On Friday, I read in Trud daily about a Moroccan soccer player currently engaged in one of the leading Bulgarian teams. The report wasn't about his performance on the field but about his driving with 0.12% alcohol in blood, crashing the car into a fence (happily, nobody was injured) and spending several hours in police custody. That wasn't his first offence of this sort. Bulgarians can read about the incident e.g. here.
Upon his release, the player was "greeted" by a pack of reporters, as any celebrity in his situation could expect. Some of their questions to him and his answers (when any) are published here. However, the Trud report listed also another question, which in various forms is repeated by various Web commenters:
"Why do you drink, after your religion bans alcohol?"
Eh well, I also hate drunken driving (though some of my best friends have been punished for it), I particularly dislike sport star drunken drivers after figure skater Maxim Staviski killed a man and left a girl in coma, I don't see any use of professional sport, I am outraged by the giant salaries of sport stars compared to the offendingly low salaries of people like me, and I don't wish in my country any guest workers from North Africa (for my new readers, I am an Islamophobe).
BUT. You may not, you just cannot look a survivor of Islam in the face and tell him that because he has had the poor luck to be born exactly in this religion, he is obliged to live by the rules of Sharia whenever this suits you.
I think this petty xenophobia reveals the spiritual vacuum of today's Europe that may eventually be the true reason for its demise.
Showing posts with label Bulgarian journalism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bulgarian journalism. Show all posts
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Thursday, May 15, 2008
The death of Georgi Stoev
I rarely write about the organized crime in Bulgaria and its powerful grip on our lives and when I do, the posts are of copy-paste type such as the ones dated May 19, 2006 and the May 11, 2007 . Not only have I no expertise in this subject, but reflecting on it for too long fills me with hopelessness and apathy, because I see no sign that rule of law and civil society in Bulgaria will ever prevail over the mafia.
However, when a writer is murdered and there is strong suspicion that this is because of his writings, no other writer (in the broadest meaning of the term) can remain silent.
On Apr. 7, writer Georgi Stoev, 35, died after being shot in the street with three bullets. It is not known (and is unlikely ever to be known) who pulled the trigger, but the victim knew it was going to happen. He left behind a 7-year-old daughter. He had separated himself from her mother, perhaps to spare her and the child the inevitable risk.
In his youth, Stoev was involved in Bulgarian organized crime. He had first-hand experience with its two most important groups, designated with the acronyms VIS and SIC. Later on, he turned his back on mafia and began to write books about it. He was an example of the writer of the future as Varlam Shalamov imagined him - not a person educated in literature with little knowledge of reality, but a person with much real-life experience and expertise, plus innate gift of writing.
I didn't know his works because in recent years financial reasons force me to stay away from the book market. However, after the murder my husband bought one of his books, SIC. It was describing not only the racketeering activities of the mafia thugs but also their ties with high-ranking members of all major political parties. After reading it, I told my husband that I wonder how the author of such things could survive that long. He suggested that it was possible because Bulgarian crime lords and politicians don't read books (though, unlike us, they can afford whatever books they wish).
However, it is not quite clear whether Stoev's murder was really motivated by his books, because there was also another story centered around Mladen Mihalev, nicknamed Madzho (Madjo). Journalists call Madzho "a businessman", which in Bulgaria has become a standard euphemism for any person with a huge income of murky origin. Madzho was portrayed in SIC and other books by Stoev. In fact, SIC was dedicated to "M.M. - M.", a clear reference to Madzho. The 2007 dedication stated, "I am not certain about our present relationships and wouldn't call you a friend now, though I used to. But I am not afraid of you, we'll meet as equals and this time I'll set the rules of the game." This makes me think that Stoev either was too naive or had too little instinct of self-preservation.
I am sorry that this post turns more about Madzho than about Stoev, but this seems inevitable if we want to face the truth about why Stoev died and in what a country we continue to live. I am translating from an unsigned article titled Do you remember who Madzho is from the May 18, 2007 issue of Capital weekly:
"... His name made headlines when the gangster war broke out in 1993... Madzho was the person whose nerves yielded and he fired an entire charger of bullets into the entrance of the Sevastopol casino at Rakovski Street in Sofia. Unfortunately for him, (rival gangster) Karamanski had made an ambush and Mihalev was wounded by a shot from an apartment across the street... His "business career" included supplying oil to Serbia during the embargo and forcible insurance... Mihalev was one of the four founders of SIC in late 1994... In 1995, Mladen Mihalev bought First East International Bank... In 1996, several hotels in (the mountain resort of) Borovets were privatized by Madzho. He later bought and built several more hotels in (the sea resort of) Sunny Beach... Because the (rival gangsters) Margin brothers are threatening his life, Mladen Mihalev is now living abroad, most of the time in Switzerland... Madzho's activities are allegedly directed by the former Interior Minister and Deputy Director of First Administration of (former Communist) State Security service, General Lyuben Gotsev... The general doesn't deny he knows Madzho but denies any influence upon him."
The reason Capital weekly paid attention to Madzho were some events that took place on May 16, 2007. Let me quote Reporters Without Borders:
"18.05 - Bulgaria: Court security officials beat photographer. Emil Ivanov, a photographer for the newspaper Express was beaten up by court security officials in Sofia on 16 May when he tried to take photos of underworld figure, Mladen Mihalev, key witness in a trial for the murder of an associate, Milcho Bonev. Tight security has surrounded the hearings, including systematic searches of journalists. Interior minister, Roumen Petkov, announced the opening of an investigation."
