The following video is the latest in a series of man-in-the-street interviews from Germany. In it people are asked to give their opinions about mass immigration and Islam. Responses range from full PC to full “Islamophobic”.

Many thanks to Nash Montana for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:

Video transcript:

0:00 …and you’ll be recorded, OK. —OK, but what do you want from me now?

0:03 We have several topics that we want to ask about.

0:06 Yes, sure, but make it short.

0:09 Good. But no address and no telephone number

0:12 and no email address! —Absolutely not! —Good.

0:15 OK then, here’s my first question:

0:18 What do you think about the word ‘Islam’,

0:21 do foreign cultures and the migrants fit in with Germany? —No.

0:24 Why not? —We are a Christian country in my opinion,

0:27 and it doesn’t fit. These people

0:30 and their beliefs,

0:33 they do not want to fit in with us.

0:36 That’s how I see it.

0:39 If they fit in, they’re here now, and most of them behave themselves too.

0:42 And, as long as they behave themselves, I have no problem.

0:45 But the other stuff, one should try to prevent that too, OK. —“The other stuff”: what do you mean?

0:48 Because there are people here who can’t behave themselves. —Oh, yeah, of course.

0:51 There I just have a bit of an issue.

0:54 Of course! We have them here now.

0:57 Yeah, and they fit in with my daily life,

1:00 absolutely, yes.

1:03 No problem if they behave themselves the way

1:06 one expects that as a German, then I have no problem with that.

1:09 What does one expect then? —Nothing! If you don’t draw attention to yourself,

1:12 you’re in the right place!

1:15 When they draw attention to themselves, then that’s wrong.

1:18 As long as Islam…

1:21 behaves itself peacefully,

1:24 that’s fine, but unfortunately it’s got a bad reputation here in Germany.

1:27 Well, maybe one first has to ask the question

1:30 whether the people who belong to Islam

1:33 want to fit in with Germany.

1:36 Maybe that would be the important question.

1:39 Certainly the people who have lived here for a long time belong here in Germany,

1:44 and insofar as they follow the laws,

1:47 I don’t see a problem. I of course hope that

1:50 that’s the case, and whoever can’t identify with that

1:53 should find themselves a different country.

1:56 Completely does not fit in with Germany.

1:59 Absolutely not. It’s a totally different culture;

2:02 when you go on vacation in an Islamic country,

2:05 just go there, and see how things operate there,

2:08 and that’s what they want here in Germany too.

2:11 We already have four and a half million, and each one of them

2:14 has like five kids, do you have five kids?

2:17

2:20 Hmmm… I’m gonna say it like this: moderate Islam

2:23 belongs to Germany, absolutely.

2:26 No problem.

2:29 So, everyone who wants to come, regardless of what religion

2:32 they believe in, I also have my own belief,

2:35 because I do not believe. [He is smugly alluding to the fact that he’s an atheist. — translator]

2:38 That is also an option, sure.

2:41 [nods head] And I want to be treated respectfully too. —Yes, OK.

2:44 And that was, in the past,

2:47 when I was a student, not the case.

2:50 And back then those who were believers,

2:53 the Catholics or the evangelicals,

2:56 they weren’t nice, either,

2:59 to the so-called “unbelievers”.

3:02 That’s just deep down

3:05 in us, in Germany.

3:08 We were raised that way.

3:11 Anything that’s foreign is supposed to be

3:14 looked at… at a minimum, at arm’s length.

3:17 No, it does not belong here. They can be here,

3:20 but they don’t belong to Germany.

3:23 Not in my opinion, because when I look at the future,

3:26 how they spread themselves wide,

3:29 if they remain among themselves, OK,

3:32 but you just hear too many harmful things,

3:35 and the way they… their culture…

3:38 it mixes too much with ours, and I am against that.

3:41 In every case. I don’t have anything more to say to that.

3:44 I mean, I’m not doing anything to these people,

3:47 and they for the most part don’t do anything to me either,

3:50 but this populating our land, I’m absolutely against that.

3:53 I am from Aachen, I can tell you enough about this,

3:56 some pretty sad examples,

3:59 but we don’t want to mention them now…

… … …

0:00 We have at the moment, in my hometown,

0:03 I’m not going to say where it is,

0:06 we have a 20% proportion of foreigners.

0:09 And if you understand

0:12 how [unintelligible] these people are,

0:15 you can imagine how this is going to turn out.

0:18 Have you talked to teachers lately

0:21 in elementary schools? an 80% proportion of foreigners,

0:24 with very limited German language knowledge.

0:27 When the social — I mean, you can see that in France right now —

0:30 when that doesn’t work anymore, there is rebellion,

0:33 Here, I mean, we’re still wealthy, thank God, we can still pay for everything,

0:36 especially these hundreds of thousands of people who come here,

0:39 but what’s going to happen when the economy isn’t so good,

0:42 and more of them end up in the welfare system?

0:45 That’s just not going to work.

0:48 …Because most of them here don’t assimilate,

0:51 and if you were to turn this around, if we were in their countries,

0:54 and we were to live our culture there,

0:57 then there would be drama, right? But here we tolerate all of this.

1:00 And that is the reason. I have nothing against

1:03 a person who comes from an Islamic country,

1:06 if they assimilate, but very few of them do.

1:09 We can’t just pull everyone into this country;

1:12 I mean, where does it end?

1:15 Where do you want to go? Of course to Germany, Germany,

1:18 all they always say is Germany, and that just doesn’t work.

1:21 We can’t just keep supporting everybody.

1:24 As much as I am a socially engaged person,