Generating other images than those of the corona demos, which currently dominate the media – that is what the organizers of the fairy lights on the Wiener Ring expect on Sunday. Volkshilfe President Ewald Sacher called at a press conference on Friday to take a stand against division, hate speech and radicalization. The focus should be on cooperation and solidarity with the health workers who were most recently victims of attacks.
The silent campaign starts on December 19th at 6.30 p.m., at 7 p.m. the participants, equipped with candles or mobile phone flashlights, stand on the Ringstrasse for around ten minutes. “I don’t like to demonstrate against anything,” said human rights activist Niki Kunrath. According to initiator Daniel Landau, solidarity and what we have in common should therefore be in the foreground as well as the mourning of around 13,000 Covid deaths. The road is then released again. Participants should “definitely wear a mask”, the distance for the short outdoor event should be kept “as far as possible”, said Landau.
MFG organizes fairy lights in Linz
The hashtag #YesWeCare, under which the fairy lights are advertised, became one of the most used on Sunday afternoon on Twitter. Numerous supporters announced that they would set an example by means of a candle on the window. Fairy lights were also planned in Granz, Steyr and Linz. In the state capital, however, the anti-vaccination party MFG is organizing a chain of lights. The party also appeared as the organizer of numerous large corona demos, most recently on Saturday in Vienna, where demonstrators broke police barriers.
In Linz there is one on Sunday between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. “Calm, quiet, peaceful human chain from the Nibelungen Bridge to the new railway bridge and back” is planned. “Our light chain is carried out in silence, renouncing any particular political statements, in the place of which the light appears as a symbol of a comprehensive message of peace,” says the MFG. One wants to set an example against the division in the country – on vaccinated or unvaccinated. The event in Linz has nothing to do with the YesWeCare movement, warn Twitter users.
Hospital staff at the end of their tether
Demonstrations against Corona measures recently not only roamed Austria’s cities, but also stopped in front of hospitals. People in health professions are currently doing superhuman efforts, stressed the President of the Medical Association, Thomas Szekeres, who calls for these demonstrations in front of hospitals and health organizations to be banned, for which, like the other speakers, he has no understanding. “You are at the end of your tether”, said the chairwoman of the GPA union Barbara Teiber about the health workers. The pandemic leads to “physical, psychological and emotional stress.”
As reported by the OÖN, a Volkshilfe employee was also recently the victim of an attack when participants in a Corona demo in Braunau poured coffee on her. The woman was on her way to see a client. “The employees are not doing well at all,” said Volkshilfe Upper Austria managing director Jasmin Chansri. In view of such incidents, Sacher is convinced that it is time to get up. Red lines of peaceful coexistence should not be crossed. “The freedom of the ego presupposes the freedom of the we”, Volkshilfe director Erich Fenninger blew a similar horn.
“Strong sign of solidarity”
“It is understandable that there are people who are afraid of new technological developments,” said the President of Volkshilfe Wien, Michael Häupl. What he does not understand, however, is – according to the former mayor of Vienna – that these people allow themselves to be instrumentalized by right-wing extremists, neo-Nazis and fascists. “You just don’t put up with it!” Appealed Häupl.
Support for the action also comes from the SPÖ. “This is a strong sign of solidarity with the health workers who do superhuman efforts every day. A visible and peaceful sign of solidarity is particularly important in times of crisis,” said SPÖ boss Pamela Rendi-Wagner and federal manager Christian Deutsch in a broadcast.
Source: Nachrichten
