So the stage is set for Barack Obama's "I can listen" speech in Berlin on Thursday. After Chancellor Angela Merkel grumbled about the senator giving a speech at the Brandenburg Gate, the venue was moved to the Victory Column Siegessäule. But the grumbling continues from the right-wing political groups in Germany. Evidently there is no place to give a speech in Berlin that is not fraught with disturbing historical implications:
But while it (the Siegessäule) is not as symbolically loaded as the triumphal arch, the 226ft monument is far from devoid of baggage, some of it potentially embarrassing.
Erected in 1873 to celebrate Prussia's victories against France, Austria and Denmark, the tower has a bellicose aura that could jar with the senator's peacemaker image.
In addition to that, the column's current location and foundation plinth were the work of the Nazi architect Albert Speer, who moved it in 1939 as part of Adolf Hitler's plans to rebuild Berlin as Germania, his future "capital of the world". Without a British-American veto, the French would have dynamited the monument after the war.
The Siegessäule location may be offensive to the citizens of Denmark, still seething from that terrible defeat in 1864. But it is sure to delight gay and lesbian supporters of Barack Obama. For the Siegessäule, known as Die Goldelse to the people of Berlin, is no longer a monument to military victory in the fabric of Berlin life- it is now an icon of the gay scene in Berlin, the endpoint of the annual Christopher Street Day Parade. Siegessäule.de is also a gay online magazine. It will be interesting to see whether the any of the US media covering Obama's Berlin speech pick up on this. If so, the Republicans in America are sure to have a field day, for in the Republican list of sins there is only one thing worse than being black or Muslim: that is being gay.
Yesterday I attended a campaign event with John McCain that took place in my neighborhood. You can read about my impressions in a diary I wrote at Daily Kos.
Gayness is not very welcome on the left, either, at least not among politicians. Do you know of anyone besides Barney Frank on the left who is openly "out?"
Posted by: Hattie | July 23, 2008 at 12:28 AM
Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin)
Posted by: David | July 23, 2008 at 04:47 AM
People should get over it. The Siegessaeule is on the Strasse des 17. Juni, for example, which casts another meaning on the location. In a city that has been there that long over such a momentous history there is no way to find a public place that doesn't have some previous historical significance.
Posted by: servetus | July 23, 2008 at 06:04 AM