The power of satire in challenging nationalism thinking: “Bon Schuur Ticino” and a tragicomic monolingual Switzerland

"Violence breeds violence; repression breeds retaliation; and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our souls." With these words, Robert F. Kennedy, candidate to the Presidency of the United States in 1968, addressed his audience at the Cleveland city club in April 1968, two months before being killed in one of the bloodiest periods of the American political history.

I have been thinking a lot about these words in the last months. The message is as simple and universal as it is often overlooked in contemporary politics. Nationalism is rampant, widely supported and capable of putting into question the bases of the world order that reemerged after the World Wars. Domestic and international conflicts are commonplace the world over, and most of all involve ethno-cultural issues. How come all this support for nationalistic rhetoric, domination over dialogue, cultural homogeneity over the coexistence of diversity?

Lots of literature has been written on identity, nationalism and diversity accommodation. What is clear is that nationalism is something that not only easily lures supporters with its easy and reassuring message, but it also still informs the structures of the societies we live in, and, in particular, the constitutional orders that govern our common lives. We live immersed in nationalism, so much that we consider it quite natural. This is why it is so difficult to distance from it and look at it critically.

What we know about radical nationalism is that it leads to violence and repression. Violence breeds violence, and repression breeds retaliation. Is not this what we are witnessing every day in Israel and Palestine, Russia and Ukraine, Serbia and Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sudan, Yemen, Kenya, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Syria and many other (very overlooked by media) places around the world?

The naturality of nationalist thought and the nationalist ecosystems in which we are immersed tend to make us choose a side in all these conflicts, generally the one that is ethno-culturally closest to us, apart from cases of evident responsibilities from one side only, as in the case of Russia. This mechanism is a product of our nationalist imprinting and contributes to reinforcing it.

Is there any alternative rhetoric or narrative, as strong and simple as the nationalistic one, which could make us at least challenge our deeply entrenched nationalist assumptions ? In the political realm, this is generally the political narrative that foresees disaster and chaos in the event of nationalists taking power. But that discourse does not really touch people until they are on the edge of a crisis or a civil war. Plus, nationalism is far more than a political ideal and reinforces itself through many other channels –football, to name just one. To put nationalism into question we need alternative views that are able to touch us as nationalism does, to make us feel and not only think that other possibilities are available.

So, when I went to the cinema yesterday and watched this movie called "Bon Schuur Ticino",¹ I thought that satire and irony could be very powerful tools to address these issues.

The setting is contemporary Switzerland: a shady politician launches an initiative to make the country monolingual. His (publicly declared) goal is to reinforce the sense of national unity and get rid of the complexity and costs of multilingualism. The country is shaken by the proposal, and no one thinks it could pass. But, against all odds, the results of the vote are clear: due to an unforeseeable combination of low turnout in the German-speaking cantons and an incredibly high participation in the French-speaking ones, the initiative is approved. And most surprisingly, the national language chosen is French!

No one can believe it; in few weeks historically multilingual Switzerland is to become a monolingual country. The effects of the adopted initiative are tragicomic: French-speaking people spasmodically celebrate and feel entitled to humiliate their German-speaking fellow citizens after decades of having lived as a minority at the national level; German-speakers cannot find a way to understand each other with their poor French; Romansch-speaking people end up doomed to clandestinity; Ticinesi feel profoundly betrayed. Thousands of German-speaking Swiss people flee to Germany in search of a safe country, with this sparking anti-Swiss-immigrant reactions by Germans worried that their children will not be able to speak "good German" because of the presence of too many Swiss fellows. In the transitional period before the application of the reform, tension quickly arises: demonstrations take place all over the non-French speaking part of the country. But while most German-speakers reluctantly accept their destiny in respect of the will of the nation – except for a small group of elderly hippies that will prove crucial in the plot – in Ticino, the repression fires strong protests and violence. A group of revolutionaries who as the movie proceeds, increasingly resemble military junta, plans what they think is the only option remaining, considering the inflexibility through which the reform is going to be implemented by the federal government: secession from Switzerland.

But when everything seems about to fall apart and a civil war is about to erupt, an unlikely cooperation between a German-speaking cop and a French-speaking one together with a woman from the Ticino canton (all able to communicate to each other thanks to these latter two’s bilingualism) reveals itself as the key to avoiding a tragic epilogue and getting back to ordinary (complex) life in Switzerland.

The movie may be a bit shallow and quickly cobbled together, and the screenwriter may not have had very profound motivation other than that of creating something funny. However, it unequivocally shows the nonsense of radical nationalism and makes us laugh at it whilst also making us feel its distortions. It reminds us that simplistic solutions for complex socio-political settings – oftentimes endorsed by opportunistic political actors, like that shady Swiss politician – are doomed to failure.

It makes us sense the uneasiness of the oppressed, re-evaluate the importance of dialogue and respect for diversity, and remember that "In spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace".²