Berlin & Back
Hey Lost Boys, I’m just back from Berlin – what’s the reason for the lack of posts over the last 2 days. Me and a friend were invited to a pre-test of the upcoming ad campaign of the German AIDS Aid (Deutsche AIDS Hilfe). They paid for the train, the hotel, the meals and we even got some extra money… pretty good thing since I’m always short on money xD The pre-test was ok. We were 20 people in 2 groups, they showed us the concept and we discussed our impressions with them. Strange enough we did that in the headquarters of the SPD, a German Centre-Right party (they call themselves “social democrats” but in fact they’re everything but social).
Lousy snapshot of the SPD headquarters
Altogether it was a good trip… if you ignore the fact that the public transport in Berlin is a joke, the charging cable for my cell did break and the weather wasn’t that good. On the good side I got the current issue of VIRUS (awful but the the only horror mag in Germany) in a very cool comic shop which is mentionable ‘cause you can’t get this issue in stores actually since they took it out of trade just after releasing it due to some litigation. We had vegetarian burgers (delicious!) in the Yellow Sunshine, Cake in the Tortenwerkstatt and visited Germany’s largest Gay book store.
You already know the whole story if you follow me on Twitter ;o)
about 1 year ago
would most meat eaters like a vegetarian burger?
In USA news, the last of our states that forbid gay adoptions no longer does:
Florida Gay Adoption Ban Is Ruled Unconstitutional
MIAMI — A Florida law that has banned adoptions by gay men and lesbians for over three decades is unconstitutional, a judge here ruled on Tuesday.
“The best interests of children are not preserved by prohibiting homosexual adoption,” the judge, Cindy S. Lederman of Miami-Dade Circuit Court, said in a 53-page decision. She said the law violated equal protection rights for children and their prospective parents.
about 1 year ago
Hey wait a minute. I know Berlin and the public transportation system there is excellent (at least by US standards :))
about 1 year ago
” SPD, a German Centre-Right party (they call themselves “social democrats” but in fact they’re everything but social).”
That doesn’t stop them from be worshiped ad nauseam by American professors of German History.
-hn
about 1 year ago
German Centre-Right party, hahahaha, there is no party you can trust. its the german ideology…antideutsch are the people who transcended anti-imperalism and brings the “german” left into a new era.state fetishism is the real problem. like to read gigi…..magazine for sexual emacipation. destroyer is good for the aesthetics..cheers, b.
about 1 year ago
Sorry, but neither is the SPD “centre-right” by any sensible European or international standard, nor is the public transportation in Berlin a “joke” – ever tried to use the underground in Paris or London with luggage? or at night? you’ll laugh your head off! ;)
about 1 year ago
Volker Janssen had the best gay bookstore in Germany before he sold it and moved out of the country. While there he also published many photo books which are now classics.
Perhaps the best bookstore ever was Glad Day in Boston, now closed although I understand a clone is run by its former manager, Mitzel, who is also a good writer and historian.
Intermale has to be at the top of the list of great bookstores anywhere in the world today located in Amsterdam at Spuistraat 251.
Soon I suspect there will be no good gay bookstores at all anywhere and if there are they will resemble the dreadful O. W. Bookstore in New York City run by fascists. I hope those who run this latter die a horrible death. Under no circumstances patronize these bastards unless you are also a fan of the Gestapo.
about 1 year ago
Nice to know you’re back. That building looks really awesome though.
At least the SPD is WAY MORE left than the current American administration.
about 1 year ago
>That doesn’t stop them from be worshiped ad nauseam by American professors of German History.
Are you talking about the current SPD? Because the current SPD doesn’t really deserve much praise as the bunch of incompetent populists they are nowadays. Calling them “anything but social” is still rather… well, wrong, even when including von der Leyen in this equation. You could easily consider them non-liberal though.
>antideutsch are the people who transcended anti-imperalism and brings the “german” left into a new era.
Antideutsch is the transcension of anti-imperialist? I hope you are joking or stoned, because being “deutsch” isn’t exactly related to imperialism at all.
Elaboration:
“Deutsch” by modern understanding is merely the rather artificial nationality of exclusively the BRD (while actually this would include the Batavian, Austrian, and Letzebuergsch people for obvious reasons, and would not be considered a homogenous nationality, simply because it isn’t, just like “British”), and as such may, in this context, merely be used to describe the dominant sentiment of the people of the BRD, and that is anything but imperialistic.
Now to the actual entry:
Why are there specific gay bookstores? I understand there might be a notable abundance of specifically homoerotical literature, or literature pertaining to issues strongly related to homoerotical views and practise, but a full-blown bookstore?
That baffles me a bit.
Also, specifically male or both genders?
EDIT: Ignore that part with von der Leyen, she’s a CDU politician. But it’s not like I cared for Germany’s current popular politicians, nothing worthwhile to find anyway, so it’s not a wonder I mixed that up. I would also let this little note stand as she deserves to be mentioned for her horribly wrong politics.
about 1 year ago
@Hessische ahle Wurscht
Every gender. They offer books, magazines, DVDs (and VHS..), Comics and some Manga concerning lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and transgender themes in German and English. There are also some literature dealing with gender-issues.
All these things togehter can fill more than just one large bookstore.
I was very pleased about the wide range they offer.
