{"id":6729,"date":"2005-09-17T10:47:53","date_gmt":"2005-09-17T08:47:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.nenasilje.net\/?p=6729"},"modified":"2019-12-06T13:42:02","modified_gmt":"2019-12-06T12:42:02","slug":"shamelessnes-of-denial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/shamelessnes-of-denial\/","title":{"rendered":"Shamelessnes of denial"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article was published in Pravda u tranziciji, No. 1, October 2005.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We would be deprived if the goal of war-crime trials were merely to carry out punishment for perpetrators and orderers,
\nwithout our reaching the realisation about coresponsibility we all have to a greater or smaller
\nextent.
\nEven though humanitarian law defines what a crime is in a war, it fails to recognise war itself as
\na crime. Still, all around us, even ten years later, there are many traces of the war, starting with
\nhatred, to the exiled, families of missing persons, destroyed lives of people deprived of
\ntheir rights, having suffered injustice that no court could set straight. War is a crime in itself,
\neven when it is \u2018only\u2019 soldiers killing each other.
\nIn spite of that, or for that very reason, all of us, even those who have come out of the war fairly
\nunharmed, have a duty of recognising our own responsibility, both for what we have done and
\nsupported and for what we haven\u2019t done and could have.
\nEven today, it is with incredible energy and hatred that many publicly storm at citizens\u2019
\nassociations that struggle for human rights or contribute to shedding light on crimes, and
\nmany ordinary people view them as traitors. They are being accused of being mercenary or
\nprofiteer.\u00a0 And in turn, these same people recognise the ones who, during the bombing of
\nSerbia, got apartments as a reward for their political merits as protectors, their hopes for
\nthe future are inspired by the ones who shamelessly enriched themselves during the
\ngreatest poverty and robbery organised and sponsored by the state.\u00a0 There is no hatred
\nagainst such, and in fact there shouldn\u2019t be any, for hatred is an illness a person carries, genuine
\ncontempt for such individuals would be much more appropriate.
\nAn average person living in Serbia today, in the year 2005, on the tenth anniversary of cessation
\nof military actions in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, will tell you they condemn all
\ncrimes and that the ones responsible should be punished, at the same time opposing extradition
\nof \u2018our guys\u2019 to some foreign court, and that the traitors are the ones from our side who expose
\nevidence of crimes committed on their behalf. The crime on our behalf is confessed and
\ncondemned with abhorrence providing there is footage of the killing, and the fact that, say, the
\nremains of hundreds and thousands of executed civilians lie in a warehouse near\u00a0 Tuzla hasn\u2019t
\nbeen enough for the realisation of the committed crime to be accepted. It is no better
\nin the case of our neighbours we have lead the war against, but this average citizen is prepared
\nto compete in shamelessness of denying with the neighbours instead of taking a painful step of
\nfacing and confessing, a step that is painful because it entails starting from one\u2019s own self.
\nWhere have I been, what have I been doing, whom was I supporting, whom was I admiring,
\ntrusting, cheering to? The whole life bursting like a soap bubble.
\nAnd then, what follows is a tainted myth of innocence and righteousness of one\u2019s own
\npeople, the myth that should be got rid of and the fact accepted that people cannot be viewed
\nin terms of honest-dishonest, good-bad. Not much remains for this average person to hold on
\nto, and that\u2019s why it is hard, because, on the bases of black and white categories, they cannot
\nplace themselves where they would like to. And it is not that hard, because a person is what a
\nperson does, and their actions can be altered in accordance with their sense and sense of
\njustice.<\/p>\n

