• 347 Posts
  • 5.17K Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: June 22nd, 2024

help-circle
  • @dumnezero@piefed.social Could you update the link to the original article at https://www.spiegel.de/a-0d1883d9-b7dd-4e5e-a6f4-a3069b13b4dd asap please?

    English translation below

    Spiegel article, DeepL translation

    The legacy of reunification

    “First an exhilarating awakening, then a radical fall”

    **Victory of freedom or hostile takeover - East Germans look back on reunification in very different ways. Why is that? Sociologist Alexander Leistner has some explanations. **

    SPIEGEL: Some East Germans see the fall of communism in the GDR in 1989 as a peaceful revolution and a victory for freedom. In retrospect, another part views the change as a defeat and even sees the reunification as a hostile takeover of East Germany by the West. Where does this great contrast come from?

    Leistner: These are two highly condensed narratives about enormously complex events. They make history more tangible, but they also partly reflect individual experiences. Even in the 1990s, negative terms such as crisis, bankruptcy and even colonization emerged in connection with the reunification, including those of people whose livelihoods were damaged by reunification. Whereby negative images - as Pegida has shown - are not necessarily represented by those who lost out during the reunification.

    SPIEGEL: Does the emotional impact of the events of that time shape the interpretation?

    Leistner: Yes. Many members of the opposition in the GDR, for example, first experienced 1989 as an almost intoxicating awakening, an attempt to change the GDR - and then, from the fall onwards, as a radical fall into insignificance, because there was a lack of resonance for their ideas among the population. Many members of the opposition and their ideas were basically overrun by the East Germans’ desire for prosperity and freedom.

    SPIEGEL: The majority of East Germans were not active members of the opposition. How did they experience the fall of communism?

    Leistner: Millions of people were affected by the collapse of the East German economy and the loss of their jobs. Added to this was the degradation of many working women to housewives, the disposal of parts of the East German intelligentsia, the loneliness of the SED victims and other fates. For many people, the social awakening and democratic liberation were coupled with enormous disappointment and great uncertainty. These were sometimes shocking experiences that affected almost every family in East Germany.

    SPIEGEL: Did people feel threatened by the changes?

    Leistner: Many people certainly didn’t experience reunification as a reunification on an equal footing. Artists, for example - writers, actors, musicians - had to experience that their work was suddenly hardly appreciated anymore.

    SPIEGEL: Were many people hoping for a revolution in 1989, for freedom and consumption, but at the same time wished that their professional and social lives would remain unchanged?

    Leistner: You could say that. But you always have to be aware of the enormous dynamics of the development: In the summer of 1989, no one could have foreseen the collapse of the GDR. The collapse came completely out of the blue, and as a result there was a kind of surplus of the most diverse hopes.

    SPIEGEL: Including the hope that the break would not be too great?

    Leistner: Yes. Populist expectations of prosperity also played a role here, such as the slogan of the “blossoming landscapes” of the then Chancellor Helmut Kohl. However, that quickly proved to be an illusion.

    SPIEGEL: Why do many people still find it difficult to understand the fall of communism in 1989 as a complex historical process that cannot be explained in simple terms?

    Leistner: Simplistic narratives can be misleading, also in terms of remembrance politics. In reunified Germany, efforts are still being made to overload 1989 as an identity-forming moment. In speeches and exhibitions in the public debate about the GDR, 1989 is perceived as an act of self-liberation and as a completed process. This is an extremely shortened narrative, because for many people it was not always a success story, nor was it complete. The individual biographical catastrophes that the collapse of the GDR led to were not acknowledged for a long time, and in some cases were even stigmatized. Charred wreck of a Trabi (1990): “Sometimes shocking experiences”

    SPIEGEL: What effect did that have?

    Leistner: It created a lot of defiance among the people, recently a negative pride among the unadjusted, as well as great criticism of the dominance of West German elites and their perspectives.

    SPIEGEL: And this defiance reinforced a one-sided view of the reunification?

    Leistner: Yes. People who criticize reunification often still have the feeling that social change came upon them without them being able to help shape it. That’s why today, if you simplify it, there are two opposing points of view: reunification as a success story and the malicious takeover of the East by the West - basically a new beginning and a demolition version of reunification.

    SPIEGEL: Has the tendency to perceive reunification as an annexation increased in recent years?

