A woman asked for a petition: The Mohr must disappear from the Garmisch-Partenkirchen coat of arms.
It failed, but its arguments were heard in the state parliament.
The
Mohr in the coat of arms of
the districts of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Freising and the city of Coburg can remain.
That was decided by the Bavarian state parliament - because it
is
powerless on this issue
.
A
petition thus failed
- although politicians partly followed the initiator's argument.
District
- The Mohr in the district coat of arms can stay.
That is certain after a decision in the Bavarian state parliament.
But not because the politicians consider the depiction of dark-skinned people to be problem-free or even appropriate.
Rather, they are powerless.
The responsible interior committee of the German Press Agency (dpa) dealt with the issue on Wednesday - surprisingly quickly.
Because a spokesman for the state parliament recently told the Tagblatt that this year, due to the large number of petitions, would no longer be expected.
A woman submitted her application in mid-August.
She demanded that the Mohr in the coats of arms of the Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Freising districts and the city of Coburg should disappear.
From their point of view, the representation contains “a false colonized image of the entire African population”.
It is suitable for giving rise to new prejudices or reinforcing existing ones.
Green politician Schulze: Stereotypical representation is a problem
Their arguments were heard in the Interior Committee.
The problem is the stereotypical representation of Africans with thick lips and large earrings, said Katharina Schulze from the Greens, according to dpa.
In addition, she spoke of an external attribution "because black people would not refer to themselves with the M-word".
Linguists often recognize the problem at this point.
But Schulze also comes to the conclusion: The state parliament could not do anything about it.
Only the municipalities themselves can change their coat of arms.
This question about the legal possibilities and the consequences of a resolution had been open to the last.
In advance, District Administrator Anton Speer (Free Voters) had set out the historical background of the coat of arms in a written statement and spoke out clearly against a change.
Because in the historical context there is no racist reference.
The state parliament member Manfred Ländner (CSU) represented the same opinion in the interior committee.
In many coats of arms, as quoted by the dpa, a person with dark skin is depicted with reference to Saint Mauritius - this also applies, for example, to Mittenwald, who was not affected by the petition.
The historical context should not be forgotten, the representation is not racist per se, said Ländner.
Interior committee in the state parliament appeals to municipalities: Open discourse on controversial representations
In the end, the Interior Committee unanimously declared the petition closed.
But not without making an appeal to the municipalities.
You may well have a debate about the controversial representations of the Moors in their coats of arms.
"Open discourse can also be open-ended," said chairman Martin Runge (Greens).
Garmisch-Partenkirchen reacted accordingly when the debate flared up again due to the petition.
The discussion about the question of whether a Mohr should disappear from hotel and street names as well as from coats of arms is used by the market as an opportunity to present the topic to the cultural advisory board in order to receive an assessment or a recommendation on how to deal with the topic.
