Still smiling in October 1989, only weeks before the end of his regime, Honecker nonetheless looks lonely between Michail and Riesa Gorbachav. The ideological approved form of familial representation in social East Germany precludes the leader from being pictured with his wife. Along with anti-fascism much of GDR legitimacy was built on the ideal of equality between the sexes. Margot Honecker was the head of East German Education.

In the end the dream of an antifascist, socialist Germany fell to pieces. The Wall that had separated East from West and inspired so much heated rhetoric was torn down, as Pink Floyd had sung in 1989, and recycled as souvenirs.