An all-male club in the northern city-state of Bremen caused a stir over the weekend when it left a major name off its invite list for a charity event — because she was a woman.
Karoline Linnert, who is the finance senator and one of the city’s mayors, was not invited to take part in Bremen’s annual “Eiswette” (“ice bet”) even though she is the designated representative for Bremen’s primary mayor, Senate President Carsten Sieling.
Sieling couldn’t attend the event on Saturday because he was in Poland attending the funeral of Pawel Adamowicz, the recently murdered mayor of Gdansk.
“The gentlemen of the Eiswette place great emphasis on etiquette. But protocol suddenly doesn’t play a role any more when — horror of horrors — the official substitute for the [male] mayor of Bremen is actually the [female] mayor of Bremen,” Linnert wrote on Facebook on Friday.
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Karoline Linnert criticized the club for discriminating against women “under the guise of tradition”
Since 1829, the men’s club in charge of the Eiswette takes bets in January on whether or not the local Weser River has frozen or not.
The event culminates in a charity dinner which collects money to donate to the German Maritime Search and Rescue Association (DGzRS).
All-men club dismisses ‘gender-gaga’
Federal ministers and diplomats are among the hundreds of attendees at the dinner, who are required to be dressed in smoking jackets.
“We’re celebrating 100 years of women’s suffrage in Germany — and the Eiswette still believes it is right to exclude women under the guise of tradition,” Linnert wrote.
Bremen’s interior senator, Ulrich Mäurer, declined to attend the event in solidarity with Linnert.
Prior to Saturday’s charity event, the president of the club dismissed criticism over the decision.
“We are a gentlemen’s club and don’t participate in this gender-gaga,” club head Patrick Wendisch told the German daily Bild.
“Even the pope wouldn’t have been invited if he were a woman,” he added.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
A stroke of luck
“The Town Musicians of Bremen,” based on a folktale recorded by the Brothers Grimm, made the Hanseatic city famous. The story features four unloved animals leaving their homes to seek fortune in Bremen. Local legend says touching the front legs of the donkey on the statue brings good fortune. The 1953 bronze statue on the market square depicts story’s characters: a donkey, dog, cat and rooster.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
The city’s guardian
The statue of Roland has stood on the market square in Bremen since 1404. It depicts a real knight who was a paladin of the Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne. According to legend, Bremen will remain free and independent as long as Roland stands watch over the city. Along with the historic town hall, the Roland statue is a listed UNESCO World Heritage Site.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
The winning formula
The former Schütting guild house on the market square has served Bremen’s merchants and traders for nearly 600 years. In 1899, the Low German inscription “buten un binnen wagen un winnen” – or “outside and in, risk it and win” – was added as a motto to the building’s portal, meaning that merchants from Bremen are called upon to risk their assets at home and abroad in order to gain fortune.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
Under full sails
The Weser River is Bremen’s connection to the sea. It leads to Bremerhaven some 60 kilometers down river. Onboard their Hanseatic cog, square rig sailing boats, traders brought in raw materials from northern Europe and also sold fabrics and ironware. In the Middle Ages, 70 large cities, including Bremen, and more than 100 smaller towns formed the Hanseatic League.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
A key factor
Architectural artists in the 17th century created countless figures and reliefs in sandstone to decorate the Weser Renaissance-style city hall’s facade. It’s here that you find the Bremen Key, which was added as symbol to the city’s coat of arms. When neighboring Hamburg claimed to be the gate to the world, the people of Bremen tend to reply: that may be, but we still hold the key to it.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
Women finally at the table
Every year 100 ships’ captains, 100 merchants and 100 guests gather at Bremen Town Hall for the traditional “Schaffermahlzeit” banquet. It was introduced in 1545 as a fraternity dinner to bring together the city’s captains, ship owners and merchants. On February 13, 2015, for the first time ever, women were invited as equals to the table, thereby ending Germany’s oldest male domain.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
All safe at sea
Some 150 years ago, a shipwreck moved a teacher from Bremen so much that he founded the German Maritime Search and Rescue Service DGzRS. Thanks to generous donations, the life savers are on call 24-hours a day and can launch a rapid deployment in any weather with their 60 lifeboats in the North and Baltic seas.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
Anchors aweigh!
Bremerhaven’s commercial seaport at the mouth of the Weser River on the North Sea is one of the largest container ports in Europe. It annually handles some 50 million tons of cargo. Continuing its tradition as a port for passenger ships, Bremerhaven has recently created the Columbus Cruise Center. This is also home to the “Atlantic Hotel Sail City,” which resembles a giant sail in the skyline.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
Off to new shores
The German Emigration Center in Bremerhaven breathes tales of farewell and departure. This is where more than 7 million people boarded ships bound for the new world in the 19th and 20th centuries. Comprehensive data banks help North and South Americans in particular trace their ancestors’ histories.
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10 reasons to love Bremen
Climate adventure
Bremerhaven’s harbor district has a glittery highlight: The Klimahaus. The building in the form of a stylized ship is encased by more than 4,000 panes of glass. Visitors go on a trip around the world following the 8th degree of longitude, past glaciers, through desert sands and tropical rainforests to the Antarctic. The implications climate change has for nature and mankind are evident.
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Article source: https://www.dw.com/en/german-mayor-slams-all-male-charity-event-for-refusing-to-invite-her/a-47160580