• saltesc@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    My friend used to climb massive pine trees late at night in a park across his street, and place traffic cones on top. No one knew who was doing it or why. Many people thought it was the local council marking the trees to be cut down which upset residents. He started noticing police regularly patrolling the area, but he kept doing it and never got caught. It made the local paper, explaining how much confusion and disruption it was causing the police and local council. He hung the article on his wall.

    Went on to become a stuntman https://imdb.com/name/nm3068647/

  • don@lemm.ee
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    3 months ago

    No one actually cared, but at least they felt good about painting rocks.

      • don@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        Sure! Like they said, it just felt good to do something that they felt the police couldn’t control or understand. From OP’s perspective, they needed to be able to exercise control over those that were controlling OP. Easy to understand.

        That said, the police and Stasi are (given the time) tasked with prosecuting and attacking far more than what OP could have known about, and given the relatively playful nature of children in even some of the most dire circumstances, the police and Stasi didn’t have limitless resources to chase down something that, over time, produced no significant threat.

        Both the police and the Stasi were wary and paranoid, but even they have their limits, and they weren’t completely stupid. They knew they had to devote their resources to far likelier threats.

        As OP said, she wanted to feel in control, and no one can really blame them. OP felt good, and that’s what matters.

        • Hadriscus@lemm.ee
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          3 months ago

          Well I was there, and I can tell you the Stasi were confused af. Got a nice giggle out of it

        • rustyfish@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          Thanks for your answer. Sorry, I really don’t want to come across like a duchebag asshole. But this sounds more like a general guess of what has happened or how the Stasi might have operated in your opinion (plus some armchair psychology that kinda rubs me the wrong way).

          I literally just woke up and thought you might have some actual insight on this particular case?

        • unemployedclaquer@sopuli.xyz
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          3 months ago

          You are not criticizing the OP, I guess, because you acknowledge their point, that it was meaningless, but it was entertaining to distract the Stasi. But you are criticizing the OP, because you think the Stasi were so competent?

          • Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one
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            3 months ago

            Surely the point is that the OP couldn’t possibly have known what the authority thought about their painted stones, unless:

            1. they had a personal contact, which is quite the omission

            or

            1. the authorities were putting up posters around town, interviewing door-to-door etc
            • unemployedclaquer@sopuli.xyz
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              3 months ago

              Cops going around and asking about purple rocks would cause a tiny stir. A kid would be aware of that and entertained. This is pre- internet and It’s Soviet culture. I’m not supporting the Soviets, but people talked to each other, which is generically quite positive.

              • Andrzej@lemmy.myserv.one
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                3 months ago

                Ok, I guess this is a matter of opinion, but ‘cops going around asking people about some purple rocks’ just doesn’t pass the sniff test for me

  • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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    3 months ago

    That’s a neat story. The Nazis did some terrible things and it actually makes me happy to know that somewhere there was a Nazis official who was baffled

    Edit: wrong side and time

        • Bernie_Sandals@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          No. It was communist.

          The society itself was not communist, but It was definitely ruled by communists. Even Marx called himself and the people who followed his ideas communists, not “socialists seeking communism.” When people say a country was/is “communist,” they mean it’s being ruled by Marxist-Leninists, not that it’s achieved the hypothetical level of society that usually only Marxists are familiar with.

  • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Surrealism is always antifascist. Cruelty and absurdity are two sides of the same coin, or perhaps the same side of two coins.

  • niktemadur@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Now THIS is art of a very high caliber, indeed!
    It was just a public visual detail that elicited a stupid response from the very stupid people, and probably some delight from the rest of the population.

    If I was one of the chief stassi goons in town, my response would have been “counter-intelligence art” or “counter-art”, painting MORE stones purple and even other colors, so that whatever secret message the original ones were conveying would be confused, drowned out.

    • masterofn001@lemmy.ca
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      3 months ago

      After many years the stasi suddenly realise they have created the worlds largest pride celebration.

      Mission accomplished.