"Should we get rid of Christmas?” asks the Swiss professor François Berger, who dreads such a prospect. "We cannot overlook the fact that the last days of December ignite feelings of anxiety and a tendency towards depression. Some psychologists note that adolescents are particularly sensitive to the absence of ritual - of Christmas in this case - that they compensate for with circumstantial rituals such as 'special cannabis' events or 'special ecstasy' ones. It suffices to efface any given ritual to see it surface in another form, more dangerous as it is essential. The day we rid our society - and thus our schools - of Christmas, for a thousand 'good' reasons, we will unfortunately have condemned a human, relational and identity-forging factor of our lives, as well as our culture and traditions." (17/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Cultura cotidiana, » Religión, » Ideología, » Global
Todos los textos disponible de » François Berger

Polly Toynbee, columnist and honorary associate of the National Secular Society, responds to claims that secularists are trying to eliminate Christmas. "No one is out to ban Christmas or Christianity - not atheists nor other faiths. Yet every year the same urban myths are repeated about the banning of Christmas by some pantomime villain local authority suffering from 'political correctness gone mad'.... we are innocent. It is the Christians who are stirring this dangerous pot, inventing non-stories, yearning for martyrdom - and worse, fermenting an outraged sense among the mainly secular population that they had better call themselves Christian because, as the BNP [The far-right British Nationalist Party] says, British 'Heritage, Tradition and Culture' ... are under threat from Muslims. While pretending to attack us, covertly these Christians stir resentment against immigrants." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Cultura cotidiana, » Religión, » Gran Bretaña
Todos los textos disponible de » Polly Toynbee

The Christian weekly has carried out a survey to measure how well the French know Jesus Christ. Jean-Pierre Denis analyses the results. "Only one out of three people can precisely date the birth of Jesus. In this pervasive cultural fog, it is not surprising that, for many, Christmas has become a pagan celebration where consummation is supposed to relieve all of our existential anxiety. Is this despairing? It isn't as simple as that. We can see quite clearly in this survey how much French people' relation to Christianity is changing. It is weakening in some respects, but it also becoming less negative than is commonly thought. The desire to know more is more pronounced too, very much so. Two thirds of the French would like their children to know about the life of Jesus. Even among those who say they have no religion, this desire for culture is also very present." (19/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Religión, » Ideología, » Francia
Todos los textos disponible de » Jean-Pierre Denis

Philosopher Andrei Plesu describes Romania's young capitalism as imitating a model. "Commercial experts Kjell Nordström and Jonas Ridderstråle have rightly dubbed this provincial imitation 'Karaoke-Capitalism': Others provide the music and words, and you just sing along (wrongly, of course). The result is the world we live in. There are three domestic kinds of borrowed capitalists. First there is the nouveau riche: He is a kind of Al Capone, still dumbfounded at being so rich, and tending to display money rather than spend it. Next come the company girls and boys: They have no individuality, all dressing the same, eating the same, thinking the same and talking the same… They work a lot because they want to become rich. Thirdly, there's the manager: He knows all the rules, has no time to lose and no interest in the chatter of intellectuals. He judges a text by its length and a book by its sales figures... Nordström and Ridderstråle don't have good news for them. The future is not theirs to design, but rather belongs to another type of person. Because what's important isn't imitating a model, but inventing a new one." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Cultura cotidiana, » Europa, » Rumania
Todos los textos disponible de » Andrei Pleșu

Estonian philosopher Jaan Kaplinski believes psychology is about to take over the role of religion: "Already under Freud, a paradigm shift was looming on the horizon. He prepared us for the fact that psychology could use terms like sin or redemption, which used to be reserved for religion. The 21st century presents a new threshold with the symbiosis between psychology and brain research. This again brings us closer to terms that once were reserved for religion or art…. For a long time, religion made use of such things as prayer, ritual or meditation. Our age offers new possibilities in the form of psychotherapy and psychotropic drugs. Here, too, their application is not risk-free. But that does not mean that psychiatry and evolutionary psychology are going to leave new religious wars, inquisitions or witch burnings in their wake." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Religión, » Salud / Medicina, » Estonia
Todos los textos disponible de » Jaan Kaplinski

