Lausitzer Revier: A life between work, earth and pride

I was born in Lusatia, I live here and I will stay here. My family has lived on this earth for generations. Mining was never just a profession, it was a promise. Anyone who got up early, the heat and cold and washed the dust out of their skin had done something they could be proud of. We knew that our work was powering the country. anyLight bulb that burned, carried a little Lusatia inside. But now we want to tell us that our work was wrong – as if it were our fault that somebody in the world decided what was right and what was moral.

From the backbone of the nation to the footnote

Politicians used to come here to celebrate. “Energy future”, “Supply security”, “Location advantage” – these were the words that stood here at the speakers’ stands. Today they don’t come anymore. Today we are talking about us, but not with us. We are extras in a story that others write. The coal phase-out was decided as if it were about a number on onePaper, not about the lives of tens of thousands of people. We should listen, thank and disappear.

The promise of a new beginning

When the first closures came, we were promised structural help, replacement jobs, future sectors. It sounded good, almost too good. Today we know they were words without weight. The number of companies that are closing is growing while the new opportunities are a long time coming. A few projects on paper, a few seminar rooms with big plans – this is not a substitute for real work. oneTalks about transformation, but for us it feels like a farewell.

When progress is at a standstill

Lusatia has learned to change. We have modernized, automated, invested. We have proven that you want to work here instead of philosophizing. But politics treats us as if we were a problem to be solved. We live in a region with mineral resources, with skill, with willingness – but we are being quieted. and while the conveyor belts are resting here,promoted elsewhere. That’s called global responsibility. It’s a mockery for us.

The view outside the box

We see pictures from all over the world: new power plants, shiny harbor facilities, ships full of coal that is unloaded where no one is ashamed to use them. And here, in the land of technology and order, functioning pits are stopped. It’s hard to understand. We know that other nations are securing benefits while we are told that we have to make sacrifices. Only: Who helpsus when the sacrifices are made?

The quiet devaluation of the work

What hurts the most is the tone that is now prevailing. We used to be proud of us. Today it sounds like we did something wrong. Anyone who has raised coal is suddenly considered a backward, as a brakeman, as a symbol of an old time. But this supposedly old days laid the foundation on which the country is now standing. It is easy to preach progress when you look at electricity andwarmth we have delivered for decades.

When words mean nothing

The talk about “future” sounds like empty echoes. If the lights go out in the halls and colleagues give up their work clothes after decades, optimism doesn’t help. The people who have worked for decades are now taught that they have to be “taken with them”. Just where? The new industries remain vague, often just headlines for press conferences. And the longer it takes, theMore people lose faith that someone knows what is actually supposed to happen here.

The fear of being forgotten

Our children leave the region because they see no future here. Whoever stays fights every day with the question of whether he is one of the last to hope. Houses lose value, close shops, clubs fall apart. The cohesion we were so proud of crumbles under the burden of uncertainty. When you hear every day that everything you’ve worked for, awas a mistake, at some point you lose the feeling of being needed.

between anger and dignity

I admit I’m angry. But I’m not blind. Nobody here wants to stand still. None of us want to live in dust forever. We know the world is changing. But we want this change to be fair. We want to be involved, not cut off. We don’t want to constantly hear that everything gets better as our reality gets worse. We’ve got hard enoughworked to at least be heard.

The double morals of world politics

What is celebrated outside as a model step is a cut in the heart here. We are told that it is morally correct to close our power plants while other countries are opening new ones. We should give up while others earn. This is not a future policy, it is self-deception. We know that coal doesn’t last forever – but why should it end here while it is going to beclimb leads? Why is success allowed to apply there and blame here?

When trust is dwindling

People no longer believe the government. Too often they were promised something that never came. It’s not just about money, it’s about respect. You can’t make an entire region the backbone of the energy supply for decades and then drop it like a used battery. We are not a number in the federal budget, we are people with families, with stories, with dignity.

What remains when faith goes

Sometimes I go to the edge of the old pit, look at the area that is being recultivated and greened today, and think: Here was my life. The landscape changes, yes, it gets new form, new hope. But the human being falls by the wayside if you forget it. It is not enough to plant trees if the people who live here have no prospects ofstand

The heart of a region continues

Despite everything, Lusatia does not give up. We have learned to live with contradictions. We see the new ways that are created – but we also see what is lost. Many of us are involved, looking for new ideas, fighting for recognition. But this fight must not be fought alone. Politics has brought us into this state and it is obliged to give us oneto offer a real way out, no symbolic consolation prize.

The longing for justice

We don’t want special treatment, just fairness. We want us to be treated with the same respect we have been demanding from us for years. We have powered this country, with our work, with our pride. Now we demand honesty. No project, no support program can relieve the pain of lost work, but honest recognition would be a start.

Lusatia – between past and future

I don’t know what the future will look like. Maybe one day new industries will emerge here, maybe people will come back here. But when that happens, they should know who they owe it to: the generations that have remained in the heart of Lusatia, even when politics and business had given up, they had long since given up. We are not a relic of the past. We are the memoryThis country – and as long as we live here, we will not be silenced.