Jan 23, 2010

Nationalism sucks! Why the 24th January Unification should not be celebrated in Iasi.

at 8:42 PM Labels: , , ,
Alexander John Cuza (or Alexandru Ioan Cuza) was a Moldavian-born Romanian politician who was the first ruler of the United Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia between 1859 and 1866.

On 24th January 1859 Cuza became ruler of Wallachia after he was elected earlied as the ruler of Moldavia. This way Cuza achieved a de facto union of the two principalities. This is known as the "small" unification in Romanian culture. The "big" unification is the one from 1st December 1918 when Transylvania joined the Romanian Kingdom.

Every year in 24th January there are big festivities in Iasi. But there is no reason to celebrate. 1859 represents the beginning of a sad period for Iasi.

Few people know that in Wallachia most of the people wanted the unification, but in Moldavia a lot of people were opposing this unification (Nicolae Istrate, Gheorghe Asachi, Costache Negruzzi etc.). Their most important fears were confirmed by later events. They warned that Iasi might lose its importance as an effect of moving the capital of the newly formed country to Bucharest. They also feared that the entire region of Moldova would be less favored than the Southern part.

Before the events in 1859 Iasi was in many ways more developed than Bucharest. But since then most of the resources were directed towards Bucharest and this city also attracted most of the talents. Over the last 150 years Bucharest had a much faster development and Iasi was neglected.


Nationalism is a notion that can be very attractive at first sight, but most of the times it is deceiving and can lead people to do stupid things. It leads to unnecessary "unifications" and also to other ugly things like wars and ethnic conflicts (see the example of former Yugoslavia).

I would like to think that in 150 years the Romanian society evolved, but I'm sad to see that no big change has happened. Romanian people are still superficial. They are very sensitive to emotions that can manipulate and remain untouched by facts and reason.

There are still people who are willing to "sacrifice their lives" for their country... willing to fight stupid wars out of "nationalism" and "patriotism". There are enough people willing to do stupid things and hurt other humans, just because they believe in the "beautiful lies" of one doctrine or another. After all, Nazism, also known as National Socialism, had at its core nationalistic ideas.
Posted by Cezar

34 comments:

  1. WOW,
    nice way of saying it!
    It's sad and it's true...
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  2. Excuse me, how old are you and what's your nationality? I'm waiting for your answers. And then I'll come back with further commentaries.

    Regards
    Ana
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  3. Hi Ana! Please go ahead with your comments. Does it matter his/her age or nationality?
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  4. Ana,
    It's funny how you hide behind a "Anonymous" label and still you ask for full disclosure from others :P

    Age: Humans are about 200,000 years old
    Nationality: Not relevant. I hope that one day we will all realize that we are "global citizens" :)
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  5. I won't argue with you about nationalism and wars, because it's true that emotions are used to drive people to fight other people.

    If I recall my history lessons in highschool, we were told that a delegation from Moldavia was present at the elections in Bucharest and persuaded them to elect Cuza, sort of a double election.

    You can view Iasi as the place from where it all started. I think those who represented Iasi did not know how to promote the city and its interests to the central authorities in Bucharest. It's still the same situation. There is not enough political will for that. In the end it all comes down to politics.
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  6. There is little, if any, support to your arguments -- just because Nazism has 'National' in its full name, doesn't mean celebrating history is equal to murder. As if I was to blame Obama for giving a speech in Berlin, because, you know who else gave speeches in Berlin? -- Hitler.

    You jump from the history lesson and how Iasi was neglected as a consequence of the unification to how Nationalism is bad and people are willing to die for their country. I find it concerning and you should see a doctor.

    It sounds more like you are jealous on Bucharest for its development, rather than anything else. Perhaps, celebrating this event in Iasi brings some of that attention that you so desperately want -- in any case you should embrace the opportunity and make the most of it.

