The speakers were of all ages. Two nursing home roommates arrived Wednesday at the Brandenburg Gate to join us for our celebration of freedom of expression. Both were in a wheelchair. They rolled up to our Hyde Park-style Speaker’s Corner and said, "We want a haircut or a pedicure. We cannot afford more at these prices.”
The audience applauded.
On the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, we sponsored two organizations dedicated to free speech -
Speaker’s Corner Trust and the delightfully named
Centre for Political Beauty - to produce an event celebrating free speech. On a perch resembling the Speakers' Corner in London's Hyde Park, speaker after speaker rose to raise their opinion. Most of the speakers's interventions can be watched on this YouTube
channel.
While the topics ranged from “last wishes” seniors we brought from old people homes, genital mutilation and elimination of freedom of speech in Russia, Syria and Tibet, many evoked, naturally enough, the Berlin Wall. Philipp Ruch of the Center for Political Beauty called the the anniversary of its a "symbol of change and a triumph for freedom of speech and expression of our democracy." The Director of the Speakers' Corner Trust,
Peter Bradley, said: "The wall was not alone, there were the people they have torn down." And
Gesine Schwan, President of the Humboldt-Viadrina School of Governance, appeared before the audience to say "Democracy is a culture of co-speech.”
Some pictures from this exciting event are posted. We’ll update with videos as soon as they become available.
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