A social media campaign has lifted a 22-year-old song mocking neo-Nazis back to the top of Germany’s single charts, in response to far-right arson attacks on refugee shelters.



Cry for Love by Berlin punk band Die Ärzte – a song about a young fascist scared of intimacy – was first released in 1993 during an earlier wave of neo-Nazi violence against immigrants.



The song, featuring the refrain “Your violence is just a silent cry for love … oh, oh, oh arsehole,” is poised to reach No 1 in the charts when official sales, download and airplay figures are released on Friday, said chart observer Media Control.



Cry for Love has already broken this year’s record for the most downloads within a week, said official chart-watchers Gfk.

The campaign was initiated by Gerhard Torges, a a 46-year-old music teacher in Osnabrück with no previous experience of online activism. He said the campaign was his way of taking a stand against racism.

“I was really surprised, I never thought we’d manage it,” he said. “I haven’t got involved with volunteering to help refugees here because I don’t know where to go and I don’t have time. It’s much easier online.”



Die Ärzte, a veteran punk band formed in west Berlin in 1982, have said they will donate all proceeds to Pro-Asyl, a German human rights NGO working with refugees.

“The campaign would have been cool with any other anti-Nazi song, but of course if it’s going to be ours, we’re very happy to support it,” wrote the band in a statement posted on the campaign website. “To all Nazis and their supporters, we wish you bad entertainment.”

Lyrics such as “Because you’re scared of a cuddle, you’re a fascist,” have struck a chord as the German public comes to terms with a staggering influx of refugees and migrants and a rise in violence against the newcomers. The country expects 800,000 refugees by the end of this year and is braced to accept half a million a year thereafter.

Over the weekend, crowds of volunteers gathered at railway stations in Munich and other cities to welcome tens of thousands of refugees, mostly from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, arriving on trains from Hungary via Austria.

Police estimate there have been more than 250 attacks on refugee shelters in Germany this year. Last month, 30 police officers were injured in a riot in Heidenau near Dresden at a march by neo-Nazis and their sympathisers against a new refugee shelter.

