Last week, I wrote a brief essay over the swimming pool policy of Bornheim (an hour's drive north of Wiesbaden)....closed to refugees because of some complaints about bad behavior at the pool. At the time, I forecasted that after the weekend....they'd come to cancel their no refugees policy. Well.....as of this morning, the management folks met, and agreed.....the no-refugees policy is to end on Wednesday morning.
All of this took place based on German swimmers (mostly women apparently).....who commented about verbal situations from young male immigrants and suggestive body language.
My guess is that political folks from the state level and lawyers got into the whole discussion....noting that you can't define such a policy.
What happens now?
I would take a guess that some portion of the regular customer base....maybe ten-percent....maybe five-percent....will say that they refuse to use the pool because they are scared bad behavior possibly occurring.
At some point, a week or a month down the line....some young punk is going to be stupid and make a verbal comment or do some inappropriate body language deal.....getting some German gal all disturbed, or getting some husband/boy-friend/lesbian wife angry, and then the cops get called. They will come out with two guys....try to stabilize the situation with the German and find some pro-kid crowd around the accused kid. The two cops will get nervous.....call for back-up....then twelve cops will be standing at the pool for some incident that involved the kid noting that the German lady had a shapely body, and Germans all furious about the suggestive situation.
At that point, the local news media will try to convey a minor problem.....but this will end up scaring off another ten-percent of the normal crowd at the pool
No matter what Germans say....pool operations are tied to some business plan and expected profits. They may say it's a city-operated deal or absolutely non-profit....but they have no idea of how the local pool is dependent upon X number of people coming weekly and they can't afford to lose customers.
So, you will eventually reach a point where some security guy....not a life-guard or cop.....is standing around this stupid pool....trying to prevent young guys from saying stupid things or conveying inappropriate body language.
A pool bouncer? Yeah. It's the perfect job for a guy like me....I can be that intimidating.....but I have to admit up front.....I can't swim. Knowing how stupid Germans are about job details....the pool bouncer will probably have to be certified as a swimmer. Well....it would have been the perfect job for a retired guy like me....just to goof off....look serious....enforce good behavior and appropriate hand signs....wear Bermuda-shorts to work....amaze people with my limited tanlines, and threaten people with a stern look.
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