Western cultural elites despise Hungary because it
refuses to play by their political rules.
If you
listen to the Western media, you might think that in the weeks following the
outbreak of Covid-19 the government of Hungary had transformed itself into a
brutal dictatorship. There was a constant stream of articles claiming that
democracy had died in Hungary. Opinion pieces insisted that the Hungarian
government had exploited people’s concerns about the pandemic to impose a
1930s-style authoritarian dictatorship.
The Covid pandemic has reinvigorated the
Culture Wars in various different ways. And these alarmist accounts of
democratic backsliding in Hungary were a key theme in these Culture Wars. On
the anti-sovereigntist wing of the cultural conflict, Hungary was held up as
symbolic of an ideology of evil.
In early
May, the mistakenly titled US-based advocacy group Freedom House offered
up an obituary on Hungarian democracy.
In a report it asserted that, because of the emergency laws it passed in
relation to Covid-19, Hungary should not be considered a democracy anymore.
Given Freedom House’s longstanding hostility to the Hungarian government, its
verdict was hardly surprising. The problem was that this verdict was
uncritically repeated in the media. At times it seemed that almost the entire
Western media were ganging up against this supposed new dictatorship.
The
Economist responded to Hungary’s enactment of a state of emergency
by claiming that
Viktor Orban, the prime minister, ‘has in effect become a dictator – in the
heart of Europe’. The Guardiandeclared that the
‘world must not let Hungary get away with this power grab’. Writing in
the EUobserver, Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human
Rights Watch, claimed that
Hungary was now a dictatorship and therefore the EU had ceased to be a bloc of
democratic states.
Writing in
the Daily Telegraph, Ben Kelly ranted that ‘if the
EU cannot rein in Hungary’s dictator Viktor Orban, it will rot from the
inside’.
According
to the narrative, Hungary’s enactment of emergency measures meant that the
normal process of parliamentary democracy had disappeared forever. It is worth noting that other
governments that enacted emergency powers in response to the Covid pandemic
were not accused of such malevolent intent. Why was Hungary held to a different
standard? The answer was devastatingly simple. ‘Orban cannot be trusted’,
Western observers implied. It was really another way of saying: ‘We don’t like
him.’
Strikingly,
these opinions did not change when, in late April, Die Weltreported that legal
experts in the European Commission had said that they saw no reason to act
against the supposedly authoritarian powers the Hungarian parliament granted to
the Hungarian government. Inconvenient truths about Hungary are always met with
a wall of silence in most of the Western press. If, on the other hand, these
experts had said the opposite, there would have been wall-to-wall opinion
articles praising their judgment and condemning Hungary.
And now
there has been a development. This week, the Hungarian government initiated
procedures to end the state of emergency. It will end on 20
June. This means Hungary has acted more speedily than many other governments to
bring to a close its Covid measures. Will those who spread the idea that
Hungary had become a dictatorship acknowledge that they were wrong? Will they
apologise for their slanderous statements about Hungary? Don’t hold your
breath. It really doesn’t matter what the Hungarian government does; its
adversaries in the West will always portray it as a dangerous dictatorship
threatening European values.
No
doubt, some might argue that Hungary is rescinding these laws precisely because
of the international pressure they put on it. But of course, supposedly
authoritarian dictatorships are not known for giving up their powers just
because of some criticism in the foreign press. ‘Hungary still isn’t a
democracy’, others will no doubt cry. In which case, why did it need the
emergency powers in the first place? Why didn’t it just carry on being the
dictatorship it already was, in the Hungary-haters’ eyes?
In the current Culture Wars, Hungary has become a
kind of lightning rod through which the negative sentiments of the Western
cultural establishment – especially their anti-sovereigntist views – can be
expressed. Throughout most of Europe and the Anglo-American world, the hegemony
of the cultural elite remains intact. It is rarely questioned. Though millions
of people resent the values of these elites, very few have the voice or the
courage openly to question them. When they do – for example, in the vote for Brexit – they are bombarded with immense
pressure to shut up and know their place. That is the case even in Trump’s
America, where millions feel they have to mind what they say.
In
Hungary, support for the Hollywood, Netflix, Big Tech globalist value system is
quite weak. Of course, given its broad influence, the global media does have
some influence in Hungary. But it is not hegemonic. Consequently, the people
and their representatives are able to express opinions and values that are
vilified in many parts of the Western world. In the eyes of the Western media,
the refusal of the Hungarian government to accept the moral authority of the
leaders of the EU or of the Hollywood woke consensus is a kind of cultural
heresy. Like the Stalinist heresy-hunters of the 20th century, the globalist
culture warriors will use everything in their power to humiliate their
opponents and force them to fall in line with the ‘right’ way of thinking.
The cultural elites’ obsession with
Hungary is not entirely about Hungary. Whenever a British, German or American
newspaper editor or observer denounces the ‘dictatorship’ in Hungary, they are
also indirectly attacking movements and politicians in their own countries who
oppose the prevailing cultural norms. That is why those of us who supported
Brexit in the UK, and who call for the valuation of national sovereignty in
countries around the world, have a real interest in supporting Hungary against
its Western detractors.
Frank Furedi’s How Fear Works: The Culture of Fear
in the Twenty-First Century is published by Bloomsbury
Press.