Thursday, January 31, 2008

Recent Reflections on a Sensitive Subject

Outside my window, Karneval season kicked into high gear today. While Cologne's Karneval is particularly famous, the holiday is celebrated far and wide, including in Munich, where it is known as Fasching. Though Karneval technically began months ago, heavy-duty merrymaking only commences in the days prior to Lent. Munich had one of its first major Fasching festivities, a parade, this past Sunday. The parade caused a storm of controversy in the press because it conflicted with -- and drew attention from -- International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

This blog has been almost silent until now about this particular period in Germany's history. That was deliberate. The Holocaust is an immensely complicated topic, and the current German political climate regarding the Holocaust is equally intricate. I did not want to add needless blather to a knotty and emotionally charged dialogue.

At this point, I have some thoughts to share. The topic of the Holocaust weighed on my mind in Munich last week. While there, I and the other participants of my seminar met with a high-ranking official of the Bavarian state government. He was obviously an intelligent, articulate man. He spoke fluidly and charmingly about Bavarian history and culture. He also made some very flippant remarks about the NS-Zeit.1 At one point, he said that Bavaria is where all the "nice" elements of German culture come from, and that the negative elements -- here he actually listed the Holocaust as an example -- came from elsewhere.

The Nazis did not exactly enjoy overwhelming support in Bavaria, but it would be a lie to say the region opposed the Reich. Conversely, though it is an egregious exaggeration to claim Bavaria has "all of German's good culture," it certainly has its share. Bavaria birthed Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss; Max Planck and Werner Heisenberg; Bertolt Brecht and Thomas Mann. But it is also where the Nazi movement began in the early twenties.

I recognize that I tread on sensitive territory here. Especially dangerous is the drawing of inferences about modern Germans from historical lessons. The general rule, as I have seen it, is that contemporary Germans are exceedingly aware of their history, perhaps even haunted by it. The generation raised in the wake of World War II was taught, at home, at church, in school, to retain a sense of Schuldgefühl, a feeling of guilt for the sins of their country. Germans are by and large saturated with their history, and while this has occasionally created blowback, more often, I have seen it lead to a greater concern for human rights and a stronger belief in international cooperation.

As for me, from everything I have learned about the Holocaust, the only sure conclusion I have reached is that it was an immensely tragic and immensely complicated event. There is still much to be learned from the Holocaust. Some Germans have gone to great lengths to do so. We can learn from them as well.

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1The most commonly used term among Germans today for the Nazi regime. NS-Zeit translates to the "time of national socialism."

3 comments:

Unknown said...

I don't believe that I would have the guts to boast that my country was above all of that Nazi business anywhere in the borders of Germany. Like you said, Germans have done a good job remembering the Holocaust and how the Nazis affected their country, so as not to repeat the egregious mistakes of the past. No matter how charming or articulate (or even truthful) he might have been about how Bavarian culture compares to German, I don't think it was very polite of him to say that Bavaria wasn't involved with the Reich.

John said...

Thoughtful post, Greg. Though I'd be interested in how you'd rate Germany's human-rights concern against its human-rights effectiveness.

Michael Stanton said...

I can't imagine what that guy was talking about...Munich was a hotbed of right-wing activity after the first world war. It even has the name "Hauptstadt des Bewegung", (capital of the Nazi movement). Hitler lived here and attempted his government takeover here. Very, very sadly, it seems that Munich was a good place for Nazism to take root.