{"id":1231,"date":"2014-09-24T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-09-24T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/%20rroma.org\/24-09-2014-vom-odenwald-one-sided-praise-of-zoltan-balogs-rroma-policy\/"},"modified":"2022-08-04T11:42:05","modified_gmt":"2022-08-04T10:42:05","slug":"24-09-2014-vom-odenwald-one-sided-praise-of-zoltan-balogs-rroma-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rroma.org\/fr\/24-09-2014-vom-odenwald-one-sided-praise-of-zoltan-balogs-rroma-policy\/","title":{"rendered":"24.09.2014 Vom Odenwald: one-sided praise of Zoltan Balog\u2019s Rroma policy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In his article for the Budapester \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tZeitung, Herrolt vom Odenwald (2014) criticises the Austrian writer Erich Hackl\u2019s \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tquestioning analysis of Zoltan Balog\u2019s policy. In his article \u201cHow to plough \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthe sea?\u201d Hackl (2014) criticised that Zoltan Balog denied that Rroma from \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tHungary were deported from Hungary to Germany during the Holocaust. This misinterpretation \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tof history is totally inappropriate, so Hackl, and was criticised by many other \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tnewspapers. The Hungarian Rroma press centre reacted immediately with the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpublication of reports by Holocaust survivors. Rroma were deported with the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\thelp of Hungarian authorities to Nazi Germany, this is beyond debate. However, the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tcriticism of Balog\u2019s statement only takes a marginal role in Hackl\u2019s text. The \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpredominant part of the article deals with the struggle of the Rroma writer \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMarika Schmiedtberger and the Rroma activists Rudolf Sark\u00f6zi against the oblivion \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tof past atrocities. However, vom Odenwald sees this differently: from his \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tperspective, Hackl\u2019s entire article is a systematic discrediting of Balog, in \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\twhich all positive achievements of the politician are deliberately hidden. And \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tyet, he himself does exactly what he accuses the Austrian author of doing; he interprets \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\this text in an extremely one-sided way: \u201cthe \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(upper) Austrian writer Erich Hackl just got lost in Hungarian politics, and from \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tmuch that he believed to have to comment on, he negated reality. This concerns \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tfirst and foremost the situation of the largest ethnic minority in the country, \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tnamely the Gypsies. I prefer this terminology to the consistently used term \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u201cRoma and Sinti\u201d by solicitously politically correct (PC) media. […] Hackl \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\thowever applied total poetic freedom in his article \u201cHow to plough the sea?\u201d, for \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthe (more left positioned) weekend supplement \u201cSpectrum\u201d of the \u201cbourgeois\u201d \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAustrian daily newspaper \u201cDie Presse\u201d, and was not concerned with \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tethno-linguistic subtleties from comparative linguistics. He and his publishing \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tmedium were in fact primarily concerned with denouncing the alleged \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tdisgraceful, racist politics of Hungary towards the Gypsies, especially under its \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPrime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n. And, according to the popular saying \u201cbeat the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tsack, but mean the donkey\u201d, do verbal bashing against Zolt\u00e1n Balog, the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tminister largely responsible for integration and the Gypsies.\u201d<\/em> Odenwald\u2019s statement \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthat the term \u201cGypsy\u201d is politically unproblematic is wrong. Rather, it would \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tbe correct to say that there is no consensus on the context in which the use of \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthe term is appropriate. Many Rroma reject the concept because of its negative \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tconnotation. The criticism that Erich Hackl one-sidedly criticises Balog is \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\talso wrong. Balog has repeatedly attracted attention for his ill-considered and \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tindiscriminate remarks about Rroma: for instance, in the Hungarian radio \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tstation L\u00e1nch\u00eddr\u00e1di\u00f3<\/em> he called the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRroma \u201cunworthy poor\u201d, because they actually were healthy and fit for work, but \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tstill burden the state as recipients of social benefits (Pusztaranger 2014). \u00adIf \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tone makes incautious remarks, one must be able to tolerate criticism. Odenwald \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthen continues to enumerate extensively what Zoltan Balog has done for the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRroma: thanks to Balog\u2019s effort, the \u201chistory and culture of the Roma\u201d is now \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpart of the national curriculum in the upper year education. Moreover, the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tminister for human resources champions a better economic integration of the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tminority. Nobody discredits these efforts. However, the extreme sensitivity of \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tsupporters of the incumbent Orban government to critique reveals that they want \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tto suppress legitimate criticism themselves. Otherwise, they would not react as \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tfiercely and emotionally to questioning or analysing comments. Pr\u00f6hles Gergely \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(2014) response to Erich Hackl\u2019s article also belongs to this category.<\/p>\n