The Unidentifiable Sadness of thumbs-up’s

They all thought it was just funny. That sweet old German lady who sold easter eggs on a local market, decorated with swastika’s, the Canadian coffee shop that served their coffee with the same symbol on top of the cream and the shoe company that gave the sole of their boots a graphic profile, so they would leave a despicable trace of swastikas where ever the one wearing them would walk. Just for fun, freedom of expression. Including German license plates with Nazi symbols, all these “artistic” ideas to slowly make these symbols becoming a normal part of society again, were declared illegal by different courts and judges. The thoughts behind it are scary though. Scary in a sense of the normalization of racism and nationalism being excepted by such a large number of people. The progress made in accepting the fact that the world is inhabited by all sorts of people with different beliefs, skin colour, religion, sexual preferences and lifestyles haven’t only come to a stop, but in fact is on a reversed track. Governments are openly discriminating against groups of people, hollowing out human rights and measure almost any decision on an economical scale.

I always looked at those people believing in secret agenda’s and complot theories with a bit of a grin imagined the tin foil hats and barricaded basement hideaways. But in fact the UK government has a secret quota of people they want to drive out of the country, the Dutch government actually takes away minimum wages and pension rights for disabled people and Shell actually has a say in decisions that same government makes. Areas in the US without clean tap water while Nestle is pumping up millions of gallons for almost free, to sell back at a ridiculous price. Politicians obviously are heavily influenced (not to say bribed) by the elite and their mega international companies. The poor are getting poorer, hundreds by the day getting homeless, health insurances become unfordable for more and more people, while politicians claim economic progress.

It’s a clever strategy to push the masses into blaming their neighbour. All decisions leading to the decay of freedom, social security, human rights, workers rights, health-care, housing etc. are made by the politicians (and their puppeteers) the masses voted for. That populist politicians are deliberately putting fuel on the sparks of racism and nationalism can’t be an unknown phenomenon anymore but its time to realize that the “mainstream” politicians have the same goals. What could be a better solution to distract the people from their path back to feudal relationships between the elite and the masses, than letting them believe all misery is provoked by their own neighbours just because they are having a different religion or skin colour. For sure, in countries where the legal authorities are still separated from the political authorities, there are some court cases with convictions on racism, hate speech or antisemitism. But even in the EU more and more legal systems are politicized and stripped of their independence.

Meanwhile, some clever white supremacists and openly racist organizations are trying to indoctrinate the masses with hidden messages of hate and bigotry. No, not open statements, that could lead to convictions (for the time being) but carefully wrapped in all sorts of “creative” expressions. Lot’s of people having a hard time due to the fact that they supposed to belong to a special “group”, which all have one thing in common; they are to blame for all the misery and misfortunes that these poor individual nationalists are facing. Like that English man that still suffers from the scars on his asshole because some priest had the need to fill it, and is feeling humiliated because he has to spread his legs in front of one of the good educated NHS doctors, which happens to be a 5th generation Pakistani immigrant, or that woman living on the Dutch bible belt, who isn’t allowed to work or vote by here extreme “Christian” congregation, refusing to be treated by the dentist because he’s a Moroccan man, and therefore must be a Muslim terrorist, because they all are.

The problem is that these kinds of people are actually convinced of their prejudice, indoctrinated by populist media, or in the case of the bible belt woman, by her reverent (she’s not allowed to watch TV, that’s the devils' equipment). Of course, there are Dutch rapists, but not all men in The Netherlands are and yes, there were (are?) a lot of paedophile Catholic priest, but not all priests are filthy child molesters. Of course the current Israeli prime minister is a war criminal and orders his soldiers to shoot innocent people of which some even seem to find satisfaction by following these orders, but certainly, the big majority of Jews are as disgusted by it as the rest of the world. And yes, there are Muslim terrorists without any human conscience killing innocent people in attacks around the globe, even their own. Therefore all Muslims are terrorists, it makes it so less complicated to be living next door to Ali. He’s a terrorist.

“Living next door to Ali” is a song, yes, a sick parody on “Living next door to Alice”. Viewed over a million times, shared 8500 times on Facebook and reading the comments will turn your stomach around. It doesn’t seem to break the Facebook rules against racism, I guess because it’s such a “funny song”. It seems to have become the national anthem of “British Bite Back”. It’s one of these “creative” expressions of racism that keeps the focus away from the politicians that are responsible for not getting the proper health care, housing or income. There are always going to be people who just won’t be able to learn, work or take care of themselves, for all sorts of reasons, there’s no shame in that, circumstances and physical or mental misfortunes in life should be compensated by a well-functioning society. It’s an easy way of blaming other persons for being so stupid and lazy, for skipping school, refuse to educate yourself and playing the victim. “Living next door to Ali” is followed by “who the fuck is Ali?” Well, he could be the doctor that saves your life at some point, because he did take the effort to get an education, he could be the garbageman that collects your pathetic waste every week, because he isn’t shy of work, he could be the man that wipes your granny’s butt in the elderly home, because he isn’t too proud and has compassion for others, he could be the factory employee that made your television you watch the Cup Final on, he could be your local MP or even Major, because he has ambition, he could be everybody that you failed to become, as an unemployed nationalist.

I’m fully aware that there are people who are easily indoctrinated, who believe everything their told and will never want to see the difference between a Muslim terrorist and their own neighbour, just because it channels their fear and frustration the easy way. I wouldn’t be so upset about it all if the video of this racist moron hadn’t popped up on my timeline, why should it? When it would have been shared with a comment of disbelieving, warning or political view it could be relevant information. Not when it’s shared with a smile and encouragement. Although I have 678 “friends” on Facebook, and I hardly know 10 percent in “real” life, I didn’t expect this to be shared with a saddening thumbs up. 

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