White Rose

I was curious to read about the white rose as a symbol of Russian feminist resistance this morning on the profile of a man in Germany to whom I was about to mail a postcard. Not knowing its history, I assumed it was a new Russian symbol. (I knew it as a symbol of Yorkshire vs. the red rose of Lancashire, from the Wars of the Roses, and of course as a symbol of the need for beauty in the lives of working people in the anthem Bread and Roses.) Imagine my surprise, though, at hearing the white rose mentioned again in my German class later on today by a Russian who now lives in Austria, talking about the resistance movement in Germany during World War II. One group of five dissidents in Munich called itself Weiße Rose and was captured in 1942 by the Gestapo, imprisoned, and executed. The anthem “Die Gedanken Sind Frei” was written a century earlier and was required to be invoked over the decades as repression and authoritarianism took their successive places in German history.

I am about to embark on a course tomorrow, Comix Activism, taught by an artist who was born to German parents and who has now moved back to Europe. The United States is no longer a safe place for her. It’s time to wield symbols and pens to resist oppression…

ETA Saturday morning: I forgot. I also caught a reference to the White Rose on Feli from Germany’s YouTube video from several years ago. Google is watching me… White roses to you, Google.