Mastodawn

1.) The context: Ever since 1990 Hungary always had between around 5-10 parties but in terms of popularity it's usually been a race between the biggest 🔴 left-wing and the biggest 🟠 right-wing party (the latter being Orbán's). I'll just call them "the left" and "the right" for simplicity's sake.

2.) The history: The left won in 2002 and 2006 but only barely (1% more votes than the right) but in 2006 shortly after the election there was a major scandal when then prime minister Gyurcsány, in a speech addressed to his party in private, pointed out that they haven't achieved anything while also continuously deceived the people. He used rather explicit language to phrase this, including the infamous "We fucked it up. Not a little. Big time." An audio recording leaked and this, combined with the already widespread dissatisfaction with his government (later the 2008 economic crisis also didn't help), has led to mass protests and the left has lost most of its credibility, causing the right to suddenly become very popular, win the 2010 elections with a 2/3 majority, and stay popular by constantly villifying the left and demonising Gyurcsány. Which has been easy for them to do because of the scandal and especially because Gyurcsány is still in politics and still the most influential people. He left the left to found another 🔵 left so there are now two major left-wing parties. Alone they have no chance of winning so they often join forces but they remain unsuccessful. They even joined with some minor right-wing parties out of desperation multiple times. Orbán and co. also did some gerrymandering circa 2011 to benefit them in elections.

3.) The present: In 2020 Péter Magyar left "the right" ( that's been growing ever more far-right) and founded TISZA, a "center-right" party that's been rapidly gaining popularity since 2024 and right now it's probably the strongest opposition party. So the 2026 elections are looking to be very interesting as Orbán and co. have the biggest chance yet of not getting their 2/3 majority of seats that lets them to do as they please currently.

Update 2025-05-08: Hold on, Gyurcsány is retiring?! Wow.

Gyurcsány is retiring from politics

neofox_surprised

It's so surreal that a visit from Pope Francis to Hungary accidentally led to the formation of a new party that actually has a fighting chance against Orbán & co.

When the pope visited in 2023, the president of Hungary and the minister of justice signed some customary pardons for the occasion. One of the people they pardoned stirred a major controversy and forced both of them to resign. Following this, the justice minister's husband divorced her and took the opportunity to distance himself from the ruling far-right party. He then went into politics himself and built up a new, center right party that became far more popular that the existing opposition in just one year and could actually have a good chance in next year's elections.

Orbán's government wants to pass a law that would let them shut down any media outlet that gets funds from abroad and that they deem to be a "danger to Hungary's sovereignty."

The far right government is panicking because for the first time since 2010 there's a party that can actually challenge them. And if they can somehow fabricate evidence of that other party getting foreign funds, this might also let the government disqualify the challenging party in next year's elections... Because otherwise the challenging party has been really good with transparency about their funds which basically all comes from sympathisers within the country.

Article (in English)

Viktor Orbán’s crackdown on free press does not only affect Hungary. It affects all of Europe

The so-called “Transparency Law”, currently pending approval, significantly undermines freedom of expression in Hungary — and its impacts are unlikely stop at the country’s borders.

444

one thing the HU govt is doing a really good job at is motivating me to pick up learning Dutch

The EU can't make decisions in a bunch of matters unless every single member state agrees and the vote is unanimous. This may have seemed like a good idea initially but now it's just making the EU dysfunctional. I really do think the threshold for these votes should be around 80-90% and not 100. That way Orbán couldn't perpetually spit in the continental perpetual stew.

90% would mean 25/27 members have to agree, 80% would mean 22/27. I think either would be reasonable.

Protest today in front of the Hungarian parliament. Against what? The past 15 years.

One of the few changes the current government made that I actually liked was getting tobacco products out of supermarkets and grocery stores and restricting their sale to so-called 18+ only "national tobacco shops" that you can't see inside from the outside.

Karácsony Gergely, mayor of Budapest or, as people call him, Apu (Dad). A constant ray of light in the heart of this country. Also, his name translates as Greg Christmas. And a happy belated birthday, he turned 50 yesterday!

304 days until 🇭🇺 Hungary elections

It's funny how Bernie's views are considered radical in the US, while in Europe he would just be an average social democrat

Moving to @xoagray@tiggi.es Jun 15

@odoben It's just a sign of how far right our politics have drifted here. Most Americans don't get that the Democrats are right, the Republicans are far right, and there really is no functional "Left" party.

@xoagray Hungary is on a track to becoming something similar. Not because any of our leftist parties were drifting to the right but because all of them are quite unpopular and most people who want the far right regime to go have their hopes in the recently formed center-right party.

Moving to @xoagray@tiggi.es Jun 16

@odoben Some people are calling for that over here too, but it has never worked here. The "center right" always ends up getting pulled farther right until we end up back at extremist right again.
Hopefully if Hungary tries this, it doesn't fall into that same downward spiral.

RixtonSnek Jun 15

@odoben Not even? He is like... liberal with some social policies.

Then again, we as hungarians can't exactly be picky either :P

300 days until 🇭🇺 Hungary elections

neocat_owo_blep

For those who missed it, Orbán had a big expensive event where he called his followers to action to build an online army to "combat" the "pro-EU" oppositional "disinformation" that is "spreading" online. He called this event and this army the Fight Club.

Not only is this name choice incredibly ironic considering the plot of the book that inspired it, but it's also a book written by a queer Ukrainian person.