The "key witness" actually appeared in court with a 3-hour delay to give completely useless testimony. However, his appearance made big news because of the way it was handled by police. They took unprecedented security measures, "occupying" the Palace of Justice and its surroundings in the center of Sofia. Eyewitnesses told shameful stories of policemen standing side by side with the thuggish private guards of Madzho and indistinguishable from them, of judges stopped by police and forced in the most disrespectful way to prove their identity in order to be let into their own offices. Nobody was surprised when 55-year-old Emil Ivanov, after photographing these security measures, was brutally beaten by police and forced to erase his photos. (More details here and here, in Bulgarian.) All commentators agreed that there was no real threat to Madzho's life and the entire parade of force aimed to show the public that Bulgarian state supports Madzho. The investigation mentioned by Reporters Without Borders later vindicated the uniformed beaters. One of them even threatened to sue his victim for libel. It is a sad Bulgarian reality that our police and prosecution not only let organized criminals do whatever they want, but help them terrorize the population by beating and prosecuting whoever tries to expose them (another example: our authorities wanted to prosecute BBC journalists for reporting a ring of child traffickers).
Let me return to Georgi Stoev. He claimed that recently Madzho contacted him and ordered him to organize a group to carry out assassinations. Stoev didn't want to do this and passed this information to the prosecution. The result was disastrous: information leaked from the prosecution to Madzho. Stoev wanted to testify against him but only after his arrest. Prosecutors were not going to arrest Madzho and, as they claim, instead offered Stoev the protection our law has for such cases (which is essentially useless). I doubt that they were ready to do even this; it is easy for them to say it now - he is unable to refute it. I cannot figure out how Stoev, knowing our prosecution, could think they would do their duty; and even if they wanted, they had no evidence against Madzho other than Stoev's words. Anyway, they were not interested in charging Madzho, turned Stoev away and after a short time he was dead.
A day before Stoev's murder, "Borislav Georgiev, the executive director of a multimillion-pound energy company in charge of maintaining a controversial nuclear power plant, was shot outside his apartment block" (quote from The Independent). These two contract killings in two days finally led to the resignation of the Interior Minister Rumen Petkov, presumably after pressure from EU. Petkov's reputation was already marred by many previous deeds, notably a meeting with two underworld bosses known as Galev brothers. Nevertheless, Petkov retained a high position in Bulgarian political life and was included in the talkes about the new Cabinet.
So Stoev was silenced, his characters who killed him are untouchable and enjoying their dirty money and high positions. Trying to construct some good end to a story that has none, I think of my husband's reaction. He usually skips voting, but now every time when Stoev's name is mentioned in the news, says, "I will vote next time - and not fot them."
"They" are today's rulers who transfered their power to the underground world.
However, when a writer is murdered and there is strong suspicion that this is because of his writings, no other writer (in the broadest meaning of the term) can remain silent.
On Apr. 7, writer Georgi Stoev, 35, died after being shot in the street with three bullets. It is not known (and is unlikely ever to be known) who pulled the trigger, but the victim knew it was going to happen. He left behind a 7-year-old daughter. He had separated himself from her mother, perhaps to spare her and the child the inevitable risk.
In his youth, Stoev was involved in Bulgarian organized crime. He had first-hand experience with its two most important groups, designated with the acronyms VIS and SIC. Later on, he turned his back on mafia and began to write books about it. He was an example of the writer of the future as Varlam Shalamov imagined him - not a person educated in literature with little knowledge of reality, but a person with much real-life experience and expertise, plus innate gift of writing.
I didn't know his works because in recent years financial reasons force me to stay away from the book market. However, after the murder my husband bought one of his books, SIC. It was describing not only the racketeering activities of the mafia thugs but also their ties with high-ranking members of all major political parties. After reading it, I told my husband that I wonder how the author of such things could survive that long. He suggested that it was possible because Bulgarian crime lords and politicians don't read books (though, unlike us, they can afford whatever books they wish).
However, it is not quite clear whether Stoev's murder was really motivated by his books, because there was also another story centered around Mladen Mihalev, nicknamed Madzho (Madjo). Journalists call Madzho "a businessman", which in Bulgaria has become a standard euphemism for any person with a huge income of murky origin. Madzho was portrayed in SIC and other books by Stoev. In fact, SIC was dedicated to "M.M. - M.", a clear reference to Madzho. The 2007 dedication stated, "I am not certain about our present relationships and wouldn't call you a friend now, though I used to. But I am not afraid of you, we'll meet as equals and this time I'll set the rules of the game." This makes me think that Stoev either was too naive or had too little instinct of self-preservation.
I am sorry that this post turns more about Madzho than about Stoev, but this seems inevitable if we want to face the truth about why Stoev died and in what a country we continue to live. I am translating from an unsigned article titled Do you remember who Madzho is from the May 18, 2007 issue of Capital weekly:
"... His name made headlines when the gangster war broke out in 1993... Madzho was the person whose nerves yielded and he fired an entire charger of bullets into the entrance of the Sevastopol casino at Rakovski Street in Sofia. Unfortunately for him, (rival gangster) Karamanski had made an ambush and Mihalev was wounded by a shot from an apartment across the street... His "business career" included supplying oil to Serbia during the embargo and forcible insurance... Mihalev was one of the four founders of SIC in late 1994... In 1995, Mladen Mihalev bought First East International Bank... In 1996, several hotels in (the mountain resort of) Borovets were privatized by Madzho. He later bought and built several more hotels in (the sea resort of) Sunny Beach... Because the (rival gangsters) Margin brothers are threatening his life, Mladen Mihalev is now living abroad, most of the time in Switzerland... Madzho's activities are allegedly directed by the former Interior Minister and Deputy Director of First Administration of (former Communist) State Security service, General Lyuben Gotsev... The general doesn't deny he knows Madzho but denies any influence upon him."
