Recently i got to know the name of those interesting -to me- old cars which appeared in old movies or in movies referring to the "ostblock",Trabant or Trabi. I can't help loving all kind of old cars, so different from those we have now, although not better. Well, that's relative since maybe a slower car is better than a fast one. There are fewer risks to take when driving up to 100 km/h. I'd like to see all those old cars back, but with their engines improved so as to pollute less. Waaa...imagine a trabi workin thanks to the power of hydrogen or electricity. perfect!When i was little, the Iron curtain still existed and divided the world. I remember movies and cartoons where "the russian people" were pictured as the evil characters. But i don't remember much, besides that. I don't even have images in my mind about the fall of the Wall in 1989 because i was 7 and i'm sure all things happening then were a bit (just a bit) surrealist to me. Fortunately i saw the images later several times, though it wasn't the same. Spain was taking off in those years, having opened the doors of democracy to people not so many years before...and having had some crisis in the mid 80es (which, obviously i can't remember)...Spain was a bit out of nowhere, though she became a member of the EEC.
I don't think Communism is bad itself...the problem is when some people try to impose it and the leaders or people with some kind of power or links to the power, are corrupt or become corrupt. But the values are pretty positive and could work well if they come out spontaneously or from rational thinking (of what's the best for all) in a small community. Those values of not wanting luxury items, giving a high value to work for the community and belonging to it are much better than those values ruling the society we have nowadays in most "western" countries. The functionality of things is relegated to the background and things such as the image it gives to the society are considered more important in many choices. A trabi or a wartburg were enough....and a seat 600, in Franco times was enough for most families who could afford having their own car, although there were some other models. Now we have too much of everything, but yet people try to follow what is socially better...and homogenisation is not strange despite the diversity of products we have. We grow up feeling we can choose among a wiiiiide range of things and that but also we're thaught, by people around us but also by the media, what is socially desirable. And we end up desiring things because they're socially better, which we don't really need, while the media keeps bombing us with messages tellin us what to do. Happyness? not much, not enough in most cases. Just have a (discrete) look at the expression of the face of people walkin on the streets of big cities, where they can reach all kind of goods, modernity and so on. I can't find many happy expressions in people's faces...and those which aren't sad, look quite bitter or stressed. But i'm not making a call to set up communist values. I don't think either people in communist countries were or are happy, feeling somebody imposes a lifestyle on them, and seeing what lifestyle people in other countries have. But it's all a matter of education and what we get used to seeing...and how we face human impulses (those who make us love possessing things, wanting more, desiring, being better than others and so on).
"have a nice trip with Trabant". Buddhism and other Asian philosophies make me think of communism sometimes...The values they have are not so far away from eachother...and they are all distant from the existing values we have in most western cultures (i'm using "western" adjective but it's not just the west...i should include japan and some other places praising capitalist values). But nowadays people don't really thing about the relationship capitalism-communism (well, Fidel Castro and Kim Jong Il politics are still a hot issue), but about christianity and western culture, facing it with islamic countries. The world keeps changing, but not to better. :( Hey..comments for this post are very welcome. I hope i didn't offend anybody..and please correct any mistake i could have made (i didn't sleep much and morning thoughts can be sometimes a bit weird and clumsy) :)
3 comments:
Hi Yolda!
Congratulations for your brand new blog! I think that this will be good for you. Given the variety of your audiences I feel that if I wrote in catalan or even in spanish, no one could understand my comment, so I write in english. You know I have slightly notions of deutsch, but I don't have neither the level nor (I must confess) the patience to decode it.
So my first comment will be short and simple, because I feel that I can't overpose my opinion on politics to that of a politologist, but anyway, we have freedom of speech and any opionion is worthy.
The problem with politics is human nature. That makes human relationships shitty, and international politics triple shitty with double cheese. Have you ever in your life, when kids, tried to lead some of your classmates, to avoid them making aberrations that you knew adults where going to punish them for, just to find out there was no 'group conscience'? It is very difficult for a group of people to work together, and I'm afraid even the best willed utopic ideas come to disaster when they become reality.
I must confess, I have not read The capital, nor any of Karl Marx's books. I should, someday, though. However, I have the notions that from an idealistic point of view, communism is probably very nice (in a perfect world). I have the vague idea that first is to come the proletary dictatorship (or how the hell is "dictadura del proletariado" written in english) to prepare things for the real idilic bucolic with flowers and birds, communism. Someone told me that communism itself has never been experimented in the world, just that "proletary dictatorship". That's why communism has always been so terrible and problematic. The bloody rulership of Stalin, rivaling or even surpassing Hitler is a crude example of it. That makes me think that extremes are simply bad, and more than that, extremes touch each other... yes, I think that communism and nazism are not that far each other, just think the name of nazism, "nazional-socialism", the name says that it is a kind of socialism combined with extreme nationalism.
