The thing comes from afar, specifically from the development of empires throughout all times by their always the same ambition: to create structures of dominance. The constant trend is an impulse toward the globalizing process that must be corrected, because unity cannot be achieved with uniformity, except by using military and economic violence.
Since 1945, walls have acquired an unprecedented presence, from Berlin to Palestine, passing through Cyprus, the plateaus of Kashmir, Korea, or Belfast. When the Cold War ended, it was said that it was time to dismantle many walls. Instead, a new division was born, more inhumane than defensive walls. From the Second World War onwards, they have multiplied and continue to grow, taller and more sinister. From Kosovo, from the gated communities of Egypt or Mexico, not to mention the enormous barrier that separates this country from the United States.
In ancient city-states, the gates were only closed during times of crisis or siege. The Romans and Chinese emperors built great walls, but their intention was not to enclose but to mark the border limits of their empires as an early warning system. The fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) seemed like the beginning of a time of reconciliation. However, that was not the case, continuing in Kashmir, Korea, in Cyprus and between Ethiopia and Eritrea, in addition to those already existing in Ceuta and Melilla which serve as a containment for sub-Saharan immigration, while Morocco has built walls that amount to almost 3,000 kilometers in Sahrawi territory.
Walls like the one that splits Korea in two; another wall between Saudi Arabia and Iraq, the ones that divide India and Pakistan, the walls between Kuwait and Iraq. Today, justice especially cries out from the open-air genocidal prison in the Gaza Strip. To all this, we must add the overcrowding of millions of refugees in Turkey and Greece who were fleeing hunger or war in their territories: Afghans, Pakistanis, Syrians, confined to lamentable situations, despite the status of refugee protected by International Law, while the European Union pays to prevent them from entering the heart –of stone– of Europe.
Everything suggests that if our civilization were to be wrecked, it wouldn’t be so much by external situations, but from within, by the decay to which our incivility would have reached. Something similar happened in the Roman Empire. Donald Trump and his peers are an example of the drift that extends to many other places, disregarding the role of the UN. In the EU, for example…
What to do in the face of such an immoral bankruptcy? Appealing to recompose and apply International Law is essential. But the indifference of those of us who live very well is lethal because it helps those who benefit from this situation. The threat also comes from financial walls and economic tariffs. From the walls of insolidarity protected by indifference while some governments act mercilessly: Italy is the latest example: after the creation in Albania of detention centers, it approves imposing naval blockades on ships of migrants.
They sold us globalization as the process that dismantled all borders, but it hasn’t been that way, leaving justice behind. George Orwell was right imagining in his novel 1984 a totalitarian slogan that occurs today thanks to people like Trump, Netanyahu, or Putin: “War is peace.” But we all see that this doesn’t work because it brings more exclusion. The fear of losing identity and comfort also leads to putting all our faith in walls, using violence. The truth is that none of this is good except for a minority, which opens us up to the hope that another world order is possible. It wouldn’t be the first time.
But it is necessary that the silence of the good ends. Edmund Burke (18th century) wrote: “For evil to triumph, it only needs for good men to do nothing.” Martin Luther King said something similar: I am not as much concerned about the outcry of the violent, of the corrupt, as I am about the silence of the good. Let us think that society is corrupted not so much by the actions of the wicked as by the passivity of the good. And, among others, the “good” are Christians. Let us reflect on our walls of the heart with the Gospel in hand.
Gabriel Mª Otalora
English version translated with AI