Anti Opfer: Warum wir Verletzlichkeit verachten

Book Presentation & Conversation with Alice Hasters, Berlin | As part of the event series "Zwischen/Zeiten: 250 Jahre USA"

“Victim”—once a term for injustice suffered, today a verbal weapon of convenience. In debates in the Bundestag and at the dinner table, the word becomes an accusation: those who complain disrupt the harmony; those who show sensitivity are seen as elitist. To conclude our series “Zwischen/Zeiten,” the multi-award-winning journalist Alice Hasters analyzes this dangerous cultural shift. Why are we suddenly celebrating the “law of the jungle” as authentic again, while vulnerability is degraded to a stigma? With productive intellectual restlessness, Hasters dissects how this new cult of toughness paves the way for authoritarian rule. Paradoxically, it is precisely these systems that create their own “victims”—whether “threatened culture” or “endangered prosperity”—to legitimize their exclusion. Alice Hasters endures the contradictions of our present and counters division with the political power of solidarity. We reflect with her on a society at a tipping point and, together with the nationally renowned bestselling author, ask the urgent question of how we can reclaim empathy as a political strength.