The Stammtisch Unchained

Everybody who is anybody who is politically correct in Germany is all hot and bothered about the marches being staged by PEGIDA or the “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West” in Dresden these days. They have to be. It’s their job or something.

PEGIDA

I say take a chill pill already and don’t take these folks so seriously, you other folks. It’s just diffuse bitching and moaning pur (pure). All this is is the biggest Stammtisch party we’ve seen yet. It’s Oddity 384 all over again (shameless ebook plug), in other words.

Oddity 384. A real German is always being “verarscht” or taken for a ride by somebody “da oben” or up there. All Germans belong to a symbolic “Stammtisch” or regular’s table, whether they actually belong to a real local regular’s table or not. This is the place where the unappreciated man on the street regularly complains about the abuse he is receiving from his employers, the rich or the ruling political caste and how they are all personally out to get him. Strangely, at least with regard to this ruling political caste, these same men on the street regularly reelect said politicians with large majorities or enable them to remain in power by not going to vote at all.

Die „Pegida“-Bewegung habe einen Nerv getroffen. Bisher sei Deutschland nicht für Populismus dieser Art anfällig gewesen.

Let It Rot

It’s voting time  in Berlin again. This time it’s about whether or not good old abandoned Tempelhof Field should be developed or not (for housing, a library, etc.). You know, to actually maybe use it for something other than flying kites?

But as usual we have learned that this would be a terrible thing and that the field needs to be “saved” from such an awful fate, or at least that’s what opponents on the left insist. Urban Romantics need more room to move, especially if they are German ones (“the richest kind”) and being that saying no is so popular and comes so naturally to Germans in general and Berliners in particular, I am quite sure these opponents will win yet again.

Der stillgelegte Berliner Flughafen liegt brach. Nicht weil der Ort belasteter wäre als andere, sondern weil es leichter ist, mit dem “Luxus der Leere” zu kokettieren, als die Geschichte anzunehmen.

Das Tempelhofer-Feld ist eine Oase mitten in Berlin.

Berlin Starts Talking Tough To Russia After All

Sort of. Jeepers creepers already! This ought to stop old Vlad Putin dead in his tank tracks.

Tanks

Germany should remove a pair of World War Two-era Soviet tanks standing on pedestals next to Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate in protest at Russia’s actions in Crimea and Ukraine, Germany’s best-selling newspaper Bild said on Tuesday.

Launching a petition to get rid of the two green T-34 tanks that have stood in front of the Soviet war memorial since it was built in 1945, Bild and Berlin tabloid B.Z. urged readers to send letters of protest to parliament against the war symbols.

Wir wollen keine Russen-Panzer am Brandenburger Tor!

Creepy Corn Coming (And I Don’t Care)

Ghastly, genetically modified creepy corn.

Corn

Creepy corn without a name. Creepy corn that isn’t even spelled with a capital K. Corn so creepy that it only has a creepy number; the nasty and nightmarish 1507. Corn devised in some creepy laboratory somewhere in the United States of Creepy Amerika.

Insect-resistant, creepy, nameless and K-less corn. Creepy corn that Germans dressed up like bees simply must say Nein! to. Corn that must be stopped at all costs.

Corn declared safe by the European Food Standards Authority. But still.

“Wir erkennen die Vorbehalte des Großteils der Bevölkerung gegenüber der grünen Gentechnik an.”

Over A Dozen Hamburg Occupy Occupants Now Without Occupation

Germany’s oldest “Occupy” camp, thought to have been established sometime during the late Römerzeit (Roman Age), was cleared yesterday by brutal financial shark-like city cleaning employees in a hush-hush operation that had been announced several weeks before.

Occupy

Many of the occupants were caught unawares in their sleep yesterday afternoon when the profit-greedy imperialist lackeys stormed the camp with brooms, trash bins and protective breathing devices, forcing the dirty dozen of unemployed occupiers into unemployment somewhere else.

Now that the “Occupy” movement has been crushed for good in Germany, many here miss its romantic lack of class struggle and crude fear-mongering antics already and have most likely begun occupying themselves with inventing other forms of worldwide occupation-like phenomena that will also lead to absolutely nothing whatsoever at all one day but will at least feel kind of sort of like they maybe could have, as long as they don’t get too uncomfortable or begin to resemble anything that demands any real commitment or anything, that is.

“Wir wurden von diesem Räumkommando überrascht”, sagte ein Demonstrant der noch etwa ein Dutzend Mitglieder umfassenden “Occupy”-Gruppe. Eigentlich sollte das Lager jedoch schon bis zum 31. Dezember abgebaut werden.

PS: USA Forcing Iraq To Defend Itself Again

More Naked Political Reality

Now these are what I call political animals. Grrrr.

Femen

A bunch of Femen activists were demonstrating again somewhere in Berlin today against somebody cracking down on their Femen activities somewhere in some country some place as if somebody could care less or was even freakin’ listening.

Activism sure can be a dirty business, can’t it? And nasty, too. But somebody’s got to do it.

“My boobs, my bombs.”

Barbie Must Die

And the “Barbie Dreamhouse Experience” must be wiped from our collective memory. And said dreamhouse must be razed to the ground, too. This is because Barbie is a clear and present danger and a real threat. At least here in Berlin it is.

Barbie

And as far as I can tell, these are the German feministic reasons for this:

Everything is pink. Barbie and her Dreamhouse are a “pink-colored, sparkling world of beautiful illusion.”

There is an “endless” closet, cupcake baking kitchen, fashion runway and pop-star karaoke stage” inside (OK, I’m with them when it comes to this part).

The Dreamhouse gives “children the chance to taste the sweet nectar of life as a doll” and the protestors don’t like “pretty propaganda” like this.

They find it unfair that “not many women have the possibility of creating such a life for themselves.”

They think that Barbie is a role model that makes young girls want to “always look good, and to cook and clean.”

Barbie and her Dreamhouse “lead to eating disorders,” too.

And on and on and on. The head feminist, Michael Koschitzki, a member of the far-left Left Party’s youth organization, has spearheaded the protest movement against the Dreamhouse, printing thousands of flyers and calling on fellow feminists to gather outside for speeches and protest outside the temporary attraction on Thursday.

I’m speechless, almost. And I’m not making any of this stuff up, either. And these aren’t little girls cranking out this nonsense. These are real live feminist grownup human beings openly calling to picket a Barbie house, albeit a “Barbie Dreamhouse Experience” kind of house, but still. And the worst part of all this? The Barbie Dreamhouse Experience will be charging adults €15 just to get in.

“Barbie has again become a tool for some to advance their own agenda.”

Berlin Far-Left Left Party Partiers Believe American Fashion Doll Wrong Role Model For German Girls

“The Barbie Dreamhouse is the expression of a conventional role model that isn’t OK.”

Barbie

Barbie is a fashion doll manufactured by the American toy-company Mattel, Inc. and launched in March 1959. American businesswoman Ruth Handler is credited with the creation of the doll using a German doll called Bild Lilli as her inspiration.

He’s Been Looking For Freedom

Or a little media coverage, at least. Damn. Another demo party freak show happening thingy I somehow managed to miss.

The Hoff

Hasselhoff said on Sunday that a real estate developer’s plans to move part of the wall was “like tearing down an Indian burial ground” because of the great historical importance it had.