Priorities

The Berlin Senate shut down Görlitzer Park’s special status. It used to be one place in the city where weed was basically fine—10 to 15 grams and nobody would touch you. Now that’s gone. The reasoning is sound: kids found cocaine packets on the playground, a child with a joint in his mouth, parents asking what it takes before the city does anything.

So they cracked down. There’s a smoke-in tonight, people showing up in protest. The organizers made a point worth considering: if the city cares about protecting vulnerable people, why shut down this one park instead of getting homeless people out of the gymnasiums where they’re living? Why not address the actual catastrophes? Find something visible, crack down hard, declare the city’s serious again. Every politician pulls this move.

Berlin used to be the place that didn’t play this game. Used to be you could do weird shit there without the state coming down on you. Guess that’s just over now. Another European capital trying to look respectable.