Kultur 11

I think many people see Germany as solidly reunited, with no differences or prejudices held against one another. That, evidently, is not the case. After reading the posted articles we are able to see that Germany is actually divided in two ways. The least surprising being East vs. West, but we also see a rift between Northerners and Southerners. The East/West divide is easy enough to comprehend, it just does not seem prevalent to people outside of Germany. We must understand, however, that Eastern Germans lived in ANOTHER COUNTRY for 40 something years. That is a long enough time to establish a culture and a system that works. It is understandable that they are upset because they were essentially pulled from their country and placed into another. In addition, as the article states, many East Germany products and companies were soon wiped out by Western German companies. East Germans, however, had grown fond of these companies, some of them being cultural staples, equivalent to Campbell's Soup or 7/11 here in America. So attached are Eastern Germans to their past, that 57% would rather have the wall put back up.
The most shocking divide is between the North and the South. In America, we see this too. In fact, it is almost for the same reasons as well. Germany's northern egions are much more industrialized, liberal, and educated than those in the south. Religion also plays a big role. Int he south, Germans are primarily Catholic, while in the north they are almost exclusively Protestant. While this divide comes with prejudice, it seems to be a relatively harmless one.