It is fair to generalise about Germans

Is it fair to generalise about Germans

Yes..

Reason.. The lack of variety, the fact that independent thought is not encouraged and the pressuse to conform means that the cross section of possible actions by the majority (ignoring the far outliers) is far smaller than in most (if NOT all) other countries.. This lack of variety has two types of effects...

1. The ripple effect of change is reduced as those with controlling interests (media, business etc) do not expose the masses to variety.. Example: Ever seen a normal turkish family in a standard family like advert situation (i.e. breakfast cereal, chritsmas, sales etc etc)?

2. German assumptions and prejudices are reinforced because all the evidence in Germany supports that narrow belief system. e.g. Foregners are less capable because the vast majority (if not all) foreigners that I see have worse jobs than "most" germans.

In other words the system reinforces itself.

It is therefore valid IN GERMANY to make statements such as,

1. Most Taxi drivers are foreigners..

2. Foreigners are less well educated than Germans

3. Foreigners commit more crimes than Germans

Because within the confines of Germany these statements are TRUE.

Germans fail to appreciate that this is not universally true... Take the UK as an example.. Given that there is such a wide variety of races, creeds and sub-cultures it is very hard to make valid sweepuing statements, re race, about the entire population which are valid other than those that concern themselves with the diversity in itself.

So in the UK a valid sweeping statements could be,

1. The UK is diverse.

2. The diversity brings social problems.

Now while you can make statements similar to the ones about Germany regarding the UK i.e.

1. (certain) Foreigners commit more crimes.

There is a principle of diversity and an appreciation that this diversity exists that is not present in Germany. This results in both many examples of people who break the stereotypical mold to achieve and a tacit acceptance by the "majority" that behaviour is a results of socialisation and not race. It is pretty hard to keep believing that your race is innately superior when you are confronted on a daily basis with counter examples.

Sometimes I observe Germany from a distance and wonder. To this observer it sometimes resembles a set of people whose creed is to play out their pre-assigned stereotypical roles in society and expect the same role playing by others - irrespective of whether the resultant behaviour is just/fair/moral or good for the individual or society itself. These roles are more often than not apportioned by race/gender. To wit..

1. The angry disaffected Turkish born German youth..

2. The housewife..

3. Typical female careers..

4. The member of the vorstand..

5. The rude cashier..

etc etc

The remit and bredth of their actions is constrained by how they are supposed to behave..

Now in a universal sense each nation is (with a few reservations) free to decide its own culture.. (That is a discusson for another day).. BUT as a result of the above I do believe that it is fair to make sweeping statements about Germans and that conversely Germans should NOT make the mistake of extraopolating their locally valid conclusions to make inferences about the world at large.

Consider the humble brotchen.. I first visited Germany in 1996.. I have observed since then that there are commonly still the same number of brotchen available for sale now in your average backerei as there were then.. In 8 years no one in a position of power has thought to try something different (i.e. diversify).. NOte also that the same brotchen are available more or less everywhere in the country. Again a lack of diversity.. I have visited in the region of 25 German cities and note the relative lack of differences. This uniformity has the effect mentioned above in that it strengthens uniformity..

This way of learning to think is universal.. Consider when you drive accross a green traffic light at a crossroad you dont normally look left and right.. Why not..? Because experience has taught you that there is an almost zero chance of anyone driving through the red light (and colliding with you). Or in any case the chance that you would yourself cause an accident by constantly checking every crossroad is far greater than the probability of someone else driving through the red light. This self reinfocing truth that "people dont drive though red lights" means that in normal driving situations you dont even think about it any more. (Even though we know that that it does happen occasionally).. Now relate that to the German situation.. If you were brought up to not think outside of the box and were only exposed to limited self reinforcing truths you would also think the same way..

So in conclusion it is fair to make sweeping statements about Germans because there are many things that are true for the vast majority of people here.

Here are a few choice ones,

1. Germans do believe that they are superior - depite all evidence to the contrary

2. Germans are racist - i.e. they think that race and behaviour are linked. (I wonder did tarzan behave like a European Great Ape in the German geist?)

3. Germans have dark souls (In a Christian sense).. While not being "evil" as some state they do seem to take a perverse pleasure in hurting others.