    Also, people are superficial - as a general rule, Romanian people are not more superficial than others ( btw, this is how the "bad" nationalism starts -- we should be better then everyone else, we are better than everyone else, etc etc )
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  7. It is a superficial article, indeed. It is normal that a capital city has a faster development than the other cities. However, the overall quality of life for people in the region of Moldova increased. It would have been stupid that people of same culture, language and history form separate countries. If the author of this article cannot see the progress in the last 150 years, either he has very poor knowledge of history or, as written also in the previous comment, he should see a doctor (a neurologist, to be more precise).
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  8. So It was a big mistake when Moldova and Wallachia united. I supposed that also the uniting of Ardeal with Roamania was a mistake too, because in Ardeal (in the same logic) is living the "Ardelean" people.
    However a "Unity" in a Soviet Union under Russian rule would be better for all isn't it?
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  9. I think that what's to say is: Moldavians missed the opportunity to benefit out of their agreement for the Union or didn't know how to use it.
    Maybe it was a sad period for Iasi. Maybe we have to recognize also the merits of Asachi or Roznovanu who actively opposed the Union or the merits of the dozens of Moldavians murdered in the streets on April 15th, 1966 while trying to force the exit of Moldavia out of the Union under freshly installed Carol I.
    But I think it would have been worse for the Moldavians without the Union.
    On the other hand isn’t it odd that we are discussing here in English whilst everybody here is a native Romanian speaker? Of course, that way we can address almost everyone on the Internet planet but for what? For promoting our lack of mind, willingness or UNITY?
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  10. You can read a similar Article in "Ziarul de Iasi". Just click the Link. It's in Romanian, but if you so not understand Romanian, you can use Google Translate.

    In many countries there have been unifications in the same period of time (Italy, Germany, etc.).
    For example in Italy Milano is as developed as Rome. Even if Rome is the capital city. In Romania why couldn't we make usre that Bucharest does not steal all the resources?

    The unification from 1918 was also a bad idea. Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, Brasov and other citis also had a lot to suffer because of the centralization. Bucharest stole all the resources from these cities also.
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  11. Well put, Radu Popescu.

    On their own, I believe that Moldova, Tara Romaneasca and Transilvania would have been ripe for the picking by the greater powers after the World Wars (Transilvania was already under foreign rule). Not to mention the tragic scenario of them fighting on different sides in the wars. With a neighbour like Russia, I find it nigh on absurd to claim that Moldova and Iasi would have been better on their own. It takes only to look at the Republic of moldova to get a glimpse of what might have been in store for them.
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  12. Moving from that, I have strong suspicions that this posting is a rip-off of a certain newspaper article dated (surprise, surprise) Jan 23 2010 http://ziaruldeiasi.ro/local/istoria-nespusa-a-zilei-unirii~ni63dr.

    Cezar, please feel free to dismantle my suspicions. I would hate to think that this is yet another proof of the "superficial" nature of Romanians.

    If unable, do credit your sources in the future. It might prevent damage to your reputation and credibility. Espacially when you advertise your postings to an entire LinkedIn group.
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  13. Cristian TeodosiuJan 24, 2010 03:32 AM
    Excellent post. You are right. No Moldavian should celebrate the Unification. All the agreements with Bucharest were broken down, Bucharest regimes didn't respect their promises. They never paid the money compensation they promised to Iassy, they stopped doing national investments replica after 1925, they changed the basic Union rule that we should have Moldavian king as Romanian ruler, now they are doing the same in Orthodox Church.
    In fact they behaved as occupation regime after the First World War and steel all Jassy's resources to South. Our taxes never come back, we don't expect a highway, an International Airport and generally speaking any major investment. And there is our money. The same is happening with Moldavia with a bigger scale. The people who can not see this are brained wash or from Secret Police. That's a reality! In facts and money figures. And as much Bucharest will rule Jassy as much we'll become a "border city" (by the way, they didn’t know we are a border city by Unification, peripheral in our society and the poverty will increase. If somebody has other opinions please come with facts. I'm full of your emotions and propaganda.
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  14. I really don't like the argumentation in this article, or of the similar one from "Ziarul de Iasi". Who can really tell for sure what would have happened if the Union never happened? Cezar's opinion is that if the Union wouldn't have happened then Iasi would have remained the capital of Moldova and this would have been a really great thing for the people in Iasi. What about the two world wars? What about the Russian influence? There are so many factors that could have made the situation of Iasi a lot worse than it currently is.

    Also the two articles are very one-sided and focus only on the situation of Iasi compared to the other Romanian cities, in particular Bucharest. Would if have been better if Iasi would have remained more developed than Bucharest, but, at the same time, Moldova would have been occupied by the Russians, Walachia by the Turks and Transilvania stayed under Hungarian rule? Would this situation have been better for Iasi in absolute terms?
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  15. There is a big difference between being nationalist, being patriotic, etc and being proud of and loving your own city (why else are on this group?) and your country/roots, etc - not at anyone's expense or discrimination.
    Loving my mother does not mean i hate my neighbour.
    Clearly Iasi lost to Bucharest after 1859 and as a proud son of the city ;-) I would have preferred a more balanced outcome...
    One thing to consider however is that our future in a different history may not be so clear (i.e. in absence of the union).
    Perhaps we would be a Chisinau-like city in a former Soviet republic...Unclear what our destiny would have been. Perhaps Bucharest might have been even worse - but this should not make us happy...
    In reverse, if we were to become the capital, Bucharest may have been in our posture, and - even if they were perhaps slightly smaller, and younger city, they would have had now a similar grief...and we only sympathetic with our grief...
    A union is made with sacrifices (and i believe a marriage too :-)
    You gain some, you loose some...
    People around the world commonly cluster around common roots and language - this is not an artificial union. Morevover a union of Republic of Moldova with Romania would not be artificial, but natural. We in Iasi should be most happy to have our relatives join us...I am not making any comment of being timely, economically advantageous, etc, etc. only that would be 'natural' ;-)

