At the moment, I don’t much like being Hungarian. In recent years I’ve started feeling that my nationality resembles a nasty skin disease that I want to scrub off. When I’m abroad, I hide my accent and I call myself a “world citizen”. I’ve vowed never to have a Hungarian boyfriend, or even to settle down in my own country. I hate the fact that much of the world now believes Hungarians to be intolerant and longing for authoritarianism. Not that long ago we were barely ever mentioned in the international media. Now, we’re a primary example of illiberalism in Europe.
Perhaps what I hate most is the way the Hungarian government tries to define what a “real” Hungarian should be. Orsolya Lehotai, an activist blogger and a high-school friend of mine, puts it this way: the prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has tried to force on us – the younger generation – a vision in which being Hungarian means “white, heterosexual, Christian or at least non-Muslim”. Orsolya likes to say she only comes from Hungary but isn’t Hungarian, because the word has been hijacked. I’ve started doing much the same.
Source : theguardian
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