It’s been a weird week, what with parliamentary questions about TV porn in hotel rooms and the startling, melodramatic declaration by a Labour MP that he’d rather live in Iran than in the den of iniquity which Malta has purportedly become.
Or rather, that’s what he was reported to have said.
As Nationalist MP Edwin Vassallo amply demonstrated when his, “What happens in the bedroom is, up to a point, the government’s business” comment was taken out of context, such off the cuff statements can quickly spin out of control. Despite later attempting to correct the misinterpretation, the damage had been done and the peeping Tom jokes about Edwin wanting to know what we were up to, came in thick and fast.
At the time of writing it is not clear whether Adrian Vassallo really meant what he said about Iran, but so far he has not denied this outrageous remark, and the Labour Party has only offered a limp sitting-on-the-fence reaction.
The electorate can only sit back and blink its eyes in bewilderment and question whether these elected representatives truly reflect its own belief system.
It is clear that there is a great conservative/liberal divide in the country – a chasm almost. What is odd, however, is that the same person can often harbour both ideologies at the same time and see absolutely no contradiction.
We saw this with the “I live with my partner but I want to receive Holy Communion” issue. Perhaps it’s because the concept of what it means to be liberal is not very clear in people’s minds, leading to the kind of split personality which surfaces each time there is one of these hot topics. On the face of it, some people’s lifestyle has become very liberal, and they have dispensed with most conventions but, every once in a while, something tugs them back and they feel this overwhelming need to conform. The Pope’s visit, their child’s First Holy Communion, the Good Friday procession – these are all triggers which seem to work like one of those magical words which a hypnotist plants into people’s subconscious, leading them to do as he tells them. How many of those thronging to these events really mean it, and how many are just obeying some inner instruction, the result of years of indoctrination?
Whose side are you on?
Over the last few years it also feels like two camps have emerged: the ultra conservative and those who seem to have rediscovered the 1960s, flower power and free love. One group clings stubbornly to the way things were in the past, while the other is intent on breaking all the rules in the book, and even a few which aren’t.
There is a sliver of people who fall somewhere in between these two extremes, but I notice that the first two groups are the most vocal and tend to make their presence felt the most. That barometer of public opinion known as Facebook can often be misleading in this regard – on the basis of the comments which pop up, you can easily conclude that there is a substantial liberal faction in Malta. But then I have to remind myself that I’m only seeing the status updates and discussions of people in my social circle of “friends” – and that there are numerous other social networks which I’m not seeing in my news feed. It is only when I happen to add someone who is from another social circle that this hits me. My network would be wondering what Adrian Vassallo would look like wearing a burka while another network is cursing the government because the BMX track is going to be taken away from them by the developers of the new sports complex at White Rocks.
And while a loud guffaw went up after Dr Vassallo’s bizarre comments, don’t be so sure that he is alone in his sentiments. I read quite a few remarks on other online discussion boards which not only agreed with him but which have expressed disgust that the Labour party did not support him. For the conservatives in the country, Dr Vassallo represents one of the last few bastions of moral rectitude left and, in their opinion, it is everyone else who has lost the plot. “At least we know what he stands for and he’s not afraid to voice his beliefs, unlike some other politicians with no backbone who want to please everyone just to get their votes,” one argument ran.
Who are you?
Notice I said ‘the conservatives’ without mentioning a political party. That’s because here, conservatism slices through party lines. It’s not as cut and dried as in the States for example, where Republicans are conservative and Democrats are liberal and you can usually tell whether someone is right wing or left wing within minutes of a conversation. In Malta, it’s much more complex. The same person can harbour a mish mash of liberal/conservative beliefs depending on the issue. Take education: many who claim to be liberal would rather die a slow tortuous death than send their children to a government school where they would have to mix with “the others” and would prefer to pay through the nose for private schooling instead. If you point out that private education is elitist and goes against the very core of social justice and other liberal values, they use the tired argument that government schools are inferior, the child would suffer and would not realise his true potential. I would give more credence to this argument if all the children coming out of private schools took your breath away with their brilliance, but this is clearly not the case. I tend to believe that a bright child will flourish no matter which school he is sent to. Private schools can give students some advantages it’s true, but it mostly has to do with social connections rather than education per se.
So what makes someone liberal as opposed to conservative? I doubt whether the average person ever consciously thinks about these abstract notions of ideology, and it is only when someone drops a bomb like Adrian Vassallo did this week, that the confusion in people’s beliefs starts coming out of the woodwork.
When statistics emerge showing an increase in teenage pregnancies, marital breakdowns and children being born from second relationships, the facile explanation is that we have “lost our values”. Yet, as I’ve often pointed out, the very same people behind these numbers are the ones who seem to be yearning to find their way back into the Catholic Church.
A priest told me recently that out of 20 couples doing a recent Cana course to get married in Church, almost half already live together and have a child. So perhaps it is the responsibility of parenthood which prods people back into a more conventional lifestyle. I’ve also noticed that those who were quite wild in their youth are the ones who tend to come down like a tonne of bricks on their offspring, whereas those who conformed in their younger days suddenly let loose and rebel like latter day hippies in mid-life. Human nature is unpredictable that way.
Conservatives often feel that they are the last ones left with a moral compass, and yet they see no contradiction between feverishly worshipping statues during the ruckus of a village festa and loathing the mere sight of refugees in our streets.
Some believe in the right to hunt and shoot down beautiful wildlife which is just passing through (it’s a tradition!) but would bristle with self-righteousness at the mere mention of gay marriage.
Conservatives insist that they hold the key to what is right and wrong (no to divorce!) but cannot admit that they are trampling on the civil liberties of others. They seem unable to connect the dots.
That is why hearing Nationalist MP Beppe Fenech Adami asking who is the man and who is the woman in a gay relationship makes you slap your forehand in despair. That wasn’t enough – he went on to say that when he and his wife tried to switch roles it didn’t work. This is a man in his early 40s, folks, and if he cannot understand what is so very wrong with what he said, then we really are up the proverbial creek without a paddle.
As for Dr Vassallo’s porn alarm – I don’t know which was worse, his PQ or Minister for Justice Carm Mifsud Bonnici assuring him that the police are investigating porn in hotel rooms as we speak.
Some of our politicians may want to appear liberal, because they know that liberal voters are the ones who decide elections, but it is only a flimsy façade. The scary thing, of course, is that these are the people who are legislating our lives.
As we read these types of conflicting messages coming out of the mouths of our MPs, however, we have to admit that their statements are merely a mirror of an equally schizophrenic Maltese society. After all, someone has been voting them in.
Was it you?
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