Berliner Luft gone missing
While the more roughneck anarchist climate thug inhabitants terrorizing the city’s eastern districts prefer the more traditional method of simply lighting their random Großkotz (big shot) automobiles on fire – 100 have gone up in flames so far this year - the more bourgeois activists to the west just let the air out of the tires and stick a flyer on the windshield.
Berlin Police are unable to say just how much famous Berliner Luft (air) has been released into the climate by climate criminals so far, but over 87 cars have been “flattened” as of this writing. “And if you multiply 87 times 4,” said one dazed patrolman, “Well, that’s a whole bunch of air.”
Terrorized automobile owners, thrilled by the prospect of finally having something new to get hysterical about, have begun forming vigilante groups throughout the city and are thought to be organizing all-night big car watching vigils, at least in the wealthier districts like Zehlendorf. “Big protzie (showy) cars like this are supposed to be watched anyway,” said one masked vigilante. “So I don’t find this all that inconvenient, to tell you the truth. That’s mine over there, by the way.”
Von den Tätern fehlt bislang jede Spur. Und Ich bin platt.
Kommentare auf Deutsch? Selbstverständlich.
PS: Thanks for the Carbusters link, letters - mein Vorwurf (World Carfree Network) war auch nicht so ernst gemeint.
!!! PPS (August 14, 1007) !!!:
rghent, I missed a comment or two here, sorry. Otherwise I would have replied sooner. Here goes:
As always, or practically always, this post was also tagged as humor, satire and joke. The post was also labeled as such at del.icio.us and as humor and odd news at BNN. Come on, “mysterious dark forces pulling strings at the World Carfree Network…”? I also wrote: “PS: Thanks for the Carbusters link, letters - mein Vorwurf (World Carfree Network) war auch nicht so ernst gemeint = my accustation (World Carfree Network) was not meant so seriously.” I would hope that this is would be obvious to all who read these posts but perhaps it really wasn’t this time.
But having said that… please also take a look at the section in the German article (picture link) in the post in which the authors (Axel Lier and Hans H. Nibbrig) write:
“Im Jahr 2004 gründete sich das „World Carfree Network“. Seine Rolle sei es, „die internationale autofreie Bewegung zu vereinigen, auszubauen und aufrechtzuerhalten, sowie alle Gruppen und Individuen in ihrem Kampf gegen die Dominanz und Zerstörungswut des Autos zu motivieren, sie bekannter zu machen und zu stärken.“
Das Netzwerk gibt vierteljährlich eine eigene Zeitschrift heraus. Darin – sowie auf einer Internetseite – sind „radikale Informationen über autofreie Bewegungen, Taktiken der direkten Aktion, Industriebeobachtung, alternative Transportmöglichkeiten, Illustrationen, gefälschte Anzeigen“ zu lesen…“
Very roughly, my translation, this describes your organization as having set out as its goal to unite, extend and maintain the international car-free movement as well as to motivate all groups and individuals involved in the fight against car dominance and destructiveness, to bring them more to the public eye and strengthen them. It says a you put out a quarterly publication in which – as well as on your Internet site – “radical information about car-free movements, TACTICS FOR DIRECT ACTION, industrial observation, illustrations, counterfeit ads” can be read about…”
My post was meant to be funny, or at least goofy. Their article seems to imply that WCN is not as harmless as you say it is. So sorry if my post came over being less harmless then it is.
PPPS: Believe it or not, I am one of the few people living in Germany who does not own a car.
http://www.carbusters.org/index.php
but having had a look-through, I can't see anything that tells people to burn cars or deflate tires..
unless of course Reuters is simply going to your blog to do its reporting? what can it all mean? (Comment this)
The above article does not fit the published standards of Blogger News Network in terms of “high-quality reporting, analysis and editorial writing”. No evidence is mentioned for a connection between World Carfree Network and Berlin’s recent car vandalism, and of course there is no connection. To our knowledge we have had no contact whatsoever with anyone responsible for (or even connected with) this or any other vandalism.
World Carfree Network is a global network of nonprofit organisations and individuals promoting practical alternatives to car dependence. Our members include people such as architects and transport planners, seeking to build carfree neighborhoods and create livable cities based on mutual trust and respect. Attacking cars as well as any other examples of property damage are certainly not among the tactics we condone.
Above all we aim to encourage a higher quality of life and a sense of community, which are possible when we open up our imagination and focus on creating human-scaled, people-oriented living environments free of traffic. (Comment this)