Sima B. Moussavian's Blog, page 2
March 28, 2022
The message
Meet David: The man who holds the fate of the world in his hands.
Tomorrow Death died out (audiobook), Episode 0: Prologue
Imagine you received a message from the future that tells you exactly this...
Prologue
Listen to a message from the future
March 27, 2022
Z like Zorro
The inevitable has happened:
I am in jail. (1)
To my mother, it was clear early on that this was where I was headed. For drugs, fights, robbery, mainly just for being stupid , she would have put it. What can I say? She was right, after all. My cell clicked closed today for something stupid, which is kind of disappointing, since I used to think if I was ever going to end up here, it would be for something memorable, lifechanging, relevant. Definitely for something better than a Z on a blue shirt, all over which I spilled red tomato sauce and white mayonnaise this morning.
You heard that right: what I was jailed three years for is a dirty, blue, kind of loose shirt, and looking at it right now, I cannot shake the feeling that the Z on it actually stands for Zero. That is not what it is supposed to mean, according to the people of the shop I bought it in. They said the meaning would be crystal clear to everyone at first glance:
Z like Zorro
It is a symbol for the fight against injustice, so they assured. Needless to say that I've been lied to. The Bavarian Department of Justice, at least, strongly disagreed with them and accused me of supporting injustice under international law. Huh? Confusion would be an understatement for what I felt.
"Injustice?" I asked, "What about it is injustice?"
After this, I heard my handcuffs click, and that was it for me.
"Outrageous to ask this question," they attacked me. "Anyone who cannot understand the injustice of it this matter is clearly a terrorist."
Being called a terrorist for wearing a misread Z and, no, they didn't misread it for a 3, like it would happen usually.
"But is it not my constitutional right to dress whichever way I like?"
When I asked exactly this, their eyes ripped me apart.
"Constitutional rights are our highest property," they said, "we honour the constitution. But constitutional law ends where criminal law begins." (2)
I let it sink in for a moment. A bad decision, because it got me thinking. About all the things they criminalize. They'd criminalized meeting up with more than five people because they could end up making you sick. They'd criminalized going out to places without a vaccination cert, criminalized walking public spaces without a mask, criminalized wearing Zs (3) because they could be misread as statements of support for the Russian war, and now I was being ostracized for asking a simple question: why?
No, I don't support any sort of war. No, I don't support autocracy, but neither can I bring myself to support a sham democracy. Maybe, in the end, I wasn't actually jailed for something stupid. Not so much for the violation of an arbitrarily introduced new law, but for my own fight against injustice.
Zorro would be proud.
- editor's notes-
(1) fictional story
(2). literal quote Bavarian Justice Department, 26.03.2022
(3) actual new law in parts of Germany as of March 2022
I am in jail. (1)
To my mother, it was clear early on that this was where I was headed. For drugs, fights, robbery, mainly just for being stupid , she would have put it. What can I say? She was right, after all. My cell clicked closed today for something stupid, which is kind of disappointing, since I used to think if I was ever going to end up here, it would be for something memorable, lifechanging, relevant. Definitely for something better than a Z on a blue shirt, all over which I spilled red tomato sauce and white mayonnaise this morning.
You heard that right: what I was jailed three years for is a dirty, blue, kind of loose shirt, and looking at it right now, I cannot shake the feeling that the Z on it actually stands for Zero. That is not what it is supposed to mean, according to the people of the shop I bought it in. They said the meaning would be crystal clear to everyone at first glance:
Z like Zorro
It is a symbol for the fight against injustice, so they assured. Needless to say that I've been lied to. The Bavarian Department of Justice, at least, strongly disagreed with them and accused me of supporting injustice under international law. Huh? Confusion would be an understatement for what I felt.
"Injustice?" I asked, "What about it is injustice?"
After this, I heard my handcuffs click, and that was it for me.
"Outrageous to ask this question," they attacked me. "Anyone who cannot understand the injustice of it this matter is clearly a terrorist."
Being called a terrorist for wearing a misread Z and, no, they didn't misread it for a 3, like it would happen usually.
"But is it not my constitutional right to dress whichever way I like?"
When I asked exactly this, their eyes ripped me apart.
"Constitutional rights are our highest property," they said, "we honour the constitution. But constitutional law ends where criminal law begins." (2)
I let it sink in for a moment. A bad decision, because it got me thinking. About all the things they criminalize. They'd criminalized meeting up with more than five people because they could end up making you sick. They'd criminalized going out to places without a vaccination cert, criminalized walking public spaces without a mask, criminalized wearing Zs (3) because they could be misread as statements of support for the Russian war, and now I was being ostracized for asking a simple question: why?
