Editing East Germany (section)

=== Ostalgie ===
{{main|Ostalgie}}
[[File:Ostalgie.jpg|thumb|right|A booth selling East German and communist-themed memorabilia in Berlin]]

Many East Germans initially regarded the dissolution of the GDR positively,<ref>{{Cite journal |date=Winter 2000 |title=Remaking the East German Past: 'Ostalgie,' Identity, and Material Culture |journal=[[Journal of Popular Culture]] |volume=34 |issue=3 |pages=229–54 |author-last=Blum |author-first=Martin}}</ref> but this reaction partly turned sour.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Naughton |first=Leonie |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AugFhjJZz0QC&pg=PA14 |title=That Was the Wild East: Film Culture, Unification, and the 'New' Germany |publisher=[[University of Michigan Press]] |date=2002 |isbn=978-0-472-08888-1 |page=14 |access-date=14 October 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160521031132/https://books.google.com/books?id=AugFhjJZz0QC&pg=PA14 |archive-date=21 May 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref> West Germans often acted as if they had "won" and East Germans had "lost" in unification, leading many East Germans (''Ossis'') to resent West Germans (''Wessis'').<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bickford |first=Andrew |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sELghp1BIbgC&pg=PA10 |title=Fallen Elites: The Military Other in Post-Unification Germany |publisher=[[Stanford University Press]] |date=2011 |isbn=978-0-8047-7396-6 |page=10 |access-date=14 October 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160427060712/https://books.google.com/books?id=sELghp1BIbgC&pg=PA10 |archive-date=27 April 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref> In 2004, [[Deborah Ascher Barnstone]] wrote, "East Germans resent the wealth possessed by West Germans; West Germans see the East Germans as lazy opportunists who want something for nothing. East Germans find 'Wessis' arrogant and pushy, West Germans think the 'Ossis' are lazy good-for-nothings."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Barnstone |first=Deborah Ascher |author-link=Deborah Ascher Barnstone |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dkO_WwhyXWMC&pg=PA92 |title=The Transparent State: Architecture and Politics in Postwar Germany |publisher=[[Psychology Press]] |date=2005 |isbn=978-0-203-79988-8 |page=92 |access-date=14 October 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160507070723/https://books.google.com/books?id=dkO_WwhyXWMC&pg=PA92 |archive-date=7 May 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref>

In addition, many East German women found the West more appealing, and left the region never to return, leaving behind an underclass of poorly educated and jobless men.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Connolly |first=Kate |date=31 May 2007 |title=Educated women leave east German men behind |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jun/01/germany.kateconnolly |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181117063245/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jun/01/germany.kateconnolly |archive-date=17 November 2018 |access-date=16 November 2018 |work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref>

In 2009, a majority (57%) of the people who stayed in East Germany defended the GDR,<ref name=":1">{{Cite news |last=Bonstein |first=Julia |date=3 July 2009 |title=Homesick for a Dictatorship: Majority of Eastern Germans Feel Life Better under Communism |url=https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/homesick-for-a-dictatorship-majority-of-eastern-germans-feel-life-better-under-communism-a-634122.html |work=[[Der Spiegel]] |language=en |issn=2195-1349 |quote=Today, 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, 57 percent, or an absolute majority, of eastern Germans defend the former East Germany.' The GDR had more good sides than bad sides. There were some problems, but life was good there,' say 49 percent of those polled. Eight percent of eastern Germans flatly oppose all criticism of their former home and agree with the statement: 'The GDR had, for the most part, good sides. Life there was happier and better than in reunified Germany today."'}}</ref> with 49% of those polled saying that "The GDR had more good sides than bad sides. There were some problems, but life was good there", while 8% opposed all criticism of East Germany and said that "Life there was happier and better than in reunified Germany today".<ref name=":1"/>

As of 2014, the vast majority of residents in the former GDR prefer to live in a unified Germany. However, a feeling of nostalgia persists among some, termed "''[[Ostalgie]]''" (a [[Blend word|blend]] of {{lang|de|Ost}} "east" and {{lang|de|Nostalgie}} "nostalgia"). This was depicted in the [[Wolfgang Becker (director, born 1954)|Wolfgang Becker]] film ''[[Goodbye Lenin!]]''. According to [[Klaus Schroeder]], a historian and political scientist at the [[Free University of Berlin]], some of the original residents of the GDR "still feel they don't belong or that they're strangers in unified Germany" as life in the GDR was "just more manageable". He warns German society should watch out in case ''Ostalgie'' results in a distortion and romanticization of the past.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hou |first=Yushi |date=2 October 2017 |title=Rewriting ideal history: The Ostalgie expression in ''Goodbye, Lenin'' (2003) |url=https://generic.wordpress.soton.ac.uk/cifr/2017/10/02/rewriting-ideal-history-the-ostalgie-expression-in-goodbye-lenin-2003 |access-date=9 July 2020 |institution=[[University of Southampton]] Centre for International Film Research}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=3 October 2013 |title=Ostalgia: Romanticizing the GDR |url=https://www.dw.com/en/ostalgia-romanticizing-the-gdr/a-17959366 |access-date=19 March 2021 |work=[[Deutsche Welle]] |author-last=Dick |author-first=Wolfgang}}</ref>

In 2023, a poll found that among Germans living in the former East Germany, 40% identified as "East Germans" and 52% identified as "Germans".<ref>{{Cite web |title=33 Jahre Wiedervereinigung |url=https://www.infratest-dimap.de/umfragen-analysen/bundesweit/umfragen/aktuell/33-jahre-wiedervereinigung/}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Hoyer |first=Katja |date=7 March 2024 |title=What's 'wrong' with east Germany? Look to its long neglect by the wealthy west |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/07/east-germany-west-far-right-afd-gdr |work=The Guardian}}</ref>