The reason Capital weekly paid attention to Madzho were some events that took place on May 16, 2007. Let me quote Reporters Without Borders:
"18.05 - Bulgaria: Court security officials beat photographer. Emil Ivanov, a photographer for the newspaper Express was beaten up by court security officials in Sofia on 16 May when he tried to take photos of underworld figure, Mladen Mihalev, key witness in a trial for the murder of an associate, Milcho Bonev. Tight security has surrounded the hearings, including systematic searches of journalists. Interior minister, Roumen Petkov, announced the opening of an investigation."
The "key witness" actually appeared in court with a 3-hour delay to give completely useless testimony. However, his appearance made big news because of the way it was handled by police. They took unprecedented security measures, "occupying" the Palace of Justice and its surroundings in the center of Sofia. Eyewitnesses told shameful stories of policemen standing side by side with the thuggish private guards of Madzho and indistinguishable from them, of judges stopped by police and forced in the most disrespectful way to prove their identity in order to be let into their own offices. Nobody was surprised when 55-year-old Emil Ivanov, after photographing these security measures, was brutally beaten by police and forced to erase his photos. (More details here and here, in Bulgarian.) All commentators agreed that there was no real threat to Madzho's life and the entire parade of force aimed to show the public that Bulgarian state supports Madzho. The investigation mentioned by Reporters Without Borders later vindicated the uniformed beaters. One of them even threatened to sue his victim for libel. It is a sad Bulgarian reality that our police and prosecution not only let organized criminals do whatever they want, but help them terrorize the population by beating and prosecuting whoever tries to expose them (another example: our authorities wanted to prosecute BBC journalists for reporting a ring of child traffickers).
Let me return to Georgi Stoev. He claimed that recently Madzho contacted him and ordered him to organize a group to carry out assassinations. Stoev didn't want to do this and passed this information to the prosecution. The result was disastrous: information leaked from the prosecution to Madzho. Stoev wanted to testify against him but only after his arrest. Prosecutors were not going to arrest Madzho and, as they claim, instead offered Stoev the protection our law has for such cases (which is essentially useless). I doubt that they were ready to do even this; it is easy for them to say it now - he is unable to refute it. I cannot figure out how Stoev, knowing our prosecution, could think they would do their duty; and even if they wanted, they had no evidence against Madzho other than Stoev's words. Anyway, they were not interested in charging Madzho, turned Stoev away and after a short time he was dead.
A day before Stoev's murder, "Borislav Georgiev, the executive director of a multimillion-pound energy company in charge of maintaining a controversial nuclear power plant, was shot outside his apartment block" (quote from The Independent). These two contract killings in two days finally led to the resignation of the Interior Minister Rumen Petkov, presumably after pressure from EU. Petkov's reputation was already marred by many previous deeds, notably a meeting with two underworld bosses known as Galev brothers. Nevertheless, Petkov retained a high position in Bulgarian political life and was included in the talkes about the new Cabinet.
So Stoev was silenced, his characters who killed him are untouchable and enjoying their dirty money and high positions. Trying to construct some good end to a story that has none, I think of my husband's reaction. He usually skips voting, but now every time when Stoev's name is mentioned in the news, says, "I will vote next time - and not fot them."
"They" are today's rulers who transfered their power to the underground world.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
About Kosovo
On March 19, a month after Kosovo declared independence, Bulgaria recognized it together with Croatia and Hungary.
The reaction of mainstream Bulgarian media is shown e.g. in this editorial of Standart daily: title We surrendered, subtitle We stabbed Serbia because of Brussels, the neigbours (Serbs - M.M.) slam the door in our face. The widespread warm feelings of Bulgarians to their Serbian "brothers" is strange, considering the fact that Serbia is a historical enemy of Bulgaria and has never missed an opportunity to "stab" it. You also see that Bulgarian journalists still cannot learn to separate reporting events from commenting them.
However, Bulgarians aren't alone in expressing hostile reactions to the newborn state. People located at a safe distance from the Balkans and expected to keep their heads calm are calling Kosovo Islamism's New Beachhead and First Step For Islam's Balkanization of the World.
Well, I am also not very happy about the emergence of another Muslim state. And I know that Kosovars, as people, aren't any nicer than Serbs. When NATO in 1999 first gave them the opportunity to be masters in their own house, what did they do? They started genocidal attacks against their Serb minority. If a person in a crowd of Kosovo Albanians was suspected to be a Serb, he would be encircled and killed. A Bulgarian working for the UN became victim of such lynching. Somebody asked him in the street in Serbian what time it was. After our man replied in the same language, he was murdered on the spot.
I also remember the words of the widow of a prominent Kosovar killed by the Serbs: "What makes me particularly sad is that he was buried by Gypsies." You cannot hear such a phrase in a civilized country, can you? We may rightly hate political correctness, but this is because we have too much of it; having too little is equally bad.
However, the question isn't what sort of people Kosovars are. The question is what sort of people we are.
Are we people who stand for a civilization based on universal moral principles, beginning with the Golden Rule? Or are we people of hypocrisy and double standards? You who are against the independence of Kosovo, would you ever agree to live under Serbian rule? Honestly? And if you wouldn't, why do you say that Kosovars should?
Do we believe and stand for human rights, or just for rights of people whom we like and who resemble us? If we deny rights to people because they are different from us and likely to be a threat to us, aren't we guilty of the same sins in which we accuse our Muslim opponents - supremacy, tribalism and us-versus-them mentality?
How can we appeal to Muslims to join our civilization, if we renounce its principles ourselves at the very moment when this seems convenient?
Are we ready to defend our society and culture against Islamism, or we consider this a troublesome and dirty job we'd better leave to Serbian war criminals?
And while putting on our special hats for thinking in order to answer the above "difficult" questions, let's give Kosovars our congratulations and best wishes for the future of their state. It doesn't matter if this is only in lip service. As I said, political correctness isn't 100% bad.
