European values, West vs East in the EU, and the rank hypocrisy

It is interesting to see the contrast between reports of alleged Hungarian brutality towards migrants (with no actual proof, but in the he-said-she-said game we of course can take anything a migrant or an NGO says on face value), and the way they report on brutality by the cultured and civilised Western European countries.

Let's see...

We all remember when migrants rushed the border at Roszke, and threw stones at the border guards; the response was, not unexpectedly, some water jets to drive them back. The video footage was heavily edited leaving out the attack, and the footage of the poor kid his/her parent was dragging towards the violence, so later the child could be paraded as an innocent victim. The videos usually have shown the water cannon first, then the stone throwing, and the crying children last. (Here's the full video, by the way. You can see a child being dragged towards the tear gas at 1:29...  which makes the whole farce even more comical. Most of the condemning articles you can find in this blog, but here is a collection by a Hungarian news portal.)

International condemnations, talks of overall racism in the whole country; the furore was real. Facts were taken quite liberally, but the whole incident was used to paint the whole country as the racist black sheep of the EU. Even the UN Secretary General had some harsh words.


In contrast, this is how an Italian use of the water cannon was reported upon.

The report is more like a factual description, and the Guardian had no thundering opinion piece on it. It kind of happened, and that was that.


Same thing about alleged violence against migrants/refugees in Hungary.

Apparently guards have been taking selfies with beaten migrants. Proof of any of these are obviously missing (even though these things tend to come out as we have seen with the US soldiers who took selfies in front of corpses they tortured to death), but let's not let facts get in our way.

In contrast, there are just dispassionate descriptions of the horrors if they are perpetrated by Western countries. No broad generalisations, no bleating about "European Values", no finger pointing to the highest level of power; I've yet to see anyone accuse Macron of being a horrible human being because of the well documented brutality of the French police, and the inactivity of the French government to help these people. (Who, let's just mention it, left the migrant processing centers without registering hoping to get through a richer country.)

The point is: Western media, and the Western world in general loves virtue signalling with the Eastern members of the EU. The political elite, the media are blatantly biased. It's not exactly a big revelation, but something that is worth recording.

Double standards, hyperboles and a complete lack of historical knowledge

That's one thing that the NYT's facebook page was full of idiots comparing Hungary to the Nazis because they have decided to detain asylum seekers until their status can be verified. I mean this is quite expected from the virtue-signalling part of the "liberals" who love to show how pious and true to the cause they are by condemning anything and anyone.

This, obviously, was not the first time. A certain Austrian chancellor did the same in 2015, the Romanian Prime Minister did the same, and several newspapers alluded to the same issue: just because a country does not agree with Brussels and Germany (and upholds the law as it is bound to do), it's essentially a Nazi country. (Although Orban makes it hard to agree with him; he is kind of a douche.) It's a difficult concept apparently: just because a country has a different take on how it imagines its future, and decided it does not wish to share the problems with large-scale immigration of low skilled Muslim immigrants (and what comes with it: enclaves, increased crime rates, etc., etc.), it does not mean that they are Nazis.

And now a Saudi prince has stood in line of the Nazi-train. It seems like we have finally reached a breaking point where even the most socially sensitive countries, the well-known bastions of humanitarianism have had enough and are now forced to say it how it is: Hungarians are Nazis for obliging the law, and making sure that only people who are bona fide refugees can get into Europe. Amid the huge outcry I still have not heard any alternative solution how to deal with hundreds and even thousands of people who can just disappear at whim after submitting their paperwork (if they bother to submit it at all). Strangely silent are Merkel and Junker about this whole issue; what I suspect is that everyone are secretly relieved that this is being done, but submit to the whole charade so that they don't look like they approve. Let someone else take the blame for an unpopular decision.

What I would like to know is how the "progressive left" feels like being on the same side as the Saudis... (Although to be fair it never really bothered anyone in the West. Beheadings, slavery, women's rights, illegal wars in Yemen never really appeared on the radar of these newspapers and politicians. Not to mention those millions of people they took in on humanitarian grounds.)