The only thing that disappointed me were the few manga. But they told me, that they tried to sell them but nobody liked it, so they stopped selling them. (I’m still sure that they tried to sell the wrong ones, love instead of sex.. can’t end well, when you want to sell it to people, who mostly never read manga before)
I don’t think you could ever find such an excellent and complete assortment in any other “regular” bookstore.
about 1 year ago
Oh well, I supposed this bookstore was a pure *book*store. Makes sense now.
about 1 year ago
In the german political left there are some tendencies. there is the “realpolitics” for example the SPD (but the left times are over here!), the Linkspartei, the DGB/labour union. of these groups you cant expect some vibes for social emancipation. Then there are the non parliamentary left. In this wing anti-imperialism is a big thing. Dont know why I wrote that, nothing to do with this… the Autonomous groups, some cheesy eighties feeling inside, are wellknown for attacks against pederastic people. These people are really dangerous for sexual emancipation, I think. They call it antisexism! LOL.
We dont need to talk about the liberal and right people. Of these morons we know their answer. Repression!!!
.One interesting tendency since the 90ies are the Antideutschen. Because they question the bourgeouis fascist philistic denouncing german ideology in all aspects. Sexual political they are really far. Here is one example: http://www.lesmadeleines.net/ .Sorry but the site is only in German! And gigi on gigi-online.de is a great magazine….Florian Mildenberger`s book about Peter Schult, the german pederast and anarchist is also a top book.
I have a problem with marginalized people never interested in politics. We need well educated people in the struggle against the mainstream.
Or what do you think about it?
cheers&best, b.
about 1 year ago
I really wish I could have gone to something like that. The only time I’ve been out of the country was to cancun, and that was crap. I studied German for 6 years, yet I’ve never been to europe. I have family in southern london I’ve never even met…but I have no means of getting out there. Do you know about the Hustlaball parties in London and Berlin? My company does all of those events, even though I don’t get to go. I do all of the parties in the US. Let me know if you are the US for any of these events, and I can work something out. :-)
about 1 year ago
>Because they question the bourgeouis fascist philistic denouncing german ideology in all aspects.
There exists no such thing. Also, with philistic you meant philistine, right? Just to make sure.
There also exists no such thing as *the* mainstream, but rather a blurry conglomerate of various streams eventually forming up one very unhomogenous huge river with some notable turbulences here and there that still works out, if you get my analogy. It’s like the Rhine, really.
Furtermore, it’s much less desinterest in politics than it is a surfeit of politicians, but, given, it is no less depressing.
I wonder about the alternatives though.
The Pirates don’t seem like a good political choice overall, however sympathetic they are, and Linke and NPD are both not very desirable either, to remain diplomatic. I just won’t even mention the Green.
Oh yeah, the Autonomes make me aggressive.
And sorry for being so scropulous about this stuff, since we basically mean the exact same thing and likely are both aware of the actual conditions, but I’m just like that.
Furthermore apologies to everyone for clogging your stuff up.
about 1 year ago
Hi Josh.
I am a meat-eater and I like veggie burgers. At least American version. Never been to Germany. And in my area, there is almost no public transportation. I live 18 miles from Baltimore (the city near Washington DC). We only have county-wide transport. Plus one bus that runs into Baltimore twice a day.
BTW where has Soja been? Is he well? Do you two keep in touch? He’s very handsome. And interesting.
about 1 year ago
@ Hessische ahle Wurscht : Woscht!
@ those American professors of German history: the SPD began as a revolutionary marxist party in the end of the 19th century. As early as 1914 they betrayed their ideals by supporting the war, then in 1918 took part in suppressing the November Revolution, thus paving the way for the reactionaries and militarists that 15 years later buried the Weimar Republic. Prosecuted under fascism, after World War II the party eventually became moderately reformist with a leftist wing for public rhetorics and a rightist wing that actually took the decisions. In the end of the last century, a clone of Tony Blair under the name of Gerhard Schröder took over, and since then they follow a strict neo-liberal course.
But sometimes, when old members meet privately, they recall days long gone, when the world was young and they were wild, and they sing those songs that used to make the Kaiser tremble with fear and anger …
@ krippel : a new era, aha. “Because they question the bourgeouis fascist philistic denouncing german ideology in all aspects”, oho. Superheroes, undoubtably. Maybe some day one of them will even be able to sax exactly, of what that ideology consists – except that it is bourgeois, fascist, philistic, and so on … New era. Well, I’m waiting.
about 1 year ago
I prefer Wurscht, Woscht reads so neo-pseudohessian.
about 1 year ago
In fact it’s old fashioned hardcore hessian.
about 1 year ago
I know, but it always feels so… Badesalzian…
about 1 year ago
Are you sure it isn’t Worscht?
about 1 year ago
How about all three versions being legitimate versions depending on the local variant of Netherhessian?
about 1 year ago
I prefer oah hoaxn!
about 1 year ago
Here are much Klugscheissers in da house.Are here also such halbgescheite parvenu??? Its incredible..What means surfeit of politicians? The mass is the murderer!
about 1 year ago
spd centre-right? lol
spd centre-left – left!
about 1 year ago
Hi your website is nice
I have a new band and we just had a live gig you can see here:
http://tinyurl.com/75993v