The data indicate: Our society is ill from racism Emil COHEN Where did the political coalition ·Attack” come from? Politicians and journalists, analysts and their listeners/viewers, people who read newspapers and those who scorn the ‘yellow press’, fans and critics of talk show host Slavi Trifonov are all asking themselves this question. The shock caused by the emergence of ·Attack” is comparable only to the surprise of hypocritical parents who discover one day that their virtuous daughter (‘But how is it possible? She is still a virgin!’) has become pregnant and is having the child. It goes without saying that there can hardly be a simple answer to the question where this shocking movement originated from. It will require a lot of thought and empirical data, some of which future studies will have to provide. But the hidden premise contained in most analyses is the idea of ·immaculate conception”, of emergence ·from nowhere” of nothing short of a miracle, which Volen Siderov created in just two months, and in a state of media isolation, no less. Analysis of the data from the sociological survey1 that the BHC conducted with the assistance of BBSS Gallup just a month before the elections may bring us a bit closer to solving the mystery of the origins of ·Attack”. We cannot state exactly who the supporters of Siderov’s formation are. We will learn that from post-election studies, which have yet to be conducted. But our data can provide a sketch of who the most likely voters for ·Attack” were, and may provide a portrait of the type of person who would be the most inclined to support the ·attacking” coalition. WIDESPREAD RACIST ATTITUDES Our first approximation of the answer we seek may be formulated thus: racist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic prejudices and stereotypes are widespread amongst the so1 ·Interethnic Attitudes, Social Distances and Value Orientations. Nationwide Representative Survey of Bulgarians Aged 18-70”, conducted by BBSS Gallup by request of BHC. The authors of the study were: Dr. Krassimir Kanev, Emil Cohen and Zhivko Georgiev. Interviews were conducted with 1,112 people. They were questioned about their opinions and attitudes on a wide range of issues, with a focus on the status of interethnic attitudes, stereotypes and social distances, as well as their attitudes towards religion, religious rights and religious pluralism. This article will highlight just a few of the aspects of the interethnic attitudes of the majority group towards minorities.
called ·ethnic Bulgarians”. In our society there is a group that constitutes about 1/5 of the population whose attitude is so anti-Gypsy and anti-Turk (and to a lesser degree, anti-Jew), that they don’t even recognise the right of these people to live in the same country with the ·pure Bulgarians”. On the other hand, negative attitudes towards minorities, and especially towards the Roma and the Turks, are relatively evenly spread throughout different age and social groups and education levels. This means that we are dealing with deeply rooted prejudices, carried over (intentionally or unintentionally) from the entire child-rearing and educational system. These people, and there are hundreds of thousands of them, are the soil out of which ·Attack” sprouted. The messages coming from Volen Siderov and company found their echo amongst the most extreme holders of xenophobic attitudes, amongst those whose stereotypes and prejudices are the deepest and the strongest. All of a sudden, in the face of the candidate for new Bulgarian saviour - Siderov - these people found a herald to voice their deeply hidden thoughts.2 Because, you will agree that in a liberal society it is somehow unsavoury to publicly display your hatred towards Turks, Jews, Gypsies or generally towards any ·undesirable others”. But it is allowed in the sermons preached on SKAT television. And at ·Attack” rallies, you are perfectly free, surrounded by a crowd of like-minded people, to vent your hatred towards ·those minorities”... and afterwards to vote for the coalition. This does not in the least obviate the fact that a large part of those who voted for ·Attack” were making an expression of protest, against poverty, against political corruption, against street crime, against the scissors being opened on their incomes, against that which they perceive as the inability of politicians to help them get their lives in order. It would be foolish to claim otherwise. It would also be unreasonable to deny the fact that some of the coalition’s demands, if they are accepted, would increase the level of democracy in the country; for example, the holding of more referenda or the implementation of a ·clean hands” anticorruption campaign. 2 Lately, Internet forums abound in discussions about ·Attack”. Here is one opinion I found after I had formulated the thesis that Volen Siderov had set loose longstanding attitudes, let them out in the open, and made it acceptable to voice them: ·The success of ‘Attack’ doesn’t come from anywhere else than the fact that they behave like strong men. Nobody likes the mangali [derogatory term for Roma people], everyone thinks they should be ‘neutralised’, but nobody’s doing anything about it, they just keep watching them reproduce. Then suddenly, along comes this guy to the tune of a Wagner melody and says ‘let’s wipe them out’ and you think, ‘that’s easy, all I have to do is put a check in the little box, and I’ve solved the problem!” It could hardly be put any clearer.