german identity, continued

After posting the translated essay about Germany and the Jews from Die Zeit two days ago, a friend of mine e-mailed me and asked me what I thought about it. Here's what I replied to him.

Exhibit, 2010 exhibition Hitler and the Germans,
German Historical Museum, Berlin.

First of all, it was a difficult piece to translate, and not only for its length. The way Ulrich phrases his thoughts is very impersonal: he uses the passive voice a lot, or starts his sentences with the object instead of the subject, or uses 'man' which we use a lot in German instead of saying 'we', 'I', or 'you'. 'Man' stands for people in general, it's a collective pronoun, instead of naming a subject (which would mean lending contours to a statement), this is inclusive, as if things that happen are universal. It is also often used to express what is customary: Man geht sonntags zur Kirche - one goes to church on Sundays. It's a peculiar thing to speak like this, a very German thing. We like to hide in the crowd, not stick out as individuals, and we don't like those who do stick out, who are more successful, have more money, are more satisfied with their lives, or are heroes. Modesty is important for us, in ourselves as well as in others, in particular since the war. I've never been so aware of my Germanness than now that I live in the Netherlands [edit: and in Rotterdam at that, the only Dutch city which was blown up by Nazi bombs] and am married to an American. The distance is what makes you see your roots more clearly. But I am digressing.

A lot of the thoughts in the piece are mine. The guilt is what people of our generation got fed with our chocolate milk and raisin buns at school. We watched Alain Resnais' Nuit et Brouillard for the first time in 7th grade, then again in 9th and 11th. This is how we were introduced to Jews. When I consciously saw my first living Jew at the age of 20, a lively hefty lady in her 50s, I was taken by surprise by the fact that not all Jews are pale, haggard, and weak creatures with hanging heads, wearing torn prison uniforms or nothing at all.

When the Berlin Wall came down back in 89, I was among those who held their breath, who were afraid that things would turn bad again - particularly with a conservative government under Helmut Kohl. Some did: the economy in the East went down the drain, thanks to short-sighted privatization policies, with all the negative effects on employment, environment, and self-confidence of the population; then there were all the neo-Nazi attacks on asylum seekers or Turkish businesses in the East during the 90s, the rise of some right-wing parties, Nazi pop, and so on - but overall, in spite of lots of problems which are still prevailing, the worst fears didn't come true. We are now the biggest nation in Europe in terms of population, but, as Ulrich points out in his article, Germany was 'doing quite well with remembrance and responsibility'. We're the big fuzzy bear without claws. We come in peace. 

We are not proud to be Germans, we may be proud of our individual accomplishments. We are not patriotic, because we know that patriotism is just one step away from nationalism, and a few steps away from genocide. We are modest people, we work a lot, we are efficient, we recycle diligently, and now we also lead Europe and maybe the world into a green energy future. What's there not to like about us? And yet, we still feel guilty, guilty for something we couldn't have prevented even if we tried, because we weren't even born when it happened.

I did visit concentration camps, two of them multiple times: The one in Bergen-Belsen, where Anne Frank died, and Buchenwald, where they mainly incarcerated and killed political dissidents ("protective custody"), homosexuals, intellectuals, and Soviet POWs. I know the feelings Ulrich describes when walking through the cells, the corridors, the crematoriums. They are among the most heavy feelings I've had in my entire life.

So, are we allowed to criticize Israel, its arms and security complex, its foreign policy, its settlements, and the way it treats Palestinians? I still think we should speak up if we're convinced that what's happening is wrong. Yes, the Holocaust was exceptional in many ways, but does that mean that we must shut our eyes from what's deemed lesser evils? 

What's with the immigrant children of today who he describes? What can school achieve in terms of teaching universal compassion and justice, rather than guilt? He's talking about Auschwitz turning into 'something pan-European, pan-human' even. Wouldn't it be nice if that was its long-term outcome: Getting rid of nationalism altogether, once and for all? And, again, I am reminded of my status in this foreign country, and in a relationship with my foreign wife. Those are cultural barriers which are relatively easy to overcome nowadays, but they are there, and from time to time they play their tricks on me.

Also, I remembered what I wrote last year, about nations. And I remembered the Rifkin speech I posted at the end of this blog post. Which, still, would be a kind of ideal in my view.

