Dear America

as a citizen of Germany all of my life and a past scholar of the German school system I have learned about the past of our mistakes in our history. The mistakes of my grandparents and great-grandparents and how Adolf Hitler came to power at some point in our history, leading to a collapse of the institutions I have known for good all my life.

The whole system started to fall apart based upon a lie, the lie that the Jewish people were to blame for all the suffering out there. Soon, the conversation shifted from blaming Jewish people to blaming other folks. Or in the words of Pastor Martin Niemöller:

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Or in the words of the past Gerald M. Weinberg:

If you solve problem no. 1, problem no. 2 gets a promotion.

Watching the events unfold in your country has bothered me for the past five years. The parallels are striking at times, even though you are foolish enough to do your own mistakes and neglect them as often as I find parallels.

The events that happened now half a year ago, exactly 6 months to the date of my publishing this blog entry, you should listen more to what history can teach you. I still see you promoting a lie so intense that can become the downfall of your society. I still see you promoting falsehoods for the good of a few, rather than taking into consideration the goodness of your people or humankind in total. I still see you dragging yourself into the end of the democratic experiment that started more than 200 years ago on a daily basis.

Please consider my words moving forward. Not necessarily for me, but mostly for you. While I believe that a stable America may help in (re-) building a more stable world overall, I fear for the outcomes of the alternative reality that I see you heading towards.

Kind regards

a concerned German.