The reaction of mainstream Bulgarian media is shown e.g. in this editorial of Standart daily: title We surrendered, subtitle We stabbed Serbia because of Brussels, the neigbours (Serbs - M.M.) slam the door in our face. The widespread warm feelings of Bulgarians to their Serbian "brothers" is strange, considering the fact that Serbia is a historical enemy of Bulgaria and has never missed an opportunity to "stab" it. You also see that Bulgarian journalists still cannot learn to separate reporting events from commenting them.
However, Bulgarians aren't alone in expressing hostile reactions to the newborn state. People located at a safe distance from the Balkans and expected to keep their heads calm are calling Kosovo Islamism's New Beachhead and First Step For Islam's Balkanization of the World.
Well, I am also not very happy about the emergence of another Muslim state. And I know that Kosovars, as people, aren't any nicer than Serbs. When NATO in 1999 first gave them the opportunity to be masters in their own house, what did they do? They started genocidal attacks against their Serb minority. If a person in a crowd of Kosovo Albanians was suspected to be a Serb, he would be encircled and killed. A Bulgarian working for the UN became victim of such lynching. Somebody asked him in the street in Serbian what time it was. After our man replied in the same language, he was murdered on the spot.
I also remember the words of the widow of a prominent Kosovar killed by the Serbs: "What makes me particularly sad is that he was buried by Gypsies." You cannot hear such a phrase in a civilized country, can you? We may rightly hate political correctness, but this is because we have too much of it; having too little is equally bad.
However, the question isn't what sort of people Kosovars are. The question is what sort of people we are.
Are we people who stand for a civilization based on universal moral principles, beginning with the Golden Rule? Or are we people of hypocrisy and double standards? You who are against the independence of Kosovo, would you ever agree to live under Serbian rule? Honestly? And if you wouldn't, why do you say that Kosovars should?
Do we believe and stand for human rights, or just for rights of people whom we like and who resemble us? If we deny rights to people because they are different from us and likely to be a threat to us, aren't we guilty of the same sins in which we accuse our Muslim opponents - supremacy, tribalism and us-versus-them mentality?
How can we appeal to Muslims to join our civilization, if we renounce its principles ourselves at the very moment when this seems convenient?
Are we ready to defend our society and culture against Islamism, or we consider this a troublesome and dirty job we'd better leave to Serbian war criminals?
And while putting on our special hats for thinking in order to answer the above "difficult" questions, let's give Kosovars our congratulations and best wishes for the future of their state. It doesn't matter if this is only in lip service. As I said, political correctness isn't 100% bad.
Saturday, March 01, 2008
Disabled Bulgarian woman sterilized against her will
Source of the information below is the Feb. 3 post of the Mogilino blog, Bulgarian readers can go directly there.
After BBC broadcasted Kate Blewett's shocking documentary Bulgaria's Abandoned Children, Bulgarian authorities and "patriots" have been busy with PR disaster management. A documentary titled Home was produced and aired on the Bulgarian National TV Channel on Feb. 3. I haven't seen it, so I am relying on Yana Domuschieva's description in the above linked Mogilino post .
The documentary showed a family caring for their own disabled child, a foster family with a disabled foster child (the only disabled Bulgarian child currently enjoying foster care), a rehabilitation center for disabled children and a protected home for young disabled people. The picture portrayed was very rosy. Indeed, only the personnel of the rehabilitation center and the protected home was interviewed, not any of the inmates.
However, human rights activist Slavka Kukova reported that last winter a not so rosy event happened in the same protected home that was praised in the documentary. One of the young disabled women had vaginal bleeding (for unclear reasons). Her problem was dealt with by removing her uterus and ovaries. She was told that she didn't need these organs anyway. After being sterilized, the woman fled the protected home and was raped in the street.
After BBC broadcasted Kate Blewett's shocking documentary Bulgaria's Abandoned Children, Bulgarian authorities and "patriots" have been busy with PR disaster management. A documentary titled Home was produced and aired on the Bulgarian National TV Channel on Feb. 3. I haven't seen it, so I am relying on Yana Domuschieva's description in the above linked Mogilino post .
The documentary showed a family caring for their own disabled child, a foster family with a disabled foster child (the only disabled Bulgarian child currently enjoying foster care), a rehabilitation center for disabled children and a protected home for young disabled people. The picture portrayed was very rosy. Indeed, only the personnel of the rehabilitation center and the protected home was interviewed, not any of the inmates.
However, human rights activist Slavka Kukova reported that last winter a not so rosy event happened in the same protected home that was praised in the documentary. One of the young disabled women had vaginal bleeding (for unclear reasons). Her problem was dealt with by removing her uterus and ovaries. She was told that she didn't need these organs anyway. After being sterilized, the woman fled the protected home and was raped in the street.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Reptiles behind the computer
As a Bulgarian blogger writing in English, I have the duty to make important Bulgarian-born ideas known to the world, rather than languishing in the confined public space of my small country. Recently, I mentioned that many Bulgarian bloggers ironically call themselves "reptiles". It turned out to come from an article in the July 4 issue of 24 chasa newspaper, Vlechugi zad computera (Reptiles behind the computer), by Borislav Zyumbyulev. Bulgarian readers can find the text of the article e.g. at http://www.pressboard.info/Preview.aspx?articleid=88783. At http://marfieta.files.wordpress.com/2007/07/447498_orig.jpg, Marfa has uploaded a scanned image of the original publication. You can see that it occupies an entire A3 newspaper page and is illustrated by a photo of a cobra.
24 chasa (24 hours) is the second most popular daily newspaper in Bulgaria after Trud and has the same publisher, featured in my July 9, 2006 post. There is some division of labour between the two papers, Trud pretending to be more "intellectual" and 24 chasa more "popular". As commenter Hassi wrote on Grancharov's blog, a fairly typical reader of 24 chasa is an old gentleman "who cannot use a computer and hasn't the slightest idea of this technology, but knows that his 25-year-old granddaughter regularly writes in Internet".
