It is possible that you are reading the comment of a journalist who belongs to the "emotional helpers" of V. A, the man who, as far as is known, tried to burn down a tent camp near the Parliament on Wednesday and wounded a supporter of the government with a pistol.
It is possible, moreover, that you are reading this in a medium that "bullies people who have a different view" and inspires "terrorism".
If the judgment of the President of the State, Aleksandar Vučić, is correct, then it is so. After all, the above words in quotation marks are all his. According to Vučić, it was only a matter of days when someone would take the gun because "this has been called for countless times."
Fortunately, Vučić has a simple rule that makes it easier to understand what is said - if he opens his mouth, then he is lying. Or at least spins.
This does not mean that "we" - in principle the critical bazaar, and especially the independent media - described here as "emotional helpers" should not reexamine ourselves. And let's see if we stick to the principles.
Who inspires the madmen?
There is hardly a critic who has not blamed Vučić, his party henchmen and tabloid mobsters for inspiring violence against students and other citizens. Except that they directly organize beatings or "nice guys" who guard the party's premises and break someone's jaw.
There have been examples of people with weak nerves who, for example, ran over female students with their cars after the president made it clear on television that drivers had the right to pass despite the roadblocks.
In March of this year, an unstable woman in Niš attacked the dean Natalija Jovanović with a knife, whom Vučić and the tabloids called a "criminal" for weeks. To avoid hindsight, here's what I wrote here at the time:
"Often no one can be held accountable before the law for the misdeeds of nervously disturbed people, not even themselves. However, this woman did not attack a random passer-by, but targeted a female dean at the place of gathering for the protest. In this case, you don't have to look for long."
So if the tabloid hunts led by Vučić can inspire lunatics to commit crimes, can it then be said that our writing, comments, tweets or views of a couple of free televisions and YouTube channels can inspire similar lunatics with the other side?
It's not out of the question. The words go on the air or are printed, and then the interpretation is taken up by the listener or viewer. Then again, the regime's incitement of people and criticism of the government are not and cannot be the same.
Who is ruining whose life?
First, because telling the truth and lying are not the same. For example, the so-called In the critical media, Ćaciland was called an "illegal camp", a "tent settlement" where people are brought in for a daily wage and where SNS thugs live, and ordinary people are no longer allowed to pass through. It's all true.
Vučić and his tabloids talk about the "colored revolution", about "traitors", "Ustasha" who will destroy Serbia, about "terrorists" and so on. Moreover, the canopy was brought down by diversion. It's all a lie.
Secondly, it's not the same when the president of the country incites and when a newspaper columnist or an interlocutor of critical media falls into the fire at his own expense - and there are some of them, of course. Some would even be best not released to the media.
Even in a normal country, the president's words would have special weight, but in Serbia they are multiplied by a million because those words are broadcast live on command by twenty television stations, and then they are elaborated by the anti-media that the president pays with our money, so the so-called analysts and bots.
Vučić can destroy someone's life with one sentence, and he has already done that. With one sentence, "We" can - and that would be a big deal - maybe make some people think.
There will be more violence.
Third and crucial: Vučić's regime is to blame for this crisis and social psychosis just as much as it illegally seized power for itself - in government from the state level to the local community, in public companies, on tenders, in the media, the police, the judiciary, the underground. And that is very close to one hundred percent.
Only in that state was this kind of social rift possible, including the media one. As if "we" would not like to write about other topics, to criticize someone else, to have a real debate, which was once the standard in the media. But, in a situation where the government is waging a war of extermination, this is almost impossible.
Only in that state, as in the case of toadstool, do the darkest social pathologies become politically relevant. There is also news from the black chronicle in other societies, but here it is politics.
In the end, if the government's fault is close to 100%, then only it can, easily and immediately, resolve all of this by finally allowing the citizens of Serbia to vote freely after thirteen and a half years. By disbanding the Batanica troops, she removed the mockery of Ćaciland, which was never allowed to be there.
But of course that won't happen. That's why we're going to see more violence. And more unstable people will attack other people, the police and progressive thugs will thrash and it will be lucky if no one dies until, once, everything is over.
And "we" will remain on work assignments, to observe, report and criticize. The president called us worse names than "emotional enablers" of violence. And all to his credit.
