It may have been a long time ago, or it may just be a legend. The lady's witty answer also broke another legend in China, that is, Germans have no sense of humor, especially among strangers, as if everyone has been frowning and thinking about philosophical issues. She reminded the fact that many people like to use stories to understand society.
China tourists who care about current events like to take photos under the big windmill next to them when they visit the Worry-Free Palace in Potsdam. This is the legendary place where the famous nail house Miller fights the king. This story is widely circulated in China today. German emperor William I liked this beautiful palace very much. When he climbed high and looked far away, he found the windmill unsightly, so he asked someone to discuss with the miller: make an offer and sell it to me to dismantle it. Who knows that the miller is stubborn, saying that this is ancestral property, and no matter how much money, he will not sell it. By the way, he also said an eternal famous saying: "Wind enters, rain enters, and kings don't." So the emperor was furious and ordered the police to dismantle it. Instead of petitioning or setting himself on fire, the miller went to court calmly, and the judge even ordered the emperor to rebuild as it was and compensate for the losses. The emperor is not terrible, but he obeys orders.
Time flies, the sun and the moon fly, and in a blink of an eye, the second generation emperor ascended the throne. After the miller died, the economy was depressed, and his son took the initiative to write to the new emperor, saying, didn't the first emperor buy my house? Your majesty can now fulfill his last wish. The new emperor wrote back that your mill has become a symbol of German law and a national treasure cultural relic, and you can never go backwards in history. If you are short of money, I will send you some flowers. Therefore, the mill stands tall and is admired by the world.
According to textual research, this story was first compiled by a German, then introduced to China by Mr. Yang Changji, and repeatedly quoted by Professor He Weifang, etc., and developed into an ups and downs fable of the rule of law with clear love and hate, some of which were suspected to be added by China people. Germans don't care much about the greatest story in China's judicial history, and it's hard to see it in their own travel notes. I'm afraid the most talked about people in the world are only from China.
The reason is, first of all, the current judicial situation in China, and the brutal forced demolition. However, this is not the whole explanation. I think this has something to do with everyone's preference for story education.
Look at another story about Germany. It has also been quoted by many scholars, widely spread on the Internet, and distilled into one sentence: "Raise the gun a little." It is about the trial of soldiers who once guarded the Berlin Wall and shot over the wall after the reunification of Germany. A soldier argued that he was forced to carry out orders from his superiors. The judge replied, you can raise the gun a little. This sentence of the judge is considered to be quite human and intelligent and touching.
I once wrote an article about my experience of face-to-face verification with two people in charge of such criminal trials in those years-ChristophSchanefgen, former Attorney General of Berlin, and Bernhard Jahntz, former senior prosecutor. They said it was completely impossible. Through analysis, I think this story is basically made up by China people themselves. It embodies some trivial resistance and plays some tricks to gain self-touch and self-redemption. This kind of folk wisdom is highly appreciated in China society, and it is more popular than discussing the issues of law, system and human nature. Later, a friend added from the legal process that it is a typical China scene to assume that judges, like prosecutors, directly debate and preach with defendants.
What I want to say is that people place too much expectation on the educational function of stories. Some media that think they have undertaken the educational function are always looking for stories with typical significance. Reality is more complicated than fairy tales, and such stories are hard to find. Therefore, the media often cut off complex things and simplify them, turning a multifaceted story into a single fable, which turns out to be a lie.
People like listening to stories, especially children. They express their feelings about the world and understand nature and society through fairy tales full of fantasy imagination. Nowadays, people in China tend to occupy children's fantasy space, let them participate in various skills training since childhood, and live a childhood life without stories in a highly competitive state every day. Strangely, a few years later, when rationality and responsibility are needed to participate in the construction of social system, they become immature children, addicted to stories, and even expect stories to govern the country.
Fairy tales always say Onceuponatime, or a long time ago-not only the childhood of human beings, but also the childhood of human society depends on stories to understand and govern society. However, adults in modern society should use more reason and courage to face more complicated social relations and diverse social phenomena, and promote social cooperation and development by establishing rules and systems. Only in this way can we really protect our childhood and protect our imagination after childhood.