The murder of Charlie Kirk, the case of Deborah from Stara Zagora, the war in Ukraine: many people today are completely incapable of distinguishing the attacked from the attacker, let alone understanding why violence is never an answer.
Let's imagine for a moment that Saint George had killed the dragon with a drone. From such a story, all elements of heroism, personal feat, valor will disappear in a second. There will be no hint of greatness. Or let's imagine the opposite - the dragon kills the saint with the help of the same technology or some more modern one that promises us tomorrow. Then the cold fact of a murder will remain, but we will not see the beast as a real bloodthirsty beast. Guilt is mistakenly moved away, settled in our perceptions thanks to technical progress. The distance created by it makes us get used to it.
Let's also imagine the royal daughter, whom St. George the Victorious finds crying on the shore of the lake - only she is not crying, but simply filming with her phone how the battle between good and evil is unfolding. Maybe she is streaming it in real time. What is her attitude towards good and evil in fact, what is her position on violence? It seems that this is the position of a spectator, at best of a reporter. And a reporter, you know, does not take sides.
I am trying to answer honestly the question about the connection between my smartphone and the banality of evil. First of all, we must admit that there is such a connection.
How the world came to resemble Bulgaria
Since clicking and tapping replaced actions, smart phones have made Bulgaria not resemble the world, but the world resemble Bulgaria - that is, to behave as a passive observer of history, instead of as a participant in it.
And the passive observer must give assessments from time to time in order to reinforce the illusion that he is not passive, that he is doing something after all. Hence this obsessive repetition of the phrase "That's how it goes!" in recent years. I don't remember ever hearing it as often as I do now. I don't remember it ever being so strongly emphasized that the victim "that's how it goes". You say it and it acts somehow therapeutically, you find solace in the verdict on the victim. Something like catharsis, but with the opposite sign - you cleanse yourself not through compassion and fear, but through solidarity with the abuser.
This phenomenon does not recognize left and right, Bulgarian and foreign, conservative and liberal. It walks on people.
Sometimes it degenerates into laughter. Always a sly, but healing laughter - that's why there are such yellow swarms of laughing little men under every news about a tragedy on our phones. These little men rarely laugh at the truly funny. For example, when the far-right says nonsense - that Satanists are chipping us and spraying us with chemtrails - the little men don't laugh so much. Or when the far-left says nonsense - that a man can get pregnant and that there are no men and women in general - the little men don't laugh so much either. But as soon as news about violence comes out, no matter whether it's an assassination or a bombing, then real fun begins. If laughter is health, then mocking the victim is downright flourishing.
And yet, those who laugh are nowhere near as dangerous as the "moderate" apologists of violence. They politely and moderately justify it.
Who is the abuser and who is the victim?
They cut an 18-year-old girl with a machetes knife and along with the just protest in her defense, the entire guild scum of the "moderate voices" was unleashed, remember? But what was she like, how much chalga she listened to, how many men she slept with, how she dressed (the eternal "counterargument" when we talk about violence against women - how they were dressed!). Moderate idiots put forward the thesis that Deborah is a "victim of chalga culture". No, come on, people, it's simple - she is a victim of Georgi from Stara Zagora. And there is no "comma but", no compromises. It just can't be done.
Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine three years ago and since then not a half hour has passed without talking about how bad the attacked Ukrainians are and how they deserve it. The irony is that the Ukrainians were of no interest to the Bulgarian media before they were attacked. After that, they had to be accused, that is, when you see someone fall, kick them. And ask how they were dressed to prove that you were looking for them.
Bombs fall on the "brotherly people" - that's what they get for not recognizing that they are brothers, their father will teach them.
Putin killed, expelled or sent to hard labor all his opposition - that's what they get for, traitors. What are they traitors for? It doesn't matter, their fate itself proves that their fate is deserved. By the way, half of Bulgaria still thinks the same about Georgi Markov.
If it happened, it was meant to happen. It is not advisable to think too long about a given topic, the game of chess in life is a blitz game. First you move, then you think.
Fires are burning California - that's how they deserve it, they have too much money, it's their job. Every disaster embodies the righteous wrath of God, which falls on the guilty victims. There are no innocent victims.
How freedom of speech became the enemy
Now in Utah, Charlie Kirk was killed, and many liberals, including my acquaintances (alas), suggested, more openly, more Jesuitically twisted, that he also somehow deserves it because he sowed hatred. Even their condolences contained "comma but"…
When they shot at Trump during the election campaign, it was the same story - people who quite seriously define themselves as liberals and Democrats said that "that's how he deserves it" and regretted that the shooter didn't hit. And what was said was not satire (I would understand it), but cordiality.
