Montenegrins and Gypsies

Written by: Darko Šuković

The opening needed to feel something like a childhood memory book and pastoral. Still, unfortunately, this text will soon plunge into the murky waters of political pathology, and you’ll wish it had stayed as it began...

1. Junuz Selimović

From a childhood free of dark memories, thanks to socialism with a human face and a fairytale-like homeland shaped by unspoiled nature and kind-hearted people, one memory stands out for this occasion. You’ll soon see why.

It’s the friendship between us locals and the Gypsy families who came to Pavino Polje every summer. The same families returned year after year, connected by kinship and the unquestioned authority of Junuz and Sofija Selimović. A striking couple, if memory serves, with four sons and a daughter, Višnja, whose beauty could easily outshine Márquez’s Remedios.

In today’s language, inclusivity was at 100%. Our parents welcomed them into their homes with absolute respect. We played with their children, visited their camps, and secretly envied their freedom, the fact that they didn’t have to mow or stack hay, the way they seemed to live more freely than we ever could.

In short: social distance, zero.

We used the word “Gypsy” without prejudice or negative connotation, which is why I intentionally use it here. I don’t feel the need to prove my sensitivity by writing "Roma", "Egyptians", or "Ashkali".

The verb to gypsy never entered our vocabulary, and I never bought into the later propaganda that tried to associate bad behavior with an ethnic identity.

To us, they were people, good people, in every essential way, no different from anyone else. Long before we even learned that 'Rom' means 'human'.

2. Vladan Đorđević

Dr. Vladan Đorđević was the first Serbian surgeon with formal training. He authored numerous books and, unfortunately, rose quite high as a politician. I say that, unfortunately, because he was a textbook chauvinist.

Today, Serbian historians call him “a great scholar and pioneer”, which is wildly exaggerated. They also describe him as “a man of progressive ideas and understanding”, which is utter nonsense, but revealing of the current (and not only current) cultural mindset in Serbia.

He served as a minister, MP, and even Prime Minister of Serbia. His government, in 1897, passed a regulation banning the entry of Gypsies and Montenegrins into Serbia. Sad but true, this wasn’t some fabricated story by Montenegrin guerrillas, nor was it a dead-letter law. The Prime Minister simply couldn’t stand Montenegrins. Or Gypsies. Or quite a few others.

This “great scholar with progressive ideas” also wrote a book in 1913 titled Albanians and the Great Powers, in which he described Albanians as “bloodthirsty, stunted, animal-like creatures”, some of whom, he claimed, even had tails.

At the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, Albania’s delegate, legendary poet Gjergj Fishta (author of The Highland Lute, Albania’s answer to The Mountain Wreath), mockingly requested a chair with a hole in the middle… so he could fit his tail through.

Meanwhile, the chair for Montenegro, a nation that had just fought and won in WWI, sat empty. That empty chair was a grim foreshadowing of the barren historical path that awaited Montenegro and its people until July 13, 1941.

For a while, the term Vladanism was used to describe Belgrade’s racist attitudes toward its neighbors. But as national policy drifted back toward 19th-century settings, the term gradually faded and then disappeared.

3. Budimir Aleksić

No one, not now, not ever, is going to use grandiose phrases to describe the current Deputy Prime Minister of Montenegro the way they do Vladan Đorđević. He doesn’t appear here as an originator, but rather as a link in the long chain testifying to persistent continuity of policy, spirit, mentality, and social pathology.

In late 2022, while still a DF MP, Budimir Aleksić said that “under the new circumstances, Montenegrins and Egyptians should form their national councils”. For someone whose worldview is shaped entirely by the altitude of Mljete and the assassination of Smail-aga Čengić, this probably felt like a sharp slap in the face to Montenegrins.

He casually equated “communist scum” with the Gypsies, only he didn’t get a slap on the wrist because he used politically correct terms: Montenegrin and Egyptian.

And he slipped in that phrase “new circumstances”, a euphemism for the socio-political climate in which Montenegrins are now a lesser people, if not yet a minority.

In Tengiz Abuladze’s cult film Repentance (1984), there’s a line that goes something like: As long as there are worse people than those in power, the crisis hasn’t hit rock bottom.

With that in mind, Budimir Aleksić being appointed Deputy PM might be a good sign, maybe we’re about to turn a corner.

4. Veljo Stanišić

Practically a nobody. The barely-noticed brother of militant priest Dragan. A professor at the prestigious university hubs of Foča and Doboj. An “artist” whose existence was only briefly noticed thanks to a bizarrely oversized Cyrillic “Љ” installed in Nikšić. A man who could have quietly slipped by, even with a July 13th state award, if only he had stayed home.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he went on Gradska TV and stole Bećir’s thunder. In a clumsy, hard-to-follow rant, made even harder to follow by his ringing phone (which, fittingly, bore the name of a tribal witch doctor), Veljo clearly expressed just one thing: that Miloš Karadaglić’s actions were “gypsy-like”.

Yesterday, this decorated recipient of the nation’s highest honor published a written explanation claiming he loves Roma and that “his soul stretches far and wide”.

It came off as weak, proof that his writing might be worse than his speaking.

Veljo seems to be a man who works a lot and says very little. But the little he did say, what could be understood, made one thing clear:

Chauvinism remains one of the foundational pillars of Serbian imperialism.

On the flip side, even this small sample shows a clear downward trend in the intellectual capacity of that ideology: from Vladan Đorđević, educated at Europe’s finest schools, to hopeless provincial types who, apart from being Serbs, seem to possess no other traits.

At least none they could use to build a place or standing (though certainly not respect) in society.

P.S.

If you’re choosing a person to go with into the hills as a Komita or Partisan, a trustworthy comrade in the People’s Liberation Struggle for the Right, Honour, and Freedom of Montenegro, circle number 1.