Politicly, I vote to socialists. I don't like opus dei religious fanatics, conservator, with ancestors in Franco's regime, capitalist politics like those in the PP. But I don't think communism is the answer. Apart from the atrocities in communism regimes, those are ruled by dictators and dictators make atrocities always, look at Pinochet. But another problem in communist countries is the lack of competitivity. You talked about cars. Why did technology in the so-called capitalist countries developed faster than in capitalist countries? Because of competition. There was an effort to become better than the competitor, develop faster, safer, more ecologic cars, or any other product. And... in communist countries, the car is not yours, is government's car, so why consider taking care of something not of your own? That's why communist cities where so grey, awful, dirty... I've been to Praga in the Czeck Republic, in the Dom Hotel, a very high bulding surrounded of very high buldings, all so ugly and grey, and it can sound like a topic, but the cars where all the same as well.
It may sound like an apology of capitalism, but it's not. I just compare communism and capitalism, and well, think of some of the reasons why communism has not succeeded even with such beautiful principles like the ones stated in Karl March's and Engels books. I think that the most important thing for a person moreover its own life, is freedom. Where you free in a comunist country? You were comunist because it was ilegal not being so, it was a treason, a betrayal to the government. You couldn't eat more than what you had in your rationament (mmm "cartillas de racionamiento?") etc. I agree, in the infamous USA during the witch hunt, there was a paranoia agains the communist, but I think that nowadays IF YOU CHOOSE TO DO SO, in any occidental country you could live in community with some friends If you wanted to, and you're not really forced to live like a capitalist buying the last cellular or a bigger car. Yes, again I agree, ads are so powerful that most people can't help ending up buying lots of things the don't need, and in the US it's even worse, there are preachers that can make people give them money in jesus' name (well I'm atheist so I find that kind of things a crap). And have you seen the political campaigns in the US for the elections? They are like commercials!! Like if they were selling the last miraculous product to loose weight, buy Bush, cleans whiter. AAAAAAH! Those ridiculous commercials with PUBLIC that claps "Joe, ever wanted to look younger? the answer is that fruit squeezer, take a look - PEOPLE CLAPS -". Ridiculous. Well I'm loosing my path, we were talking about politics.
I think that the most important thing in politics is that a government should work to achieve its citizen's happiness and security. In my opinion, the most important thing for a government to protect is its citizen's freedom. So, that's the question, it is very difficult to find the divisory line between freedom for the people and security. Total freedom is anarchy and is not the answer. In anarchy crime would multiply, one would desire other's belongings and use force to take them (more than now). And there would not be a police to stop anyone. In the other hand, in a totalitary world, with lost freedom, I think that would be police itself who would perform most of the crimes. And if you find the line, you still have to deal with corruption. As I said before, human relationships are shitty.
Mmmm well I think I have wrote too much for the first time. I have not found the answer yet but It wouldn't be funny otherwise would it? Have a nice day (tomorrow is my birthday, as well as Hiroshima's hecatomb)
Der Trabbi roolz!
El otro coche (para la "clase alta" de la sociedad sin clases) de la RDA era el "Wartburg". Hoy por hoy siguen existiendo algunos pocos Trabbis, sobre todo aquí en el Este en las calles.
Aquest home, el Dr. Karl, és el teu professor d'alemany?
And I noticed that in Spain this positive perception of Communism is highly popular. So often I heard that Communism in itself is "a good idea" or things like that. I don't know, but I think the Marxian theory is so unconcrete that you can do whatever you want with it, and that what the former Soviet countries did with it does not contradict Marx, although I don't say that there aren't possible other interpretations of Marx.
It is funny that a couple of days ago, this woman from a village a couple of km away from Frankfurt (Oder) was found to have killed 9 of her babies and stored them in containers and such in her garage. Since 1988! And now they found it out. Well, in any case, the discussion was about why there are so many cases of such brutal delicts especially in East Germany (the chance to get killed if you are a child are about 6 times as high in the East than in the West). So Brandenburg's Minister of the Interior, Jörg Schönbohm, said this has to do with the forced "proletarianization" (gewaltsame Proletarisierung) of the country which bred a culture of looking away (Kultur des Wegschauens), of indifference (Gleichgültigkeit), and of Verrohung (more or less "apathetic brutalization"). Of course, everybody here got ragingly upset and demanded the immediate resignation of Schönbohm (especially because they see him as a Wessi (he was born in Westdeutschland), and Wessis have no legitimation whatsoever anymore to say anything bad about the GDR (DDR; RDA)), but I can't deny that there certainly is some truth to that, even though there are other factors to consider.
If I look at the "indigenous" population of Frankfurt (Oder), the words of Schönbohm seem to be very appropiate. The people are "verroht", they are indifferent, look brutal, without culture, apathetic and so on. It will take several generations until this will be solved.
"Es wird das Proletariat ohne Kohle rabiat."
herr Drogenfranz,
Em presento, no sóc pas el professor d'alemany de Yolanda, just a friend que va coneixer a la Université. Precissament el que dic al primer paràgraf es que el comment en alemany no tinc ni el nivell ni la paciència per desxifrar-lo. La paciència es requerida per la manca de nivell, ja que només vaig fer un curs intensiu d'un mes d'alemany fa un parell d'anys així que els meus coneixements son molt limitats. Els únics idiomes en que em podria defensar son castellà, català, anglés i francés. Com a Dr. Karl em va batejar Yolda, com una derivació del meu nick habitual.
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