Comments on: The sense of guilt of being German https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/ a blog by a multilingual lifelong expat/international, linguist, researcher, speaker, mother of three, living in the Netherlands and writing about raising children with multiple languages, multiculturalism, parenting abroad, international life... Sun, 22 Jan 2023 15:10:31 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 By: Ute Limacher-Riebold https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/#comment-29739 Sun, 03 Jun 2018 19:17:52 +0000 http://expatsincebirth.com/?p=7517#comment-29739 In reply to ZJShen-PSimon.

Thank you so much for your very honest comment. I understand your feeling and yes, I think it will take generations to get less intense. It might not pass, but I hope it will change. I hope that my children and their children one day will not feel the same way I feel. I know that every society carries some historical guilt, I just wish it wasn’t that the wounds of the past weren’t opened regularly. One needs for them to heal. There will always be the scar to remind us, but we have to be able to carry on.

]]> By: ZJShen-PSimon https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/#comment-29738 Sun, 03 Jun 2018 17:50:54 +0000 http://expatsincebirth.com/?p=7517#comment-29738 Dear Ute,
This is a very sensitive issue indeed. Unfortunately, we in Hungary possibly never dealt with it completely properly. I studied some German from my grandma, partly of Austrian origin, but then I began to hate everything German and never wanted to learn the language. I’ve just overcome this feeling, above 60, even though some of my colleagues used to be very-very nice and professional Germans where I used to teach. I think this abhorrence, sorry I call it that, is a feeling against Germans, not simply against Nazi Germany – we in Hungary, having suffered under the Russians – may be something that takes generations to pass, a completely stupid aversion, but embedded so deep that I’m even ashamed to admit – and I have nobody having suffered by the Nazis in my family! You can imagine feelings of those who had! I think this was so deep, so wide-spread, infecting so many beside those directly involved (ever read Jerzy Kosinsky’s “The Painted Bird”?) that it’ll take generations to pass. I’m grateful for daring to get involved in Germany even for short periods, to feel a culture that gave us Bach, Buxtehude, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, Goethe, Hegel, Thomas Mann … but also destroyed a large part of what gave us Pushkin, Tsaikovsky, Chopin, Rubinstein, Maupassant, …

Of course I hope that everybody in and originating from Germany manage to let their children understand this is not their fault at all – not even your fault! These are human feelings I’m afraid. I should also ask how Tutsies feel agains the Hutu and vice versa, how Cambodians feel, how Vietnamese feel against Americans and the Chinese (!), and the list could go on. We humans are a hopeless race, but I hope we can at least make it bearable to our children.

]]> By: Ute Limacher-Riebold https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/#comment-29704 Fri, 25 May 2018 10:53:13 +0000 http://expatsincebirth.com/?p=7517#comment-29704 In reply to Dallas Smith.

This is very interesting, Dallas. The atonement is an important step of the “Vergangenheitsbewältigung” 😉 It’s good that you found people sharing their experience. When I asked my grandparents and extended family, they would not want to talk about all the details – I had so many questions ! – and they would only want to share some of their memories and experiences. I would have loved them to tell me more, but I guess they were still processing it all and its’ very painful…

]]> By: Ute Limacher-Riebold https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/#comment-29703 Fri, 25 May 2018 10:46:51 +0000 http://expatsincebirth.com/?p=7517#comment-29703 In reply to Springbrookorbillabong.

Thank you, Springbrookorbillabong, you are very right and I’m glad that Germans and Nazis are separated. It’s something that some teachers don’t focus on when holding those lessons.

]]> By: Springbrookorbillabong https://expatsincebirth.com/2018/05/20/the-sense-of-guilt-of-being-german/#comment-29702 Fri, 25 May 2018 09:04:32 +0000 http://expatsincebirth.com/?p=7517#comment-29702 Growing up in Australia, in our history classes, we were taught about Nazi occupation of Germany before a declaration of War. German was never substituted for Nazi. Yes, Germany was at War but not by the choice of the German people.

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