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Sunday, August 20, 2006
GraSS drüber: Germany's Selective Amnesia Again The awful truth about his recent revelation isn’t his recent revelation, it’s the sobering fact that Nobel Prize winners like him are just as hypocritical and flawed in their thinking as their compatriots are; the rest of us, in other words. He has spent most of his career haranguing Germans about their inability to face up to their Nazi past and they kissed his feet for it. And now he casually asks them to accept the fact that he, one of their greatest moral apostles, was no better than they were. He was never on that moral high ground he seemed to be preaching from after all. No wonder everybody feels so verarscht (tricked, ripped off). It seems superheroes like Günter Grass are susceptible to selective historical amnesia, too. And nobody likes flawed superheroes, unless that flaw is a susceptibility to kryptonite, maybe. But I think one should be thankful to him for the service he has just performed. Grass drüber (forget about it, let the grass grow over it), I say. At the very least (or worst), he has reminded us that the very best should always be enjoyed with caution, as the saying goes. He has reminded us that the preaching prophet who just came out of the desert should always be met with skepticism. What is it about these preaching types anyway? I assumed that Germany was immune to them by now but I was off base again. On the one hand, everyone here loves to schmunzel (smirk) at American religious fundamentalists trying to tell us what to think, but the same folks have been eating up Günter Grass’ sermons since the 50s. I’ll tell you what it is about preachers like that (wherever and whenever they are in the world): Die haben alle Dreck am Stecken (they’ve all got something to hide, a skeleton in the closet). They are trying to make up for something that they have done wrong or something that is missing in them. That’s why they’re preaching. If they didn’t have some personal score to settle with themselves, they wouldn’t be bothering the rest of us in the first place. So the next time the next Günter Grass comes along, and he will, judge him by his art – before he starts judging you. Everything else he’ll have to say will be a complete waste of your time. Come visit me at Observing Hermann... Blogger News Network is advertiser-supported, and your visits to our advertisers help BNN to meet its expenses. Help keep us afloat! posted by Clarsonimus at 1:10 PM |
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