Such a pretty face, such a black heart

Former East German figure skater (and Stasi collaborator) Katarina Witt, who has cashed in very nicely since the Berlin Wall came down, is going to host a German television show about the "lighter side" of living in the DDR. Which is understandable, I guess. As an Olympic gold medallist she lived quite comfortably in the workers' paradise - unlike her less talented countrymen who were shot dead trying to jump the Wall, or were tortured and murdered in the Gulag.

The Olympic skating champion Katarina Witt will bring to a climax a wave of Communist-era nostalgia sweeping Germany with a television show next week highlighting the bright side of life in a totalitarian state.

A batch of films, TV shows and series is cashing in on a wave of popular sentiment for the East German Communist era, and nearly all have avoided painful subjects such as the infamous Berlin Wall.

The programme's uncritical stance has angered those who suffered under Communism. Former dissidents who have studied East German Stasi secret police files say the shows are an insult to the more than 1,000 East Germans shot dead trying to escape to the West.

Walter Momper, Berlin's mayor during the fall of the Wall 14 years ago, has derided the programmes for making the former East German regime appear harmless. Erich Loest, an eastern German writer, said the producers of one nostalgia show should be sacked for their uncritical portrayal of a totalitarian era.

Günter Nooke, an eastern German conservative Christian Democrat politician, said: "What would be the reaction in Germany if television produced similar programmes about the Third Reich?"

Actually, I'd love to see a program about everyday life in the Third Reich- provided it didn't gloss over the atrocities and crimes committed by the Nazis. Can anyone imagine the host of such a program wearing a Hitlerjugend uniform?

During the four-part series, she will interview former East German personalities but avoid politics.

"It is an entertainment show," Ms Witt said. "It is time to show we also had fun in the German Democratic Republic." To drive home the publicity message, the ice-queen sports a blue communist Free German Youth movement shirt.

Piss off and die, you commie bitch.

(via The Corner)

Posted by damian at August 31, 2003 07:20 PM