{"id":4502,"date":"2021-08-19T09:40:52","date_gmt":"2021-08-19T08:40:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/?p=4502"},"modified":"2025-06-09T09:43:21","modified_gmt":"2025-06-09T08:43:21","slug":"abel-bodi-those-who-lead-and-ruin-western-countries-are-the-ones-calling-us-far-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/2021\/08\/19\/abel-bodi-those-who-lead-and-ruin-western-countries-are-the-ones-calling-us-far-right\/","title":{"rendered":"\u00c1bel B\u00f3di: \u201cThose who lead and ruin western countries are the ones calling us far-right\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Interview with \u00c1bel B\u00f3di, leader of\u00a0Identit\u00e1s Gener\u00e1ci\u00f3\u00a0<\/em>(Generation Identity), the Hungarian branch of the French youth movement\u00a0G\u00e9n\u00e9ration Identitaire\u00a0<\/em>(GI): \u201cthe voices that call us far-right \u2013 here in Hungary too \u2013 are those of people leading and ruining states such as France and Germany\u201d
\n<\/em><\/h4>\n

Well-known in France, where the movement started (the very first organisation was founded in 2003 under the name\u00a0Bloc Identitaire<\/em>, Identitarian bloc), the movement of the Identitarians is also present and active in Germany and Austria. Few people know that the organisation also has a branch in Hungary. The Identitarians are mostly youngsters concerned by issues such as immigration, LGBT hegemony and Islamisation of certain parts of Europe. The Identitarians are often attacked by the French, German and Austrian states, and labelled by the liberal and progressive left-wing press as a fascist, extreme right-wing or racist movement.<\/p>\n

If the situation \u2013 and therefore the actions of GI activists \u2013 are similar in France, Germany and Austria, the existence and action of this movement in Hungary raises questions. Why such a movement in a country with no extra-European immigration? What is the purpose of this movement in a country without massive Muslim immigration? What is the\u00a0raison d\u2019\u00eatre<\/em>\u00a0and what are the actions of the Identitarians in Hungary, the country of conservative Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n, who became world famous in 2015 for his opposition to uncontrolled mass immigration?<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy met the leader of the Hungarian organisation, \u00c1bel B\u00f3di, in Budapest for an exclusive interview.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>The French government announced that they want to ban the Generation Identity movement. Something similar is happening in Austria, where, for the time being, their Lambda symbol is being penalized. It is classified as an extremist organization in Germany; meanwhile, though it exists in Hungary, few know about it. In fact, in Hungarian society it is not seen as an extremist movement at all. How can there be such a difference? And why does this movement exist in Hungary, and why is it so tolerated?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>These are very good questions, and the answer covers a fairly wide spectrum. I usually say we do the same thing in every country. We are talking about the same topics and problems everywhere. Later I will talk about why things are a little different in Hungary.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Are the Generation Identity movements just related, or do they fall under the same umbrella?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>Aside from the common symbol and some cooperation, there is no umbrella. If a given country wants to establish their own Generation Identity organisation, they of course need the permission of the other participating countries. The Lambda can\u2019t be used any which way.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>So, the Identitarians don\u2019t have a central leadership?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>No. Just picture it this way: we want to see Europe work. In our case, independent movements work together for common goals, we don\u2019t interfere in the domestic political affairs of the nation. We have a solid set of values which we want to encourage for society.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Is there some kind of charter or something?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>No, and this doesn\u2019t really need to be laid out because the right, conservative thoughts mean the same thing everywhere. This can best be seen in the critique of migration and the rejection of the \u201968 Cultural Revolution.<\/p>\n

This is a perfect example \u2013 if we\u2019ve already organically come to this actually healthier conclusion of what we represent \u2013 that the West is really headed for a sick direction, as those who consider the Identitarians extremist and Orb\u00e1n a fascist. From this point, perhaps everyone will see the idiocy of that. The only difference in the West is that the voices that call us far-right \u2013 here in Hungary too \u2013 are the ones leading and ruining states such as France and Germany.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>But then doesn\u2019t this make it true (according to them) that since you\u2019re not seen as extremists here in Hungary, thus Orb\u00e1n is an extremist and that\u2019s why he tolerates you?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>That\u2019s a good question! Obviously, no. Everyone should see what we have to say. Based on that, if someone considers us extremist, then maybe they should recognize that their objectivity is compromised. That\u2019s the first thing. The other is, that in the West, the silent majority is buying into these lines less and less. Of course, there, the ongoing liberal manufacturing of the consciousness industry has reshaped the population in recent decades and thus people don\u2019t take a position on the conflicts that public discourse still provides opportunities for in Hungary.<\/p>\n

