steven@mcvax.UUCP (Steven Pemberton) (09/19/84)
> Well, let's see you explain the number of people who have fled across the > Berlin wall, and the lengths that they will go to get across? Let me assure > you, the East Germans don't like their system. You seemed to have missed the point. I'm not denying people flee. The original remark was "if we lose, everybody loses, but if we win, everybody wins, including all the people under Communist control right now". All I was doing was quoting an interview that suggests that contrary to what we're led to believe, not all East Europeans want to flee, and some seem to defend their system. My aquaintance with East Europeans is not great. I know only three personally, here in Amsterdam. The one is Rumanian, from what he has told me he fled because he was fed up with petty beaurocracy, and travel restrictions. The second is his wife: she didn't want to leave, but did to be with him; both of them are somewhat disappointed with the West, in particular the general cultural level is lower than they anticipated, they say. The parents of the man came and visited them for three months this Summer, and they didn't take the opportunity to flee. The third is a Yugoslav. She didn't flee. She just came here to live with her Dutch boyfiend, and goes back to Yugoslavia several times a year. Also when I was in Vienna this Summer, I noticed a large number of cars of people on holiday from East Europe.