As dead tuna fish keep washing up on our shores and half the land keeps being thrown into darkness, it’s hard not to get serious Biblical plague vibes from this country.
Keeping that in mind, I suppose the imagery can even be extended to arrogant kings and their decadent people. It’s funny how history, or, in this case, stories, repeat themselves. It’s less funny that the rest of us that didn’t ask for any of this and have been ringing alarm bells for years over the state of the country have to deal with the disastrous state it’s in.
With each passing day, I empathise more and more with those people that upped sticks and left a decade ago; they may refresh their newsfeed every few hours to see what’s happening at home but, at least, they have the electrical power to do so in the first place.
I mean, not that there’s much to see online to begin with. As usual, our issues have become a political football match, with one faction of the population complaining that the country has gone to hell in a handbag and another flooding Facebook groups with cryptic posts about the European Union, overpopulation, electricity cables that have given way because the Nationalists installed them decades ago and how rich the country has become.
In situations like this, I can’t help but think of the myth of Stalin and the bloodied chicken. Of how Stalin ripped feathers out of a live chicken in front of an audience, put the suffering chicken on the floor a little distance from him and threw wheat towards it. According to legend, when the chicken began to follow him around, he told the crowd around him: “This is how easy it is to govern stupid people: they will follow you no matter how much pain you cause them, as long as you throw them a little worthless treat once in a while.”
How can you say you love your country when you allow it to be raped and pillaged?- Anna Marie Galea
It’s impossible not to read that story (thank you Julia Farrugia Portelli for reminding me to always put my literature first) and draw a parallel with the funds we have gotten once every few months from our own taxes.
Sitting among all the ruined food that no cheque I’ve received would even leave a dent in, given how much food prices have risen, I was immensely disheartened by many of the comments people were making. I don’t know if it’s the heat but I have literally read posts stating that it doesn’t matter what their political party does, they, the faithful, will still vote for them. It’s so incredible to me that anyone would give someone else that kind of power over them freely. What would motivate you to do that?
Governments are there to serve the country’s interests and when those interests aren’t being met, when your country is on the brink of catastrophe, you look for an alternative or create one. How can you say you love your country when you allow it to be raped and pillaged? What kind of love is this that allows us to ignore our choked air and our clogged seas in favour of hollow gods that throw us wheat while they feast in palaces?
May we eventually find light in the darkness.