Three Cheers for the Red, Black and Gold

...This just in from our sister site, the New York Feuilleton

When Germany hosted the World Cup in 2006, much was made of the outpouring of national sentiment, the likes of which had not been seen since the Second World War. The German flag found newfound acceptance in everyday life. But this “New Patriotism,” as the press dubbed it at the time, was short lived. Once the games ended, people quickly folded up their banners. Now, four years later, the ubiquity of German flags here is even more staggering, suggesting what a joyous release this is for a country that has kept its tail between its legs for so long.

Nevertheless, I was irked. While the flag of the Federal Republic of Germany was never the banner of the National Socialists, the associative link between German nationalism and the Nazis is hard to break. And so it was amid the rich profusion of black, red and gold paraphernalia that I decided to watch last week’s Germany-Ghana match at an African club in the hopes of avoiding the flag-waving hordes. Imagine my surprise when I beheld African children with German flags painted on their faces and the vast majority of those assembled cheering for Germany. What became clear to me was that the “New Patriotism” is not simply about Germans reclaiming their pride, but to a large extent reflects how immigrant groups identify with their adoptive country.

In Berlin, you might say that the city’s large immigrant population is giving Germans a lesson in self-love. One much-publicized example concerns a Lebanese immigrant who has hung a 60-foot flag above his electronics shop in the immigrant-heavy district of Neukölln. The flag has been the victim of attacks by radical left wing groups in Berlin.

The danger, as some on the German left see it, is that flag-waving will erode Germany’s collective experience of coming to terms with the Nazi past and lead to a sort of cultural and national amnesia. But no one who has spent time in Germany recently can accuse Germany of having a blind spot, or of relaxing its efforts to come to grips with the Nazi past. Two months ago saw the opening of a new documentation center at the former site of Gestapo headquarters. Every day, thousands of people visit the Berlin’s central Holocaust monument and the famed Jewish Museum.

Waving a German flag 65 years after World War Two requires a critical awareness of history and the long shadows its cases. An educated and even skeptical approach is needed. At the same time, the flag can mean things very different to an immigrant or child of immigrants than it does for someone of German heritage. Sports have traditionally been a way for immigrants to rally around their adoptive countries. The many banners that have sprouted in Berlin’s heavily Turkish and Arab neighborhoods might be seen as an effort to counter stereotypes about disloyalty and resistance to integration. In 2006, misplaced analogies were made to the Berlin Olympics of 1936.

Four years later, those analogies are if anything more absurd and out-of-place. With nearly half their players of non-German background, the Germany team represents both the successes of present day, multi-cultural Germany and the challenges it faces.

Two Saturdays ago, I watched the Germany-Argentina match at a sidewalk bar in Neukölln. Germany’s astounding victory was greeted by cheers from every corner. Across the street, a gaggle of young Turkish girls jumped up and down from a terrace and shouted with glee, “Deutschland! Deutschland!” This time around, I will not be surprised if the flags stay up in Neukölln long after the World Cup has ended.