4. Germans do not like diversity

This is way too long to read carefully right now. But I will dispute 2 things you say.

"Most taxi drivers are foreigners." I would strongly disagree with this. I'd say out of 10 taxis I take, 7 are Germans driving. Even if it isn't, what's that got to do with the price of chips? Cities like New York are reputed to have a lot of foreign cab drivers too.

Considering the humble Semmel. I personally think that they have started to diversify. I see more wraps and "vital brot" and sandwiches and other various things than I did when I first came to Germany.

Your end statements:

1. Most people believe they are superior. It's human nature.

2. Too long to argue now, could be partly true that they think this.

3. I haven't searched too many souls other than my own. I disagree with the "take a perverse pleasure in hurting others" statement. Telling people what is correct, enjoying slapstick or when someone gets a comeuppance, yes, but actual sadism - no.

4. Again, no group likes to change, that's human nature. Look at the oldies on Toytown moaning about how it's not the same with all the new people on it. The only thing I would say is that they could do more to accept it and the govt could be a bit more forward thinking.

Okay, that's enough for the crack of dawn.

It's the egotistical brötchen that REALLY freak me out.

@[email=hmmmm]hmmmm[/email]

Hello Hmmmm,

a bit early I guess, went out last night and am reading your statements here after my first coffee. I am not sure what the point of your thread is..? Saying Germans suck and meaning to prove it by mentioning the examples you did? I do not understand why you conclude that which you did after reading your postulate. Let's start (in short):

The USA is a very diverse country regarding its population. Yet I have not seen any country that sprouts as much of the same when visiting the different cities. You keep finding the same products, the same stores, the same fast-food/restaurant chains in every bloody city/town. They are just arranged in a different way, when you drive through town you'll sometimes find Wendy's on the left, sometimes on the right.. Does this mean Americans are suffering from uniformity effecting uniformity as well, leading to all the other evils that result from this? By Jove, I have not seen, to quote your example, any other country in the world (except for Austria - which is basically the same as Germany) that offers as many different types of bread or breadroles as Germany does. I think you have chosen a rather strange example for making your point. Weird stuff.


This statement holds true for the whole world, not only Germany. The mind can be trained, any mind irrespective of nationality or so-called "race", to think outside its social barriers.

Words fail me, man.. Your reasoning is a bit, eh, unscientific to say the least.


Well actually this applies to the whole world and not just Germany. They do suffer from a superiority complex, but I think every country with a strong culture believes it to be superior to others. Give me one example of the contrary, I don't think you will find one.

The Germans are shit scared of anything different and new. That's their main problem. That's also the reason why this economy is going to pot. Once again you will find these stereotypes in all other countries. Name me one country that doesn't believe its foreign population to be more susceptible to commiting crimes!


This statement is just too silly to answer. You were tired when you wrote this, right?


Hooray! I agree with you fully on this one!

MB

I love the irony of this guy accusing others of racism.

you will face problems by trying to buy a "brötchen" here in Toytown..

What I love about Ireland is you can get 372 different types of sliced white bread , and that's just in my home town.

Yet another troll post from Hmmm

Most of what you have stated here can be applied to anywhere in the world. You don't have a single possitive thing to say about the Germans, and you think the majority of them are racist, elitist and sadistic, why are you here ? In fact nearly every post you have made on TT is anti-German. Very amusing considering you talk about peoples inability to think 'outside the box'

Who let him in here?

Is this some kind of O level essay we are writing here?

Seems to me you think that you are superior to them.

You could say that about Canada, at least the major cities. To suggest that this forms the basis of a racist society is a bit much.

Your posting strikes me as the type of pseudo-psientiphik nonsense that leads to racial profiling, ethnic cleansing and Final Solutions...

Now, is it a good thing or a bad thing that in Germany you would get arrested for saying it in public? Hmmm.

Hmmmm, joined TT at 11:35pm last night. Hmmmm, smells like Troll.

