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Why does Germany have weak soft power (in terms of pop culture)?

HomokHarcos

Member
Jul 11, 2018
2,447
Canada
EDIT: Autocorrect made it say "pea". I meant to write "does".

I think Germany has been the biggest underperformer when it comes to exporting pop culture. For the past few decades Germany has been the strongest economy in Europe, but it's pop culture is dwarfed in comparison to the United States, Japan United Kingdom and arguably even South Korea. Germany really has no thriving animation or comic worldwide like Japan, the film industry was certainly the strongest in Europe (possibly even the world) during the Weimar era, but since World War II France and Italy have been the two giants of European cinema. There's been some German acts to make it big worldwide like the Scorpions, Kraftwerk, Rammstein and (uhhum) Milli Vanilli, but the UK has much bigger musical acts worldwide.

So why is this?
 
Xando

Xando

Member
Oct 28, 2017
27,568
Because german culture was and has been dominated by US influence since WW2
 
CloudWolf

CloudWolf

Member
Oct 26, 2017
15,721
HomokHarcos said:
the film industry was certainly the strongest in Europe (possibly even the world) during the Weimar era, but since World War II France and Italy have been the two giants of European cinema.
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What are you talking about? Germany is way up there, too, or did you just forget that Wim Wenders, Rainer Fassbinder and Werner Herzog are German?
 
Stinkles

Stinkles

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
20,459
Germany brought us David Hasselhoff, Schwarzenegger, the band Franz Ferdinand and Liszt. What else could you possibly need?
 
Avantgarde

Avantgarde

Member
Oct 27, 2017
486
Germany is huge on the 90's-00's Eurodance scene. Snap, Masterboy, Culture Beat, Haddaway, Maxx, Real McCoy, Scooter and many others... those were the days!
 
Wilf Netherton

Wilf Netherton

Banned
Jun 20, 2019
2,638
Lingering impact of world wars limits German pop culture appeal in the anglosphere. German cultural references were abundant in the US before WW1 and strong even through the 20s and 30s. You can for example find a lot of German references in Disney animation of the time, in silent films, in popular music, and so forth.

Wartime propaganda extinguished the popular appeal of everything "German" coded, making it look either ridiculous or ugly whenever referenced. Widespread shock at the discovery of the Holocaust death camps locked that attitude in more or less permanently, no one was willing to try to rehabilitate German cultural markers here.
 

Deleted member 13148

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,188
Germany has had a pretty major influence on Heavy Metal as well, creating the Power Metal subgenre. Blind Guardian is pretty popular in many parts of the world, though they've never really managed to get much popularity in the US.
 
behOemoth

behOemoth

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,722
Techno and electronic music is still heavily influenced or dominated by German acts.
Also Bundesliga is pretty big all over the works except the U.S.
 

Deleted member 13496

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
7,409
Wilf Netherton said:
Lingering impact of world wars limits German pop culture appeal in the anglosphere. German cultural references were abundant in the US before WW1 and strong even through the 20s and 30s. You can for example find a lot of German references in Disney animation of the time, in silent films, in popular music, and so forth.

Wartime propaganda extinguished the popular appeal of everything "German" coded, making it look either ridiculous or ugly whenever referenced. Widespread shock at the discovery of the Holocaust death camps locked that attitude in more or less permanently, no one was willing to try to rehabilitate German cultural markers here.
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This is it.

Honestly, for the average English-speaking layman, the Germans are pretty much entirely viewed as the bad guys from the World Wars as far as media representation. Not to say everyone thinks you're still Nazis or anything, just that generally speaking that's your cultural footprint for the rest of the West.
 
behOemoth

behOemoth

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,722
Wilf Netherton said:
Lingering impact of world wars limits German pop culture appeal in the anglosphere. German cultural references were abundant in the US before WW1 and strong even through the 20s and 30s. You can for example find a lot of German references in Disney animation of the time, in silent films, in popular music, and so forth.

Wartime propaganda extinguished the popular appeal of everything "German" coded, making it look either ridiculous or ugly whenever referenced. Widespread shock at the discovery of the Holocaust death camps locked that attitude in more or less permanently, no one was willing to try to rehabilitate German cultural markers here.
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That's not really true. German music and the new german movement of movies of the 80s and 90s were hits in the US. Probably thanks to the many GIs stationed in Germany.
 
EloKa

EloKa

GSP
Verified
Oct 25, 2017
1,909
Germany has a huge impact on the global pop culture but this influence is often indirect and also not visible at first glance like the fact that most (older) Disney movies are based on german fairy tales. Even the disney logo was designed to represent the german castle Neuschwanstein.

The more obvious influences are for example the metal / techno / electro genres and having a huge share of modern inventions that shape our cultures.
 
J2d

J2d

Member
Oct 26, 2017
1,140
Well Michael haneke was atleast born there so that counts for something.
 
