ENGLISH

We ask Róbert Alföldi’s pardon

Written by Andrea H., 28-09-2016

Translated by SEA

In contrast with the drift of the editorial staff I begin my day studying brown nosed, loyalist propaganda sites on rare occasions. Shall we say instead of coffee. This time I made an exception. It happened to me a way back that a writing would upset me in such a manner, as in the Magyar Idők[1] recently published sly filth integrated quite deeply to the rhetoric of exaggerated, hating tension before the quote referendum.

The apropos of vileness (I could not call it an article, not even with goodwill) is that some civil organisations (Hungarian Helsinki Committee, TASZ[2], Artemisszió[3], EKINT[4], Krétakör[5] and MigSzol[6]) announced a demonstration on Kossuth Square[7] for Friday called Notice the human being, aiming to support peace, human rights, freedom and solidarity. Along with others Róbert Alföldi is an initiator of the demonstration. At the press conference last week heralding the event Alföldi said:

I love my country very much. And I think that my homeland is a place which does not kick people asking for help. My homeland is such a place where people notice people in trouble. (…) It’s not migrants, not horde, not terrorists, not rapists, but human beings.

Well, the fact that the demonstration is organised by more people along with Alföldi, is overlooked wondrously by the Magyar Idők’s historian author as he decided to chivvy the gay stage-director, thinking that the hidden, sly name-calling can serve the campaign for quota referendum. Because there was nothing like this yet. So the newbie historian author of the writing titled Mr Alföldi, Vote No, using and abusing the above sentences of Róbert Alföldi jotted down the following (it is worth to suffer it advertent):

• (…) same is said by Viktor Orbán and his government (i. e. what Alföldi says – ed.), and the majority of people and its supporters along with them. We like open, normal, helpful and feeling people as well.
• Mr Alföldi forgets one thing: the Islamic culture does not like open, feeling people of our own sort. Especially if people are gay in some cases. The European Muslim immigration changed the image of our continent for a lifetime: Europe where nobody tells you who you should sleep with or which god you should worship since Rome, lives in a grave threat. A non-tolerant culture infiltrated our ranks, they would toss gay people from rooftops, therefore Róbert Alföldi as well.
• (…) 100 percent of British Muslims disapprove of Róbert Alföldi.
• Mr Alföldi should understand that gay people are not so lucky like himself on different places of the world. There are countries not as tolerant as Hungary where Róbert Alföldi can be a renowned artist and stage-director.
• Róbert Alföldi can retire to bed at ease, counting himself a lucky man. He lives in one of the last Christian countries of Europe, where differences are not threatened by machine guns, where people can look each other in the eye and where nobody kicks gay people.
• Hungary is still a tolerant place, so it defends minorities abandoned by Western – and sad to say the domestic – left wing. Same „different people” represented by the left wing before, are defended by the right wing by now. While Viktor Szigetvári[8] gives the finger, in the meantime Viktor Orbán has clarified „No homophobia will happen here”, and no mass killings.

So, stating the above the author advises Róbert Alföldi – as per the title of the article –, to vote with no on 2nd October, as the Hungarian government and the mob too supporting the Hungarian government think the same about tolerance as Róbert Alföldi.

Damned if it ever in my fuckin’ life entered my mind that in this sly, lying campaign (its costs reach 15 billion HUF [ca. 53 million USD] today) supported at full steam by mouth-pieces paid by state-party Fidesz, in which every conceivable and inconceivable card was played, the homosexuality of Róbert Alföldi (or anyone at all) can appear as argument/counterargument. An abusingly insidious idea like this has not been born on the national right-wing (and I’m not counting but not forgetting the factual lies), and the competition of such ideas becomes stronger every day.

Even if we (and the not recognized historian author) did not know how the name of Róbert Alföldi, praised, acknowledged and successful stage-director of National Theatre in Budapest was dragged through the mire before his chair was given to the terribly national Attila Vidnyánszky[9], we could be flushed red in the face reading these lines. And it is not us who should be embarrassed, of course.

The train of thought starting from an untrue premise is inevitably false, but the most terrible thing is that the author of the article thinks, believes and profess that our country is an open and normal one. On the contrary. While most Western politicians side with the rights of sexual and other minority groups, some individuals of the national right-wing (yes, the Fidesz) openly malign gay people without batting an eyelid, while others hide it in a joke and again other people have voiced their hopes that homosexuality can be cured. When Imre Kerényi[10] maligned Alföldi at full stretch and Vidnyánszky did it at half stretch (they could not get a grip on his substantial work), Viktor Orbán remained silent though he was asked in an open letter to make a resolution by János Kulka, openly declared gay actor. Orbán remained silent and after one year answering a casual question of a journalist revealed a rude judgement about the Hungarian sexual minorities: in other counties faggots seethe, but they do not seethe here because we are tolerant.