    Finally, I strongly believe that the secret for Iasi is not to languish and live in its glorius past but to impose iself and rebuild itself as a modern European capital. Forget the competition with Bucharest - we can compete within Europe, bring European funds, engage in international projects, use local diaspora for progress, investment, etc. Networks such as this can be of tremendous help and in this context of Cezar's initiative si a laudable step (and i commend him for this although I belive his article today may not be the most inspired;-) I understand his reasons, yet I prefer my interpretation of the things :-)
    Let's stop lamenting and build the future!
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  16. Well said, Anonymous!

    Cristian Teodosiu, nobody here has argued against the fact that Moldova and Iasi have been (and perhaps still are) orphaned of state money and investment. We're simply arguing that in the absence of the Union it may have been much worse due to external factors.
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  17. I did not read the article in Ziarul de Iasi before posting this. It was also brought to my attention in a comment on Facebook.
    It can only make me happy to see other people who are not blinded by the "dogmatic" view on history that was promoted in Romania.
    Cosmin PASCA deserves my congratulations. His article is quite interesting.
    But I wrote my post without reading his article.
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  18. You know what's the problem for a lot of people in Moldova? They are cowards! They are afraid that they cannot make it alone. They need some one to blame for their failures. They are afraid of doing things alone.
    And it's the same in Republic of Moldova. A lot of people are afraid to start rebuilding their country. They think that unification with Romania will sole all their problems.
    Let's forget about history. Let me ask you one thing. Today, would you like regional/local autonomy for Moldova and for Iasi?
    Courageous people would say YES! Courageous people would like to have control aver their future.
    And there are a lot of brave and courageous people in Moldova and in Iasi. And they could do amazing things!
    But there are a lot of cowards that are afraid of this. They want the "protection" of Bucharest.
    I think that this is something that is close to the Stockholm syndrome where the victim falls in love with it's kidnapper.
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  19. Go fuck yourselves Soldoveni imputiti
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  20. I totally agree with u. I live in Bucharest and nothing will make me happier then a sesession movement that will re-establish the pre-1859 situation in these teritorries.

    I am so tired of heareing people like you or those poor bastards in Cluj complaining about Bucharest.

    As far as i'm concerned they should impose a drastic visa-regime for anyone that comes from the region of Moldova. Or from Transsylvania for that matter :)

    I wish u good luck! Sincerely!
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  22. Cred ca toata lumea care a scris aici, articol sau comentariu, a luat-o pe aratura.
    Cred ca noi romanii, indiferent din ce zona ne tragem, avem un mare talent in a inventa probleme, chiar si atunci cand avem prea multe. Ne inchipuim cumva prea mult.

    O moldoveanca care traieste in Bucuresti.


    PS. mai comentati cumva si de ce au umplut moldovenii bucurestiul? asta imi place cel mai mult....

    PS2: daca nu intelegeti cumva ce am scris va rog folositi Google translate
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  23. If you really want to change something in your region, you should stop complaining about how the history has betrayed you and start _doing_.

    Strategy is about creating an advantageous position, and so far I haven't seen any evidence of that. The only thing that clearly transpires from the article and comments is the utter xenophobe attitude. If you really want to have any chance of success, trying to solve problems rather than pointing fingers is a much better route to take.

    My advice is if you want your region to have a more important role, then make your local leaders accountable. And I don't mean that by thrash talking them in press/wall posters. I mean, go to public meetings, ask them about progress; when election times comes around, ask them what have they done and what are they going to do ( and btw, having a new street, or changing the landscape of the city -- it is nothing in the big picture -- a better question is how are they going to bring more resources to the city/region ). Have them think about the region rather than the city, etc. And when everything fails, and you cannot convince them, run against them at the polls. So what if you have no chances of winning ? Just offering a fresh new alternative is often good enough to have people reconsider their position.