Spaltazar

Spaltazar

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
2,105
was redest du denn da. Lebt denn der alte Holzmichl noch ist Kulturgut welches wir in die ganze Welt exportiert haben und uns auf Platz 1 in den Herzen der Menschen gebracht hat! jeder sänger macht das nach heute

man writing and reading german online on a forum always feels so weird
 
Razgriz-Specter

Razgriz-Specter

Member
Oct 25, 2017
29,706
Switch Back 9 said:
This is it.

Honestly, for the average English-speaking layman, the Germans are pretty much entirely viewed as the bad guys from the World Wars as far as media representation. Not to say everyone thinks you're still Nazis or anything, just that generally speaking that's your cultural footprint for the rest of the West.
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For a short time in the 90's-ish German terrorists seemed like a popular media thing as well until it started shifting entirely to Middle Eastern terrorists.

Being too young in that time I don't know if it actually had a basis in anything or was it Hollywood chasing Hans Gruber influence.
 
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Ruruja

Ruruja

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,723
They gave us a lot of sweet dance music in the 90s.

Commercial trance in the early 00s was also mostly German.
 
iksenpets

iksenpets

Member
Oct 26, 2017
6,541
Dallas, TX
I feel like modern German culture is weak in America, but otherwise fairly strong, if maybe a bit under where it should be based on just economic size. American distaste for electronica and soccer and dense board games really limits German appeal. Also Germany has the same problem that all of Northern Europe has, that there's very limited appeal in exporting their food. Restaurants are always a great way to get a cultural beachhead somewhere, but Northern European food isn't terribly exciting, and again, in America, it's even harder to sell since the stuff that would sell well is extremely close to what Americans already conceive of as "American" food.

And then German nationalism just gets a bad rep in general. Japan can have American teenagers running around ranting about the superiority of Japanese culture, and everyone will think they're weirdo weebs, but nothing worse. That kid in your class starts talking about the superiority of German culture and you wonder if he belongs on an FBI watch list.
 
Glasgow Mega-Snake

Glasgow Mega-Snake

Member
Oct 28, 2017
2,976
Bunch of different reasons, I guess.

When it comes to film/TV, the German entertainment industry has been pretty weak for a while. Private TV is shit and public channels are great for news and documentaries, but haven't produced any good series in ages. They are really ratings-driven and risk-averse, content on producing nothing but the same old crime serials and Volksmusik shows.

It's just sad to compare German state channels to the BBC when it comes to creativity. And it took Netflix starting to produce foreign language shows to get something like "Dark". The film industry's output also isn't that great aside from a few standouts.

I guess the language barrier makes it harder for German language content to get international attention, while German also isn't considered 'exotic' in the West like Japan. Also Germans are hardcoded as Nazis and/or communists internationally. So the film that have international attention often deal with those parts of history, like The Lives of Others or Der Untergang.

Music? I really don't know. There are really great German bands and artists, both underground and more mainstream stuff. Can't think of a German band that became internationally famous since Tokio Hotel.
 
Fliesen

Fliesen

Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,281
B-Dubs said:
Language barrier I imagine
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Certainly the main reason. And German pop culture isn't "wacky" or "unique" enough to cross that barrier, like kpop, jpop, or anime.

like, why would Americans or English folk care about pop culture that is as "generically western" as their own but at the same time in a different language?
 
KingFox

KingFox

Member
May 17, 2018
1,073
They gave the world Playmobil: The Movie (even if it was made by a French animation studio) and the world said: No thank you.
 
Wilf Netherton

Wilf Netherton

Banned
Jun 20, 2019
2,638
Fliesen said:
Certainly the main reason. And German pop culture isn't "wacky" or "unique" enough to cross that barrier, like kpop, jpop, or anime.

like, why would Americans or English folk care about pop culture that is as "generically western" as their own but at the same time in a different language?
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French culture makes an impact in the Anglosphere. So does Italian, Spanish, and Scandinavian (well, the last is a little more muddled and generic).
 
DirtyManos

DirtyManos

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,176
Cars have an effect on soft power. BMW, Audi, Mercedes are usually the standard that luxury carmakers bench themselves against and are status symbols around the world (good or bad).

German comedians and all that lol
 
Tavernade

Tavernade

Tavernade
Moderator
Sep 18, 2018
8,735
I wish there was more German stuff around. I swear the only thing I've seen from them in the US recently is "Dark" which was really good. There's also that crime show on Netflix but I haven't watched it yet. I feel like Germany would be really interesting to watch British-style cop/detective shows about.

B-Dubs said:
Language barrier I imagine
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This doesn't seem to impact Japan at all.

Wilf Netherton said:
Lingering impact of world wars limits German pop culture appeal in the anglosphere. German cultural references were abundant in the US before WW1 and strong even through the 20s and 30s. You can for example find a lot of German references in Disney animation of the time, in silent films, in popular music, and so forth.

Wartime propaganda extinguished the popular appeal of everything "German" coded, making it look either ridiculous or ugly whenever referenced. Widespread shock at the discovery of the Holocaust death camps locked that attitude in more or less permanently, no one was willing to try to rehabilitate German cultural markers here.
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This is probably the reason.
 
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