sticks and stones... and Neo-Nazis

Yesterday, on our way back from a seminar on ‘Warning Signs of Fundamentalism and Feminist Responses,’ my fellow Women in Black and I attended an anti-fascist rally and march in Novi Sad.

Weeks ago, a collection of neo-Nazi organizations had been given a permit to hold a rally in Novi Sad yesterday (which was Himmler’s birthday). It was later revoked due to a law that prohibits the promotion of ethnic and religious hatred. The groups then vowed to gather without their permit.

Local NGOs thought it was important to stage a counter protest to show that fascism is not welcome in Novi Sad, the main city in Vojvodina, the most ethnically, linguistically, and religiously diverse region of Serbia. I agree with such sentiments and, although I was a bit nervous, thought it was important to participate.

The group I was traveling with arrived a bit late, but quickly found the rest of the Women in Black and picked up banners (Mine read ‘Women in Black against Fascism.’) and Pace rainbow flags. We listened to speeches by representatives of NGOs (including Women in Black’s Marija Perković), professors, and a representative of the local Jewish community before the few thousand of us started to march through the town accompanied by police in full riot gear.

We reached a point where there was a park below street level on the left side of the street, with only a low fence and a row of police officers between the park and the street. A vocal group of fascists was in the park. Since the park was so low and I was on the far side of the street, I didn’t see how many of them there were; I only saw them when they climbed up the fence. Others in the group went to the fence to confront the Nazis. I stayed where I was. Rocks started to fly toward us. A golf ball-sized rock hit me in the shoulder.

I would like to say that this attack didn’t faze me, that I continued to hold my banner and kept marching, but that would be a lie. I dropped my side of the banner and moved further away from the park. My eyes started to well, more from shock, sadness, and lack of sleep than any physical pain. (The rock didn’t even cause a bruise.) My heart was hurting much more than my shoulder; it hurts to think that there are people who think it is permissible to throw stones at (or shoot or bomb, for that matter) people with whom they disagree. This pain grew when rocks, sticks, and bottles starting being thrown into the park as well as from it. I wanted us not to stoop to their level.

I quickly found some familiar faces and tried, in my now especially shaky Serbian, to explain what happened; the tears in my eyes and my hand rubbing my shoulder were much more eloquent than my words. I wanted to sit on the curb, hide behind a car, and weep, but I didn’t. I had Women in Black around me offering hugs, kisses, cookies, and, today, flowers. I stood with a small group far from the fence someone’s arm around me, dodging further projectiles.

After a few more minutes of rocks, accompanied by yelling and possibly the first genuine Hitler salutes I have seen in real life, the police, who had been standing between the two groups the whole time, began to intervene.

L and I walked hand in hand, continuing with the parade route. Later, after we met up with S, the two of them told me, jokingly, ‘Welcome to Serbia,’ and ‘This is normal.’ Even in jest, these words were the most soul-crushing of all. I don’t want to live in a world where such things are normal, where teargas and stones are ordinary responses to peaceful protests, where ideas like fascism and Nazism have an ounce of credibility. I want to live in a world where my heart and soul are not covered in scars and calluses because of the way things are.

Later, N told me, ‘It is time for you to go home.’ At that moment, I wanted nothing more than that, to be home, with family and friends, far from there. It was a selfish impulse; not everyone could escape like that. And it wouldn’t solve anything, except give me some emotional distance, allow me to assume a mentality where I can read about the war in Iraq and the democracy protests in Burma, but not ache for them in the same way I do for rocks thrown at a peaceful protest that I am part of. I know that the situations in Iraq and Burma are much more serious, that many people are dying there. I am doing what I can in my own small ways (Women in Black held a vigil for Burma today.), but still, I feel slightly immoral—or at least without moral consistency—knowing that what happens in those places doesn’t make me want to sit on the curb and cry the same way that a rock thrown by a Nazi does when it hits me in the shoulder.