Martin, 32, Czech Republic
What makes me an a European? And how does that show?
The economic and social system and its institution and culture makes me a European. For example, I have regular income, social insurance, rights that are guaranteed by the law, clean and hot water at home, public health care, Sonderkommando photographs regulraly in appearing mind, Frantz Fannon books on a table, and I live a live in a Country with ten Opera Houses. Identity is processual and defined always in relation to the Other. So, rather than to presuppose any essence of a European, we may ask ourselves what king of Otherness we mobilize to define ourselves as European, what sort of people we “employ” to provide us the comfort of feeling European; or what makes us Non-Europeans?
How do I imagine Europe?
I imagine Europe for all, not only for Europeans. I imagine Europe with no borders for common people and with great limits for financial capital, with united European minimal wage and progressive tax system. I imagine Europe without Catholic Church, at least without its official national establishments. In my imagination Crimea is part of Ukraine and Ukraine part of EU. In my imagination, all Nazis, xenophobes and all the Russian army of internet trolls are dressed in pink. This is Europe I want.
One day I get up and there will be again a direct train connection from Prague to Ljublajana and I will spend all day and night in the train travelling from North to the South.
utopias of europe 