Just because the Schengen area has been extended, it doesn't mean border controls are gone, writes Andrej Brstovsek. They've merely moved. "The image of eastern Europeans who are longing to get to the glorious west has been shifted to the newcomer from Bangladesh who has paid more than 1,000 euros to get to Europe – without knowing whether he will manage to make it through the European Schengen fortress. But the new border regime also has an effect on the immediate neighbor: For example, citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina now have to pay 35 euros for a Schengen visa, whereas it used to cost nothing for them to go to Slovenia. It's the same for Ukrainians who want to go to Poland - and their average wage is a mere 200 euros. The borderless Europe that we now celebrate remains encircled by a firm boundary, with customs agents who may be either happy or sad, but are certainly on their guard." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Ampliación de la UE, » Política de la UE, » Eslovenia
Todos los textos disponible de » Andrej Brstovšek

Journalist John Palmer notes that Slovenia is due to take over the rotating EU presidency on January 1st. "The presidency of the European Union will pass for the first time ever to one of the so-called 'new member-states' from central and eastern Europe - specifically from the Balkans. ... The Slovenian presidency comes at a critical time in the affairs of the union, on the heels of the Lisbon agreement in December to sign the reform treaty, as the economic clouds gather across the globe and as Kosovo - and the Balkans regions generally - confronts the EU with some daunting challenges. ... Slovenia is running one of the most successful economies in the EU and has just joined the single currency euro-group at the heart of the European integration process. ... Although critics note the rather introverted nature of the domestic Slovene political debate, there is overwhelming public support for the government's strongly pro-EU orientation." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Política de la UE, » Eslovenia, » Europa
Todos los textos disponible de » John Palmer

"The meeting held on Thursday, December 20th, in Rome, between the Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, the French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the head of the Italian government Romano Prodi has allowed the Mediterranean Union project to be reintegrated into the EU", the Spanish daily is glad to observe. "The French president's desire to launch this initiative on the outskirts of the EU, limiting it to a project concerning the coastal countries of the Mediterranean, posed a problem. ... Germany in particular felt brushed aside by the French president, something that incited the German chancellor Angela Merkel to voice her disagreement in public. The German arguments are the same as those defended by the Italian and Spanish governments: what goes on in the Mediterranean concerns all Europeans and Mediterranean policy needs to be coherent with the rest of European activity." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Política de la UE, » Europa

Following the latest inconclusive meeting of the UN Security Council, it is becoming increasingly clear to Erich Rathfelder that the EU is the only body that will support the independence of Kosovo. "So the West demonstrates its power. And Belgrade should be compensated with an expedited integration into the EU. That only stands to reason. But Serbian suggestions that Europe stop insisting on the arrest of war criminals Ratko Mladić and Radovan Karadžić, who are in hiding, undermine the integrity of Europe... This horse trading is damaging to Europe. And it won't achieve anything in Serbia. There are too many who would rather align themselves with Russia than Europe. A withdrawal in the EU from the question of war criminals will not be seen as a magnanimous gesture, but rather as a sign of Europe's weakness." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Relaciones internacionales, » Política de la UE, » Serbia
Todos los textos disponible de » Erich Rathfelder

Károly Balla presents Hungarian culture blogs, which often deliver more up-to-the-minute, more authentic, and more lively reports on the cultural scene than traditional media. For example, take the "Könyvesblog" (book blog): "Traditional newspapers and magazines react very late to new publications; their critics talk shop and are barely comprehensible to 'normal' readers. It seems they only write for and about each other, taking great care not to depart from the dogma of the day. That's how such untouchable 'gods' of Hungarian literature are made, about whom you can never write anything bad. Authors whose praises are sung by the prevailing, self-congratulatory authorities are on their way to becoming taboo. The young book bloggers haven't got too much respect for either the literary elite or for authority; they write their opinions openly and candidly, even if they end up coming down hard on one poet or another." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Literatura, » Medios de comunicación online, » Hungría
Todos los textos disponible de » Károly Balla

