East German Figure Skaters

tdnuva · Aug 10, 2005

brad640 said:
The difference is that those skaters have the option of leaving their coach if they don't like the situation, and they can continue their careers, unlike GDR skaters who had to accept everything or face the police.

That is a big exaggeration. The police would not be involved if you give up. Yeah, probably there would be no other coach available, at least not at that level. But again, this is a situation many skaters enfaced. Either do it with this brat or leave it. Never a nice situation. But nothing extraordinary. On FSU they just now discuss the Shpilband camp and the debate about health issues. If you look at dance today it seems the politicking is more important than anything else, remember what the hints were for Denkstas when they moved coaches? Yeah, they can choose, though not between many possibilites. But that it's possible is rather a change in political situation than a personal problem having to deal with Mrs. Müller or not.

I really get the impression that some kind of US propaganda and media talk (most posters here seem to be from the US) is still taking its toll. Everyone who had some bigger role in the Eastern bloc countries MUST be evil. Everything in the western world is plain good. This black and white view is just wrong. It often comes down to personal decisions of single persons. And not all of them - even if they worked in and for a communist country - were evil.

SusanBeth · Aug 10, 2005

I highly doubt that it's a wide spread American attitude. I would almost be willing to bet that most Americans don't think about it very much at all. We have bigger things to agonize over.

I do agree that growing up (let's say several decades ago) there was a strong "evil communist " theme in the media. Does anyone remember Bullwinkle cartoons? But, most of the young people today didn't get subjected to that. People my age tend to yearn for the days when that was our biggest worry! It seems so silly now.

brad640 · Aug 10, 2005

tdnuva said:
I really get the impression that some kind of US propaganda and media talk (most posters here seem to be from the US) is still taking its toll. Everyone who had some bigger role in the Eastern bloc countries MUST be evil. Everything in the western world is plain good. This black and white view is just wrong. It often comes down to personal decisions of single persons. And not all of them - even if they worked in and for a communist country - were evil.

Nope. I did not make any blanket statements about the eastern bloc. All my comments related specifically to the GDR during the period of state supported doping. Yes, people should be judged according to their own personal decisions, and in that case, those individuals were wrong.

LegalGirl82 · Aug 10, 2005

SkateFan4Life said:
Annet Poetzsch married and divorced Katarina Witt's brother. She was a skating coach in the GDR at one time - whether or not she's still involved with the sport is unknown to me. She skated in one of the "Skates of Gold" television specials about ten years ago, and she still skated quite well.

SkateFan4Life, as usual, you started a very interesting thread. I'll stop back and read more closely when I have a little more time. Just wanted to let you know, I was doing some research at the ISU website this week, and Anett Potzsch-Rauschenbach is listed as a Technical Specialist for the 2004/2005 season.

SkateFan4Life · Aug 10, 2005

I remember that some of the American press tried to portray the East Germans as "the bad guys" while our US skaters were (of course) "the good guys". A "Sports Illustrated" write-up on the 1986 Worlds, in which Debi Thomas of the US unseated Katarina Witt for the title, labeled Witt as "the beautiful villain". The writer stated that Witt lost the title with a costly error in her short program triple/double combination and that her faced "contorted into a hideous grimace and she spit out a German vulgarity." Please, guys. Witt was NOT a villain, and neither were any of the members of the GDR figure skating team. They were all wonderfully dedicated, well-trained athletes who competed for their country. The fact that they were citizens of a communist country whose political views are not in sync with ours does not make them the antagonist, IMHO.

SkateFan4Life · Aug 11, 2005

Joesitz said:
I think in the communist world the most important thing for a competitor was to win for the State! any which way it could. There was no tradition of the ideal sportsman of letting the best man win. It had to be first place. It showed the power of the State.

Cheating in sports still goes on in most countries, but it is not a national policy as far as I know. It is the individual competitor (or his coach) who cheat. It's more of an ego trip than a state power trip.

Joe

I remember an interview Robin Cousins gave during the Lake Placid Olympics prior to his gold medal victory. He said, to paraphrase, that the skaters from the communist countries, particularly the Soviet Union and East Germany, competed to win medals, plain and simple. The skaters did not skate for their own pleasure - they skated to win medals for their country, and they were expected to win medals for their country. Cousins' said, to paraphrase, that the skaters from the "West" had a different approach to competition. While they also wanted to win medals, they were free of government pressure and expectations to do so.

tdnuva · Aug 12, 2005

SkateFan4Life said:
I remember an interview Robin Cousins gave during the Lake Placid Olympics prior to his gold medal victory. He said, to paraphrase, that the skaters from the communist countries, particularly the Soviet Union and East Germany, competed to win medals, plain and simple. The skaters did not skate for their own pleasure - they skated to win medals for their country, and they were expected to win medals for their country. Cousins' said, to paraphrase, that the skaters from the "West" had a different approach to competition. While they also wanted to win medals, they were free of government pressure and expectations to do so.

