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What must be said

Eddie Dane said:
Well he's German isn't he.

Every time I talk to a German about anything nuclear, they think the apocalypse is near.
He probably thinks that a derailed radwaste train would trigger a world-wide nuclear holocaust.

(Don't want to insult the many rational Germans on this board. But I'm married to a German and the undercurrent of angst and guilt in German culture has become a pet peeve of mine.)
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I for one prefer our culture of guilt and angst over our culture of hypertrophic nationalism after the founding of the Kaiserreich.
The generation most shocked by Grass is the generation of my parents. For them he was a moral writer, a writer that put the finger on the wound that Germany had not completely managed to get the nazis's victims their deserved justice and that brown henchmen and opportunists ended back in power in Germany after the war. It was almost unbearable for them to see his own hypocritical position regarding his own biography after he publicly flogged others for having been in the Wehrmacht and the NSDAP.
This just happens to add insult to injury. He seems eager to fulfill every stereotype of the caught salon antisemite, including the evil media conspiring against him. Which makes me wonder who he suspects as the instigators.
 
SezMe said:
Any policies that have been in effect for 30 years and have yielded diddly-squat are worthy of no more than derision.
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Like MAD?
WildCat said:
You think arming, training, and funding terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas who have collectively launched tens of thousands of high explosives into Israeli towns is "diddly squat"? :rolleyes:
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It may be a matter of things lost in translation. Not sure how "diddly squat" scans in other languages.
Pardalis said:
Exactly, it's a freaking poem, in German, that may or may not rime, from a writer who is way past his prime. Who cares?
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Rhyme.

I like what you did there, in terms of an attempt at poetic meter.

Exactly, it's a freaking poem,
in German,
that may or may not rime,
from a writer who is way past his prime.
Who cares?

gambling_cruiser said:
I have seen an tv interview with Grass; he seems to believe a strike against the iranian uranium centrifuges could kill the whole population and trigger a multi-nation nuclear war.
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Pshaw. Do you mean to tell me that Germany also has idiots speaking up above the noise level?

Who'd have thunk it? :p
 
MG1962 said:
Regardless of why he came to his opinion, it seems harsh to call him antisemitic because he criticizes Israel
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It's virtually impossible to participate in any political discussion without being called all kinds all kinds of awful things, why should this one thing be considered taboo?
 
Moss said:
I for one prefer our culture of guilt and angst over our culture of hypertrophic nationalism after the founding of the Kaiserreich.
The generation most shocked by Grass is the generation of my parents. For them he was a moral writer, a writer that put the finger on the wound that Germany had not completely managed to get the nazis's victims their deserved justice and that brown henchmen and opportunists ended back in power in Germany after the war. It was almost unbearable for them to see his own hypocritical position regarding his own biography after he publicly flogged others for having been in the Wehrmacht and the NSDAP.
This just happens to add insult to injury. He seems eager to fulfill every stereotype of the caught salon antisemite, including the evil media conspiring against him. Which makes me wonder who he suspects as the instigators.
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I actually have no problem with his SS past.
But I can see that the cultural role he played in putting Nazi era in perspective and then keeping his own past a secret, makes him a gigantic hypocrite to many.
OTOH, I wonder if his career would have ended if he'd come clean sooner. maybe he was just in tune with the culture and waited until he knew that the revelation wouldn't be a career ender.

He is right in saying that there is a taboo on criticizing Israel, but then blows it by taking a stupidly black-and-white approach to the whole complex issue.

As far as I can tell, that is.
Choosing to convey this message in the form of a poem, was a terrible choice. Maybe a whole opinion page in the FAZ would have allowed for a clear message with the necessary nuance.

I couldn't even bother to read the damn thing all the way.
 
Childlike Empress said:
Just to put this into perspective - Grass was drafted into the SS in Autumn 1944 when he was 17 years old.
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To put it in some better perspective, he then proceeded to keep it a secret for the next sixty years, all the while excoriating his fellow Germans for not accepting and coming to terms with their own Nazi past.
 
Giz said:
Yeah, they are a bit hyper-sensitive about the risk of genocide aren't they. Those obstinate Isrealis should really try and compromise... maybe they can get a promise of only 50% of the Jews killed and the rest dhimmified if they ask nicely. It will be for peace! PEACE!!
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Good thing, then, that the innocent peace-loving people of Israel have been boldly protected from the oncoming storm that is an octogenarian poet.
 
Personally I never cared about Grass and his work, and fail to see how his text can be considered poetry, but I'm glad that he took it upon him to start this debate which, as the predictable (over-)reactions show, was long overdue.
 
I don't think banning Grass was a good response.

Israel often have problems with people trying to boycott its artists such as orchestras and now a drama group. Those opposed to the boycotts often argue that art shouldn't be censored whatever the beliefs or even the actions of the artists. Now Israel is banning a writer from travelling there which somewhat undercuts that argument (although no doubt important fine distinctions will be found).

I also don't think what Grass said was anti-semitic. It was more poseur politics than anything. Again, I wish the targets of that kind of stuff had thicker thins.
 
Isn't it time someone stood up and took the brave step of ragging on Israel? A practice wrought with personal danger and risk.
 
Virus said:
Isn't it time someone stood up and took the brave step of ragging on Israel? A practice wrought with personal danger and risk.
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Well, it isn't completely risk-free given that Grass ended up banned from entering the country.

I think Chomsky and Finklestein ended up banned (or barred) from entering Israel as well.

But what kind of risk and personal danger are you thinking of?
 
angrysoba said:
Well, it isn't completely risk-free given that Grass ended up banned from entering the country.

I think Chomsky and Finklestein ended up banned (or barred) from entering Israel as well.

But what kind of risk and personal danger are you thinking of?
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Imagine if he wrote a poem criticizing Islam.
 
Virus said:
Imagine if he wrote a poem criticizing Islam.
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Oh, Islam! You are so crap!
The Muzzies think women are sluts,
Unless, they're under wraps
There is no God but... but me no buts!

I'll just sit here and wait for the fatwa!

Gosh, I do feel brave...
 
As long as I can recall the anti semite charege has been levelled at anyne who even milldy criticised a policy followed by the govenments of Israel, Iran has made similar cahrges of people being anti muslim snce 1978 whenever their government has been criticised.
 
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