    And drop the HATE. There is nothing good that's going to come out of that . Think about it, you want your region to flourish and let's say that it will, then people from other places are going to come ( as everyone wants better for themselves ) -- what are you going to do then ?
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  24. I like to quote one of the final comments from the article on ziaruldeiasi.ro:
    "Nobody can deny that we are all brothers: Moldavian, Wallachian, Transylvanian, etc.. but the brothers have also the right to personality, not to impose only one "more badass". "
    I think Cezar dindn't think to nationalism as an extreme point of view. Besides, he condemned nationalism, identifying it with National Socialism = Nazi.
    Maybe the right to personality, to self-determination can be viewed as a demand in front of extreme centralization that ignore the past and the good of the other.
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  25. I would like to say one thing...the poster of this article is a selfish person and if there are more like you, you should be ashame and crawl under a rock. I am a romanian born in the regional area of Moldova. I studied in Iasi and i am going to say that the city is never going to develop with complaining people like you. Do you have any idea how many Romanians died to have this Unity ? Do you know how many wars our ancestors had fight to get a chance at a unity and so that you people are able to speak this language and live a normal life? And i am going to tell you one other thing ... Iasi is not the whole Romania and your opinion is not that of all Romanians and Iasi is never going to go anywhere with people like you who insted of doing something to make the place the live better they complain that history didn't go the way they wanted.
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  26. Cezar, ce sa zic ? "You did it again !", ca sa folosesc singura limba pe care se pare ca o intelegi. Nu o sa stau sa iti explic de esti "esti wrong", ca oricum nu o sa intelegi. Hai salut!
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  27. Cristian Teodosiu, as far as I know the airport in Iasi is international. There are flights between Vienna and Iasi, and from Iasi to the ouring capitals, Chisinau, Kiev, Budapest.
    Oh, maybe you're referring to the fact that there are no flights from Paris, Munich, or Berlin or other large cities to Iasi. I think it has to do with the runway, it's to short for the planes of the airlines who might consider operating on the Iasi Airport. However, this is a problem of local investment. Or you expect Bucharest to come and do it ? First of all it's not their interest, it's Iasi interest. You need to see things for what they are: everybody fights for their own interest. When the interests of the two sides converge, then they work together. It's as simple as that. And it's been like that since people are on Earth.

    I think Cuza was moldavian, he was the mayor of Galati for some time before the election. And a significant number of the members of the new government were moldavians. Setting the capital in Bucharest was compromise they reached to get the unification done, giving the geopolitical situation at that time.
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  28. Though I don't agree with the general tone of this article, I also feel the need to correct Adina's last comment: the modernization of the airport in Iasi is not a matter that can be handled only by the local authorities, it involves the central authorities as well. And to sustain my idea I would remind you that on Jan 14, 2010 the Romanian Parliament has rejected (again!) the allocation of funds for the project regarding the modernization of the airport. (http://www.evenimentul.ro/articol/aeroport-la-anu.html). And without the airport, I don't really see a strategy for the development of this city.

    Regards,
    Daniel
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  29. The celebration of the unification is actually related to Romanian history and not really to nationalism.
    Well, there are many people in Republic in Moldova or Russia who try to convince us about the existence of moldavian language, separate moldavian history and other soviet theories. And they will agree with you that we should not celebrate the unification in Jassy. But the majority of Romanians know that we all speak the same language and we all need to celebrate the time when Romanian state was born (no matter what's the capital of the country).
    Each country celebrate important moments of its history... and Romania should make no difference.

    Ciprian
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  30. Based on the information from other Cezar's posts and the link to facebook - support Moldova, I think that Cezar was born or has strong ties with Republic of Moldova.
    And as long as there are many people from republic of Moldova who listen to comunist propaganda over there, no wonder that we see this kind of posting.
    Let's not forget April 7th, 2009 and the people who died or were tortured by moldovan comunist regime... Let's not forget that we share the same language, culture and history on both sides of Prut river...
    The majority of people born in Jassy strongly belive that we really need to celebrate January 24th.
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  31. Ciprian,
    Don't ass-u-me :P

    Cezar was born in Oradea.
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  32. One Q: Would you have liked Iasi to be the same as Bucharest is right now? I mean messy, over-populated, over-polluted, corrupted(here we get close), poorly managed, sad, gray (I can come up with more). My opinion is we(Iasi citizens) should stop complaining that we lost the development train because all the money went to Bucharest (and Bacau for that fact). We should become more autonomous, and not begging for attention. If we (and I mean especially the mayors) would be more hard-working ("gospodari")) than we wouldn't even have this discussion.


    P.S. And why English?
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    Va multumesc ,

    Tudor
    ReplyDelete
  34. VA felicit PE TOTI unul MAI INCREZUT decât altul
    ASA SUNT ROMANI!
    ReplyDelete

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