    Leistner: At least among some people, right up to the absurd equation of the SED dictatorship with Merkel’s alleged dictatorship in right-wing circles.

    SPIEGEL: What mistakes were made in the West?

    Leistner: What many West Germans still fail to recognize today: Very little has changed in the West as a result of reunification, whereas almost everything has changed in the East. As a result of this disparity, there are completely different memories between the West and the East.

    SPIEGEL: Are right-wing circles in East Germany consciously picking up on that?

    Leistner: Yes. Although the AfD in East Germany, for example, is not only appealing to the victim role of East Germans, but rather trying to appeal to East German self-confidence and even present East Germany as the better Germany. It’s almost tragic - basically, it was only the AfD’s electoral successes in East Germany that led to more attention being paid to East German history after 1989.

    SPIEGEL: What would have to change for the fall of communism to become a common date in German history and not remain a divisive event between East and West for many people?

    Leistner: The empathetic West German view is still missing, there is a lack of understanding to recognize that the first experiences with West German democratic society were not only positive for many East Germans. Many people in the West still do not understand the shock of the almost lightning-fast transformation that hit the East Germans. To this day, however, accusations of ingratitude can still be heard in the West against the East Germans.





  • It makes no sense at all to use this argument to reason in favor of building out energy generation that needs a decade+ to come online and which only ever works with massive corporate and state support.

    Solar starts to work at the scale where a random dude in Pakistan screws a couple of panels on their roof without any permits. Nuclear starts to work at the scale where either a corporate behemoth (like GE or Siemens or Hitachi) or a multi-billionaire-financed startup sells a concept to a state-subsidized utility and then they collectively go through years of permits and construction.

    Even if solar were a little more expensive per kWh at scale (which is mostly a matter of tuning the calculations the way you prefer), it’s just so! much! easier! to roll out.

    And no, we don’t need an ever-increasing supply of power. What we actually need is for people to have a standard of life that they’re happy with. Which has some relation to use of energy but unlike what the article suggests, that correlation is nowhere near linear. People in the US don’t have proper healthcare, they live in sad places cut apart by vast car infrastructure, their cities are still suffering from the aftermath of redlining, etc. — their energy consumption is higher than in many parts of the EU, yet their standard of living is, on average, a lot lower.




  • the most expensive renewable

    Ftr, Uranium is not renewable.

    I don’t buy the “unsafe” argument

    The thing is that the well-known nuclear catastrophes, at a minimum all resulted in fairly large areas right in the middle of civilized land being lost to humanity for the foreseeable future. So, even if overall death rate is only somewhat higher than for e.g. wind energy — wind energy does not lead to such devastating local effects. The other thing is, nuclear needs skilled teams to manage plants at all times, even when they’re shut off. As soon as your country goes off its routine because military coup!, nuclear plants become a massive danger. Also, nuclear plants can make for devastating attack targets during a war (obviously the attacker would need to value mayhem and defeat above colonizability).

    And finally, nuclear danger is (within human time frames:) eternal because you need to store some materials safely for a very long time; “nuclear semiotics” is an actual thing studied by scientists somehow — yet I’ve never heard of “oil semiotics” or “solar semiotics”.








  • eine Adaption an das sich verändernde Klima, keine Klimapolitik im Sinne von Emissionsreduktion

    Es ist schon Klimapolitik, primär Anpassung, aber eine Schutzkomponente gibt es trotzdem: Straßenbäume binden keine Massen an CO2, aber wenn man eine Autospur mit Bäumen bepflanzen kann, dann spart das wahrscheinlich CO2.

    alle Strecken, die weiter als zur Garage sind, mit dem Auto zurücklegen

    Das ist eine Mischung aus Gewohnheit, Selbstrechtfertigung und Ideologie. Da kann man nicht so viel dagegen erklären, glaube ich.

    Sobald aber mal was geändert wird, sind Menschen meist plötzlich deutlich positiver. So ein Baum und ein sicherer, schattiger Fußweg sind ja auch ganz schön.

    Viele Städte zahlen immer noch die Kosten für Gaslaternen statt LEDs.

    Bitte was? Hinter welchem Mond sind die denn. Selbst in Düsseldorf werden die denkmalgeschützten Gaslaternen bald umgerüstet

    Das waren ja nur Beispiele. Da gibt es garantiert mehr.

