German
Bundestag, September 30, 2020, Plenarprotokoll 19/179, pp. 22521-22522.
Herr
President. Ladies and gentlemen.
Corona
times are not only bad times for culture, but also apparently bad times for the
truth.
Timon Gremmels (SPD): You are
stumped by the truth!
Frau
State Secretary for Culture Grütters, your press release of last Wednesday on
the Culture budget is a parade example of hypocritical polit-prose which
obscures reality and turns parts into the opposite.
Hypocrisy
number one: You boast that the “New Start Culture” rescue program, weighing in
at one billion euros, runs at high speed. What you fail to mention is why this “New
Start”, actually not one, was at all necessary; namely, because the government
since April of this year has run down cultural life to nothing with the Corona
lockdowns; because with your utterly excessive measures, you have imposed a so-to-say
occupational ban on artists, organizers, musicians and theatre people. You have
thereby destroyed thousands of livelihoods, driven businesses into insolvency and
the self-employed onto Hartz-IV. And you still often say: The virus is guilty. –
No, the virus is not guilty. The intensive care units are as empty as the
concert halls. Your politically false decisions are guilty. Cultural people
feel themselves left in the lurch by you; there have already been some
suicides. The artists and organizers do not need your alms. They want to
finally be able to live again from their work. End these excessive
restrictions! That would be the real “New Start Culture”.
Hypocrisy
number two: You have written – cite –:
Certainly in times of crisis, culture
is the basis of our social solidarity.
Sounds
nice; yet with the Corona regime, a culture of angst, of insecurity and of
paralysis has made its entry. That does not signify solidarity, ladies and
gentlemen, that signifies the splitting of society. It also signifies a new
area of denunciation – who wears no mask must lately pay a penalty – and a
poisoned social atmosphere. Each citizen is potentially infectious, and he thus
must be surveilled, controlled and guided. Yet that is why this crisis has
gained such favor with you, why with you the test numbers always further
increase so as to keep artificially alive the pandemic situation: You do not
want to lose the power offered to you by this new, exceptional situation, you
want to enforce things in the shadows of this crisis, limit civil rights, which
would otherwise run into massive resistance and will in the future run into the
resistance of the AfD delegation. That is guaranteed, ladies and gentlemen.
And, as if in defiance, you write – Hypocrisy number three: Art, culture and the media always again make us aware of our high privilege of living in a country of freedom of the press, of culture and of opinion, in which controversial debates are possible, are desired and have been sustained.
End
citation. – Ja, here in the Bundestag
you must for the time being still listen to the only opposition party. In the
state and leading media, in the universities, in the subsidized cultural
institutions, however, any controversial debate has long since been throttled.
With
the Internet Enforcement Law, with the unconstitutional law against hate
speech, you wish to criminalize citizens who do not follow the official,
leading ideology. That after all is the truth, ladies and gentlemen.
Timon Gremmels (SPD): Are you now in
favor of hate speech?
And
what has happened with the 6.6 percent increase in the Culture budget?
Primarily, the construction of this statist, leading ideology. The Deutsche Historische
Museum and the Haus der Geschichte in Bonn shall – quote – “Further strengthen
the democratic understanding as well as the discernment of our society”, as it
is called in the newspeak of your press release. Tomorrow, in the Historischen
Museum in Frankfurt, opens the exhibition “I see what you do not see. Racism,
Resistance and Empowerment”,
Timon Gremmels (SPD): What do you
have against it?
Erhard Grundl (Greens): Which you
could visit!
with
the explicit goal of – cite – “Struggling against everyday racism”. Culture as
a means of manipulation and propaganda to stigmatize the citizens as everyday
racists and render them defenseless against the unlimited immigration of
migrants of an alien culture – that is your plan!
A
total of around 200 million euros is foreseen for film production, a
substantial increase. Will the quality of German films be thereby improved?
Hardly, if as heard, the donation of means is to be attached to diversity
standards and politically correct measures like women’s quotas.
Ulli Nissen (SPD): Very good!
Stefan Schmidt (Greens): Do not
speak of matters which you do not understand.
The
Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein film production has already gone ahead with a
latently totalitarian example. It will there be asked in all seriousness “whether
the sexes have been equally represented in history, whether people of color
appear and figures with under-privileged socio-economic backgrounds were
presented”. Ladies and gentlemen, thus is produced no successful German films,
thus is produced social and multicultural kitsch.
And
the last of the hypocrisies – I come to an end – : You announce that the
Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation shall be additionally promoted, and you keep
secret that you have just as good as decided upon the destruction of the Foundation
by means of elimination of the burdensome name of “Prussian”.
Ladies
and gentlemen, who loves art and culture cannot vote for this budget. Quality
and Tradition, instead of Ideology – that is the maxim of our amending motions.
Many
thanks.
Ulli Nissen (SPD): Make the table
nice and clean!
Timon Gremmels (SPD): The virus of
hatred!
Alice Weidel (AfD): What idiocy!
[trans: tem]
