TALK BACK! - A Family Discussion about Right-Wing Populism, Values and Political Engagement

WHY I CANNOT KEEP SILENT

You may wonder why I am raising my voice to galvanize families into action across generations. Why do I think that politics, the discussion of values, and an honest exchange about the right and wrong ways to set the course for our common future need to infuse our daily lives much more than they do now. I am a European by conviction, which of course has to do with my age. I am a German, born in 1955, and even as a young man I was looking for a different—or better, a second—identity. I was a European first, then a German. Months before the Brexit vote, it was clear to me that I could not reconcile the discussion of Brexit, permeated and tainted with propaganda as it was, with my European identity.

The lies and polemics that accompanied the exit campaign, especially from turncoats like Boris Johnson, were both ugly and tragic. Although the world capital London with its grandiose and infectious dynamic will not lose its attraction even for the avant-garde, that dynamic is based more and more on a dubious foundation. For me, London was always a functioning city, exciting, alive, cosmopolitan. I always had the feeling that if London could function, there was hope for other metropolises. If so many people from so many countries could live together in relative peace, and at the same time the city could live and be productive at this tempo, then that success was transmissible.

But the Brexit referendum was dominated by inexplicable aggression, an aggression that—we have to be honest if we want to change anything—exists not just in Great Britain. We can observe it in Bavaria and Saxony as well, and not just in the Alternative für Deutschland1 but also among the right-wing populists and opponents of European Union in the Netherlands, France, Austria, Poland, and Hungary. Education, seriousness of purpose, and expertise count for too little. Facts are simply swept aside. Half-truths (13) and lies are in fashion. People like Nigel Farage complain about how bad things are for us while thousands of human beings are drowning in the Mediterranean. What have we come to when our standards have slipped so far?

For the first time in my life, an extremely right-wing Europe is being constructed before our very eyes, something I simply cannot comprehend. It is happening so quickly that I have to wonder if we Europeans with hearts and brains—we who wanted to create a peaceful continent for our children and grandchildren—have suddenly lost our sense of reality. Where are our Christian values, the commandment to love our fellow man? For me, the concepts of freedom, tolerance, and solidarity are sacred. Sacred is a big word, but the stakes are also large. I refuse to allow people like Marine Le Pen to set the terms of the debate for the future. I refuse to accept nationalism as legitimate. The rhetoric in England was so belligerent that any thinking German had to see parallels to our own history in the 1920s and 30s. Didn’t many people back then also think and say, “What’s happening isn’t good, but it won’t turn out to be so bad”?

»For me, the concepts of freedom, tolerance, and solidarity are sacred.«

A long time ago, I wrote a dissertation on the cultural politics of those years. I’ve never forgotten the countless newspaper articles I read from the Twenties. They reported exactly the same things I saw in the run-up to the Brexit vote of June 2017: leaders stirring up feelings, going on the offensive, and then apologizing while their followers go even further. The development escalates until it can no longer be stopped. We know how that turned out in Germany. Of course, it’s risky to draw such comparisons. But if we want to shake people out of their apathy, we have to lay aside polite restraint. Where was the outraged reaction in 2015 when Pegida2 demonstrators in Dresden held up mock gallows for Angela Merkel and Sigmar Gabriel?3

I’m stunned by the silence, (14) especially of those involved in cultural production and policy. We can no longer take refuge in our preoccupations with art and culture and withdraw into our lovely cultural institutions to sit and watch events take their course. I understand art and scholarship to be essential components of our civil society, since so much can be accomplished by artistic and creative processes. I am convinced that art and culture are the indispensable foundation of peaceful communal life in a democratic society. The more creative a society is, the more it is able to recover from setbacks and thus survive. During my time in Dresden, I learned what that means for a city, a society, and a state. Even in today’s Dresden, one still gets a sense of the complete loss of identity in the Third Reich and its aftermath, of people no longer knowing who they were. It reminds me of the leaden, depressing times I experienced in West Germany during the 1960s and 70s in Baden-Württemberg, as the first Italian guest workers arrived in our little town. Barracks were deemed good enough housing for them, and we all went over to have a look at them, as if they were exotic animals. Anyone who says otherwise today is lying.

When I recall Dresden and try to connect it to what we need to think about today, all I can say is that people who deny the loss of identity are fooling themselves. It’s not just a question of recalling what we have lost. What’s important is that what we have lost is missing in our daily lives today: churches, synagogues, self-confidant citizens, a full life, and intellectual aspiration. When I first arrived in Dresden in 1989, a friendly old man who had experienced the night of bombing in February 1945 gave me a tour through the center of the city. “There is the church of St. Sophia,” he said. “There’s the Albert Theater.” He named one building after another as if they were still standing. But there was nothing there, nothing but ruins. We were walking through a ghost town.

Even the dismantling of the Berlin Wall certainly didn’t herald a new identity. Yes, now everybody could visit Mallorca, buy brand-name goods, and even purchase a coveted VW Golf. But was there an increase in social interconnectedness? Looked at another way, there was always something missing. For some, it was the sense of collective purpose; for others, perspective; for too many, hope. Long before Brexit, neo-Nazis and Pegida in our own country had shown how susceptible people can be when they feel left behind. It’s especially bad that for many, having this feeling is often enough: there are people on the street and now also in legislatures who have no real goals except to destroy the system. That inevitably evokes memories of 1933. Where is the lively discussion we need between generations and in families? Democracy is at stake and so are moral and ethical standards that apply to everyone. People go on and on about their next vacation, the size of their flat-screen TV, barbeque sauce recipes, and cooking shows. But what about our system and its achievements?

And yet there are so many positive things to say. In any conversation where someone is running down our system of government, everyone of sound judgment can and must disagree. We have a perfectly functioning polity. If there is a power failure, there is of course a telephone number that anyone—rich or poor, young or old—can call to report the problem. And the damage gets repaired. We have courts that function without bribes, which doesn’t mean that every ruling they make will please us, especially if we’re personally involved. But anyone familiar with the functioning of our legal system has to recognize its advantages. Unlike my children, I was not born into the circumstances I live in now. My background was a humble one. I have learned to value the experiences I’ve had. I can feel relatively free and safe in many countries, I have made many friends all over the world, and I can cultivate contacts and bring people together. The last thing I want is to turn back the clock, either for myself personally or for Europe. (16)

I thought it important to discuss our current situation across generations and publish the results. I was partly motivated by coming across something my mother had written in 1988, a sketch of her life and the life of my grandmother. It reminded me how important it is to pass experiences on from one generation to the next. To give one example: my grandmother’s brother was fifteen years old when he fled a hated barbering apprenticeship in Stuttgart and immigrated to the United States in order to become what he’d always wanted to be: a baker. In his little suitcase he carried a photo of his deceased mother. My grandmother, who herself emigrated to Argentina five years later from the same impoverished environment, remained in correspondence with her brother for the rest of her long life. “He himself,” wrote my mother, “was never to see his native land again. Two wars, inflation, and illness prevented him from doing so.” All his letters were saved and my grandmother was much saddened by his death at the age of seventy-eight. It’s hard to imagine that in their long lives, two people who loved and cherished each other so much never had the chance to see or hear each other again. There was no money for travel, and not even enough for a telephone call. I want my children to have the same open and free communication that I enjoy, whether they be in China or Chile,...