• Politics
  • Amok Mama: Why we won’t ban Laterne

Politics

Amok Mama: Why we won’t ban Laterne

There's a reason why foreigners in general and Muslims in particular – even the really naughty al-Qaeda ones – don't want to ban Laterne. It's because it's not that important says Jacinta Nandi.

“I think it’s terrible when foreigners come to Germany and don’t want to celebrate Laterne,” says my Russian friend Lenka. “Why come to this country if you don’t like lanterns? You can just go to another country. Where they don’t have that celebration.”

“Well,” I say.

“And now! They don’t even just not want to celebrate it, Jacinta! They want it to be renamed! They say the word ‘Laterne‘ is too Christian!”

“I don’t think anyone really thinks that lanterns are particularly Christian,” I say, blandly.

“They want it to be renamed ‘Sun, Moon and Stars Festival’!” she says, angrily. “So Muslim children don’t feel discriminated against.”

“Well,” I say.

“If I went to Saudi Arabia, would they let me rename Zuckerfest?” she says, sneering at me angrily.

“Hmmm,” I say.

“What do you think, Jacinta?” She says.

I look at her carefully. It’s a bit tricky with Russians sometimes, and I know that’s a racist statement, but they just are all bloody bonkers. You can’t reason with them like what you can with other people. They’re slightly insane.

“Have you ever been to a lantern festival?” I ask. “It is very cold. It can be really cold this time of year. And sometimes they make you walk round the block twice. And it’s very boring. It’s really fucking boring. Nobody except for German people like it. No one. Nobody. Because it’s kind of a really bad combination of boring and pointless and cold.”

“I’m not talking about foreigners like me,” she says dismissively. “I’m a Christian, and I don’t even have kids. You know who I’m talking about. I’m talking about non-European foreigners. Muslims with children. They should make them do it. The Germans, I mean. They should force those Muslims with children to walk round the block with a lantern in their hands and if they don’t do it they don’t get any Kindergeld.”

The thing is, the whole story about the lantern festival isn’t just a paranoid fantasy – it’s a pure hoax. It hasn’t happened. Nobody wants to ban Laterne, which, by the way, should really be called, if you’re a proper Christian, St. Martin’s. Dur. Not even al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda’s official position on Laterne is that even once we’ve established our anti-German, pro-Muslim, multicultural Reich, you know, the one where bacon’s been banned and all the Germans live in concentration camps and all the N-words in children’s books have been replaced with the M-word (“Maximalpigmentierte“) we will STILL allow the Germans to walk round the block twice with a little lantern in their hands. That is the official position. Phew. Bet you’re relieved now.

I think it’s interesting this whole fantasy about the renaming. Nothing’s been renamed. Nobody wants to rename or get rid of Laterne. There was ONE kindergarten in ONE town in Germany who renamed the party years ago because they had a nice soup with suns, moons and stars in it. They still called the walking round the block bit afterwards the St. Martin’s procession. The whole renaming/banning Laterne thing is a big fucking red herring. Historically, the only people who’ve renamed things have been white people. Bombay for example, or Beijing. Laterne hasn’t been renamed, nobody wants it to be renamed, nobody thinks it should be renamed, nobody has suggested it be renamed. But Bild seem pretty keen on telling us it will be renamed and a lot of white people seem pretty enthusiastic – or maybe desperate is the right word – to believe it. It makes me wonder why. That’s all. I wonder why people are so ready to swallow this bullshit. So eager. Sooooooooooo… so hungry. Why are people so hungry for this propaganda? It’s almost as if they feel guilty. I don’t really believe white people feel guilty about colonialism – I’m half-white and I don’t feel guilty at all – but they certainly act like it sometimes. Hey, no hard feelings, just mentioning it. That’s all I’m saying. They act like they’re relieved to be the “true victims” for once. There’s a relief there, which I find interesting, and a desperation for it to be true. Sometimes I think the answer to all these “political-correctness-gone-mad!”-type stories would be proper reparations for slavery, colonialism and all that shit. I mean, we can probably never make up for it but at least it would give the people at Bild something to really complain about.

PS: St. Martin was a stingy cunt and he should’ve given his whole cloak to that fucking beggar. Tschau.