Also in Europe we can go crazy in many different ways.. One of the results was the Berlin Wall:
(From Wikipedia)
“The Berlin Wall (German: Berliner Mauer), known in the Soviet Union and in the German Democratic Republic as the “Anti-Fascist Protective Rampart,” was a separation barrier between West Berlin and East Germany (the German Democratic Republic), which closed the border between East and West Berlin for 28 years. Construction on the wall began on August 13, 1961, and it was dismantled in the weeks following November 9, 1989. The Berlin Wall was the most prominent part of the inner German border and an iconic symbol of the Cold War.”
Nowadays the wall is gone, Berlin is one city again and all that remains is this brick line running through the city, where one side of the double wall used to be. The memorial stone reads ‘Berliner Mauer’, German for Berlin Wall.
What is interesting about this scene is that the buildings in the middle (right below ExposedPlanet.com) are new as they are on the former no-man’s-land between the double wall. The building on the left is the Axel Springer Verlag, one of the largest publishing houses. As they were situated right next to the wall, on the western side, they started to broadcast messages on huge LED-powered screens, to inform the East Berliners about news that would have been censored out by the Communist party and the controlled media.
This bothered the Party so much that they build the big flats -2 of these can be seen on the right side of the image- , so that the view was blocked. Of course only proven loyal party members could live in the flats…
This little piece of history proves a few things:
– It is important to have free access to information
– Never trust only the news sources in your own country, as they will always be biased
– The internet -an uncensored one- is of vital importance for mutual understanding in the world
So if you live in the US, take a look at Al Jazeera and other Arabic websites before you condemn an entire region as being terrorists and want to know what really is happening over there, if you live in Iran, check out CNN before you damn all the Yankees.
And for everybody: try to use more objective press like the BBC website and Wikipedia. Never just believe what you see on your home channels..