The reality I have had contact with is a different one. There is a certain palpable level of fear here in Germany, fear and resentment. The old ways of doing things, the things that one used to be able to count on are disappearing. Believe me, this creates fear here. And nobody likes to come out and say it, but a replacement for that old system of certainty has not only not yet been found, it doesn’t appear is if there is ever going to be one.

The resentment arises from the fact that due to this breakdown, German society is slowly but surely dividing itself up into two classes: Those who still enjoy a minimal amount of certainty i.e. security (regular employment – for now) and those who don’t. Statistically speaking, the wall that separates these two classes grows larger every year and, in my mind’s eye, bears an uncanny resemblance to the one that used to physically separate Berlin.

And that’s the real German no-go-zone for me. That’s the place where nobody wants to go to here. The ugly attacks taking place in the no-go-zones of Brandenburg and elsewhere these days are ugly enough in reality, nobody is denying that, but they are actually proxy wars being fought on behalf of a silent “moral majority” scared to death of fighting a real war of mutually assured destruction over here and now in what remains of their heile Welt (orderly world). It’s the German collective psyche hoping to unburden itself by projecting its fear and resentment into these other convenient hate-filled no-go-zones, if you will. This is nothing new, of course. Neither is the fact that it’s just the next dead end in a long and illustrious line of other German dead ends.

It’s a dead end because the German political class (no relation to the other two classes I mentioned a moment ago) does not have the strength to pull itself and its country out of this mess by itself. It does not have a solution for mass unemployment. And that is and remains the real problem. It’s not because they couldn’t solve this problem or don’t want to solve this problem, it’s because they can’t.

And why can’t they, you ask? I’ll tell you why: They are in denial. They are in denial because they are still in “good old Germany” themselves. They are in denial because they are not in the position to make hard and very painful decisions. Of all of the sacred goods associated with the “good old Germany” of days gone by, the most sacrosanct of all is the tacit, illusionary belief that “es dürfen keine Verlierer geben” (nobody is allowed to lose here). You know, the state will always be there for you should something unforeseen ever come your way. And it always has been, or so they believe. And it still is. Up until now, that is.

There have always been “losers” in this society, of course. It’s just that they’ve been paid off and willing to keep quiet about up until now. But now something very, very unforeseen has come Germany’s way. The money that the German state has had at its disposal for so long (full employment) has long ago run out and there is no more room for making new debt and we are now beginning to witness the results of this institutionalized denial. We are witnessing it in the form of an entire nation living in a no-go-zone that makes the ones in Brandenburg and elsewhere look quite small and insignificant indeed.