Okay, so, Budapest's local government came up with a brilliant idea to try and combat the law that banned Budapest Pride in its usual NGO-organised form that the police now wouldn't allow. The city's government itself is organising a customary parade in June commemorating the withdrawal of the Soviet forces from Hungary. This is not unusual. But this time it's "in the name of freedom, love and pride" and they're literally calling it Budapesti Büszkeség menete ("the Budapest Pride rally"). Since it's now organised by the city itself, fewer permissions are needed.

since the Democrats aren't really left wing anymore, Bernie should start a party named the Social Democrats of America, or

SODA🥤‼️

for short

Budapest

drgn_flag_rainbow

@odoben i knew there would be a lot of people but dang!! go budapest!!

@kadse Press have been interviewing random attendees all day and the majority of them said this is their first time attending

blobfoxfloofhappy

@odoben I mean he already is an independent...

But yeah it sucks we either have center right or far right here

@spud Wait, he is?

@spud Huh. Longest serving independent, meaning that he's been independent for a long time already?

blobfoxthinking

Or just that he's independent right now but they also count his time in office as a democrat?

@odoben not sure - all I know is that he's old, and that he's been pretty based his entire life including getting arrested for protesting

@odoben @spud He has always been an independent. He just caucuses with the Democrats, and works together with them, but technically he's an independent

@Gauss @spud I wonder if that's part of the reason the democrats never chose him as their presidential candidate, because "oh,we can't have a non-democrat candidate..."

@odoben @Gauss you joke but kind of? It was more that he wasn't an establishment Dem who was friendly with big Business and monied interest, so they labeled him a socialist which is worse than the devil

Dems will campaign the hardest against their own to maintain the failing status quo

@spud @Gauss oh i was being serious

we either have center right or far right here

🇺🇸🤝🇭🇺

neofox_googly_shocked

@spud Thing is, the only realistic way for Orbán & co to lose if if everyone besides their voters votes for the most popular opposition party, center right. If that succeeds, hopefully the leftist parties can catch a break from the past 15 years and recoup, maybe even form some new parties, because honestly, the current left is quite dysfunctional as it it.

@spud @odoben Ever heard of CPAC Hungary? Yeah...

neofox_googly_shocked_256

@Gauss @spud Yup...

https://packaged-media.redd.it/blfky6qdcp5f1/pb/m2-res_854p.mp4?m=DASHPlaylist.mpd&v=1&e=1751198400&s=4086ba0cbed7c616873d0f46baa6a0be69246c90
Politicians first, ambulance second.....

@odoben @spud Wtf

neofox_googly_shocked_256

verified_dragon

I can't remember a time when the Democrats were left wing tbh but, y'know, it's the left-of-fascist coalition I guess

@odoben Can't come soon enough

byte::Arc<Webmaiden>

neobot_sign_beep

blobhaj_flag_nonbinary

@odoben but also it’s a monopoly that fully belongs to orban’s clan afaik

@byte Yeah, there's always a catch. But I wonder whether this change resulted in less people smoking. On a related note, the idea of banning people born after a certain year from ever buying tobacco has been floating around for years. I wonder if it'll become an actual law anytime soon.

@odoben o.0 TIL!
I thought that was a "since many decades" thing, a not a recent new monopoly...

@odoben Do iiiit

(both learning Dutch and getting the heck out of that shithole)

@ralesk I mostly just want to get ready. If the election goes well, I might reconsider.

@odoben Even then the recovery of the country will be slow and likely hindered by the opposition Fidesz. If the new government even wants to fix the problems in the first place.

@odoben goed uwu

@odoben I've actually switched to learning Italian

Mostly because boyf, but it's incredible that even a government as right wing as in Italy is far more tolerable than those orange fuckers

Maybe it's because the news isn't controlled by them, or because they're nowhere near to getting a 2/3rds majority

@Gauss Hmm... Maybe I should also consider it. I have four years of Italian under my belt so it could be faster than learning Dutch. But then, if I'm going I'd rather go as far west as I can. Without going to France.

@odoben Italy has some nice things in common with Hungary, such as good food and tax evasion

@odoben @Gauss What's wrong with France?

@exec @Gauss Political climate (although things might be better now than when I last checked)

@odoben @Gauss I thought it's about the language

@exec @Gauss Oh no, I'd be willing to take up any germanic or romance language

@Gauss @odoben Bf started learning Italian but we have yet to set foot there. He more or less was motivated because he's watching an Italian speedrunner, so you don't need such big reasons to learn the language; he's kinda a polyglot anyway at this point

@exec @odoben Fun fact: if you go to Italy to work, but previously you've never been to Italy, you get a pretty substantial tax cut for 5 years

@Gauss @exec Vacations don't count I hope

ying_laugh_sweat

@odoben @exec Sadly they do

@Gauss @exec that is a very silly policy then

@odoben @Gauss Sounds like a "bet on blindly moving" ruling

@odoben @exec Consider that the tax office doesn't really have a way to verify you saying that this is your first time in Italy. For the most part they just take your word for it

blobfoxthinksmart

@Gauss @odoben Very GDPR breaching idea: they could ask every train, bus, and aeroplane company operating in the EU if you had any tickets to Italy

@Gauss @odoben There's the 30/20/10% ruling as well in the Netherlands (but also changing in 2027)