Germans wrestle with multicultural identity

[Penguin]

This happens when I submerge some days from the forums: heated discussion, but some good posts:
Seems like the headline is indeed true, still a wrestle about the (multicultural) identity going on here...

my 2 eurocents, sorry for the wall of text, got longer than I expected:

First there is a little too much Dark-Fish-bashing here for my taste - I don't see him as an immigrant-hating madman who wants to promote a germanic master race. I think of him more in terms of a patriotic socialist - yes this is not a contradiction, there have been many of them, Willy Brandt being Germany's most famous example. I understand his way of thinking, that's why I said he can do better than over-generalisation. The Dutch always had a reputation of being a very liberal and tolerant society. Did the mentality change overnight, or isnt it much more that people learn from many negative experiences? I believe the latter.

There has always been migration to Germany, especially here in the Rhineland. A paper here had a series some time ago: why we have the most beautiful women here: it comes from thousands of years of mixing. We had the Romans here, the French, dozends of other visitors in the 30 year war. Then the immigration from eastern europe, mainly Poland in the 19th century, after WW2 many others. Of course also the inner-german migration, not to underestimate: many people here are closer to the Dutch than to the Bavarians - in their way of thinking and their cultural norms. This all contributed to the fact that we are a mutt race here and there is a certain mentality here that a stranger is not seen as a threat but as a victim for chit-chat. When you are sitting alone here, people will talk to you.

When we talk about generations, we should make clear what we are talking about. A 1st generation Turk from the 60s differs much from a 1st generation Turk from the 90s. That's why I prefer to talk about different eras. The people who came here in the 50s - about 1970 were integrated like ****. They were called guest-workers, most did blue-collar work, no need to learn much German, the intention was to leave after making some money. We all know live is always other than planned. Many stayed. Their children are the real 2nd generation, my generation, born in the 70s. Most of them speak perfect german without an accent. This comes from several factors: When the parents cared then they wanted a better life for their kids, many of those even refused to teach their children their native language. The 2nd gen grew up in predominantly german neighbourhoods, so they had to speak German in school as well as in everyday life. As far as criminal activities go, well I can only speak from my experiences, we all did much non-smart stuff in our youth *innocent looks* - Besides juvenile stupidity, class/wealth are also factors.

When people decide to stick to an idiotic culture, they do not want to mingle with people from this 2nd or 3rd gen. The women are much too westernized for their taste, they prefer import brides - preferably uneducated and religious, lovely combination! Little anecdote: When a co-worker of turkish descent finally got her german citizenship she first complained that it was a non-easy procedure. In the next moment she said that she however understands this, as the germans should not let every "Kanake" (n-word for turks) in. She meant exactly those people who I talked about in the previous sentence.

It is a lie that there are only the Turks causing problems here and all other nationals are well-integrated. I can show you a tamile, a russian, a german and a maroccan ghetto, all within 10kms. Go through a german city, tell me what ethnicity the dealers at the central station have or look up where most burglars or pickpocketers come from, if you know what I mean. An interesting article in the Spiegel stated that the worst integratedimmigrants are Italiens: many don't speak good german after generations, the school-drop out rate is high, though many live off welfare - all in higher percentages than the Turks. This does not match up with my experiences, but they did some reasearch.

I am far from a peace-loving tree-hugging kumbaya-singer. The problems are here, they are real and it does not help to marginalize or mute them. There are some quarters of towns going down. People move in who don't care about their community, the better-off leave, analogue to the american expression of "white flight". It is not comparatible to the US however. It has nothing to do with ethnicity, even the better-off immigrants don't want their kids to go to predominately foreign schools. We all live much closer together here in Europe - so if you are not a total ignorant, everyone should be aware of these problems. Especially people in the less well off neighbourhoods feel that they left alone. Our police is a joke, our justice system an even sadder one. Activities for juveniles become closed, social work funding cut down. Money for education? muhuahua, we got the ****ing banks to bail out!

I am not saying that it is only an issue of funding, but if money in key areas is denied then this is a matter of politics, or political will if you want to call it so.
Countries with traditions of immigration, like Canada and Australia have sensible policies regarding this isssue - in comparision to Germany of course. It seems here the politics does not want people coming here who can contribute something to its society.
During all the time, Germany never developed an immigration policy worth it's name. The debate goes on since I am political aware - like the german joke called "health reform": much talk, nothing gets done since decades.


Conclusions: dunno, I am just a grumpy old anti-everything guy...