Conservatives and liberals alike refuse to understand that it is precisely dialogue between radically disagreeing people that is a condition for the existence of democracy.
Charlie Kirk's killer attacked the most important thing for the success of the American experiment over these two and a half centuries - freedom of speech. And how did the Trump administration respond? Well, it attacked freedom of speech too. It took Jimmy Kimmel off the air, after the same thing happened to Stephen Colbert's. The 47th threatened that the next two would be the "losers" Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers. Such a reckless suspension of fundamental democratic principles is simply stunning to watch. The sheer speed with which it happens makes you unable to take your eyes off it. It's still some kind of late-night show, but the jokes are at the expense of humanity.
Donald J. Trump, whose biography is the exact opposite of the American Dream, has set out to make America great again (appropriating the old Reagan slogan) by targeting… comedians. And because he can't directly violate the First Amendment—this isn't Russia, after all, the Russian soul is straightforward, even when it's disgusting, and that elevates it spiritually—he orchestrates corporate discontent. In other words, there are cowardly bureaucrats—there are some in the private sector, too—and they promptly get shaken up by Jimmy Kimmel's comments. They're told to be shaken up, and they do, and they even believe it. Then, because they're shaken up, they take Jimmy Kimmel off the air. They don't say a word about the fact that even if his jokes are inappropriate, they embody the whole point of the First Amendment - and if you say something inappropriate, the government can't just do anything to you. Private individuals have the right to try and sue you all they want, but the state can't get involved. The government can't decree that "that's how you deserve it" because you said nonsense.
And here, the First Amendment is de facto not violated here, as long as the government "didn't interfere", this is business, suddenly bad ratings statistics helpfully appear and there's simply no way out, the show is taken down. Perfidious censorship. The coiled spring of servility does not even need tyranny to release its energy.
Now, thank God, the decision will be overturned under public pressure, because servile cowards are never afraid of just one thing and one person, be it Donald Trump. Cowards are afraid of many things in many ways - of many people and many things. Of public pressure too.
Violence is not strength. It is the opposite.
But I was scolded, and my point was about "that's how you like it". The corporate axe has been swung, and if tomorrow someone takes out a real axe against humor, will there still be a "comma but"? What will the "moderate voices" say, will they again justify the axe moderately? We are becoming hypersensitive to everything except physical violence - it always has a way of rationalizing it. Everything else is "fascism"... except fascism.
Violence is the most vivid manifestation of cancel culture. What more unequivocal "cancellation", what more literal "denial" could there be than denying your physical safety, encroaching on your very being? Do we have to agree with Charlie Kirk on everything to know that this is not how one treats the "other side"?
Do we have to check what music Deborah listens to and how she dresses to agree that this is not how one treats another human being?
Many confuse power (might, authority) with violence, and there is something touching about this fallacy, insofar as it is very easy to fall into it, and it is actually a grandiose fallacy - it is about diametric opposites, at least if we believe Hannah Arendt - and common sense. In a purely political sense, power must rely on consensus in order to be implemented. Violence could be its tool, but the moment power begins to use it to assert itself, it compromises itself and proves its weakness. Stable power has no reason to resort to violence.
In an individual context, violence is also an obvious sign of weakness. It is a blatant impotence, a demonstrative inability to cope. The play on words "violence-powerlessness" is too obvious, but it tells the truth. The man who hits his wife is too weak to leave the room during a quarrel. He is afraid to leave, and even more afraid of being left. He is powerless.
Violence is a means that the goal cannot justify. That is why it is so tied to the technique, to the available tools of the era. It often needs some kind of extension of the hand to strike with impunity (to deprive the victim of the opportunity to defend himself) and to allow the abuser to distance himself as much as possible from his guilt. This extension of the hand can be a mock knife, a Mauser rifle, or a high-tech weapon. And it can also be a smartphone.
It is precisely as a means, as a tool, that violence always needs justification, some kind of rationalization. How can you justify your weakness? The easiest way is to blame the victim - that's how it is.
There is no such thing as involuntary violence, it is always a matter of choice. Its only form that does not need justification and is implied is violence in self-defense. The right to inevitable defense applies to both individuals and entire societies. And if we cannot at least shake our hands about the fundamental difference between an attacker and the attacked, then that really is how it is for us.
This comment expresses the personal opinion of the author and may not coincide with the positions of the Bulgarian editorial office and the DW as a whole.