How I'd love to be able to write about all the good things we have going on in Germany. How I'd love to be genuinely proud. Sadly, time and again I am reminded not to carry my head too high.
Consider all the things that a government should be concerned with: taxes, education, public health (very important these days), public infrastructure, public safety, foreign affairs, trade, just to name a few that spring to mind. What they actually do concern themselves with is often a vastly different matter.
To give an example, I have just learnt, there is a law governing the "Peace of the Dead" (Totenruhe) which lays down your "post-portem personal rights". One effect, my landlady told me, is that if you have a relative cremated somewhere other than where he or she will be buried the urn has to be sent by mail to the place of burial. It cannot be handed over to the deceased's family (as it can in other countries). They might set grandma's remains on the mantle piece and that would be "disturbing the Peace of the Dead". It would be an offense. The Peace of the Dead is protected for ten years. I'd agree it would be extremely bad taste - but to be punishable is going a bit too far. And then I consider that representatives in parliament must have sat down to debate this and make it law. What precious time they must have spent on this! Sometimes I think it's so that later when challenged on what they achieved they can point at it and say: "We weren't idle. We passed a bill to protect the personal rights of the dead."
Similarly, there's a bill somewhere covering domestic violence where a husband physically abuses his wife. You'd think that such things were covered somewhere under rape, assault or grievous bodily harm. But parliament stuck their heads together and came up with a separate bill for this just to show that they are very concerned about the fate of women. Now, I agree that there should be zero tolerance toward such offenses. Still, is this what our government should spend their time on when economy at the time was stagnant and unemployment on the rise? Later they will say: "But we protected women's interests." While neglecting their duties toward the future of the country.
Environment: There has been - and still is - a big debate about abolishing nuclear power in Germany (Atomausstieg). This egg was hatched by the Green Party after the Chernobyl incident. All around us our European neighbours like France, the UK and even the Czech Republic are actually increasing their nuclear capacity. We also have as yet no workable alternative. Still, environmentalists go on shouting their slogans of renewable energies, setting an example and making our country safer. I don't think they have given much thought to how many wind generators it would take to power a city like Berlin or Hamburg. Or that the French have nuclear power plants right across the border from us (so much for safety). We might well end up buying electricity from them later. But that's what parliament spend their time on.
Or education: When I was in secondary school the government spent years agreeing on a spelling reform and finally introduced the "New German Spelling" (Neue Deutsche Rechtschreibung). It turned out to be mainly a rearrangement of the existing rules. Nothing new or ground breaking. The usage of "ß" and "ss" has become more complicated rather than less. The government spent God-knows what resources repairing something that wasn't broken in the first place. With the only effect that I can throw away half the rules I painstakingly memorised at school and now have to rely mainly on my spell checker. Some reform.
The list goes on.
Sometimes this kind of behaviour seems to me like children that are told to do unpleasant chores. Mum says: "Clean up your room." When she comes back little Timmy stands in front of the door of his room and proudly announces: "Mum, I washed my face." When mum tries to take a look at his room he quickly steps in her way and beams his clean face at her. What he did wasn't useless but it would have happened anyhow and his room is still a mess.
My grandfather always says we have the government we deserve. There are times when I fear he is right. The next general election is coming up and I can already see the propogan- I mean, campaign posters. "Financial sharks would vote for Liberal", the Social Democrat posters proclaim ominously. They promise to deal out more money. The current government has already ensured the "scrapping bonus" (Abwrackprämie: a €2500 bonus you get from the government if you scrap your old car and buy a new one) will continue to be paid until the end of the year. This will boost economy, they say. To blind voters, they're handing out money they don't have. And they pass laws that allow them to pretend they've been busy. And they're surprised that young people are frustrated and loose interest in politics. It's all really a lot like kindergarten.
What to do? I will cast my vote and do my personal duty. And hope against all hope that something will change.
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