The article author Zyumbyulev isn't an ordinary journalist but a Deputy Editor-in-chief. It is not quite clear why he dislikes Internet so much. Some bloggers speculate that he may have entered a Web forum anonymously and other participants have scorned him. Others think that the reason is the abundant criticism in the Web to his newspaper (see e.g. an article titled 24 chasa or the misery of journalism at http://e-vestnik.bg/1429).
I cannot quite understand why Zyumbyulev called Web forum participants "black". With the exception of an occasional student or soccer player, there are no black people in Bulgaria. The only subpopulation with darker skin (though far from being black) are the Gypsies, and whatever other sins they may have, they don't use Internet. So I come to the explanation that Zyumbyulev, similarly to some fairy tales, uses black as a symbol of evil.
I am aware that translating and posting almost the entire text of an article without informed consent by the author and the publisher is a violation of copyright. However, I hope that the utmost importance of the text in question allows my post to arguably qualify for the "fair use" label. After all, if a Bulgarian scientist discovers that some food component used by billions of people is very harmful, isn't it a duty of every decent person with the required linguistic skills to rush, translate and publish the findings? And what's the difference if the discovery is about Internet, which is indeed used by billions? The world must be informed about its dangers. So read, learn and enjoy!
Title: Reptiles behind the computer
Subtitle on red background: Short, black and village-born is the anonymous creep from the Internet forums. Anonymity in the Web devastates the personality and will be the main psychological problem during the following 30 years
Author: Borislav Zyumbyulev
Malice in Internet is so mighty that if somebody manages to convert it into megawatts, its energy will be enough for all light bulbs in Bulgaria to illuminate for at least 77 years. Most writings in Web forums are negative, directed against other participants or against some phenomenon in our life... When the text is about people, they are State Security agents, thugs, good-for-nothing and fools. There isn't a single decent person in this country. This is especially true about people who are popular. Everybody who is widely known or popular in fact is just a boar who deserves his blood to be sucked in a very painful way.
Let's not discuss popular politicians like Boyko Borisov or Georgi Parvanov and take as an example (popular TV show host) Slavi Trifonov. Slavi's concerts over a single summer have been attended by 200,000 people. However, in Web forums you cannot find a single well-intentioned word about him - only malice. It is evident that those who gloat over Slavi becoming blind have in fact bought tickets for his concerts. But they fall into some bizarre Internet schizophrenia.
In their normal lives, when these people haven't accepted nicknames, they almost look normal and don't call fool everybody they meet. But at the moment when they enter the little square, their faces distort as in a second-quality Hollywood movie and they turn into terrible zombies, plain scoundrels and reptiles.
What is the cause of this mass personality split? "Writers in forums are people with complexes, unsatisfied by their lives," explains behavioural psychologist Ray Cavallino from Boston University (not sure about the name spelling; I failed to find Dr. Cavallino in the Boston University Web site - M.M.). "Anonymity gives them courage which they lack in real life. It allows them to feel important, even if for a short time. To feel like people whose opinion matters. Unfortunately, nobody reads their opinions and Internet is a giant psychoanalytical monologue. Chatter of creeps," as Cavallino has called his study on the anonymous swear-words in Internet.
"Even the most innocent subject discussed, such as growing radish or breast-feeding, quickly turns into malicious, libelous and full of personal attacks against some participant in the forum...," writes psycholinguist Lance Winslow. According to Winslow, Internet communication resembles swear-words at an elementary school lunch: if a teacher doesn't interfere, things inevitably escalate to fighting...
"The anonymous author in forums resembles the anonymous murderer. He deprives himself of his personality... in order to carry out his criminal intent," says Boyko Ganchevski, an expert in criminal psychology. Ganchevski points out that not every forum user is a future murderer or has strong criminal motivation, he rather vents his complexes... But the personality split mechanism is the same as in murderers: evil is done with impunity and without burdening the conscience by taking another personality, under cover.
According to Winslow, anonymity and the weeds of malice and baseness in Internet corrode the tissue of human civilization. Because "even most oppressive regimes don't allow arbitrary insults between individuals... We don't know what will the situation be in 30 years, what will happen to mankind, after everyone is allowed to insult everyone else with impunity and to pour whatever libel he likes," wonders Winslow. He finds it the most important field of psychological research in the near future.
Will Internet anonymity change human personality? Will there be an epidemic of schizophrenia in the streets, after this is already the norm in the Web?...
Who is writing in the forums? Bulgarian Internet service providers say that the number of these people is limited - not more than 1500-2000, according to an analysis of their IP addresses... The opinion that Internet is the media of the young is wrong. Young people go to sites for dating, music, movies and other teenagers' entertainment activities. In the "serious" forums people are middle-aged and older. They have accumulated much frustration.
There are several types of know-alls. The first can be called Reptile - short, black and village-born subjects. They have survived a number of misfortunes and are the first in their families to do the village-to-town civilizational transition. Because of this feat, they live with the feeling that the world is their debtor. This leads to painful careerism combined with a lack of realistic personal self-estimate and typical village laziness... We call them reptiles because their writings are most venomous, the evil is most evident. In fact, these people need specialized medical help because of their sociopathy which often has dramatic consequences. They abandon their families, become alcoholics, commit domestic violence.
The other type is the Sad Gay. This group includes many women. Here, the frustration is a consequence of ambiguous sexuality, several failed attempts to lose weight, miserable personal life, acne, oily hair. Especially aggressive are the homosexual guys who have a double life - they photograph themselves in the company of naked female models but dream of butts of young boys. Neurosis is sure and soon comes bipolar personality disorder.
