Ramblings

[bubosquared]

So today marks the 20th aniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. What this means for me is that I've been alternatively blubbering and feeling really old whenever I watch the news, which is usually three to four times a day, sigh.

I have a very vivid memory of watching the wall fall, live on the news. It wasn't the first time I became aware that the world was bigger than, like, my immediate family (that was Chernobyl, which I don't recall seeing on the news, but I do remember my mum and gran talking about the potential fallout), but it was the first time I felt actually connected to current events. It's also one of the few really vivid memories I have from before I was about ten -- I can still easily recall sitting crosslegged on the floor in front of the couch, watching the telly.

(I actually spent years convinced this had to be an inaccurate memory, because the wall fell around 10 PM, which was way past my bed time, surely? Except it was a Thursday, so I would've been up late to watch Dallas anyway, and my parents confirmed that they'd have let me stay up to watch something this historical if I wanted to.)And then I became a news junkie in the worst way for the next decade or so, until 9/11 somewhat overdosed me on it and the subsequent Bush shenanigans forced me to put myself on a restricted news diet for a while, sigh.

But to return to my orginal point: Yaye 20th anniversary of the fall of the Wall! Excuse me while I go be easily manipulated and blubber some more.

Comments

[dantesvendetta.livejournal.com]

I remember the fall of the Berlin Wall, even though I was about 6/7. I remember feeling sad for all the people who had lived apart in the same city.

Weird that it's been 20 years! God I feel old.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

Weird that it's been 20 years! God I feel old.

Seriously, pull up a chair and tell me about it. TWENTY YEARS! O_O Where's my cane? Where am I? Who are you? Who took my trousers? You damn kids, GET OFF MY LAWN!

[aunt-zelda.livejournal.com]

*sighs* My mom can remember watching the Moon Landing. Me? I remember watching 9/11 on TV over and over and over and over ... *shudders*

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

You know, I sometimes wonder how much that sort of thing influences how one sees the world. Like, if I'd been born just a few years later, my first memory of international events would probably have been of the (first) Gulf War, which would have been a decidedly less happy memory, and I wonder if I'd have been less optimistic about people's ability to change the world in that case.

(I mean, I probably would've been, with my parents being who they are, but still. *ponders*)

[aunt-zelda.livejournal.com]

I have a teacher who thinks that an entire generation has some kind of PTSD (or, well, a mental reaction to disaster footage) because of the countless reels of 9/11 footage that they just. Kept. Showing. Over, and over, and over again. I'm inclined to believe him. I don't know how it was elsewhere in the world, but for several weeks after 9/11 it seemed like NOTHING ELSE was going on but those planes crashing into the Twin Towers. Over, and over, and over again. In retrospect, I see that it contributed to the hype, hysteria, and public support of the 'war on terrorism. For a lot of people, it was like the attacks WERE happening again and again, for real, because of all the footage being replayed over and over again.
Why couldn't I have been born later, and remembered the Beijing Olympic opening ceremony as the first big TV thing in my life? That'dve been COOL. I envy the little kids who got that ...

which would have been a decidedly less happy memory, and I wonder if I'd have been less optimistic about people's ability to change the world in that case.
(I mean, I probably would've been, with my parents being who they are, but still. *ponders*)
Yeah, TV does shape people in a certain way. It'll be interesting, during the next couple of decades, to see studies of just how much it affects us, and how, and so on.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

I do think culture/nationality comes into the effect especially 9/11 would hacve had, as well. (And wow, awkwardly phrased sentence is awkwardly phrased.) I remember going through about a week of rather intense "aftershock" after 9/11, but then I started healing and "getting over it", so to speak.

But I'm European, and we are, to put it cynically, more "used" to terrorism (and to war on our home soil, for that matter), whereas a lot of the US reaction had an element of "But but this isn't supposed to happen here!" to it, which I suspect is going to make the shock a lot more severe.

(... I'm trambling, sorry.)

[aunt-zelda.livejournal.com]

But I'm European, and we are, to put it cynically, more "used" to terrorism (and to war on our home soil, for that matter), whereas a lot of the US reaction had an element of "But but this isn't supposed to happen here!" to it, which I suspect is going to make the shock a lot more severe.
Yeah, that was a big part of it. We were so used to wars being fought in distant lands. They were horrible, but we were removed from them.
I don't know if you've ever read the Dragonlance books, but I read the Annotated Legends a couple years after 9/11 and in a sidebar, after the big shiny fortress of goodness is razed by the Chaotic Evil legions, everyone from the city was shocked because their city had always been spared and the evil armies had never gotten that far. In the sidebar the authors mentioned how people drew parallels to 9/11, but they hadn't intended to do that. Very interesting. I should dig that book out again, it was REALLY good ...