Condemnation and sentence
\nThe realisation that not all are the same seems like a good start. There are many Serbs, Croats,
\nBosniaks ,\u00a0\u00a0 Albanians\u00a0 who don\u2019 t\u00a0\u00a0 ident i f y themselves with crimes committed on behalf of
\ntheir people, but instead condemn these publicly, and, let\u2019s call things their proper
\nnames, they are not traitors, but conscience of their own people.
\nThe first prerequisite for reconciliation and building mutual trust between people who were
\non opposing sides during the war is not to sanction war crimes, but for them to be
\ncondemned by the ones on behalf of whom they had been committed. Sanctioning is a logical
\nstep that follows, not for the sake of revenge or setting straight the injustice that cannot be set
\nstraight, but as an act of a responsible society that removes the blur of collective guilt and
\nreduces it to what it is, individual guilt. The punishment for a crime is not satisfaction to the
\nfamilies of the victims, but an acknowledgement of their suffering, injustice
\ndone to them, establishing the truth about the fate of the victims is what brings certainty and
\nends a longtime process of struggle for truth and justice. This act merely opens the possibility of
\nthe wounds people carry for years healing. Things would be easier and more simple if the
\nsame criteria would be applied to \u2018ours\u2019 and \u2018others\u2019, then we would only measure with our
\nown sense of justice and basic humanity, with no interference of the national as an element
\ninfluencing the value system, transforming the suffering of our compatriots into something
\nlarger and more important than that of the other side.
\nResponsibility is linked with the power we haveto influence things, us, citizens of Serbia, carry
\nthis responsibility in this country of ours first of all, that\u2019s where we can influence and
\ncontribute to building a more just and more humane society, in favor of the huge majority,
\nincluding these maddened, confused and scared ordinary citizens of ours. We also carry the
\nresponsibility for allowing the opportunity to change, to not label people and allow them to
\nabandon the bonds of stances they had been slaves to ten years ago. If we succumb to the
\nattraction of superior entrenchment and moralising, from the position of those whose
\n\u2018hands are clean\u2019, as opposed to people with \u2018dirty hands\u2019, we will do injustice to the tricked
\nones, the ones who haven\u2019t known, haven\u2019t been able to, have been afraid, have lied to
\nthemselves, and even to the ones who have repented. The road of reconciliation also starts
\nwith ourselves, in relation to and against society that supports change instead of cementing the
\ncurrent condition and expanding the trenches between \u2018us, the good\u2019 and \u2018them, the evil\u2019.<\/p>\n

Former warriors for peace<\/p>\n

The one time warriors and peace activists are two seemingly irreconcilable categories of
\npeople. Some would call them patriots and traitors respectively. It has been four years now
\nsince former warriors from Serbia and M ntenegro, \u00a0Croatia and Bosnia and
\nHerzegovina have worked together at what they have recognised as a shared value,
\npeacebuilding in the region. It had been hard to initiate such a thing, but much easier than would
\nhave been expected. Contrary to the prevailing opinion about irreconcilable opposition, a great
\nnumber of people from all the one time warring sides, perceive the senselessness of violence
\nthey have taken part in and feel the need and responsibility to, learning from their gruesome
\nexperience, become engaged in building peace and cooperation between people, to advocate
\nthe rights of all, and particularly the ones they used to experience as enemies.
\nIt is not just the superficial and fake story of \u2018whoever lead us to fight each other\u2019, it is not
\neven the one of \u2018the politicians are to blame, if it had been up to people the war would never
\nhave taken place\u2019.\u00a0 Things are more profound than that. The people had indeed been asked,
\nand when\u00a0 they had been asked, believing they\u2019d win, the majority had been in favor of the
\nwar, which should also be faced. Expectations had not been met, and their hearts filled with
\nsorrow, rage, hatred and fear.
\nOne should oppose \u2018one\u2019s own\u2019, the ones in their own environments who keep spreading
\nhatred, who keep the hopes of revenge warm, who allow themselves to speak on our behalf,
\nwho flaunt the numbers of the masses behind them as they speak and deny the ones who think
\ndifferently the right to say or do anything. The choice is before the people yet again, the choice
\nbetween fake security of misconception trying to justify injustice done to others, and honesty
\nin relation to \u2018their own\u2019 and \u2018others\u2019. I know dozens of warriors from all three one time
\nwarring sides who now have the courage to fight for peace and justice, for a fair society they live
\nin, and many of them say it was easier to carry a gun than fight myths of immaculacy of their own
\npeople. I have also seen thousands of people who have visited panel discussions where the
\nformer warriors from all three sides spoke and who generally saluted these brave people. And
\nthe greatest number of visitors were former warriors and refugees, the ones that were
\nseverely affected by the war. Such voices are not rare, but are rarely heard from all the noise
\nmakers and bullies from all three sides, that\u2019s why it is important to react, that\u2019s why it is
\nimportant to voice it, to make it clear that it is not on our behalf.
\nIf we lived in a country in which all structures of state and society had a consensus about this
\nhonest attitude, that every person must have their own right, regardless of their name, there
\nwould be less need for citizens to come together to protect themselves or to express their
\nsolidarity in protecting others. Unfortunately, more often than not people realize this only
\nwhen they feel injustice on their own skin and see that the others don\u2019t care because they fear
\nfor themselves, and in fact merely hope they are not the next in line.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If we lived in a country in which all structures of state and society had a consensus about this
\nhonest attitude, that every person must have their own right, regardless of their name, there
\nwould be less need for citizens to come together to protect themselves or to express their
\nsolidarity in protecting others. Unfortunately, more often than not people realize this only
\nwhen they feel injustice on their own skin and see that the others don\u2019t care because they fear
\nfor themselves, and in fact merely hope they are not the next in line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":215744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[79],"tags":[285,1860,2122],"class_list":["post-6729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-en","tag-bosnia-and-herzegovina","tag-peace-activists-en","tag-trust-building-en"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6729"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":226976,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6729\/revisions\/226976"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nenasilje.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}