Re: [xmca] Berlin Wall

[David Preiss <ddpreiss@me.com>]

Post script: And to make thinks more worrisome, I just checked the  
source of the video and so it seems the video was published in You  
Tube by a Neo-Nazi, this version at least. But again, german  
colleagues may want to clarify.
I came in touch with the video because it was mentioned in the Chilean  
radio. I found interesting they did not mention the source. Internet  
is a booby trapped symbolic territory and makes historical truth  
increasingly elusive for an uninformed audience. How will the youth  
relate to this and to historical truth?
Alas! This is more than nauseating. That is why I wanted poetry.
DP



On Nov 10, 2009, at 12:51 AM, David Preiss wrote:

> And maybe not with the older generations either.
>
> Check this very recent video of Margot Honecker in Chile, which took  
> refuge here along Eric Honecker  as a result of misunderstood  
> reciprocity because of DDR solidarity with Chilean exiles.
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUJ92C-AKfQ&feature=player_embedded
>
> This video was reported in the Chilean radio. In addition to sing  
> some old DDR songs, according to the radio hosts she showed no  
> regret but maybe the german speaking colleagues at XMCA may want to  
> translate and correct me if they were inexact.
>
> Alas, we not only welcomed nazis in Colonia Dignidad but also old  
> Stasi patriarchs. Interestingly, some of those chilean exiles in the  
> DDR have produced many testimonials about what it meant to them  
> living their exile in a dictatorship of the opposite sign and how it  
> ended up eroding what was left of their idealism, after the Coup.
>
> On Nov 10, 2009, at 12:33 AM, mike cole wrote:
>
> > thanks for the memories, bruce.
> > I assume that there is no possibility of communicating with next  
> > generations
> > about this. And so it has always been? Or are there some
> > optimists out there who can recount counter-examples? I hope.
> > mike
> >
> > On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 4:49 PM, Bruce Robinson <bruce@brucerob.eu>  
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Interestingly, tonight I went to a seminar on the fall of the wall  
> > > and what
> > > has happened since with five German speakers. One, an interesting  
> > > character
> > > called Gerd Koenen related that he was working with an American  
> > > NBC news
> > > team. He said that when the news came that the border gates had  
> > > been opened
> > > in Berlin, the Americans instantly believed it, while the Germans  
> > > were
> > > extremely sceptical and their news teams didn't appear on the  
> > > streets until
> > > a bit later. He also spoke about the different attitudes, with the  
> > > Americans
> > > thinking something like 'Hurray, we knew we beat communism one  
> > > day'. Several
> > > of the speakers talked about how far apart the two lots of Germans  
> > > had grown
> > > over the 40 years of the GDR.
> > >
> > > I was in Berlin at New Year 89-90 (as I was in 88-9 and 90-91) and  
> > > managed
> > > to get hauled up onto a bit of the wall just behind the  
> > > Brandenburg Gate. I
> > > also took a photo of a smiling young East German border guard  
> > > looking
> > > through a hole in the wall and talking to the people on the  
> > > Western side.
> > > There was also a clear presence of dissident slogans and  
> > > organisations in
> > > the exhibition area under the Fernsehturm on the Alexanderplatz.  
> > > An amazing
> > > atmosphere but also a feeling that nobody was really in control of  
> > > what
> > > would happen next, which led to the initiative falling to those  
> > > who seemed
> > > to provide the most immediate solution.
> > >
> > > Bruce R
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tony Whitson"  
> > > <twhitson@UDel.Edu>
> > > To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> > > Sent: Monday, November 09, 2009 10:05 PM
> > > Subject: Re: [xmca] Berlin Wall
> > >
> > >
> > > I just saw a brief TV clip, which got me wondering:
> > > > I don't know this in any scientific way, but I would not be  
> > > > surprised if
> > > > people in the USA are under an impression that the Berlin Wall  
> > > > came down
> > > > because of Ronald Reagan.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Mon, 9 Nov 2009, David Preiss wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Dear colleagues
> > > > > Does anybody know of a good poem to remember the (fall of the)  
> > > > > Berlin
> > > > > Wall?
> > > > >
> > > > > And / or the Stasi and the damage of / to the human soul?
> > > > >
> > > > > I was looking for some but was unable to find.
> > > > >
> > > > > 20 years is too early, maybe?
> > > > >
> > > > > Or, beyond the fireworks, did we already forget?
> > > > >
> > > > > David Preiss
> > > > > ddpreiss@me.com
> > > > > http://web.mac.com/ddpreiss/
> > > > >
> > > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > > xmca mailing list
> > > > > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > > > > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> > > > Tony Whitson
> > > > UD School of Education
> > > > NEWARK  DE  19716
> > > >
> > > > twhitson@udel.edu
> > > > _______________________________
> > > >
> > > > "those who fail to reread
> > > > are obliged to read the same story everywhere"
> > > >                -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970)
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
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> > >
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>
> David Preiss
> ddpreiss@me.com
> http://web.mac.com/ddpreiss/
>
> _______________________________________________
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David Preiss
ddpreiss@me.com
http://web.mac.com/ddpreiss/

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