The unbreakable bubble

I feel threat. Palpable threat, sadness and helplessness. I felt it the night the attacks in Paris happened, and I feel it today that the attacks in Tunisia have been carried out. I have always been a believer in democracy, in progress and in the possibility of solving problems through dialog. I have grown up ignoring what it is to feel your life at stake. During my childhood and teenage years, I was too innocent, thinking that war was something that either happened in a distant past or in far away countries. I somehow thought that democracies were impermeable to the threats of the outside world, that we could be safe in our comfortable bubble, home.

I remember how, at school, a nun used to tell us how lucky we were to have been born in a country like Spain, because other children did not have the same luck. No. Other children had been born in places were they could not be sure if they would be alive the next day. Other children, they told me, had to face not only hunger, but the possibility of being abducted by those "evil guys" who would dress them in military uniforms and show them how to kill another human being. So yes, I was thankful that I was here, not there, not because I deserved it, but by mere chance.
 

And now? Now I am seeing how these "evil people from far away" are continuously cracking the walls from our democratic bubble, not only from the outside, which would be easier to stop, but from the inside as well. I see how Tunisia, the only successful country to acquire a democratic system during the Arab Spring, instead of being an example for other Arab countries to follow, is seen by the fundamentalists as a heretic country that has to be destroyed, just like us.

 

The closeness of the threat has waken me up, I have to say. It's made me see how the human being can do amazing things to improve other people's lives, but can also be the most cruel being on Earth. Are democracies going to be able to erradicate these horrible people? Some time ago I was completely sure about it. Now I don't know. Inside of me I still think we are stronger than them, but they have found our weaknesses. For now, all I can have is hope in the capability of our security forces to adapt to this new kind of war. But I don't see my country as the safe isolated bubble that little Juan used to think of anymore.

Terror en Europa

39. 39 muertos y 60 heridos en varios ataques coordinados en París, hace algo más de dos horas.

Uno de ellos, en una discoteca, un lugar que solemos frecuentar los jóvenes y donde lo último en lo que piensas es que alguien va a entrar en mitad de la fiesta y pegarte un tiro.

Tres explosiones en las proximidades del Estadio de Francia, donde jugaban Partido amistoso entre Francia y Alemania. Qué vuelcos da la Historia: dos países que hasta no hace tanto no cesaban de declararse la guerra entre sí, se ven ahora amenazados por una tercera fuerza mientras disfrutan de la paz que tanto les costó conseguir.

Leo en El País que Francia ha dejado en suspenso el acuerdo de Schengen durante un mes y restablecido controles fronterizos. Y esto es, quizás, lo que más escalofríos me da: temo que el yihadismo pueda conseguir que antepongamos la seguridad a la libertad, que aumenten los sentimientos islamófobos y que se tambaleen los pilares del tan ansiado proyecto de una Europa unida e integradora.

Me sorprende a mí mismo la reacción que me ha causado la noticia: tengo lágrimas en los ojos. No siento el mismo horror cuando leo acerca de las muertes en la guerra de Siria, o en algún país de África. Peco, como muchos, de sentir las tragedias en el mundo occidental como más cercanas a mí. Y no debería. Pero el hecho de que ocurra otro atentado yihadista en un entorno similar al mío, me hace preguntarme: ¿estamos seguros?

Lo único que podemos hacer es mantenernos unidos, defender nuestros valores democráticos y mantenernos firmes, por mucho dolor que llevemos por dentro, para impedir que unos fanáticos pongan en duda los Derechos Humanos.

En todo caso, yo me acuesto temblando esta noche. Y Europa también.