Mistrust in East Germany

Mistrust in East Germany
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Mistrust in East Germany
In the early 1960s, the communist government of East Germany, or the German Democratic Republic (GDR), resolved to build a wall separating it from West Germany. One of the fundamental reasons it gave for constructing the wall was to keep West Germans, derogatorily referred to as "' Fascists," from entering East Germany. It was supposedly an "Anti-Fascist" protective measure (Funder, 2003.). However, the principal function of the wall was to stop East Germans from defecting to the West. This is because numerous challenges in East Germany resulted in a mass exodus to the other side of Germany, where conditions were much more tolerable. One significant challenge in East Germany was political persecution, which, in turn, bred profound mistrust among citizens. The mistrust manifested itself in various dimensions, including massive suspicion and trickery.
Suspicion
The restrictive conditions in East Germany had conditioned citizens to never believe or trust any information without evaluating it critically, especially when interacting with strangers. One factor that considerably enhanced suspicion was the existence of the dreaded secret service known as the Stasi. The government relied extensively on this unit to maintain its grip on power and gave it autonomy to employ all means at its disposal to create as much fear as possible fear among East Germans. In her book, Ann Fundler explores the situation in depth by highlighting the escapades of Miriam, a sixteen-year-old girl who had unsuccessfully tried to flee East Germany. During interrogation after being arrested by the Stasi, Miriam gives a ridiculous story of how he met strangers in a hotel who offered to help her make good her escape (Funder, 2003). She is pleasantly surprised that the officers do not see through the gaping holes in the story. According to her, it is inconceivable in the GDR that one would ask a total stranger whether they lived near the border. In the same vein, it was improbable that one would ask a stranger whether they were planning to escape and offer a helping hand. In essence, interpersonal relationships among citizens dipped drastically since people could seldom believe anyone or anything. The possibility that one could unknowingly disclose secrets to undercover Stasi agents propagated intense suspicion and secrecy among people. Additionally, citizens viciously despised Stasi officers and never believed anything they said to them. Most probably, they took it as a ploy to squeeze information out of them. For example, when the officers informed Miriam that her parents no longer wanted anything to do with her following her arrest, she intimated that she did not believe the assertion (Funder, 2003). The officers could have been trying to make her desperate in order to solicit a dossier regarding her attempted escape.
Equally noteworthy, suspicion among East Germans seemed to supersede such demographic factors as age and gender. In short, so long as you were from the Eastern side of the German divide, the communist law applied to you accordingly. This is made clear in the experience that Miriam had to endur...