Friedrich Schiller's play "Wallenstein" has been performed on three German-speaking stages in 2007: Leipzig, Berlin and now Vienna. Matthias Heine wonders what the public has understood of Schiller's drama, which unfolds in the period of the Thirty Years' War: "What has the Wallenstein Year brought? Primarily the realisation that not only are young directors not up to the task of presenting classics… but the general public lacks the ability to appreciate them as well. In Berlin they even answered their cell phones during the performance. And in Vienna there were people in the audience who had managed to print out the 'Wallenstein' article from Wikipedia beforehand ... Clearly, explication is needed. And the poet knew that himself, because in his day, too, not everyone knew the history of the Thirty Years' War by heart. And today you can hardly expect people to be educated at all." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Escenarios, » Alemania
Todos los textos disponible de » Matthias Heine

In conversation with Marcin Wojciechowski, Ukrainian writer Olexandr Irwanez, who co-founded the Lviv-based poets' group Bubabu with Yuri Andrukhovych in 1985, muses over why Ukrainian literature is becoming increasingly popular. "For Russians, particularly younger ones, it might be the freshness of Ukrainian literature, a certain anarchy and courageousness, that are attractive. We are constantly rediscovering ourselves – to ourselves, our neighbours, and the world. For years I have been watching the bookstore shelves in Germany, Austria and France. From year to year, more Ukrainian literature is making its way there... The charm of Ukrainian literature lies in the fact that it describes many features of the present day better than journalists or sociologists do." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Literatura, » Ucrania
Todos los textos disponible de » Olexandr Irwanez

"[The deputy mayor from the Flemish Christian democrat party] Eric Van Rompuy has made quite an impact by managing to decree that his commune [on the outskirts of Brussels] will only sell land to Dutch-speakers ... . The European Commission is taking a close interest in this measure that appears to be a new case of discrimination", explains Philippe Boeck. "Several criteria [enabling one to buy land at a low cost] have been presented. Some are comprehensible (Eligible people including first-time buyers, inhabitants or people born in the commune, etc.), others are considerably less so (such as knowledge of the Dutch language). This measure, which smacks more of a 'coup', can hardly be repeated. Once again it illustrates the battle a that part of the Flanders community is waging against the 'oil-stain' spreading of French-speaking culture and the comeback of peripheral Flemish culture." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Política interior, » Bélgica
Todos los textos disponible de » Philippe de Boeck

Fabrice Martin-Plichta, long-time Prague correspondent for Le Monde, gets a kick out of traditional Czech Christmas foods. In an interview with Lenka Zlámalová and Josef Greš, he says: "The Czechs are terribly conservative. Ninety percent of the people serve breaded carp with potato salad for dinner on Christmas Eve. I have nothing against traditions and habits – I happily keep some myself. But in the Mediterranean countries it would be perfectly inconceivable for a huge majority of the population to have only one sort of meal on the Christmas table, prepared exactly the same way.... Don't get me wrong: I love to eat carp, and more than once a year, but definitely not breaded... On the other hand I love roast sirloin or roast pork with dumplings. And I also find fruit dumplings or sweet casseroles interesting. You never see a sweet main course in Mediterranean cuisine. It's a real adventure for the taste buds." (21/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Cultura cotidiana, » Francia, » La República Checa
Todos los textos disponible de » Fabrice Martin Plichta, » Lenka Zlámalová, » Josef Greš

Columnist Franck McNally considers a crucial ingredient of the Irish Christmas menu, the Brussels sprout. "The constitutional crisis in a core EU member-state is, of course, unfortunate. But Belgium's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity. Which is why I propose that we take advantage of the current confusion there by unilaterally refusing to eat Brussels sprouts this Christmas. ... The country that has been without a government for almost 200 days now has given us many fine things. Unfortunately, it has not always given them with the same generosity as it did the sprout. Take beer, for example. Belgium makes some of the world's finest beers ... But you will struggle to find these in Irish bars ... . The constitutional crisis there will resolve itself in due course, perhaps in the process producing a better sense of export priorities. Then maybe we can express solidarity with whatever new political entities emerge, just by drinking beer." (20/12/2007)

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Más de la revista de prensa sobre el tema » Cultura cotidiana, » Religión, » Gran Bretaña, » Irlanda
Todos los textos disponible de » Franck McNally