The third main type is the Professional Informer. The former State Security is believed to have had about 300 000 professional and volunteer agents in the early 1980s. Not all of them are now in the business elite... It may be just a coincidence but most of the newly created Bulgarian news sites and blogs have some connection to the former State Security Committee...
Hidden in the Web, the anonymous creep can be found out only with special skills and a lot of efforts. Therefore, he gets away (with whatever he is writing). This perhaps gives him joy but it ruins his psyche.
The anonymous scoundrel is in fact a seriously ill person who deserves pity. "This aggression has been accumulated for millenia, since human race began to socialize. Barriers have been erected to spontaneity. These barriers fall in the darkness of Internet... The aggression typical for Internet is generalized, claiming that everyone is stupid. It is pathological, a symptom of neurotic behaviour similarly to sadism and masochism. It needs help," says psycho-analyst Madlen Algafari.
24 chasa (24 hours) is the second most popular daily newspaper in Bulgaria after Trud and has the same publisher, featured in my July 9, 2006 post. There is some division of labour between the two papers, Trud pretending to be more "intellectual" and 24 chasa more "popular". As commenter Hassi wrote on Grancharov's blog, a fairly typical reader of 24 chasa is an old gentleman "who cannot use a computer and hasn't the slightest idea of this technology, but knows that his 25-year-old granddaughter regularly writes in Internet".
The article author Zyumbyulev isn't an ordinary journalist but a Deputy Editor-in-chief. It is not quite clear why he dislikes Internet so much. Some bloggers speculate that he may have entered a Web forum anonymously and other participants have scorned him. Others think that the reason is the abundant criticism in the Web to his newspaper (see e.g. an article titled 24 chasa or the misery of journalism at http://e-vestnik.bg/1429).
I cannot quite understand why Zyumbyulev called Web forum participants "black". With the exception of an occasional student or soccer player, there are no black people in Bulgaria. The only subpopulation with darker skin (though far from being black) are the Gypsies, and whatever other sins they may have, they don't use Internet. So I come to the explanation that Zyumbyulev, similarly to some fairy tales, uses black as a symbol of evil.
I am aware that translating and posting almost the entire text of an article without informed consent by the author and the publisher is a violation of copyright. However, I hope that the utmost importance of the text in question allows my post to arguably qualify for the "fair use" label. After all, if a Bulgarian scientist discovers that some food component used by billions of people is very harmful, isn't it a duty of every decent person with the required linguistic skills to rush, translate and publish the findings? And what's the difference if the discovery is about Internet, which is indeed used by billions? The world must be informed about its dangers. So read, learn and enjoy!
Title: Reptiles behind the computer
Subtitle on red background: Short, black and village-born is the anonymous creep from the Internet forums. Anonymity in the Web devastates the personality and will be the main psychological problem during the following 30 years
Author: Borislav Zyumbyulev
Malice in Internet is so mighty that if somebody manages to convert it into megawatts, its energy will be enough for all light bulbs in Bulgaria to illuminate for at least 77 years. Most writings in Web forums are negative, directed against other participants or against some phenomenon in our life... When the text is about people, they are State Security agents, thugs, good-for-nothing and fools. There isn't a single decent person in this country. This is especially true about people who are popular. Everybody who is widely known or popular in fact is just a boar who deserves his blood to be sucked in a very painful way.
Let's not discuss popular politicians like Boyko Borisov or Georgi Parvanov and take as an example (popular TV show host) Slavi Trifonov. Slavi's concerts over a single summer have been attended by 200,000 people. However, in Web forums you cannot find a single well-intentioned word about him - only malice. It is evident that those who gloat over Slavi becoming blind have in fact bought tickets for his concerts. But they fall into some bizarre Internet schizophrenia.
In their normal lives, when these people haven't accepted nicknames, they almost look normal and don't call fool everybody they meet. But at the moment when they enter the little square, their faces distort as in a second-quality Hollywood movie and they turn into terrible zombies, plain scoundrels and reptiles.
What is the cause of this mass personality split? "Writers in forums are people with complexes, unsatisfied by their lives," explains behavioural psychologist Ray Cavallino from Boston University (not sure about the name spelling; I failed to find Dr. Cavallino in the Boston University Web site - M.M.). "Anonymity gives them courage which they lack in real life. It allows them to feel important, even if for a short time. To feel like people whose opinion matters. Unfortunately, nobody reads their opinions and Internet is a giant psychoanalytical monologue. Chatter of creeps," as Cavallino has called his study on the anonymous swear-words in Internet.
"Even the most innocent subject discussed, such as growing radish or breast-feeding, quickly turns into malicious, libelous and full of personal attacks against some participant in the forum...," writes psycholinguist Lance Winslow. According to Winslow, Internet communication resembles swear-words at an elementary school lunch: if a teacher doesn't interfere, things inevitably escalate to fighting...
"The anonymous author in forums resembles the anonymous murderer. He deprives himself of his personality... in order to carry out his criminal intent," says Boyko Ganchevski, an expert in criminal psychology. Ganchevski points out that not every forum user is a future murderer or has strong criminal motivation, he rather vents his complexes... But the personality split mechanism is the same as in murderers: evil is done with impunity and without burdening the conscience by taking another personality, under cover.
According to Winslow, anonymity and the weeds of malice and baseness in Internet corrode the tissue of human civilization. Because "even most oppressive regimes don't allow arbitrary insults between individuals... We don't know what will the situation be in 30 years, what will happen to mankind, after everyone is allowed to insult everyone else with impunity and to pour whatever libel he likes," wonders Winslow. He finds it the most important field of psychological research in the near future.
Will Internet anonymity change human personality? Will there be an epidemic of schizophrenia in the streets, after this is already the norm in the Web?...
