Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 5:43 pm  

Let's not confuse irrational dislike of the Germans (just because they are German) with dislike of the monetarism their government is trying to impose across the Euro zone at the moment.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 5:43 pm  

Germany has to be one of the most boring countries on Earth. Great tracts of land that look the same mile on mile (a few forests and Bavaria apart). I am of the opinion that the lansdcape accounts for the stereotype of the people. Compare with the UK, a smaller place but with a very diverse landscape, more coastline and variable weather. The people of Britain are relatively speaking far more culturally diverse, creative and innovative.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 6:20 pm  

God, Dally, you really are an idiot.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 6:26 pm  

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 6:39 pm  

Mintball wrote:

God, Dally, you really are an idiot.

I am a firm believer in envionmemtal determinism. Why else would Northerners be so torpid? Lack of sunlit hours.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 8:36 pm  

Mintball wrote:

Off the top of my head?

Luther, Grünewald, Bach, Schubert, Haydn, Handel, Bach (there was more than one), Beethoven, Schumann, Wagner, Strauss (Richard), Brahms, Mahler, Neitzche, Schopenhauer, Kant, Marx, Brecht, Weill, Eisler, Grass, Mann (Thomas and Hienrich), Dietrich, Lang, Pabst, Goethe, Schiller, The Brothers Grimm, Dürer, Kraftwerk, Gutenberg ...

That's off the top of my head. And it ignores science and medicine, of which I have limited knowledge. But every one of those have influenced culture way beyond the boundaries of the German lands.

Damn, I thought you of all people would have got a Monty Python reference.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 8:56 pm  

Dally wrote:

Germany has to be one of the most boring countries on Earth. Great tracts of land that look the same mile on mile (a few forests and Bavaria apart). I am of the opinion that the lansdcape accounts for the stereotype of the people. Compare with the UK, a smaller place but with a very diverse landscape, more coastline and variable weather. The people of Britain are relatively speaking far more culturally diverse, creative and innovative.

how often have you visited Germany then Dally? I lived there for over 3 years , made some great friends too. The countryside is beautiful, the people around my age were fun, friendly, and knew how to laugh and had a sense of humour.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 9:12 pm  

World of Redboy wrote:

how often have you visited Germany then Dally?

Quite a few times, although I have not been there for 4 months now.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 10:15 pm  

Dally wrote:

Is German rigiduty of thought once again destroying Europe? Their handling of the Eurozone crisis suggests so. Their insistence of austerity on austerity for Greece is stupid. It's leading to the disintegration of Greece and probably civil war their. If that happens it will spread to Portugal, etc. Even if the austerity package goes through Greece will still have unstainable debt levels for at least a decade and will need a couple of hundred billions of Euros support from somewhere.

Greece needs to withdraw and default, but I doubt they've planned to. Germany ought to as well - they won't put their dosh up to rescue the Eurozone.

If the socialist wins the French election, then Germany's approach to the crisis will become an isolated one. The Euro is almost certainly doomed but the Germans keep sticking rigidly to their logic without looking at the wider picture. There is clearly a weakness in the German collective mind.

The problem has almost nothing to do with some weird kind of patriotic allegiance. If this were truly the case Germany would not manifest similar levels of social inequality as can be found in just about every Western nation. I'm not saying Germans (or other nationals) aren't capable of favouring their own - but in the grand scheme of evils it's way down the list.

I mean, do people really think that if, say, France were the dominant economic force in Europe instead of Germany it wouldn't be pushing for the very same measures?

The problem here is a systemic and lethal flaw within capitalism. The mistake is thinking it can be corrected simply by better legislation. Time and time again this has been shown not to be the case as capitalism itself encourages people to circumvent the law, denude/obliterate it entirely or open up new avenues for exploitation so that the net effect on society is even worse.

Pretending capitalism can be fixed is like pretending Mussolini could be a nicer guy. We need to look for a better way that at the very least isn't predisposed to exploit those at the bottom of the pile whilst twisting the minds of those at the top to the extent that they are blind to exploitation or think it's a good idea.

Re: German inflexibility of thinking : Sun Feb 12, 2012 10:35 pm  

Mugwump wrote:

The problem has almost nothing to do with some weird kind of patriotic allegiance. If this were truly the case Germany would not manifest similar levels of social inequality as can be found in just about every Western nation. I'm not saying Germans (or other nationals) aren't capable of favouring their own - but in the grand scheme of evils it's way down the list.

I mean, do people really think that if, say, France were the dominant economic force in Europe instead of Germany it wouldn't be pushing for the very same measures?

The problem here is a systemic and lethal flaw within capitalism. The mistake is thinking it can be corrected simply by better legislation. Time and time again this has been shown not to be the case as capitalism itself encourages people to circumvent the law, denude/obliterate it entirely or open up new avenues for exploitation so that the net effect on society is even worse.

Pretending capitalism can be fixed is like pretending Mussolini could be a nicer guy. We need to look for a better way that at the very least isn't predisposed to exploit those at the bottom of the pile whilst twisting the minds of those at the top to the extent that they are blind to exploitation or think it's a good idea.

Nice speech, but rather off topic methinks. Are the Germans being too rigid and ultimately counter-productive?