No, I don't support any sort of war. No, I don't support autocracy, but neither can I bring myself to support a sham democracy. Maybe, in the end, I wasn't actually jailed for something stupid. Not so much for the violation of an arbitrarily introduced new law, but for my own fight against injustice.
Zorro would be proud.
- editor's notes-
(1) fictional story
(2). literal quote Bavarian Justice Department, 26.03.2022
(3) actual new law in parts of Germany as of March 2022
March 25, 2022
Boycotting the boycott
I turned off the TV news and read Tolstoy today. In Russian. Out loud. With a glass of Moskovskaya in my hand, because without a good sip of a 40 % originally Russian vodka, no one will ever understand him.
Halfway through his novel, I felt freezing cold, and decided - maybe inspired by his War and Peace - to not fucking freeze for freedom any longer, even though they've been trying to convince me that by doing so I could stop the war.
Fuck it, I thought, if I freaking freeze to death nobody will even understand what I've given my life for, and certainly my end won't be ending any war.
Even with gas straight from hell, I would have turned up me heater today, snuggled up to Tolstoy’s words today, gotten wasted with originally Russian vodka today, fallen out with my Ukrainian neighbours today, when they claimed they had better borscht than the Russians, flushed Lvivske down the toilet today, since it has ever only given me headaches, and: you know what? I don't even feel guilty.
I expected the guards to take me in, my boss to throw me out, my father to beat me up, my grandma to take me out of her will, the devil to take me into his arms, God to hit me with a lightning bolt, but none of it actually happened – quite frankly, nobody really cared. Because they don’t really care, the people: not even the clever clogs, who are constantly acting the big shot. They only want to feel like they’re doing something important, know what’s important, are someone important. They only want to feel better: than before, than the others, than the Russians, than me, who decided consciously I’m not better than any of them. and they are not better than me, even though - as of today - I boycott the boycott!
“And how will you explain this to your children and grandchildren someday?”
Asked exactly this, I will answer like a lawyer would: with a counterquestion.
How in all the world will you?
How will you explain the discrimination against everything Russian in favour of every little Ukrainian thing? How will you explain your acceptance of a right-wing ambassador who visits German Nazi graves and has been known for praising them? How will you explain that you simply had neither an interest in nor a clue about Eastern European history, and only blindly trusted whatever you were being told? How will you explain using the verbiage solidarity to cover up your own discriminatory tendencies? And, maybe most importantly:
How will you explain that, doing all of this, you still felt better than, still felt superior to everyone else?
As for me, I'm sitting here, warm through Russian gas, wasted thanks to Russian vodka, reading Russian literature in Russian, while I am expecting Russian friends who are still the same people as they've always been, and I am - just like all the years before - still proud to be one of them.
Halfway through his novel, I felt freezing cold, and decided - maybe inspired by his War and Peace - to not fucking freeze for freedom any longer, even though they've been trying to convince me that by doing so I could stop the war.
Fuck it, I thought, if I freaking freeze to death nobody will even understand what I've given my life for, and certainly my end won't be ending any war.
Even with gas straight from hell, I would have turned up me heater today, snuggled up to Tolstoy’s words today, gotten wasted with originally Russian vodka today, fallen out with my Ukrainian neighbours today, when they claimed they had better borscht than the Russians, flushed Lvivske down the toilet today, since it has ever only given me headaches, and: you know what? I don't even feel guilty.
I expected the guards to take me in, my boss to throw me out, my father to beat me up, my grandma to take me out of her will, the devil to take me into his arms, God to hit me with a lightning bolt, but none of it actually happened – quite frankly, nobody really cared. Because they don’t really care, the people: not even the clever clogs, who are constantly acting the big shot. They only want to feel like they’re doing something important, know what’s important, are someone important. They only want to feel better: than before, than the others, than the Russians, than me, who decided consciously I’m not better than any of them. and they are not better than me, even though - as of today - I boycott the boycott!
“And how will you explain this to your children and grandchildren someday?”
Asked exactly this, I will answer like a lawyer would: with a counterquestion.
How in all the world will you?
How will you explain the discrimination against everything Russian in favour of every little Ukrainian thing? How will you explain your acceptance of a right-wing ambassador who visits German Nazi graves and has been known for praising them? How will you explain that you simply had neither an interest in nor a clue about Eastern European history, and only blindly trusted whatever you were being told? How will you explain using the verbiage solidarity to cover up your own discriminatory tendencies? And, maybe most importantly:
How will you explain that, doing all of this, you still felt better than, still felt superior to everyone else?
As for me, I'm sitting here, warm through Russian gas, wasted thanks to Russian vodka, reading Russian literature in Russian, while I am expecting Russian friends who are still the same people as they've always been, and I am - just like all the years before - still proud to be one of them.