Who is writing in the forums? Bulgarian Internet service providers say that the number of these people is limited - not more than 1500-2000, according to an analysis of their IP addresses... The opinion that Internet is the media of the young is wrong. Young people go to sites for dating, music, movies and other teenagers' entertainment activities. In the "serious" forums people are middle-aged and older. They have accumulated much frustration.
There are several types of know-alls. The first can be called Reptile - short, black and village-born subjects. They have survived a number of misfortunes and are the first in their families to do the village-to-town civilizational transition. Because of this feat, they live with the feeling that the world is their debtor. This leads to painful careerism combined with a lack of realistic personal self-estimate and typical village laziness... We call them reptiles because their writings are most venomous, the evil is most evident. In fact, these people need specialized medical help because of their sociopathy which often has dramatic consequences. They abandon their families, become alcoholics, commit domestic violence.
The other type is the Sad Gay. This group includes many women. Here, the frustration is a consequence of ambiguous sexuality, several failed attempts to lose weight, miserable personal life, acne, oily hair. Especially aggressive are the homosexual guys who have a double life - they photograph themselves in the company of naked female models but dream of butts of young boys. Neurosis is sure and soon comes bipolar personality disorder.
The third main type is the Professional Informer. The former State Security is believed to have had about 300 000 professional and volunteer agents in the early 1980s. Not all of them are now in the business elite... It may be just a coincidence but most of the newly created Bulgarian news sites and blogs have some connection to the former State Security Committee...
Hidden in the Web, the anonymous creep can be found out only with special skills and a lot of efforts. Therefore, he gets away (with whatever he is writing). This perhaps gives him joy but it ruins his psyche.
The anonymous scoundrel is in fact a seriously ill person who deserves pity. "This aggression has been accumulated for millenia, since human race began to socialize. Barriers have been erected to spontaneity. These barriers fall in the darkness of Internet... The aggression typical for Internet is generalized, claiming that everyone is stupid. It is pathological, a symptom of neurotic behaviour similarly to sadism and masochism. It needs help," says psycho-analyst Madlen Algafari.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
The war aborted, and why not to trust Margarita Mihneva
(Caution: long post)
The war between Hezbollah/Lebanon and Israel I wrote about on July 29 was aborted. The enemy claims they won and Israel lost. In a sense, they are right: without finding the kidnapped soldiers, Israel agreed to a cease-fire and so used the simplest and most reliable way to lose - left the battlefield. Has Israel caught from old Europe the virus of unwillingness to survive?
However, it would be wrong to blame Israeli leadership alone. I cannot imagine the war led logically, i.e. spreading to Hezbollah sponsors Iran and maybe Syria, without the help of the USA. And instead of helping, the Americans were pressing Israel to step back. Somebody rightly described Bush as "all talk, no walk".
Of course it was just a stage in the ongoing global war and, as such, it produced some benefits: revealed the arsenal and capabilities of Hezbollah, the attitudes of key world players and the so-called world opinion (about the latter and how much it costs, read a good essay at http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=23635). However, this knowledge will be useful only if somebody really intends to resume the fight.
As for the Lebanese, it seems that what sympathy I had for them was largely undeserved and the support for Hezbollah actually is much stronger than I thought. I'm translating information by Netinfo: "The (Lebanese) government hasn't even considered disarming Hezbollah, which is one of the basic requirements in the UN Security Council cease-fire resolution... The pro-Syrian president Emil Lahud said it would be a shame to insist for disarming the national resistance (Hezbollah), the only force in the Arab world that stood against Israel..." (http://news.netinfo.bg/?tid=40&oid=923890).
Hezbollah ringleader Hassan Nasrallah became a hero of the Muslim world because of his successes in kidnapping soldiers and shelling Israeli cities and villages. These same Muslims who hail a thug for deliberate killings of civilians are angry when we say they are bad people... I recently commented on Highlander's blog, "Can the Muslim world reach a deeper point in moral degradation? I cannot imagine, but let's wait and see, every time when I think this is impossible they manage to make another step downward. If the Devil exists and makes list of the souls who belong to him, I pity the poor fellow, he must already have arthritis from the too-intensive writing or typing."
Or possibly I'm too pessimistic. Perhaps, when things become much worse, the civilized world will awaken from its lethargy and take care of itself. And at least our media will stop working as enemy PR. Last night, I watched the TV show "Neudobnite (The Inconvenient)". It's broadcasted by cable TV Channel 3 and its host is one of the best known Bulgarian journalists, Margarita Mihneva. She had invited two Lebanese who offered plenty of anti-Israel talk and put photos of killed Lebanese children under our noses (as if the Israeli children killed on Friday are expected, like Jesus Christ, to be alive again on Sunday).
I liked just one of the questions asked by Mihneva: what the ordinary Lebanese think about Hezbollah. The Lebanese guests said that the lack of support of Lebanese to Hezbollah is US media disinformation, in fact all Hezbollah fighters are Lebanese and the population supports them. Unfortunately, Mihneva offered no comment and no further questions to clarify this important issue.
All the time Mihneva was saying that she will present the Jewish viewpoint as well. Only during the last minutes we heard a Bulgarian Jewish intellectual, Jacob Dzherasi. However, he was not in the studio, his voice was taped. And he was not discussing the current conflict but something completely unrelated - the architecture and history of a particular house at Oborishte street in Sofia! She used him just to wash her hands. So much about the honest representation of opposite viewpoints.