    Aber hier ist es zum Beispiel so, dass seit ein paar Jahren progressiv auf LED umgerüstet wird. Allerdings ist der Betreiber der Beleuchtung das privatisierte ehemalige Stadtwerk, das eben gleichzeitig auch so viel Energie wie möglich verkaufen möchte und von dem erwartet wird, dass es den ÖPNV querfinanziert. Düsseldorf ist aber eben auch reicher als viele andere Orte, sodass die Erstinvestition weniger ins Gewicht fällt.


  • Erstens übersiehst du, wie wichtig Adaption ist: Wir können sofort entscheiden, Städte zu begrünen und dadurch sofort sicherer für Menschen zu machen. Wir können sofort Schwammstadtkonzepte umsetzen. Etc.

    Zweitens hat es einfach auch beim Klimaschutz gar keinen Sinn später anzufangen.

    Drittens ist Klimaschutz oft auch sinnvoll für beispielsweise städtische Finanzen. Die Autofokussierung beispielsweise raubt uns alle aus, in jeglicher Hinsicht: Mehr Hitze, längere Wege, mehr Kosten für Straßen- und Stehflächen, … Viele städtische Gebäude haben immer noch keine PV. Viele Städte zahlen immer noch die Kosten für Gaslaternen statt LEDs.


  • 2100 ist schlicht nicht relevant. Viele der heutigen Rentner werden aber 2035 erleben oder sogar 2040.

    Es wird natürlich schleichend jedes Jahr ein bisschen gefährlicher und es wird nicht das eine Katastrophenjahr geben. Wenn wir weiter so wenig tun. Wir sind in einer Phase, in der wir nicht mal genau erklären können, warum die Erwärmung aktuell so stark steigt von Jahr zu Jahr.

    Übrigens ist ein großer Teil der heutigen Hitzetoten im Rentenalter. Und diese Zahl wird absehbar drastisch steigen — wobei Stadtgrün natürlich eine super günstige Bekämpfungmöglichkeit wäre. Aber das kriegen viele Städte aktuell schon nicht hin, siehe Berliner Baumentscheid.





  • So, first, it’s at least a little interesting that you say nothing about EU sanctions against China in your response. That’s the one concrete point from my reply which you could have responded to.

    No I’m not spreading apathy and I support the communist party of Russia

    Funky. Otoh, you were basically saying that German politics is completely determined by corporates. That exact idea is spreading distrust in democratic processes and that is what I mean when talk about spreading apathy.

    Please stop doing the fucking Adam Curtis monologue about how Putin is psychically poisoning society

    I have no clue who Adam Curtis is. I am sure you know who that is. Rather consistently though in this thread, you seem to suggest things about me and put words in my mouth. Do you consider that good discussion style somehow?

    Your country has a problem with Russia because it has nationalized its oil supply

    What makes you think that?

    West Germany has had a relationship with Russia and its variously nationalized or semi-nationalized oil and gas infrastructure since the early 80s. And Germany has just progressively bought more of the stuff produced there.

    One of Germany’s chancellors even went straight from calling Putin a “flawless democrat” to lobbying for Gazprom. The German political system could never get its hands on enough Russian gas—even after Russia attacked a country that neighbors the EU in 2014. German politicians watched people in Poland freak out about Russia’s imperial potential for close to a decade and didn’t think anything of it. Germany literally allowed Gazprom to buy its national gas storage. That last bit is actually completely insane, even if the buyer of said storage hadn’t been an autocratic nation.

    Russia only became an issue to Germany, when it launched a full-scale attack on said country neighboring the EU.

    This isn’t a pissing match between countries

    I believe it is a war.

    this is about neocolonialism and Germany’s leadership is fighting for its place within that system

    Russia is not a colony, and it never was. Post-1990, Russia was largely just left to its own devices which you can certainly criticize as being unfair but I honestly don’t know what you get out of throwing the term colonialism around in this context.

    Honestly, this is such a warped view of reality. Germany is quite sure where it stands overall, as a defining part of the EU, amidst Western nations. To me, it seems post-1990 Russia never was so sure of its identity. Now the official goal appears to be filling that void with imperialist ambition. Russia being geographically large and geographically “close” to Germany does not really figure into the equation of political/economic/mental closeness though.