Because Putin's propaganda is just that effective. Give europeans a reason to bash Germany and they'll gladly gobble up whatever you tell them. The Kremlin has been spreading blatant lies about Germany's energy dependencies since 2021 in preperation of the invasion and internet users have been repeating those lies like a mantra ever since.

Just a couple of weeks ago Germany reduced coal power to the equivalent of shutting down several nuclear power plants as renewables generate more than enough power and prices are down to pre-war levels aswell. Besides, last year was the most profitable for energy utility companies in german history, meaning most of the price increases were simply exploitation of the narrative that "war makes energy price go up". Prices didn't need to go up nearly as much, but media couldn't shut up about their scewed narrative. I mean international media still can't shut up about it, apparently. In Germany, everyone knows we got screwed by corporate greed, not just the war.

I'll try to answer this, please consider that English is not my native language:

Yes the prices for energy have been decreased up to the point where it has been pre-war. But the energy providers don't forward the now lower prices to the end-customer immerdiately, because customers often have contracts with a certain energy pricing which are still running (usually you can escape a contract after one year). Also, people pay an anticipated payment each month. At the end of each year this anticipated payment is matched with what you really have to pay. This can lead to a discount (you get money back) or, in most cases, you have to pay an additional ammount. This happened to a majority of people because the energy priced have increased over the last years. So people have to pay more money for the same amount of energy consumption.

With that in mind, it is also encouraged that people are supposed to stop using natural gas or oil for heating their homes and are supposed to use air-to-air heat pumps or long-distance heating (heat is tranferred through a pipe into your house). This comes with a full refurbishment of your heating system. Simplified: you can't just throw out your old gas-heater and connect your pipes to a heat pump - you need to replace the heatings in your rooms among other things. This is very expensive. In the meantime the Gebäudeenergiegesetz or Heizungsgesetz ("Energy law for buildings" or "Heating law") will be changed to this situation. Beginning from 2024 all heating systems shall not be using natural gas or oil. The law couldn't be established before the parliament's summer break, so this will be done after the summer break. Affected people can get a sponsorship from a governments bank (KfW-Bank) for fitting their homes - but the law has to be there first. That's why people are hesitant at the moment. Also, people don't like changes, especially those who are old. They often say that for the 10 to 15 years they still live, it is not worth changing.

In Scandinavia it has been proven that the usage of air-to-air heat pumps can even withstand severe winters. But they started the transition years ago.

In conclusion:

• People have contracts with their energy provider they can't escape at the moment
• Law has to be fitted to the use of heat pumps or long-distance-heating
• with the law there are sponsorship programs but people wait for the law
• some people just don't care because it doesn't affect them in the long run
• Germany didn't push the transition away from gas and oil and coal in the past. With the goal of being carbon emission free by 2045 now is the last chance to start the transition.

Democracy isn’t weakened by the AFD. It’s the conservative parties like the CDU/CSU and the FDP that have switched to populism and disinformation to stay somewhat relevant in the age of climate change. Both parties were scared of the popularity of the SPD and especially the Greens in the last election. In the end, they’re only helping to raise the popularity of the AFD, as they support more and more of their talking points. Without them, the AFD would have stayed on its downward trajectory into irrelevance.

PS: Many CDU/CSU politicians see the Greens as their number one political rival and source of all problems, not the AFD.

Strange dig with Rammstein.