We have to take into account that the left-wing press is very strong there. Conservative voices can best operate as \u201cunderground propaganda\u201d like here, in the beginning of the 2000s. There, if the average person who doesn\u2019t deal with politics constantly sees that the Identitarians are bad, they are fascist, then, though they don\u2019t really deal with public affairs, they\u2019ve seen our symbol and assume it\u2019s bad \u2013 and that\u2019s that. People won\u2019t dive deeper to read and see every side there is to it\u2026<\/p>\n

From this point, they can very skilfully narrate the role of a movement at a given political level. This does not happen at home in Hungary, thank God, as I can say that it\u2019s not as easy to convince Hungarians that someone is or isn\u2019t a fascist because we have experienced both gangs [ed.: \u201cboth gangs\u201d relating to the fascists and the communists]. And from here, I think that Hungarian society is a little more thoughtful of someone who the West is trashing in such a way. In the West, a political campaign has been launched against the Generation Identity because it\u2019s not in the government\u2019s interest to have a \u201cright-wing NGO\u201d that draws attention to problems that they do not want to talk about \u2013 just think of migration.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s also point out that we represent a slightly different thread here in Hungary. Obviously, we also have a strong voice on immigration and Islam. When asked why there is a need for an identical movement at home (since Orb\u00e1n is here) I would answer: just look at what happened under de Gaulle in \u201968 when the new right was formed. That\u2019s when the cultural left and cultural Marxism gained so much ground \u2013 we have to take the gloves off today, before it\u2019s too late, as the struggles of the future must be fought today for the youth.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>You often say that Generation Identity is a metapolitical organization. What do you mean by that?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>The first and probably most important thing is that everything is based on community. Its construction in fact, transforms us into a phalanx. As family is the basis of society, it has always been a strong part of politics. Actually, this is one of Fidesz\u2019 advantages, that they are so closely knit. The second thing we try to do is come up with narratives that reveal the true nature of the left \u2013 like for example when we \u201cbesieged\u201d SZFE [ed. A theatre university where a student strike was recently instrumentalised against the Hungarian government]. We take the counter-revolution to the streets; for us, that is the primary front and if there is a curfew, that obviously inhibits us too because we can\u2019t reach people. And social media\u2026 well, they aren\u2019t our friends. Going back a bit though, the SZFE affair really highlighted how terrible the cultural war is in Hungary. The government attacked one of the left\u2019s major bastions by seeking to transform the symbol of cultural and educational fusion. Then of course, came the mantra that university independence and freedom is at stake as well as students\u2019 self-determination\u2026 We did not look idly by. We ripped the mask off the left and revealed their real intentions: the left\u2019s need to preserve its cultural hegemony.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when we managed our most famous move thus far, and I think we succeeded in providing a narrative. Without any exaggeration I can say that until that point, the right unfortunately did not have an adequate response. Although politicians do have a different margin of manoeuvre and \u201cfront line\u201d anyways. Party politics never deals with culture enough \u2013 because it can\u2019t really \u2013 as it can\u2019t be managed from above, it works much more organically. And this is exactly where our guerilla team can feel at home. Before larger audiences bought into the narrative that it\u2019s about independence, we went there and shed light on the fact that this was really just a disguise.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Are you Fidesz\u2019 soldiers? Or their partisans?<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>*Laughs*\u00a0<\/em>Not for Fidesz, but for the right. We are the real partisans, at least in terms of operations in enemy territory. I usually say we\u2019re a kind of \u201cspecial force\u201d activists.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>And what do you think of the Hungarian government? What kind of relationship is there between the Hungarian government and the Identitarians? Do you think it\u2019s possible that it may be banned at some point? Also, you\u2019ve been in the Fidesz-friendly media frequently recently. What can we know about this relationship?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>I would rather say that we have a narrative-relationship, some things we agree on and others we disagree on. I don\u2019t believe there is a chance for our organization to be banned in Hungary right now, but obviously \u201cnever\u201d can\u2019t be said in politics. I didn\u2019t see Donald Trump going down.<\/p>\n

