By: Mitja Iršič
Slovenes have never liked authority. One of our national symbols is the salt smuggler who defied the Austrian court. Even our fascination with Tito has to be understood through the lens of the communist fantasy of fighting against alleged capitalist repression.
Over the years of independence, we mostly rewarded left‑leaning politicians who were mild and unassertive. The archetype of such a politician was Janez Drnovšek. Any politician whom the street perceived as an “authoritarian” failed miserably in Slovenian society – whether they were authoritarian or not.
Now the street has turned on Robert Golob – and his party – and recognised him as an authoritarian ruler. That the street has come for the party and its great leader carries a kind of poetic justice, since Golob was swept into power by the street, which was dissatisfied with anti‑COVID measures. The “Svoboda – Freedom” in the name Gibanje Svoboda symbolised the promise that the would‑be rulers would abolish all anti‑COVID measures, even if they had to wade through the bodies of COVID‑19 victims. The left used the street’s dissatisfaction, came to power, and – drunk on victory – became authoritarian, truly authoritarian. They “purged” political opponents in the police and on public television, used our money to bribe ideologically left‑leaning private media, completely took over the levers of all three branches of government, squeezed entrepreneurs and individuals with ever‑new taxes, even sent the police to protesters’ homes (something unimaginable under a right‑wing government!) … Things piled up, and Slovenes, both on the right and on the left, began to turn up their noses at Robert Golob’s conduct. Arrogant, condescending leaders have never been liked in Slovenia – such figures always awaken the nation’s subconscious traumas of foreign rulers from the past. The fact that Robert Golob has a habit of lying and misleading, of course, did not help.
Now the street has turned on Robert Golob – and his party – and recognised him as an authoritarian ruler.
In the end, the shift happened precisely where Robert Golob sought his support: on the street. When his (apparently very amateurish) PR team tried to revive the sentiments of the golden COVID days with the now‑famous video of Robert Golob and the burek seller, and the poll underneath asked whether people felt freer than four years ago, people said enough. As many as 95 percent remembered the “purging” of political opponents from institutions and the media, and the insulting of half the political body with the label “fascists.” They remembered waiting in lines for a family doctor and all the money the Golob government took from them by overturning the income‑tax reform, in exchange for nothing. They said they felt less free – and the rest is history. Perhaps the influencer Repić did start rolling the snowball, but the small snowball turned into a huge mass rolling down the hill purely by inertia, while the ministry of truth and the workers’ media tried to stop it with shovels. They have no idea what hit them.
The more the media explained that the party had suffered a terrible foreign cyberattack, the more people became interested. And they looked.
Repić could never have attracted such a crowd to rally around a political goal if there had not been accumulated anger among the people. Influencers “influence” our decisions (or at least try to), but not by convincing us to do something we fundamentally do not want – they influence only by reinforcing what we already believe. If there had been no deep dissatisfaction on the street with the authoritarian spasms and arrogance of the Golob government, the action would have been futile. Anyone who read the comments under articles about the so‑called “cyberattack” could see immediately: this is natural dissatisfaction, not bots, not trolls, not hackers, and not an international cyber conspiracy. The people said enough. And this time, the Slovenian left, rooted in communism, has for the first time since 1988 completely lost the culture war. It has lost the youth.