War inside my head

41
Written by Manja Maksimovič

It’s disgusting, that’s what it is. Remove culture and what you’re left with is war. Love each other instead. It’s all we’ve got.

In a way, the internet has made it clear: people are ugly. Better yet: without guidance, culture, restraint, and under a relative shield of anonymity, people turn back into beasts which they were to begin with. One needs to only look at the comment section under any burning issue.

Much more has become clearer than clear: politics does not work. Politicians are puppets. Masses are led. And what we are led into is war.

The way we are being divided, turned against each other, our blood made to boil with counterexamples, enemies pinpointed, the Other embodied. War!

Instead of declaring war on capitalism we buy their concepts. Instead of uniting we further divide.

Slovenia and Italy are in a diplomatic conundrum. I don’t follow it closely because it makes me sick. It’s got to do with what the Partisans did to Fascists (and not only them?) after the war was won.

Even if you win a war, it will haunt you. Wars have no winners.

The victory is when there is no war.

Much luck with that. We are going to need it.

In the photo part, images from two family trips to the areas next to the Italian-Slovenian border which was hard won and is sometimes loose, sometimes random and sometimes unfair, and of various war memorials in the region. If anything they teach us what happens when you stop getting along.

(I had a look what the matter was: European Parliament President Antonio Tajani ended his speech at the ceremony commemorating Italian victims in Bazovica near the Slovenian border by saying: “Long live Italian Istria, long live Italian Dalmatia.” Not only Slovenians, Croatians will kick his ass too.)

  • Doberdob in Italy. The memorial to the victims of Fascism and Nazism.
  • Redipuglia War Memorial in Sredipolje, the largest WWI memorial in Italy.
  • The Walk of Peace from the Alps to the Adriatic crosses the Sabotin hill above Nova Gorica.
  • Here is Peace Park, the open-air museum of the Isonzo Front.
  • The view from Sabotin towards Goriška Brda, called “Slovenian Tuscany”. Not so peaceful. The mountain in the header photo is Kanin.
  • The picturesque Šmartno village in Goriška Brda with a familiar face in the window.
  • The church in Lokev. On the right Slovenian people, on the left foreign occupiers.
  • They are all offering something. The one lowest to the ground is supposed to be Mussolini. The one on the left is holding a tank.
  • The Bazovica “foibe” where Tajani spoke. We found the Italian monument first.
  • But we were searching for this one remembering the anti-Fascist victims. They are close together. Let’s stay this way.

41 Comments

  3. I am afraid you are right, Manja. We are horrible – humans are. When I was a child I wanted us to be wiped out of the surface of Earth and only animals and plants would reign the world. (In fact I still think everything would be better if we did not exist) Since many years back we no longer buy or read evening papers – too much negativities in them about war, murder, famine and extinction of animals and plants. I know it so well, but don’t want to be fed with it every day. It makes me sick
    ” Love each other instead. It’s all we’ve got.”

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    1. Ohh, Leya, this is such a tender thought you had as a child. Tender but also radical. 🙂 It’s all about moderation, something we are incapable of as a species, it seems. It is sick what they are doing to us all. Thank you. ❤

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    2. The problem is that there are those who maintain power by creating instability. it also creates revenue. Human beings are capable of such beauty, yet such horror as well. The negativity we see on the internet is largely, I believe just people strugglinh tpo deal with society and the way it is set up. Negative ideas are thrust forward all the time, open to yonger generations who like all are trying to find their way in this world.
      Humanity is a gift, yet like Manja says we are constantly manipulated. We work so much to provide for our families that people do not have the energy to fight back. That falls on a small idiolistic crowd who are portrayed in the media as trouble makers and extremists.
      There is growing awareness, and through that I believe there is hope, but man tends to respond only when it all goes to shit!

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  6. We are mostly just fine. It’s just that now we have amplifiers like the internet, and the internet rewards reactions, good or bad. Who gets the most reactions? Assholes. Yes, wars are terrible, but they are not the sum of us. Yes, politicians lie, but we seem to muddle through all the same. Yes, we are, at times, despicable, but at other times, radiant.

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  7. The human race has made incredible progress in science and technology, but deep inside we are all a bunch of brutes, straight out of caves. Some worse than others, of course… When I see what’s happening in the world, the kind of leaders people are electing, the increasing amount of hatred and intolerance being displayed everywhere, I feel sad and hopeless… 😦

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  9. War memorials like this always seem to trigger such deep emotion – from sadness to fear to anger and the full gauntlet in-between. As Europeans, you live it more intimately as a part of your daily reality.
    How depressing that often it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.

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    1. Very true, Joanne. It’s the same as it ever was. It’s just getting more and more transparent. As a European I’m wondering whether this bloody continent has learned nothing from the two wars. The Balkans might be the chillest area right now. They had the most recent massacre and they know.

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      1. Personally, I don’t think we’ve learned anything. The powers-that-be just put a new face on the ‘enemy’ and then convince the population that this is the reason for all their problems. Someone coined the expression ‘sheeples’ and that really describes it well for me.

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  10. The victory is definitely when there is no war. I’ve been thinking a lot on this topic lately and my current mantra is ‘Love Starts At Home’. I find I am all about ‘world peace’ but seem to be arguing a bit more than I would like aboard the good ship Amandla these days. If I can create more love at home, perhaps I can change the world :-). And speaking of love, I adore your picture of Tuscany framed in barbed wire! Well done!

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    1. Hey, Lisa, good to have you here. Love definitely starts where we are, and we can change our worlds which make up the big world. As for arguing, for Italians it’s a way of life, I see. 😉 At least my Italian often draws me into some bickering that I don’t even see coming. And after that he is happier. 😀 Oh, that landscape in barbed wire is not real Tuscany but the part of Slovenia called “Slovenian Tuscany” because it’s a bit similar and also gives great wine. Thank you for reading, always.

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      1. Yes – sometimes we just have to go through the pain. I saw a card in the store a while ago and it said “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” The worst would be to get stuck in this current state!

        Liked by 1 person

  13. Well Manja, you certainly opened a can of worms with this one. And rightly so. I fear for the future generations who are being sucked in even tighter by the corporate money making machine.
    But that is away from you point which is the futility of war. I think we are past real wars now. All we see are power struggles over resources nowadays. And your politican soundiing off is just trying to gain favour to further his political aims. The more people talk about it, the less people like that will have sway.

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    1. Thanks, Gavin, for all of your thoughts. I hope as you say that we are past real wars now.

      I wouldn’t be too sure of that though. Imagine: you live smugly in Europe all your life, learning of WW2 as the last armed conflict in these parts – and then you get a 10-day war on your doorstep at age 21 as Slovenia wanted to get independent. They – meaning Yugoslav National Army with Serbian leadership – let us go lightly, but not Croatia. Dubrovnik was under siege. And what happened to Sarajevo, and so many other places in the Balkans? Do you understand?

      War is never as far away as anybody might think. Especially with dipwits in charge. (BTW, this was an Italian politician who said it, not mine in any way, hehe.)

      I’m glad for all the comments this post has gathered. Rightly so, as you say.

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      1. I do see your point. I was in Macedonia nd Kosova after the conflict. I saw the effect on ordinary peoples lives. What worries me most is when you have idiots like Trump and Putin with egos and testosterine controlling huge piles of nuclear weapons. I may go quiet for a few days. I have a story i have been trying to write that is along these lines.

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