Who is the group around “Captain Future” ?: Corona skeptics chant “A bit of Sars must be” in a Berlin supermarket – Berlin

The conductress getting out of the RE18 on platform two of Dresden Central Station is visibly annoyed. “That’s them, they’re the crazy ones,” she said to a unit of federal police officers standing by and pointed to a colorful group of people who were leaving the train coming from Cottbus at this moment. The self-proclaimed Berlin Freedo Parade has arrived in the Saxon capital.

The group around its leader “Captain Future” regularly goes on weekend trips. The aim is always to demonstrate the “lateral thinking” movement. In Dresden, too, people who played down the corona, critics of measures and conspiracy ideologues wanted to take to the streets this Saturday, but the city had unceremoniously banned any elevator of the movement.

The supporters of the Freedomparade nevertheless took on the journey from the capital, which will initially end in Dresden Central Station. Presumably the conductress had already alerted the police on the route. On a video published later on YouTube you can see how “Captain Future” and fellow campaigners in the regional express disregard all hygiene rules on the way to Dresden. Nobody wears a mask, nobody keeps their distance.

Instead, the train danced in polonaise to the song “A bit of Sars must be”, which the “captain” personally rewrote. Once in Dresden, the fun seems to be over for the group at first. The federal police issued all those involved a day-long expulsion for the entire city area. The Freedo Parade must turn around.

But no sooner have the accompanying police left the group’s home train than the demonstrators decide to simply drive back. As always, the command is “Captain Future”: “Who, if not us, should stand firm. We are unruly party beasts, “he says in the video.

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The Freedo Parade leaves the train in Radebeul-Ost and drives back to Dresden. There she takes part in an unapproved, spontaneous corona protest in front of the Frauenkirche at around 7 p.m.

Dance demos with a three-digit number of participants

Like “lateral thinking 711”, the Freedo Parade was created at the time of the first lockdown in spring. Techno was played at the organization’s “dance demos”, and the lifts repeatedly had a three-digit number of participants.

Meanwhile the hard core of the Freedo Parade consists of less than twenty supporters, whose backgrounds couldn’t be more different. The “Captain Future” alias Michael B., who always appears in a yellow cape, comes from the party scene and organized fetish parties himself before Corona.

Earlier acquaintances describe the “captain” as “attention-seeking”

The Tagesspiegel had the opportunity to speak to former acquaintances of B. Many have now distanced themselves from his attitudes and describe the Berliner as “attention-seeking”. He politicized himself at demonstrations of “Fridays for Future” and “Extinction Rebellion”, through his good networking in the art and cultural scene of the capital, he realized the immense effects of the political pandemic measures on the industry early on and is therefore already took to the streets in April, said a former acquaintance in a letter available to the Tagesspiegel.

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The new side of party organizer B. for former friends and acquaintances is the lack of demarcation to the right. Because the Freedo Parade is not only noticeable for the mass spread of conspiracy theories on the Internet and on the streets, but also because it tolerates right-wing and right-wing extremist actors in its own ranks.

Members draw parallels with the Holocaust

While the group is getting off the train in Dresden, one of the fellow travelers turns to the press present and asks: “Where is the train to the concentration camp here?” When one of the journalists asks what this means, the man replies: “Well , The men in black look like the men from the SS and SA back then. There are parallels, ”and points to the federal police forces.

Shortly behind on the platform is Reza Begi, Iranian Holocaust denier and a welcome guest at NPD events. He wears a woolen hat in the colors of the German Empire and has also come from the capital with “Captain Future” and his entourage.

In the past few months, the group has repeatedly been noticed by seemingly spontaneous protest actions against the corona policy of the federal government in the capital. The Telegram messenger service is coordinated.

Protest actions in suburban trains and shopping centers

While the self-proclaimed freedom fighters roamed Berlin shopping centers in the autumn to Helene Fischer’s modified hit “Maskenlos durch die Nacht” without covering their mouth and nose, the Freedo Parade has meanwhile arrived at more elaborate productions.

A week ago, they distributed a video in which they were walking through a train on the Berlin S-Bahn in white quarantine suits and covered their faces. Over the loudspeaker, a voice proclaims, “Danger to solitary confinement, ostracize mask deniers, that’s solidarity.” The staging is eerie. The right-wing extremist micro-party “The Third Way” had previously carried out similar actions in central Germany.

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The latest video of the Freedo Parade has meanwhile also reached federal politics. A smaller group around “Captain Future” can be seen shopping maskless in the LPG supermarket on Senefelderplatz in Prenzlauer Berg. In the entrance area, the conspiracy ideologues do squats and sing “A little bit of Sars must be”.