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Return of the Blown-offs Once the myth becomes dominant, we're in trouble - part 2
Srđan Puhalo is a social psychologist;
I try to be a human being first,
and I declared myself to be a Serb and a Bosnian at the census.
So, err...
That's that.
Are Serbs the Heavenly people?
Serbs are a people just like any other.
They'd probably like to be the Heavenly people, because they'd like
to be thought of as the Heavenly people.
Or perhaps they'd choose to be the Heavenly people,
but I'm afraid that goal is difficult to accomplish
and that's...
It can create more problems for the people than it's worth.
What is the essence of the Heavenly people myth?
I think that it isn't bad in itself,
and that every person should generally have some sort of ideals
that are worth fighting for, that are... even worth dying for.
Or the kind that you must fight for.
But, perhaps in the meantime this myth was
let's say, abused for different goals.
And perhaps we're not interpreting it properly.
How is the myth (mis)used?
Look, if you want to present your people as superior
or worthier than other peoples,
or as a people that chose higher ideals
who are then allowed to do all sorts of things
because of those higher ideals, then that's definitely disastrous.
This is not exclusive to Serbs;
other peoples that have such unrealistic opinions of themselves -
that they're better or superior - or whose leaders claim such things,
have all fallen into that trap.
How is the myth present in the day to day experiences of a Serb?
If you live with a myth like that,
about your grandeur... Or your superiority
compared to other peoples who didn't choose that myth,
you constantly come across obstacles that give you a headache.
What am I trying to say?
If you go to work thinking that you're superior because
someone 500 or 600 years ago chose the Kingdom of Heaven
instead of the one on Earth,
you'll quickly notice that your problems are earthly, banal, simple,
and that you have to resolve them, and that it's worthless...
Everything that you were force fed with is worthless;
instead, you're being asked to show competence in something banal,
to display a very banal skill in order to show that you are
good at something and for someone to respect you.
If you want respect only because you are a Serb,
or because you belong to any other people, I'm afraid that...
That you have a serious psychological issue.
People like that, who believe in this and who base their worth only on this -
but there aren't too many of them, I think, there are only a few, realistically -
simply put, they can't be taken seriously in any environment.
It is a completely acceptable and completely normal thing
to choose an ideal and aspire to it.
I think that we're missing that today.
But, to feel superior because you chose an ideal
that others perhaps didn't, or you don't know that they did,
that's pathological then.
Why are myths so alluring?
Let's put it this way: myths are a part of every nation.
Every people.
Every people has a Golden Age that they think was
a time when they were powerful, strong, reputable, accomplished.
Everyone is trying to get back to... I wouldn't say to return to that time,
but to achieve that same state from that time when their people
were respected, accomplished, well-known, rich, successful, or whatever.
So... What's important there is that behind those myths -
there's a period and there's a geographical point from which
we all came - we all come -
so those myths aren't based on facts, but on certain half-truths,
which are not completely false, but are definitely not true.
That's the cohesive factor that connects a people.
Germans have their myths, Serbs have theirs.
The French have their myths.
That's not the problem. The problem is when the myths become dominant.
Myths become dominant when everyone deals in history, except the historians.
Or to put it differently, myths become dominant when
historians leave the public life, while other interpreters of history
and creators of myths come to the forefront.
In order for them to come to the forefront,
there has to be political will, because someone has to permit them,
allow them to enter the public space.
And that's what I think happened in the 90s.
What was the role of myths in the 90s?
If we examine that period closely, we'll notice that history was
mostly discussed by writers, poets, pseudohistorians,
and then we had a history that was full of myths,
with very few facts, and what's even more important,
with a lot of embellishing.
I believe that, when there's political will,
when someone is in power, he creates everything in one country,
so he creates the public opinion, meaning, he creates the educational program:
he makes the textbooks, says what can or can't be in history textbooks,
and he allows the myths to uncritically surface in the public.
He will tell you that we're better than other peoples,
worthier than other peoples, and that we have certain rights
that other peoples don't.
Now, to put it this way, there's a thin line between
thinking that you're the best, the prettiest, the smartest
and that you have the right to something that others don't,
and those thoughts becoming real.
Unfortunately, we saw how this could happen in the 90s,
when both the Croats and the Serbs
developed their myths and created them according to their politics.
Another very important thing is that whoever creates the present
also creates the past...
in order to justify what is being done in the present.
The problem was that we didn't have a critical mass of people
who would bust those myths.
Who would fight back to a ludicrous ideology.
And who would then simply sober up
those who thought that they were much better than others.
What is the relationship between myths and fear?
I think that fear in BiH is induced, that is,
that it is created and released by politicians first and foremost,
but also all others who don't resist what is being done by the politicians.
Are the Serbs justified in their fear that the Republika Srpska will be abolished?
There are politicians, Croat or Bosniak,
who question the right of the Republika Srpska to exist.
I simply believe that that's counterproductive,
and there's no point in wasting time discussing it,
but this back and forth between politicians
induces fear, and then fear prevents any kind of
rational thought in regular, average people.
We care less about education, healthcare, the economy,
how much money we have...
As long as the Serbs feel that Republika Srpska is in danger.
What's even more important is that they're ready for more cutbacks
only to save the Republika Srpska.
How does one manipulate through fear?
If this fear were to disappear, I'm afraid that your average person
would start thinking about other problems.
Everyday problems.
That's something that today's politicians have no solutions for.
The government.
So politicians would then be in trouble.
So it's a lot easier to create fear and manipulate with it
in order to make everything else seem less important and irrelevant.
They're very talented in doing that, and sometimes I think that
they have... That they are coordinated.
So when someone from the Federation needs something,
a bombastic statement, "that's not a problem, we'll make it,"
when someone from the Republika Srpska needs a statement about
being endangered, "no problem, we'll find someone to say
that the Republika Srpska needs to be abolished."
And that's why we're stuck in the same place for 20 years now.
Because you can't abolish the Republika Srpska -
there's no one to abolish it - and it can't secede from Bosnia and Herzegovina
but simply it seems like we're stuck on treadmill,
meaning that not only are we not moving, but we're also stagnating
because everyone else is moving forward.
Is there hope for this country?
Look, I think that there is hope
for Bosnia and Herzegovina, but only under the condition that
there is a quick change of generations among politicians.
What am I trying to say?
I expect that there will appear - or at least we can hope -
a new type of politician who will manage to define
certain goals that are equally acceptable to the Serbs,
the Croats and the Bosniaks alike.
So that the goals can't be achieved individually,
meaning that they can't be achieved by one ethnic group alone,
but only by everyone working together
and utilizing their strengths in order to reach that goal.
Maybe it's the European Union. Maybe it's EU values.
That's something that can make us begin to see ourselves as one group.
Today we perceive ourselves as at least three separate groups.
But we need to start seeing ourselves as one group
which can only accomplish these goals by working together.
What's common to us all?
This society needs to start respecting the right values,
to have those values unite it:
honesty, hard work, labor, knowledge...
And that these are more important than being Bosnian, Serb, Bosniak or Croat.