Immigration Issues: Germany faces the Mirror

After almost three straight days of policy meetings and discussions from morning through evening on energy and climate change led by the American Council on Germany, it was a welcome respite this evening to chew over an old standard: racism.

Here in Germany, the Turkish immigrant minority is very much on the outside of mainstream German society. There are a host of reasons for this: cultural, historic, economic, social, educational, and financial. Oh, and there’s the language thing, which also doesn’t help as a bridge.

But just like in the good ‘ol US of A, (emphasis on old, as in the Fifties) and the way our forebears used to do things (don’t hate me for saying used to, and don’t hate me for not saying we still do) when it came to minority issues and the rights of minorities, German today is totally backward when it comes to this issue.

Our cozy group from across the country got to witness this up close during an enlightening and engaging dinner presentation by Parliamentarian Ozcan Mutlu, who represents a district within Berlin (Neukoln) for the Green Party.

Mutlu ran through the issues, personalized it in clear and unambiguous terms, repeatedly said he’s an optimist, and sees the glass as half full on these issues, but left the impression that there may not even be that much liquid to drink from the beer mug.

For starters, he has been told on more than one occasion by authorities that he is being profiled because they are searching for terrorists. His son, born in Germany, was told by a driver’s education instructor to go back home to Turkey. The instructor, a Berlin police officer, knew from class registration that the teenager was German born.

Mutlu bemoaned the dreadfully small number of stories on the Turkish community on German public television, noting that every train wreck gets full coverage. (sound familiar, tv pals?) He decried that there are very few elected officials of Turkish heritage, but said inroads have been made in that there are now 200 police officers with Turkish ancestry on the force in Berlin. But wait. There are a total of 18,000 cops in Berlin. 200 comprise a shade over 1%. In a country with a minority population in the high teens. Since when does1% count as a success story?

So when I say the good ‘ol US of A, the analogy fits. Back to the day of Beaver and Wally and Ike and all those good things we had going on during those happy days of the 50’s.

Perhaps what the Turkish community needs is a Rosa Parks, unwilling to go to the back of the bus, and willing to advance a cause on principle regardless of the cost.

Germany has that with its national soccer team. 11 of the 23 players are from immigrant families. Many of them are Turkish. Their top player, Mesut Özill, is of Turkish heritage, and he publicly decided to play for Germany in this past year’s World Cup, much to the delight of Germans, and Germans of Turkish origin. Still, his bio leads with this line: ‘A German-born son of a Turkish immigrant,’ which suggests there’s still a long way to go for even those who have risen to the top of their field.

So while there may be some small things over which there is commonality, and we all know that sports has proven over time to be a stepping stone for the disenfranchised, Mutlu does not want Özill, or other German footballers to get involved in politics. Even after being told the story of Jackie Robinson and how he helped move America forward, Mutlu does not think their attitudes would have any bearing on the public.

Well, that’s probably short sighted, but it does go to show you how dated attitudes are in Germany today, at least in some areas, and still how far communities living on the margin (there’s a 50% unemployment rate for the Turkish community in Berlin) have to go if they opt not to take advantage of what others might see as golden opportunities.

So I must defer to Mutlu on whether his glass is half full, and wish him luck on getting some real juice in that cup.