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DEVIL’S ADVOCATE: “TAKE THEM TO YOUR HOUSE”

ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ (GREEK) TÜRKÇE (TURKISH)

The phrase is typically used by the average troglodyte xenophobic Cypriot, who has more unresolved issues than the drawers of the UN, as an ‘argument’ in almost every discussion on the migration issue, especially online, because that’s where the bogus tough guys feel safer. You see, in real life, they have to gather in packs to attack poor working deliverymen or young girls who are not charmed by their “come with me to get your groove on” [Translator’s note: Lyrics from a humorous song popularised by a Greek film] level pickup lines.

Of course, this phrase is the epitome of stupidity, but then again, we are not talking about MENSA members. Not all idiots are racist, but all racists are idiots. Because you really have to have a brain smaller than a beetle to believe that there is even the slightest fucking possibility in the universe (in this one, I don’t know about the alternatives) that you might be considered superior to other people simply by virtue of the completely random fact that you were born Greek. If you believe such a thing and regularly demonstrate it with your words and actions, then the question is not whether you are an idiot, but exactly how stupid you are. Because stupidity has degrees too.

Let us return to the phrase “take them to your house” or “esso sas” in the Cypriot dialect, a phrase that a mainland Greek may confuse with the well-known oil company. The one who utters it usually means that if we support migrants, we should take them home to get a taste of how sweet it is when they steal from us, rape, and slaughter us, as happened so many times to the family and friends of Charles Bronson’s character in Death Wish which they apparently consider to be the Bible. And at the same time, are they implying that they themselves would be more than happy to put up someone in their house simply because they are Greek Cypriot? Of course not, but I think we’re already past the point where we’re looking for logic in confronting a devotee of “take them to your house”, right?

But let’s follow their thought process, you know, the one that their flawed ‘logic’ gets into. On the one hand we have 20-year-old Yusuf from Pakistan, a deliveryman for a slave-driver company that exclusively exploits employs immigrants and whose owner is a well-known face of the far-right/nationalist movement that often rails against immigrants and refugees. Yusuf works 12 to 16 hours a day in a job that hardly any Greek Cypriot is willing to do in order to earn a salary for which I doubt very much if any native would even get out of bed in the morning. With that money he survives in a country with a high cost of living, most likely crammed in some shack in old Nicosia owned by some stingy Greek Cypriot asking for Upper East Side rent while even transferring money to family back home – if he doesn’t already have one of his own here. On the other hand, we have Greek Cypriot Yiannis, a 22-year-old entitled prick who thinks the whole world owes him something. He hates Yusuf because that’s what his parents, friends, teachers, priests and the kids in black at the fans’ club where he spends most of his day taught him. He doesn’t work because he’s primarily lazy but “foreigners are coming in and taking our jobs” sounds like a more legit excuse. That’s why he thinks a better source of income is robbing Pakistani deliverymen who anyway steal the jobs he doesn’t do and the benefits he’s not entitled to. And he’s not doing it alone. He’s got his buddies from the club with whom he attacks others like a pack. The deliverymen to rob them, random passers-by on the street if they wear the insignia of the wrong team, young girls who dare to turn down such a catch (and if they’re ‘Turkish’ it’s even worse, then they ALSO take it patriotically).

So, which of the two would you put in your house? Or to put it another way, would you put the shitty spoiled brat who robs working people he considers lower caste with a knife or the toxic incels from Ayia Napa who attacked the 25-year-old Turkish Cypriot girl? Would you let them near your children or date your daughter or sister just because they are Greek Cypriot, Christian, white and erm… patriotic? It goes without saying that not all foreigners are like Yusuf, nor are all Greek Cypriots like that asshole Yiannis. These are just examples for those who like to make invalid generalisations by refusing to see the person behind one’s origin, religion or skin colour. Those who prefer to hate without even knowing why. Simply because that’s the way they were taught and they themselves never bothered to look into it.

Personally, I have very strict criteria for who I take home and they have nothing to do with ethnicity or religion. Then again, you can put the man from Ayia Napa in yours, he can marry your daughter too, why not? Don’t let such a catch go to waste. And you can sleep soundly knowing that all that hatred, those complexes, insecurities and nerves will only be saved for foreigners and those of other faiths. There is no way, I suppose, that he will turn… against you.

After all, he’s ‘one of us’, right?

Source: DEVIL’S ADVOCATE: “TAKE THEM TO YOUR HOUSE”

 

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MARINOS NOMIKOS | TO THEMA ONLINE
A journalist for over 20 years, Marinos Nomikos has been a constant thorn in the side of the Establishment, thanks to his sharp humour and insightful social commentary. He has collaborated, among others, with the newspapers Politis, Kathimerini and Phileleftheros, the magazines TV Mania and Down Town, and the radio stations Active, Sfera and Kanali 6. He currently writes for the websites ToThemaOnline and LimassolToday and presents the podcast ‘TV Stories’ by Alpha.

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