Berlin Immigration

From watching Head On! and reading the Russian Disco it is quite clear that Berlin has a complicated history of immigration. I think what I found most interesting about Berlin's history of immigration is how they have treated different immigrants with different backgrounds and ethnicities in completely different manners and how the treatment of these immigrants has changed over time.

For instance, the Russian Jews mentioned in one of the first few chapters we read of the Russian Disco seem to have been given very generous accommodations for the simple reason that they were Jewish. Upon arrival from Russia they received little identity cards which granted them access to free living quarters.

Contrastingly, the Turks aren't regarded with quite as much good cheer. From what we saw in Head On it seems that Turks are thought of as a plague by the average Berliner. My assumption of the reason for this difference in treatment is that society favors the underdog. The Russian Jews were small in number and were given much more sympathy upon there arrival from escaping Russia. Notice that the treatment of these Russian Jews changed over time as more and more of them found they way to Berlin; they began to be seen as more of a pest than a pitiable group. The Turks shown in Head On were in Berlin at a time when the Turk population was immense. Since these people were everywhere in Berlin and offering serious competition for resources -- definitely not underdogs -- they were regarded with much more animosity.