Finally, let me quote a different Arab voice, like a beam of light in a realm of darkness: Libyan reformist writer Dr. Muhammad Al-Huni and his article "The lexicon of resistance", presented by MEMRI (http://www.memri.org/bin/opener_latest.cgi?ID=SD125306#_edn1):
"The word 'resistance' has come to be constantly used in the killing fields known as the Middle East... When Shi'ites kill Sunnis and Sunnis kill Shi'ites in Iraq merely for their [sectarian] identity, it is called 'resistance.' When Janjaweed gangs murder unarmed civilians in Darfour, it is called 'resistance.' When year after year, Hamas and Islamic Jihad extinguish any spark of peace which can end the suffering of the Palestinian people, it is called 'resistance.' When Hizbullah takes an entire people hostage and refuses to obey the elected [authorities], dragging Lebanon into destruction, it is called 'resistance.' The war which is being waged by the new global terrorism under the command of bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri and Al-Zarqawi is called 'resistance'... What is common to these types of resistance is that they all present themselves as 'Islamic'... The project of these resistance [groups] has had its day in the Arab world. It made the most noise and the most bloodshed, and therefore its dreadful collapse is highly imminent. They betted on a wild horse, and have left not a single seed that can sprout, nor a single bud that can open. They are the murderers of the future, and therefore they have no future."
Read the whole text, it's worth it. I hope Highlander will see it, too, because it's by her fellow countryman not very likely to be published in Jamahiriya or any other Libyan newspaper. I hope his prognosis will come true.
The war between Hezbollah/Lebanon and Israel I wrote about on July 29 was aborted. The enemy claims they won and Israel lost. In a sense, they are right: without finding the kidnapped soldiers, Israel agreed to a cease-fire and so used the simplest and most reliable way to lose - left the battlefield. Has Israel caught from old Europe the virus of unwillingness to survive?
However, it would be wrong to blame Israeli leadership alone. I cannot imagine the war led logically, i.e. spreading to Hezbollah sponsors Iran and maybe Syria, without the help of the USA. And instead of helping, the Americans were pressing Israel to step back. Somebody rightly described Bush as "all talk, no walk".
Of course it was just a stage in the ongoing global war and, as such, it produced some benefits: revealed the arsenal and capabilities of Hezbollah, the attitudes of key world players and the so-called world opinion (about the latter and how much it costs, read a good essay at http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=23635). However, this knowledge will be useful only if somebody really intends to resume the fight.
As for the Lebanese, it seems that what sympathy I had for them was largely undeserved and the support for Hezbollah actually is much stronger than I thought. I'm translating information by Netinfo: "The (Lebanese) government hasn't even considered disarming Hezbollah, which is one of the basic requirements in the UN Security Council cease-fire resolution... The pro-Syrian president Emil Lahud said it would be a shame to insist for disarming the national resistance (Hezbollah), the only force in the Arab world that stood against Israel..." (http://news.netinfo.bg/?tid=40&oid=923890).
Hezbollah ringleader Hassan Nasrallah became a hero of the Muslim world because of his successes in kidnapping soldiers and shelling Israeli cities and villages. These same Muslims who hail a thug for deliberate killings of civilians are angry when we say they are bad people... I recently commented on Highlander's blog, "Can the Muslim world reach a deeper point in moral degradation? I cannot imagine, but let's wait and see, every time when I think this is impossible they manage to make another step downward. If the Devil exists and makes list of the souls who belong to him, I pity the poor fellow, he must already have arthritis from the too-intensive writing or typing."
Or possibly I'm too pessimistic. Perhaps, when things become much worse, the civilized world will awaken from its lethargy and take care of itself. And at least our media will stop working as enemy PR. Last night, I watched the TV show "Neudobnite (The Inconvenient)". It's broadcasted by cable TV Channel 3 and its host is one of the best known Bulgarian journalists, Margarita Mihneva. She had invited two Lebanese who offered plenty of anti-Israel talk and put photos of killed Lebanese children under our noses (as if the Israeli children killed on Friday are expected, like Jesus Christ, to be alive again on Sunday).
I liked just one of the questions asked by Mihneva: what the ordinary Lebanese think about Hezbollah. The Lebanese guests said that the lack of support of Lebanese to Hezbollah is US media disinformation, in fact all Hezbollah fighters are Lebanese and the population supports them. Unfortunately, Mihneva offered no comment and no further questions to clarify this important issue.
All the time Mihneva was saying that she will present the Jewish viewpoint as well. Only during the last minutes we heard a Bulgarian Jewish intellectual, Jacob Dzherasi. However, he was not in the studio, his voice was taped. And he was not discussing the current conflict but something completely unrelated - the architecture and history of a particular house at Oborishte street in Sofia! She used him just to wash her hands. So much about the honest representation of opposite viewpoints.
Finally, let me quote a different Arab voice, like a beam of light in a realm of darkness: Libyan reformist writer Dr. Muhammad Al-Huni and his article "The lexicon of resistance", presented by MEMRI (http://www.memri.org/bin/opener_latest.cgi?ID=SD125306#_edn1):
"The word 'resistance' has come to be constantly used in the killing fields known as the Middle East... When Shi'ites kill Sunnis and Sunnis kill Shi'ites in Iraq merely for their [sectarian] identity, it is called 'resistance.' When Janjaweed gangs murder unarmed civilians in Darfour, it is called 'resistance.' When year after year, Hamas and Islamic Jihad extinguish any spark of peace which can end the suffering of the Palestinian people, it is called 'resistance.' When Hizbullah takes an entire people hostage and refuses to obey the elected [authorities], dragging Lebanon into destruction, it is called 'resistance.' The war which is being waged by the new global terrorism under the command of bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri and Al-Zarqawi is called 'resistance'... What is common to these types of resistance is that they all present themselves as 'Islamic'... The project of these resistance [groups] has had its day in the Arab world. It made the most noise and the most bloodshed, and therefore its dreadful collapse is highly imminent. They betted on a wild horse, and have left not a single seed that can sprout, nor a single bud that can open. They are the murderers of the future, and therefore they have no future."
Read the whole text, it's worth it. I hope Highlander will see it, too, because it's by her fellow countryman not very likely to be published in Jamahiriya or any other Libyan newspaper. I hope his prognosis will come true.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)