After posting the translated essay about Germany and the Jews from Die Zeit two days ago, a friend of mine e-mailed me and asked me what I thought about it. Here's what I replied to him.

Exhibit, 2010 exhibition Hitler and the Germans,
German Historical Museum, Berlin.

First of all, it was a difficult piece to translate, and not only for its length. The way Ulrich phrases his thoughts is very impersonal: he uses the passive voice a lot, or starts his sentences with the object instead of the subject, or uses 'man' which we use a lot in German instead of saying 'we', 'I', or 'you'. 'Man' stands for people in general, it's a collective pronoun, instead of naming a subject (which would mean lending contours to a statement), this is inclusive, as if things that happen are universal. It is also often used to express what is customary: Man geht sonntags zur Kirche - one goes to church on Sundays. It's a peculiar thing to speak like this, a very German thing. We like to hide in the crowd, not stick out as individuals, and we don't like those who do stick out, who are more successful, have more money, are more satisfied with their lives, or are heroes. Modesty is important for us, in ourselves as well as in others, in particular since the war. I've never been so aware of my Germanness than now that I live in the Netherlands [edit: and in Rotterdam at that, the only Dutch city which was blown up by Nazi bombs] and am married to an American. The distance is what makes you see your roots more clearly. But I am digressing.

A lot of the thoughts in the piece are mine. The guilt is what people of our generation got fed with our chocolate milk and raisin buns at school. We watched Alain Resnais' Nuit et Brouillard for the first time in 7th grade, then again in 9th and 11th. This is how we were introduced to Jews. When I consciously saw my first living Jew at the age of 20, a lively hefty lady in her 50s, I was taken by surprise by the fact that not all Jews are pale, haggard, and weak creatures with hanging heads, wearing torn prison uniforms or nothing at all.

When the Berlin Wall came down back in 89, I was among those who held their breath, who were afraid that things would turn bad again - particularly with a conservative government under Helmut Kohl. Some did: the economy in the East went down the drain, thanks to short-sighted privatization policies, with all the negative effects on employment, environment, and self-confidence of the population; then there were all the neo-Nazi attacks on asylum seekers or Turkish businesses in the East during the 90s, the rise of some right-wing parties, Nazi pop, and so on - but overall, in spite of lots of problems which are still prevailing, the worst fears didn't come true. We are now the biggest nation in Europe in terms of population, but, as Ulrich points out in his article, Germany was 'doing quite well with remembrance and responsibility'. We're the big fuzzy bear without claws. We come in peace. 

We are not proud to be Germans, we may be proud of our individual accomplishments. We are not patriotic, because we know that patriotism is just one step away from nationalism, and a few steps away from genocide. We are modest people, we work a lot, we are efficient, we recycle diligently, and now we also lead Europe and maybe the world into a green energy future. What's there not to like about us? And yet, we still feel guilty, guilty for something we couldn't have prevented even if we tried, because we weren't even born when it happened.

I did visit concentration camps, two of them multiple times: The one in Bergen-Belsen, where Anne Frank died, and Buchenwald, where they mainly incarcerated and killed political dissidents ("protective custody"), homosexuals, intellectuals, and Soviet POWs. I know the feelings Ulrich describes when walking through the cells, the corridors, the crematoriums. They are among the most heavy feelings I've had in my entire life.

So, are we allowed to criticize Israel, its arms and security complex, its foreign policy, its settlements, and the way it treats Palestinians? I still think we should speak up if we're convinced that what's happening is wrong. Yes, the Holocaust was exceptional in many ways, but does that mean that we must shut our eyes from what's deemed lesser evils? 

What's with the immigrant children of today who he describes? What can school achieve in terms of teaching universal compassion and justice, rather than guilt? He's talking about Auschwitz turning into 'something pan-European, pan-human' even. Wouldn't it be nice if that was its long-term outcome: Getting rid of nationalism altogether, once and for all? And, again, I am reminded of my status in this foreign country, and in a relationship with my foreign wife. Those are cultural barriers which are relatively easy to overcome nowadays, but they are there, and from time to time they play their tricks on me.

Also, I remembered what I wrote last year, about nations. And I remembered the Rifkin speech I posted at the end of this blog post. Which, still, would be a kind of ideal in my view.

german identity, continued