Well, the partition originated from the situation after WWII, where Germany was divided into zones, each administered by one of the Allies. The US, UK and France quickly joined their zones together, but refused Stalin's offer for reunification that has been posted here already. After the formation of the two German states, it's hardly surprising that both the US and the USSR maintained a military presence there, it was one of the frontlines throughout the Cold War. Scenarios for WW III tended to involve massive tank battles on the inner-German border, you can look up Fulda Gap Scenario if you want a good example of why the two German states where so important geostrategically. The parted status of Berlin made it a nest for spies both from NATO and the Warsaw Treaty Organisation, too.
The prevailing attitude in Western Germany is "gommulism bad bc wall and empty shelfs", whereas the prevailing attitude in Eastern Germany is "yes, of course it sucked, but ...". Many Easterners who really hate the DDR are either giga chuds or outright nazis. The rest are very aware of the bad sides (esp. travel restrictions), but can also point to plenty of things being worse under capitalism. For example, when it comes to freedom of speech, many view their workplace after the reunification as a highly authoritarian environment where they have to be careful about not saying the wrong things, and claim that for this reason they do not feel they have more freeze peach than in the DDR. Which makes Western lib pundits foam at the mouth and rant about the underdeveloped, ingrateful Ossis who have still not learned to appreciate rEaL dEMoCrAcY enough. We have these millions of people who have experienced life under really existing socialism as well as under capitalism, and we could learn a lot from that, but anything that isn't a total condemnation of everything DDR still gets brushed over. Talking about this is completely different to how, for example, the Russians view the USSR (cf. Putin caling the collapse of the Soviet Union the biggest catastrophy of the 20th century), because the East simply got swallowed up by the West and was never treated on an equal footing. Anti-Eastern attitudes are highly prevalent in the West (similar to how many Americans view hillbillies / rednecks), whereas many Easterners experienced the time after the reunification as highly unstable and humiliating - more than 90% of them lost their jobs, for example.
Well, the partition originated from the situation after WWII, where Germany was divided into zones, each administered by one of the Allies. The US, UK and France quickly joined their zones together, but refused Stalin's offer for reunification that has been posted here already. After the formation of the two German states, it's hardly surprising that both the US and the USSR maintained a military presence there, it was one of the frontlines throughout the Cold War. Scenarios for WW III tended to involve massive tank battles on the inner-German border, you can look up Fulda Gap Scenario if you want a good example of why the two German states where so important geostrategically. The parted status of Berlin made it a nest for spies both from NATO and the Warsaw Treaty Organisation, too.
The prevailing attitude in Western Germany is "gommulism bad bc wall and empty shelfs", whereas the prevailing attitude in Eastern Germany is "yes, of course it sucked, but ...". Many Easterners who really hate the DDR are either giga chuds or outright nazis. The rest are very aware of the bad sides (esp. travel restrictions), but can also point to plenty of things being worse under capitalism. For example, when it comes to freedom of speech, many view their workplace after the reunification as a highly authoritarian environment where they have to be careful about not saying the wrong things, and claim that for this reason they do not feel they have more freeze peach than in the DDR. Which makes Western lib pundits foam at the mouth and rant about the underdeveloped, ingrateful Ossis who have still not learned to appreciate rEaL dEMoCrAcY enough. We have these millions of people who have experienced life under really existing socialism as well as under capitalism, and we could learn a lot from that, but anything that isn't a total condemnation of everything DDR still gets brushed over. Talking about this is completely different to how, for example, the Russians view the USSR (cf. Putin caling the collapse of the Soviet Union the biggest catastrophy of the 20th century), because the East simply got swallowed up by the West and was never treated on an equal footing. Anti-Eastern attitudes are highly prevalent in the West (similar to how many Americans view hillbillies / rednecks), whereas many Easterners experienced the time after the reunification as highly unstable and humiliating - more than 90% of them lost their jobs, for example.
Excellent effortpost, I did meet a German lib who had that kinda attitude, so now it's amking sense