When politicians from Lajos Kósa[11] to István Tarlós[12], from Máté Kocsis[13] to L. Simon[14] ridicule this question and are not able to deal with it normally, when the entire KDNP[15] and Jobbik[16] scream and rattle about the Pride Parade which is natural part of the everyday life – in the more civilized half of Europe, then the historian taken up with the regime lies that Hungary is a tolerant place, its tolerant kind-hearted government protects Róbert Alföldi from Muslim hordes, since the left-wing is not able to do so. Alföldi ought to be grateful that he has not been attacked with machine-guns and has not been tossed from rooftops.

While xenophobia has broken all the records this year in Hungary, the historian-author is – openly lying for his pay and crookedly neglecting data – officially using homosexuality of Róbert Alföldi as an argument for confirming government propaganda with a calculated malice. While hate campaign building on people’s fears and lowest instincts is driving on full throttle, which campaign has neglected rationality and level-headed arguments and clearly works toward intolerance (this is proved by various surveys), then Magyar Idők reaches the rock-bottom by using homosexuality of Róbert Alföldi for the sake of instigation of the mob.

And it does not use open and rough-spoken obscenity typical of Zsolt Bayer, it wraps it in insidious generality (all Muslims toss gay people from the rooftop). Speaking about gay people becomes stinking provocation as sexual orientation of the renowned intellectual, actor and stage-director has become more important than any part of his art. Any part. You can criticize Alföldi’s message and produce proof to the contrary, you can disapprove of his action and explain why is it nonsense. But his sexuality can never be a point of reference. Just like the instigating campaign of Viktor Orbán has nothing in common with the fact that how many times he washes his arse and who he sleeps with after that.

It is not Róbert Alföldi’s or any other person’s gayness or straightness which makes the person an acknowledged artist and stage-director, and especially not the so called tolerance of the government and the brown-nosed writer of Magyar Idők. No, Róbert Alföldi is the person he is because of his talent. And this fact cannot be changed by the government openly badgering and savaging Alföldi because of his homosexuality and by its grovelling bootlickers .

I understand that everything must be used for the success of the fake referendum, and I understand that now migrants play the part of Jews, Gipsies and gays. But where is the rock-bottom of this simplistic, disgusting and untrue brainwashing contemplated by the Hungarian regime contentedly? Where is it? The biggest pain is not the squandered 15 billion HUF here, but to experience this type of united well-poisoning leaving a festering, stinking, putrid wound in the mind of people which wound maybe never heals.

We would like to apologize Róbert Alföldi for this whole unbelievable thick-headedness.

[1]             Magyar Idők (Hungarian Times) is a propaganda site.

[2]             TASZ (Társaság a Szabadságjogokért): HCLU Hungarian Civil Liberties Union

[3]             Artemisszió Foundation a non-profit organization of public interest. The founders were young anthropologists who wanted to apply their theoretical knowledge and the results of their scientific research to foster social and personal development and open-minded thinking. The Artemisszió Foundation is aiming to achieve its objectives through the research, promotion and use of the theory and practice of intercultural communication.

[4]             EKINT (Eötvös Károly Institute) wishes to contribute to raising professional and general public awareness and to shaping the political agenda in issues with an impact on the quality of relations between citizens and public power.

[5]             Krétakör is a modern theatrical workshop

[6]             MigSzol is perhaps the biggest migrant solidarity group of Hungary.

[7]             Hungarian Parliament is on Kossuth Square

[8]             Viktor Szigetvári political scientist, politician of the party Együtt

[9]             Attila Vidnyánszky is a stage-director, current chief managing director of the National Theater in Budapest.

[10]           Imre Kerényi is a stage-director, politician and lecturer.

[11]           Lajos Kósa is leader of the Parliament’s Fidesz faction.

[12]           István Tarlós is the Mayor of Budapest, independent but declared conservative politician.

[13]           Máté Kocsis is jurist and politician of Fidesz, Mayor of Józsefváros (8th distict of Budapest).

[14]           László L. Simon is a writer, poet and politician, former Secretary of State for Culture of the Ministry of Human Resources.

[15]           KDNP (Kereszténydemokrata Néppárt) Christian Democratic People’s Party of Hungary

[16]           Jobbik (Movement for a Better Hungary) is a radical nationalist political party.

Iratkozz fel most!

Ha tetszett a cikk, de még olvasnál, ha esténként van időd leülni a gép elé, akkor légy az előfizetőnk a Szalonnázón. Naponta 18 órakor élesedő további 3 cikket ajánlunk, jellemzően szintén olyan magyar és nemzetközi közéletet, lényegében az életünket érintő témákról, amelyeket fontosnak tartunk, de nem férnek bele a Szalonna napi kínálatába. Szeretettel várunk!

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