I remember the celebrations that took place when we officially became a member state of the European Union in 2004: the fireworks, the joy at being part of something bigger and no longer having to fill those pesky pieces of coloured cardboard whenever we went anywhere else in Europe, the belief that things could finally change for us as a very small nation with limited resources.
Little did I realise at the time how very superficially that change would be able to affect us as a people, and how ingrained the populism, avarice, ignorance, and fear of ‘the other’ was.
I see it clearly now.
A democracy only in name, we will lie, steal and cheat to get our own way. Challenge anyone who is clearly in the wrong and you will be threatened and beaten into submission. It’s almost hysterically ironic to me that for a country so obsessed with bullying we have probably produced some of the biggest bullies in Europe.
A few weeks ago, I watched with tired amusement as a woman I had just met tried to explain her job to me: a job which anyone with two brain cells could tell she was incapable of doing. I wondered aloud at how she had got the post and she helpfully told me that she had connections. There was no shame, no pause, nothing.
I often wonder how these people sleep at night knowing that they can’t remotely manage the duties they’re being paid to fulfil, but I imagine that their fat pay cheques can afford them better beds than most of us. A job you can never be fired from means that even if everyone else knows you’re stupid, it won’t really matter.
There are many things that don’t matter in this country: the environment, for example. In our latest tango with the hunters, a dance that is set to go on throughout the ages, where it literally doesn’t seem to matter how many protected species they kill, the media has uncovered that the government plans to make good on the Miżieb and Aħrax woodland deal that surfaced in April and simply hand over acres of public space to hunters.
A job you can never be fired from means that even if everyone else knows you’re stupid, it won’t really matter- Anna Marie Galea
Like most sordid deals, the signing is to take place in a car park over the weekend and will probably be signed by the time you’re reading this and having your afternoon tea.
A petition is already doing the rounds, but we all know how effective those are in the face of a government that will do exactly what it wants, when it wants and without fear of losing the next two elections. This lot went a step further and didn’t even let the local councils know what was brewing till the last possible minute. That’s how democratic and transparent we are.
Our government’s ego is so fragile that we make secret deals and don’t let the press or anyone who may oppose it know because we can’t take the backlash. They’ll be banning books in the library next, but then again, there’s no point in doing that here: no one reads anyway.
The most revolutionary thing you can do in this country is be fair and decent.
I can’t wait for next week: maybe it will bring me news that they’ve removed English as an official language, banned thinking and made racism legal. Only then will we be the best in Europe.