We regularly appear on the\u00a0Komment\u00e1r<\/em>\u00a0show, and I write for Magyar Nemzet occasionally and I\u2019m active at Pesti TV too. Thank God I can say that the right-wing Identitarian, new-right message is normal in Hungary. There are many topics that I don\u2019t think Fidesz would have involved themselves with a few years ago. This obviously required a change in the political scene, a silent majority, and a wake-up call. We should be happy if we are attacked from Brussels, or 444 [ed. well known Hungarian far-left online outlet] writes negatively about those of us on the right \u2013 if they praise us, we did something very wrong.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Does the government support you financially?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>No, I have a civic occupation as does everyone among the Identitarians. While we study or work, we are activists alongside.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Where will this all lead? What do you think of the near future for Hungary (if we\u2019ve already strayed from the Identitarian topic), where do you think this conflict with Brussels is headed? We can see that it\u2019s getting stronger as they call for Hungary to be expelled from the EU and or whether our right to vote should be taken away. Do you think this is a good direction?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>Let\u2019s start from a little farther back. The European bureaucratic monolith is obviously in need of reform. Currently, the leading politicians in the EU are all ex-revolutionaries, leftists, social democrats, socialists, and I could go on. They\u2019ve got everything, just a shortage of conservatives. So, if these politicians say that Hungary should be sanctioned, we will welcome it, because they are revealing their own true selves because they don\u2019t represent the people of Europe. With these weak leaders who allow internal conflicts, we become a playground for major powers. This was all perfectly exemplified by the European Championships. I\u2019m not a big football fan, but it was very obvious that while the BLM and LGBTQ lobby influence was strong, Arabic and Chinese advertisements were flashing on the sidelines.<\/p>\n

What will this all end with? I see that the V4 works very well, Orb\u00e1n frequently meets with right-wing leaders and he is not avoiding the National Rally either, even though he used to. He has a great relationship with Salvini and it seems to me that the German AfD is moving towards the Hungarian line. Budapest may end up being the opposing polar end of Brussels and that\u2019s why they\u2019re attacking us so aggressively.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Let\u2019s get back to activism, and specifically what you\u2019ve done. How did the whole movement get started and how did you get there? And what do you do for work as you said you don\u2019t make money through the movement?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>No, thank God no. It would be a problem if one served his country for money. At the end of 2017 I took over the leadership of the movement and our first large-scale action was in the gender affairs of the ELTE University when it was still active, and we really were sort of a \u201cspecial force\u201d. We knew the class would start at 8:15 and the banner rolled out at 7:50 and the flyers were handed out\u2026 By the way, I never denied that I was always on the right. Around 2010 I helped Jobbik in Budafok, obviously it was another era, but I wasn\u2019t a member. We are talking about 2009 and 2010, when it was still very different to be a right-wing activist. You put on a Hungarian flag ribbon and you were labelled a neo-Nazi, so it was a very hard time, but it was good, but\u00a0Jobbik has changed\u2026 After the elections I left them because while they promised everything \u2013 community life, constant activism \u2013\u00a0it didn\u2019t happen. They sat in velvet chairs and have been getting along very well, and well, we see what\u2019s become of them.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when I became disillusioned with politics and didn\u2019t even deal with it for a year and a half, and then during college I turned a bit to the extreme right, but I think that happened to a lot of people in our generation \u2013 due to a lack of a better alternative. After this turn to the far right, I realized that neither anti-Semitism nor socialism is for me, I can\u2019t identify with it, so I quit in 2015. Obviously, the more one reads, the more one realizes that these two do not necessarily go together. Then I graduated in 2016, avoided public life, got a relatively good job at a multinational company back then, and for a year and a half I left politics again; I always felt I had to do something else. My life kept encountering politics until I saw Defend Europe start at sea, and I joined the movement. Finally, I \u201ccame home\u201d and I found something I could identify with both in message and activism. We have been present and growing beautifully for 4 years now, thank God all over the country. I can say that in bigger cities there are 1-2 people who are putting up stickers and posters (because that is the basis of activism) so the Lambda is now in more and more places throughout the country.<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>Yet at the same time, you are appearing less and less online.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>Well right now, 10 days before this interview, my Instagram profile with 2 000 followers was banned. There was no hateful incitement on my profile, just normal patriotic content, but it was banned for \u201chate speech and dangerous organization\u201d. You don\u2019t need to think of anything extreme, just pictures of 120 people standing in Identitarian blue t-shirts in France\u2026<\/p>\n

Ferenc Alm\u00e1ssy:\u00a0<\/strong>How can you take action against this? How can you function as a metapolitical, youth movement while you are literally being censored online by big tech?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00c1bel B\u00f3di:\u00a0<\/strong>Offline. The tech giants are incapable of circumventing reality. There they cannot censor the banners, they have no way to erase our posters, they cannot destroy us patriots. They cannot censor every sticker. And that\u2019s the most important thing. Our message, if not elsewhere, should at least reach a wider audience there. Then, in turn, comes an alternative. Politics needs to be taken to the streets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interview with \u00c1bel B\u00f3di, leader of\u00a0Identit\u00e1s Gener\u00e1ci\u00f3\u00a0(Generation Identity), the Hungarian branch of the French youth movement\u00a0G\u00e9n\u00e9ration Identitaire\u00a0(GI): \u201cthe voices that call us far-right \u2013 here in Hungary too \u2013 are those of people leading and ruining states such as France and Germany\u201d Well-known in France, where the movement started (the very first organisation was founded<\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":4503,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4502"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4502\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visegradpost.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}