section_path: Public profile/Early days
section_name: Early days
paragraph_text: Early days
  
  At the outset, AfD presented itself as conservative and middle-class, catering to a well-educated demographic; around two-thirds of supporters listed on its website in the early days held doctorates, leading to AfD being nicknamed the "professors' party" in its early days. The party was described as professors and academics who dislike the compromises inflicted on their purist theories by German party politics. 86% of the party's initial supporters were male.