Yes, I write a lot about it. Because it annoys me. Because it is present, and it is frankly strange, that the Western media would pick on a shitty little country that matters to no-one. Since I happen to be from that shitty little country, it annoys me. It also worries me, since the reason Hungary got the short end of the stick after WWI (and was punished way more than anyone else on the losing side) was one part due to the incredibly anti-Hungarian press in the UK and elsewhere. While British and Russian football hooligans were fighting on the streets, the British newspapers were worried about Neo-Nazi Hungarians who did not actually do anything- showing the photo of a Hungarian fan who happens to live and teach in Spain.
This is especially prominent during the times when the center-right is in power; during these times the cries of fascism, the return of the ovens and whatnot are always the loudest. One reason is simple: the Hungarian Left loves to complain about the destruction of democracy, the free press, and the inherent racism of Hungarians which can clearly be seen by them electing the wrong people. (They are fine of labelling their own people genetically inferior, too.) Also: antisemitism is on the rise, obviously. Even though facts and statistics don't really show it -especially comparing Hungary to France, the UK or the US, Hungary is clearly on the verge of firing up the ovens. Interestingly, when they don't get the stuff they want, they just bury an interview.
The last couple of years of migrant crisis was also a great demonstration of this. They were complaining about closed borders (even though anyone is still free to pass through the actual border crossings, and ask for asylum), the brutality of Hungarian police (with carefully edited footage and no proof whatsoever), the chaos at the Keleti Railway station (as if the government could be held responsible for people striking up camp in the middle of Budapest...), and for not letting the migrants on the train (even though the Schengen Agreement kind of forbade letting this happen), where Jews are in danger (yet interestingly French Jews are fleeing to Israel), and so on and so forth. When the government's propaganda (which was quite inappropriate) mentioned no-go zones in the UK, the BBC and others jumped on it; even though the BBC four was airing "No go Britain" at one time, and there are issues with the whole thing. Sorry, guys, if you make documentaries like these, people will believe them, regardless of what the actual situation is... so you really should not complain. If you made a misleading documentary, then the onus is on you for the mistake. And if all else fails, just do the old guilty by association smear quoting some BNP nutjob. Suddenly his delusions mean that Hungary, is in fact, Nazi. Don't get me wrong: it's not about how innocent and pure the government is. It's about how biased the western media is, regardless of what the government does.
The whole of EU used Hungary for their virtue signalling exercise, meanwhile quite content in the knowledge that someone else -that someone they are condemning with the strongest words- are doing their own dirty work. Once the migrant flood rerouted (even though, if they really wanted to keep to the law, they still could have applied for asylum), they themselves started building fences- which, apparently, are not that big of an issue. Only the Hungarian fence hurts these paragons of morality. The ones built before or after are fine. A fence between two EU nations (Slovenia and Austria), does not offend anyone, either. (Oh, but it's not a fence at all... it's a "gate with wings".)
Hypocrisy much?
Three more examples demonstrating the blatant anti-Hungarian bias in the Western Press.
Example number 1.
The recent shift to the Right in The Netherlands filled a lot of people with worries until the election. So what was the reaction? Did we read angry editorials that would shame OId Testament Prophets about the inherent Nazism of the Dutch?
Did we?
Well, not exactly.
We read a couple of lamenting articles on how we need to respect the differences in the EU project, and how not respecting them could lead to a powerful push-back.
So when populism makes way in Western Europe -you know, the civilized folks- then we need to consider the reasons, and gently ponder on the solution. When populism -and not even as extreme as the Dutch- is making way in Central -sorry, Eastern- Europe, then it's those unwashed barbarians are tainting our sacred European project!!
Example number 2.
Gabor Vona, the leader of the actual far right, the Jobbik Party (think of Hungarian Ukip or Tea Party) went to London. Now, you don't have to make facts up to write bad things about this guy. You don't need to lie -there's enough bad things for everyone to choose from. Yet, the BBC did just that. For some reason which I cannot fathom, an ortodox Jewish organization actually demonstrated for him. The BBC simply edited the photos so that the signs were not visible, and then claimed that they were demonstrating against him.
It took a while -and some serious complaints from the group involved- to correct the mistake, but the first iteration of the correction was to simply remove them from the article altogether. Only in the next version did they get back in, with the correct caption this time.
Example number 3.
And then there's when the stars align and you can smear Trump and Hungary at the same time.
We're talking about Sebastian Gorka here. Who is, apparently, a Nazi. Let's just ignore everything about the case that might prove us wrong; we finally can call Trump a Nazi, since he is employing one.
Interestingly, the Jerusalem Post -of all newspapers- came up with a long analysis of the case, doing actual journalism. Journalism, which only required about 30 minutes of google searches, but apparently was not a feasible option for The Independent.
Talking about the JP... you know when foreign and domestic press is writing about Horthy as a rabid Nazi intent on exterminating all Jews? Well...
It is indeed astonishing that aside from modern historians (whose work nobody reads) only the JP came up with a factual description of Horthy. Again; it's not to say he was a blameless saint with a halo; it's about not lying about the past.
This should really tell you something.
Addendum: after an extensive email correspondence with the Independent (because I honestly thought they'd need some information so I shared the JP article with them), this was published. The article is far from coherent, but hey! We can cry Nazi!
Addendum: after an extensive email correspondence with the Independent (because I honestly thought they'd need some information so I shared the JP article with them), this was published. The article is far from coherent, but hey! We can cry Nazi!