Sure it was not the government who opressed the "western" skaters. But look how different Fratianne and Sumners were treated compared to Fleming and Hamill. I guess the degree of pressure was not that much different for a lot of skaters. Only the source of it (the federations, the media?). And I sure thought that Katarina Witt enjoyed what she did.

hockeyfan228 · Aug 12, 2005

The difference in pressure is that under Soviet or Soviet-style rule, the athlete's decisions didn't just affect the athlete. Entire families' fortunes or misfortunes were tied to the behavior of one family member, and educations, job opportunities, ability to travel, and apartments/houses for the entire family, and often extended family, were dependent on that athlete.

Joesitz (RIP) · Aug 12, 2005

tdnuva said:
I really get the impression that some kind of US propaganda and media talk (most posters here seem to be from the US) is still taking its toll. Everyone who had some bigger role in the Eastern bloc countries MUST be evil. Everything in the western world is plain good. This black and white view is just wrong. It often comes down to personal decisions of single persons. And not all of them - even if they worked in and for a communist country - were evil.

tdnuva - Are you living in the US? You will find less homogeny in the US than any other place in the World. Americans tend to root for their ethnic background.
Many posters here, for example, follow Russian skaters with a passion.

Joe

tdnuva · Aug 13, 2005

Joesitz said:
tdnuva - Are you living in the US?

No I am not. I responded to posts of Americans here. Where I sensed an underlying malthinking of everyone from Eastern Europe. Which seems rather not rational to me.

SkateFan4Life · Aug 13, 2005

tdnuva said:
Sure it was not the government who opressed the "western" skaters. But look how different Fratianne and Sumners were treated compared to Fleming and Hamill. I guess the degree of pressure was not that much different for a lot of skaters. Only the source of it (the federations, the media?). And I sure thought that Katarina Witt enjoyed what she did.

Ah, but Fleming and Hamil won Olympic gold and became "America's Sweetheats", while Fratianne and Sumners won "only" silver (and to East Germans Poetszch and Witt, respectively). Their defeats were considered slip-ups in the land of Tenley Albright/Carol Heiss/Peggy Fleming/Dorothy Hamill. The Americans (myself, included) had a notion that the Olympic gold medal in ladies' singles - especially after World War II -- was more less American property. Unrealistic, granted, but that's the way the media and many fans felt. We expected our women champions to win Olympic gold, and when they did not, it was considered a failure. Fratianne and Sumners were never the media stars and/or household names that Fleming and Hamil were. Was this fair?
No, IMHO, it was not, but that's what happened.

The fact that both Fratianne and Sumners came into the Olympics as the reigning World champion just added to their label of "failure".

Joesitz (RIP) · Aug 13, 2005

hockeyfan228 said:
The difference in pressure is that under Soviet or Soviet-style rule, the athlete's decisions didn't just affect the athlete. Entire families' fortunes or misfortunes were tied to the behavior of one family member, and educations, job opportunities, ability to travel, and apartments/houses for the entire family, and often extended family, were dependent on that athlete.

It also affected the State which, like Hitler, wanted to show off their best to the world. It was and still is highly political.. I believe the remnants of that motivation still lingers in the East European culture and in the Russian diaspora. who are now judges from a number of countries.

Entire families of the athlete did not suffer from this system. It actually gave them a better life.

Joe

SkateFan4Life · Aug 13, 2005

Joesitz said:
It also affected the State which, like Hitler, wanted to show off their best to the world. It was and still is highly political.. I believe the remnants of that motivation still lingers in the East European culture and in the Russian diaspora. who are now judges from a number of countries.

Entire families of the athlete did not suffer from this system. It actually gave them a better life.

Joe

Katarina Witt said in an interview many years ago, when she was still competing for East Germany, that it was important for her to do well so that her efforts could help to bring honor and respect to her country. She said (to paraphrase)
"When we win medals, the world sees this as a good reflection on our country and our society."

SkateFan4Life · Aug 14, 2005

I remember another television interview Katarina Witt gave - around 1989 or so - in which she defended her East German government and the opportunity it gave her to compete on the world stage. She added, however, that she genuinely did not realize the pitfalls of communism as she was growing up, but she understood the situation better and realized the shortcomings of the GDR's form of government.

