While the consequences of peer violence, and the culture of violence in general, are taking people’s lives in Montenegro and the region, our ministers Adzic and Kovac would like to deal with more important matters.
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Violence is exaggerated, isn’t that right Messrs. Ministers?
The incomprehensible and painful tragedy in Belgrade, and then the mass murder that happened last night in Mladenovac, shocked not only the region, but also the world. What we heard in the American media is happening in Russia and Europe. It is happening here too. The difference is now that the school has become the scene of a mass murder for the first time. Last year, children also died in Cetinje. There is no excuse for evil. When evil happens, we point the finger at politicians, at the West, at games and movies, at parents. In a state of shock, we all react differently. At the first moment, our first reaction should be empathy, and there is plenty of time to analyze and search for causes. What each of us should think about is how we can prevent something like this from happening again.
I won’t talk much about the ministers, because I don’t want to exploit the tragedy in order to deal with someone politically. However, what we need to deal with is the arrogance shown by Minister Kovac and Minister Adzic when commenting on the violence, when they each said in their own way that the media pays too much attention to violence. Kovac said that, if I understood correctly, because in the media he sees the culprits who make stars out of the attackers, Adzic, commenting on the epidemic of violence on the Montenegrin streets, praised himself for fighting crime, so now only violence is written about, though it has always been present.
It is true that there has always been violence. Our culture and our traditions are contaminated by violence. In my environment, I watched fathers teach their children to be cruel to stray cats and dogs. As a child, I watched in the countryside how a puppy that attacked a chicken was tied around its neck and thrown alive into the Zeta River.
A boy in Belgrade allegedly went to a shooting range. Maybe he also played violent games and watched violent series. Neither Pink TV, nor Happy TV, or others are the reasons. Censorship achieves nothing in that sense.
When we talk about traditional gender roles, we rightly often talk about women as the biggest victims of gender norms and customs, in which women are “put in place” and thus put in a discriminatory position. What we forget is that men are also victims of these same roles and customs. Boys are taught not to cry from an early age. Boys are taught to bully. It is desirable to have a weapon and know how to shoot.
The mental health of young people is, among other things, poisoned by bad traditions. Who works with youth? Parents are not trained for such a thing. We have a huge number of suicides in Montenegro. An epidemic. Especially among men. Mental health is a taboo topic here. Instead of talking about emotions, in a country where therapists should have their hands full, because of PTSD, wars, organized crime, domestic violence, we hide and suppress everything, because it is simply not talked about. And of course, when we push everything under the rug, it’s natural that it will burst at some point.
This is a situation in which society and societies show solidarity. The night before last, candles were lit for Belgrade children in front of the theater in Pristina. This should be an example to us that in Montenegro at such moments there is no Serbian Orthodox Church, Montenegrin Orthodox Church – no Montenegrins, Serbs, Bosniaks, Albanians, Catholics, Muslims and Orthodox. We share the same cultural space with Serbia. Our media report on the event as if it happened in Podgorica. It means that people are interested and care about it. That’s why we need to understand that we have reached a moment when the whole society needs to gather all its resources in the public space in order to stop violence and the culture of violence. If we can do that, then our other problems will begin to resolve themselves.
That’s all for today and this week. See you again on Monday.
Kind regards,
Ljubomir Filipovic, CdM analyst and columnist
(The opinions and views of the authors of the columns are not necessarily those of the CdM editorial staff)
