Reinhard Lüschow (r) and Heinz-Friedrich Harre were the first same-sex couple...

Several German cities are holding Pride events a week after a deadly attack on a march in Berlin. A forest fire is burning out of control in Bavaria. DW has more. Deutsche Welle