Witt appeared on Brian Boitano's "Canvas on Ice" televlsion special around 1990 or so, and a part of the program was filmed in the former East Germany, in her hometown of Karl-Marx Stadt (now Cheminz). Brian and Kat were filmed walking around the city, and boy, was it decrepit. With all due respect, one would have thought that any government - democratic or communist - would have seen to it that the ravages of World War II bombing would have been repaired by then - 45 years after the end of the war at that time. Quite a few of the buildings were covered with shell marks that occurred during the war. Of course, the only people who saw the city for many years were folks living behind the Iron Curtain - or at least not many from the West probably ventured there.

tdnuva · Aug 15, 2005

SkateFan4Life said:
Witt appeared on Brian Boitano's "Canvas on Ice" televlsion special around 1990 or so, and a part of the program was filmed in the former East Germany, in her hometown of Karl-Marx Stadt (now Cheminz). Brian and Kat were filmed walking around the city, and boy, was it decrepit. With all due respect, one would have thought that any government - democratic or communist - would have seen to it that the ravages of World War II bombing would have been repaired by then - 45 years after the end of the war at that time. Quite a few of the buildings were covered with shell marks that occurred during the war. Of course, the only people who saw the city for many years were folks living behind the Iron Curtain - or at least not many from the West probably ventured there.

It's Chemnitz.

And no - not many from the west got there. Simply because you had to get a visum for it and you had to have good reasons to get one. And if you were there with kind of an official reason you probably had some "guard" with you who tried to show you only the good parts.

But this neglection of the buildings and houses was not only happening in the GDR, I saw the same results in the Czech republic e.g. All in all I think it was simply due to lack of money. Or the will to invest the scarce money for those tasks.

SkateFan4Life · Aug 15, 2005

tdnuva said:
It's Chemnitz.

And no - not many from the west got there. Simply because you had to get a visum for it and you had to have good reasons to get one. And if you were there with kind of an official reason you probably had some "guard" with you who tried to show you only the good parts.

But this neglection of the buildings and houses was not only happening in the GDR, I saw the same results in the Czech republic e.g. All in all I think it was simply due to lack of money. Or the will to invest the scarce money for those tasks.

Thanks for the spelling correction! Chemnitz it is.

I recall reading Janet Lynn's book "Peace and Love" in which she wrote briefly of touring through Europe after the World Championships of 1970 - which were held in Ljublijana, (then-Yugoslavia). She wrote that, in her opinion, it was "depressing" to tour through eastern Europe, which then was behind the Iron Curtain. She also wrote of their group being followed wherever they went.

I'm sure the financial aspects of repairing the cities, roads, etc., after World War II came into play. On the other hand, West Germany was rebuilt, thanks to a lot of aid from the US and other Allied countries. The Soviet Union seized control of eastern Europe to make it a buffer between itself and the West, and it really never paid all that much attention to repairing its bloc countries from the ravages of war. To me, that was completely inexcusable. Just what kind of message was this, anyway? "We'll conquer you and impose our form of government on you, and by the way, we won't help you repair your country." Horrible!

hockeyfan228 · Aug 15, 2005

Joesitz said:
Entire families of the athlete did not suffer from this system. It actually gave them a better life.

Joe

Exactly. And it all went away if the athlete didn't cooperate or produce.

SkateFan4Life · Aug 15, 2005

hockeyfan228 said:
Exactly. And it all went away if the athlete didn't cooperate or produce.

Precisely. Remember Petr Barna at Calgary? He finished something like 17th overall, and the Czechoslovakian skating association was so angry with him at his "failure" to win a medal - or at least finish in the top five or six - that they summoned him home the day after the men's long program on an early-morning flight. Frankly, I'm surprised that he managed to stay in the skating system, since the eastern European skating associations tended to place rather heavy expectations on their skaters - and woe to them if they failed to live up to those expectations!

SkateFan4Life · Aug 15, 2005

By the way, what was the name of the East German national anthems? We certainly heard it played often enough at Worlds and the Olympics. If I recall it correctly, it started out rather slowly, then had a "marching" middle section, and the same slow ending.

tdnuva · Aug 16, 2005

SkateFan4Life said:
By the way, what was the name of the East German national anthems? We certainly heard it played often enough at Worlds and the Olympics. If I recall it correctly, it started out rather slowly, then had a "marching" middle section, and the same slow ending.

IIRC Ironically (thinking of our debate above) it started with something like "Built up from ruins".

East German Figure Skaters

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