When memory – and history – fail you

International Desk - IRAN DAILY

It was perhaps an early sign of dementia, on a personal level. Or a recurring symptom of chronic historical forgetfulness combined with an unhealthy dose of arrogance and delusion, on a collective level. In any case, it was offensive to almost everyone – except perhaps old, white, elite Europeans, or, in a nutshell, the heirs to centuries of colonial savagery.

Josep Borrell, the high representative of the European Union for foreign affairs and security policy, recently delivered an outrageous speech at the inauguration of the new European Diplomatic Academy in Bruges, Belgium, in which he compared Europe to a garden and most of the rest of the world to a jungle.

He then carried on with his racist discourse to advise the younger gardeners to protect the garden not by building a wall, but by going to the jungle.

The advice would undoubtedly open up many wounds for nations who have still a long way to go to undo the sort of ruthless European colonialism that led to the accumulation of wealth and, eventually, building of the metaphorical garden.

Borrell’s insensitive, supremacist views also serve as a reminder of  fascism and Nazism – both founded on a philosophy of segregation. Two worldviews espoused by Europeans until not very long ago, which were responsible for a deadly world war that razed their garden to the ground and claimed millions of lives.

His racist rant, however, is somehow in keeping with Europe’s speedy downward spiral. It should be obvious that the increasing popularity of far-right politics and the spread of neo-fascist parties in the continent is nothing to be proud of; not to mention its sheepish surrender to US international policies.

What shook us Iranians the most in Borell’s ignorant speech, though, was its apparent hypocrisy: While Europe trumpets universal human rights and – through meddlesome remarks and uncivilized actions – claims to stand with Iranian protesters, such rhetoric only highlights the depth of the gardeners’ hatred towards non-Europeans, or the jungle-dwellers who could invade the garden.

As it turns out, Europeans need to forgo their selective memory, above all else, and acknowledge their debt to the rest of the world that suffered decades – and in some cases centuries – of their looting and plundering so that a limited percentage of the world population could enjoy prosperity.