Probably also smells of alcohol...

oh dear god - where to start! who writes this kind of crap and then posts it on the internet!!!
@hmmmm, there's so much wrong with your original post that there's not point taking up every point - though i do think it's weird, bordering on creepy, that you have been staking out the bakeries of Germany in a near 20 year campaign to see the brötchen evolve into something else (for someone who spends a lot of time down the müller, you think he'd know that they're called semmel) in order to use it as a metaphor for an entire country while blatantly ignoring the hundreds of different types of bread also available? Do you have nothing better to do, other than visiting bakeries at random hours, than to write essays on why the germans are racist? (oh, the irony)
what stands out most from your post:

are you kidding me with this!!!
what really gets me is that if, for example, a national group living in the UK or the States, had their own website where they slagged off their host country - there'd be uproar! I can see the headlines now!

Well, in his work "Das Brot der frühen Jahre", Heinrich Böll did exactly that.
The central character (a mechanic) has a bread fixation as the scent of bread reminds him of the time as WWII ended and Germans were poor and hungry and of bread being basic and noble but also a connecting thread through time. Bread (and thus rolls) were a symbol of the rebuilding of post-WWII Germany.
And Böll later won a Nobel Prize for Literature for his works.
hmmm is no Heinrich Böll though (and for someone who lists his mother tongue as German on his profile, he's either a German-hating Austrian or has some significant self-esteem problems).

Don't knock Hmmmmmm. Everyone's entitled to their view, and at least we can see some effort going into the argument.

Je mehr desdu besser.

BRÖTCHEN!!!

good to see this troll thread is already going a little stale

Maybe Hmmmm's really just one of those dark-souled Germans and is trying to come to terms with it, catharsis-like.

I like girls

try Sweden for lack of diversity

Great stuff.
Since when does any country have somebody in a position of power to suggest introducing different types of bread rolls to the general public? I think it sounds like a grand job, interior minister for bread rolls, but I cannot see it realistically.

Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Germans

Noel Coward (1943), via Tim Blair:

>>Verse

We must be kind
And with an open mind
We must endeavour to find
A way -
To let the Germans know that when the war is over
They are not the ones who'll have to pay.
We must be sweet
And tactful and discreet
And when they've suffered defeat
We mustn't let
Them feel upset
Or ever get
The feeling that we're cross with them or hate them,
Our future policy must be to reinstate them.

Refrain 1

Don't let's be beastly to the Germans
When our victory is ultimately won,
It was just those nasty Nazis who persuaded them to fight
And their Beethoven and Bach are really far worse than their bite
Let's be meek to them-
And turn the other cheek to them
And try to bring out their latent sense of fun.
Let's give them full air parity
And treat the rats with charity,
But don't let's be beastly to the Hun.

Verse 2

We must be just
And win their love and trust
And in addition we must
Be wise
And ask the conquered lands to join our hands to aid them.
That would be a wonderful surprise.
For many years-
They've been in floods of tears
Because the poor little dears
Have been so wronged and only longed
To cheat the world,
Deplete the world
And beat
The world to blazes.
This is the moment when we ought to sing their praises.

Refrain 2

Don't let's be beastly to the Germans
When we've definately got them on the run
Let us treat them very kindly as we would a valued friend
We might send them out some Bishops as a form of lease and lend,
Let's be sweet to them
And day by day repeat to them
That 'sterilization' simply isn't done.
Let's help the dirty swine again
To occupy the Rhine again,
But don't let's be beastly to the Hun.

Refrain 3

Don't let's be beastly to the Germans
When the age of peace and plenty has begun.
We must send them steel and oil and coal and everything they need
For their peaceable intentions can be always guaranteed.
Let's employ with them a sort of 'strength through joy' with them,
They're better than us at honest manly fun.
Let's let them feel they're swell again and bomb us all to hell again,
But don't let's be beastly to the Hun.

Refrain 4

Don't let's be beastly to the Germans
For you can't deprive a gangster of his gun
Though they've been a little naughty to the Czechs and Poles and Dutch
But I don't suppose those countries really minded very much
Let's be free with them and share the B.B.C. with them.
We mustn't prevent them basking in the sun.
Let's soften their defeat again - and build their bloody fleet again,
But don't let's be beastly to the Hun. <<

so Hmmmm, how do you know which end to wipe when you go for a dump?

@Hmmmm you really got to get away from this place...