In recent weeks, two seemingly unrelated events have occurred on different continents. In Europe, a weeks-long dispute erupted between Brussels and Paris over the mass deportation of Roma from France to Romania and Bulgaria, the outcome of which will be a lawsuit against France, while in America, the mayor of New York City banned smoking in public spaces. What is the connection? In fact, it is significant.
The French have decided that the Roma are a very problematic group that needs to be dealt with, which they soon began to implement by relocating them to a place where they would feel more at home, and after Viviane Reding, the Commissioner for Justice and Fundamental Rights of the European Commission, drew certain parallels with practices from World War II, Paris opted for an utterly unconvincing defense, reduced to anger over the audacity of a civil servant who dared to question France’s commitment to human rights. They even tried to promote the thesis that it is not really about the Roma, but internal correspondence, plus practice, disproved that. Setting aside all the obvious arguments against such behavior, it can ultimately be concluded that it is hard to believe that the only, or even the main problem of France, is the Roma.
Standing on the side of the Roma is a matter of principle, which brings us back to the beginning and the connection with the decision of Michael Bloomberg, a former smoker who became a militant non-smoker, and it is known that converts are always the worst kind. Demonizing groups in society always has a predictable course, and the expulsion of the Roma and the ban on smoking in public spaces are just the same procedure at different stages of realization. First, they deal with those who are disliked by everyone. Then they start dealing with those who do not evoke any particular emotions. You are still in a state of divided feelings and seek, with more or less success, arguments to justify the exclusion of the latter. Then they move on to those who are actually quite likable to you, and it becomes clear that something is indeed wrong, but by then it is too late – you are next.
First, someone claimed that smoking is unhealthy. It is indeed, much like many things. Let’s not even start on alcohol, drugs, cars, bad government… And so this whole story rolled slowly but surely until it finally became the only true mantra of the new, better world. Smokers have evolved from the usual scapegoats into the greatest health threat to society in a manic race for perfection. We must be healthy, beautiful, smart, hardworking… Partial bans increasingly took on an absolute character, and now it has begun the internment of smokers in their homes. Of course, this is not the end because ideas about banning smoking in one’s own home have already emerged, which will be really fun to see in practice. And they will try, that is for sure. The next targets are the fat, there is no doubt about that, with them the battle is just beginning, they have already started with the obligation to buy two seats on an airplane. Then perhaps the bald, ugly, hunchbacked, nosy, mustached… Only fools seem to be safe. There will surely be some scientific research for their ghettoization. Perhaps from the same ones who concluded that atheists are smarter than believers, a living truth, proven by research, or that eggs are not healthy, only to conclude a few days later with new research that they actually are. Then they are not. Then they move on to cucumbers. Then to you. Exaggerated?
