BIFFI-FEST 2023
“If you want to understand today you have to search yesterday.” -Pearl S. Buck, American novelist (1892-1973). If I say Berlin Wall what comes to your mind? Undoubtedly, your first thoughts would be the separation and sorrow of millions of Germans. You would think that 3 decades of food shortage, government persecution, and severe punishments for escape attempts, the idea of another wall being built would be logically anulated, or so we thought. My name is Victoria Merchan. I'm a junior high at American school and I'm 15 years old. Taking Pearl’s words into context, in order to understand what the walls being built nowadays mean, we must look into the initial purposes which would take us back to the Berlin Wall. What possible situations is the world facing currently that were faced in the 1960s?
The Berlin wall not only physically separated the community, but it represented the separation of both ideological differences. From 1947 to 1991 a global conflict known as the cold war was striking, it had damaged the world converting it into a warfare for decades. Germany had been separated into four zones controlled by different nations with very different political parties from each other. It was now between the Soviet Union, France, The Usa and Uk. It was now considered two different nations named German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany. "Nobody has the intention of building a wall." - GDR head of state Walter Ulbricht, East Berlin, said precisely 2 months before the construction of the Berlin Wall. They had now demonstrated that society was only ammunition in an attempt to demonstrate power. The U.S.A. and Russia had their conflicts from many aspects, and Germany became the playground of their discussions. This wasn’t only pieces of concrete and imprisonment.
It was a clear fact that the building of walls became stagnant after the Fall of the Berlin wall; however, the change of the statistics was caused by an unimaginable event such as the 9/11 attempt. The misogynist prejudice over the Middle East was proven, and the need for walls meant the separation of principles and beliefs between the Middle East and the rest of the world.
Palestine seems to be a protagonist of two Berlin Walls ersatz with both the West Bank and Gaza Strip. During the second Intifada (A palestinian uprising against Israel) there was clear terrorism done from Palestine’s part (specifically the West Bank) which caused clear fury and a need of protection from Israel’s part, hence the walls. By the international community, the wall was accused of destructing and confiscating land from Palestine, which was fair regarding the invasion the wall had in Palestinian land. Israel is a nation driven by control which is obtained by their blockade of the Palestinian homelands and despite of terrorism the affected Palestinians have tried to gain their independence, their rivalry is controlled by Israel.
The vexing controversy of Americans vs immigrants will not be excluded from this particular topic. The U.S.A. being such a welcoming country has made the entirety of Latin American countries feel welcome to search for a better life. Sadly, the abuse of this power made The U.S.A. decide on a restriction from immigrants and had to take as extreme measures as building a whole wall. With violence, drugs, and illegal immigration the liberty had to take a turn. The initiation of protecting the borders commenced with President George Bush building the well known Tijuana-San Diego Border. Barack Obama took the job of building a wall, which ended up being incomplete as complaints from Mexicans came and unhappy republicans began to oppose Mexican protests . In 2016 with Donald Trump’s election, the wall was a certain project declared along with the Donald Trump 2016 campaign.
From a historical crisis to a Battling resource, walls have caused impacting consequences and stated points globally. It’s physically only pieces of concrete put together over the span of many miles, but does it only mean that? It symbolizes the clear differences over politics, beliefs, and mostly comes across one side having more dominance over the other. Nowadays these walls will never reach the brutality the Germans had to face during the 1960s; nonetheless, the creation of the idea will always affect the world. “In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery?”. -Saint Agustine
By Vicky Merchán, Step 9
Semifinalist Biffi-Fest 2023
