That's right, people steal bikes because they are inherently evil and want to make baby Jesus cry.
I think it's ok to define "survive" as an addict who needs (<-also loosely defined) a fix.
You don't generally commit serious white collar crime, tax fraud or do crypto grifts to survive. For petty street crime, I don't really see any other motivation.
There are a lot of teenagers stealing bikes and other stuff for fun. It's common, and in many circles very "cool". Doesn't have to be inherent, really.
Yes, they only kill random fishermen in the Caribbean, foreign leaders get kidnapped and tried in kangaroo courts. Except Iranian leaders, those do get killed. But that's just the last 6 months.
I'm not sure why the distinction matters, the Navy and Coast Guard also need to recruit. I could imagine at least an occasional sailor is troubled by shooting drowning seamen, even if they are suspected smugglers.
Perhaps even a few civilians are troubled by the lack of regard for human life of the psychos running the show, eliminating any moral standing the world pretended the US had.
Being German who lived in other parts of the world myself, and someone who likes food and considers the typical German BBQ an abomination I can feel your pain.
But is this not more of an example of you wanting to do things the Brazillian way rather than German's unwillingness for you to integrate? At any rate, the Nackensteak guy is a total dick!
Also don't forget, a lot of those Italian, Turk, Greek, Spanish and Polish coworkers may well be Germans...
Maybe this is just an East/West or North/South thing. I am German too and would find that just very weird and atypical. Maybe something you would do in a company setting, where you don't actually want to go, but just keep your job and don't create enemies, so you come and keep the lowest profile possible.
> If talking Germany the basic example is changing from a very militaristic society (far before the Nazis) to a rather pacifist society.
I seem to recall that this was not the result of Germans staying put and changing things for the better, but rather due to external forces reducing the majority of their country to rumble and and spending 2 decades reeducating them.
Not sure what "your country" is, but here in Germany that's the general consensus of Germany's progression to a "rather" pacifist society. You might want to take pacifist with a grain of salt though, considering how excited many Germans were about being able to deploy the Army for non defensive reasons in the Balkans, Afghanistan, etc. and how giddy everyone was that we were once again allowed to export arms to Ukraine. Not to mention the current rise of far right, xenophobic parties.
Fighting corruption is very difficult. A good way to go about it is to sent some of your young people to countries that don't have massive problems in order come back home viscerally convinced it's not a necessary evil you need to put up with.
> considering how excited many Germans were about being able to deploy the Army for non defensive reasons in the Balkans, Afghanistan, etc.
Having lived at that time in Germany, I can tell you how excited many Germans rather were to openly name the responsible politicians "war criminals" (and would have been insanely happy if these politicians were brought before a war crimes tribunal) and the compatriot soldiers to participated in this campaign "murderers". I know this very well because I was among these people.
Even on the schoolyard there was a deep divide between the boys who were not completely rejecting the idea to do their (at that time near-compulsory) military service instead of considering at most doing alternative service as the only acceptable alternative, and those who did alternative service did then use every available opportunity to spread their opinion about wars and the military (they often had to work their alternative service in some welfare facility or retirement homes - places where you meet lots of people to whom you could tell your "soldiers are murderers" opinions).
The way I see it is the cultural change happened after the Prussian elites lost power and the general German public understood their recent history as far from the eternal victory they were promised. That's a major cultural change however you want to spin it, and there are enough examples in history where countries haven't gone through the same changes in similar situations (Weimar Republic also comes to mind)
Regarding the current day pacifist state of Germany, in my mind it is still very drastic anti-militaristic compared to the vast majority of the world.
Regarding corruption, countries changed drastically during the 20th century due to ideologies and individual action, sometimes resulting in disaster but also often not. Trying to say nothing can change is a defeatist deterministic attitude that has no anchor in recent history.
Presuming we are talking about migration, most of these source countries were able to fight and win European colonization in the past, why do you think that's easier than fighting corruption?
> Presuming we are talking about migration, most of these source countries were able to fight and win European colonization in the past, why do you think that's easier than fighting corruption?
While I neither claimed "nothing can change" corruption nor that fighting corruption is more difficult than fighting European colonization, here are some arguments to your straw man:
Corruption is very insidious to combat because you don't have a clearly demarcated enemy to unite against. Corruption spreads through all layers of society and most people in deeply corrupt societies will be both victims and beneficiaries of corruption: you want your house built and saved up enough dough? Sure you grease the wheels a bit so you can start building right away. Also, your brother who's helping you finance the house is a civil servant and a good chunk of his income is a result of taking bribes. The government itself sees it as "tips" that justify lower wages, and you sure as shit don't want taxes to go up with all the baksheesh you need to hand out...
At best you're in a "glass house" scenarios, it's very difficult to break out of without a general amnesty and serious external pressure, because all the parties that are actually qualified to run a government (or similar corrupt organization) are implicated.
> The way I see it is the cultural change happened after the Prussian elites lost power and the general German public understood their recent history as far from the eternal victory they were promised.
But the "Prussian elites lost power" because of the rise of the National Socialists who are universally not considered pacifist.
It might be a "major cultural change" but it was not affected by people staying at home and changing things for the better.
The Prussians nobles were a big reason why the Nazis rose to power and were well integrated to the party and the army.
The Prussians losing power is not the reason why Germany changed, but because Germany changed its values (militarism wasn't sacred anymore) the Prussians lost power post-war.
That change was a change in the collective opinions of the entire country, and that did not happen because the allies took everyone to school but because people saw the effect of that ideology and the disaster with their own eyes, and their decision was not the same decision they collectively reached post-WW1
"More german than many germans" is a figure of speech in the German language and, even overlooking that "German" is not a race, I can't conceive of any German considering it racist, in any way derogatory let alone extreme misbehavior warranting expulsion.
I can only imagine you are a troll, but in case you're not, I'm very sad you are not mature enough to realize the extreme privilege you received in the lottery of life by no effort of your own. Maybe it's time to move out of your parents' house, provide for yourself and change things for the better in your community, maybe travel a bit and generally learn to have some compassion and empathy for those less fortunate than yourself.
