The fifth moment
Learning from the past
The picture above is the poster of a movie based on the book of the same title.
The title of this post was inspired by it. I highly recommend to all of you to read it.
The movie adaptation is also excellent. There are several clips from it on Youtube.
This is yet another one of my highly personal posts that I wrote a long time ago, but was not ready to share it on my blog. I wrote it in Hungarian for a Hungarian audience as a contribution to a vivid public debate on the subject of informants. In 2007 there was a wave of outings of informants, including many celebrities. What did they do, what did it mean, what was the point in talking about it.
I wrote the following piece to put some perspective into the debate. I was hoping to get it printed, but did not manage to do it. I am sharing it now because I few days ago (finally) I received the 300 page file on myself from the Hungarian state security archives. I would like to write about it, and this piece below is essential to the understanding of what I am planning to say. So here we go:
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I have not followed the agent disputes in their current or previous flare-ups. I didn't have to follow them. For almost 26 years I have not been concerned about what is happening in Hungary. As before, my relatives have brought it to my attention now.
I don't want to explain myself or the age that has wronged so many of us, I just want to shed light on the psychology of a few (four) moments for those who were lucky enough not to have to experience such moments.
The first moment.
When I was nineteen, I was caught up in a demonstration on the 15th of March. Although I got there by chance, once I was there, I was in. I was singing, I was joking, it was spring.[i]
It took me two months before I started to realize, in the Gyorskocsi Street prison, that they are serious about my arrest, that they weren't going to let me go, that I cannot talk my way out of it. There was no place more serious in the country than that.
I was tried, convicted, I appealed for a more lenient, the state appealed for a more strict sentence.
Then I was released, waiting for the appeal trial.
When I walked out from the courthouse with my 'accomplices', a relative of one of them who had watched the trial shook my hand, congratulating me on my 'brave' behaviour.
I was embarrassed because I didn't feel brave.
During the trial, I hardly ever said what I thought. I didn't call the false witnesses the liars they were, I didn't object when the judge questioned the prosecution witnesses in the absence of my state appointed defender and I sat down when I was told because my questions confused my witnesses about their lies. I did not question the legitimacy of the trial, the process or the law. I never talked about the freedom of speech and assembly.
I accepted the rules of the game. I didn't behave with the docile submissiveness of my 'accomplices', but I would not have called my behaviour courageous. I wasn't afraid, but I did not question the system. I was not ‘brave’ enough to be myself.
The questions of the first moment would be these:
Can the lack of heroism be called cowardice?
Is it courage to run headlong into a wall? I could have easily been 'myself' until I ended up with a ten-year sentence.
Would I have proved anything? Standing up would have been a self-destructive gesture in which no one would have gained and I would have lost.
Was I a victim or a cooperator? Is open confrontation, a refusal to accept the circus, not cooperation? Is not being (openly) against them equal being with them?
Sometimes even being a victim isn’t that easy.
The second moment
In the appeal trial, all our sentences were made harsher. On January 9th, we checked in to the maximum-security jail to serve the rest of our sentences. I met some good people in there, but also some indescribably despicable scoundrels. Of my two cellmates, one (K.J.) was one of the most decent person I ever met, while the other (A.J.) the most despicable.
I did not know any of my accomplices, I did not even know their names before I got the indictment in my hands. I worked with two of them in the prison factory and I was able to build a loose relationship with them, but at a certain point I was given the fatherly advice by K.J. that if I wanted to make parole - which for me meant three months - I should not cultivate these relationships too much. Not to avoid them, just not to hang around with them too much. The powers that be will not take kindly seeing us too much in each other's company. I had to assess in my own mind whether my gesture of standing up for the solidarity imposed on us was worth three months more in jail. Since I had nothing to do with them before we got locked up, and was not likely to have anything to do with them afterwards, I decided that it was not worth it.
The authority, the man of political power, was called the ‘education officer’. In our first meeting he called himself a prison psychologist. Everyone had to talk to him at least once a month.
It was a miserable feeling, like being a worm on a hook, wiggling as I tried to do all at once:
- not to agree explicitly without disagreeing explicitly.
- replying to every question without answering them with any information.
- standing my ground without getting confrontational.
The probation officer nagged me with question on how to prove my faith in the system, asked me where I would turn if I knew that some enemies of our glorious future were plotting against it, but he didn't put a paper in front of me to sign and I managed to stick to the promise that if a counter-revolution was about to break out, I would be the first to let them know. Scouts’ honour.
.......
Before I reported to prison, I thought I would have time to read there, so I took with me a selection of Lenin's works (which I wouldn't have wasted time on otherwise), a vocabulary, a French phrase book and two French dictionaries. Of course, they took them all away from me. Later my fellow prisoners explained that I could only get my own books as a reward for years of good behaviour.
Although not many people would have jumped on Lenin, the dictionaries and the grammar book were of immense value. I promised D., who got 8 years for sabotaging the invasion of Czechoslovakia as a conscript in 1968, that I will send the books to him.
The practice on the last day of our release was to be put in a temporary cell where we were given our civilian clothes and personal belongings - which in this case included my books - to be released the next day just after getting up. I just had to arrange for someone reliable to collect the books from me.
Five minutes after the hand-over, the cell door opened and they were escorting me to…..somewhere.....
I have only given such a long description of the background to the moment to make my state of mind clear. I walked with slightly shaky knees in front of the guard. It's over, I thought - they've caught the dictionary runner. So not only could my parole be withdrawn immediately, but they might even give me extra time.
When we got to the probation officer's office, I still didn't know anything. Do they know or don't they know? Could they be blackmailing me with this?
Today I don't think they knew, but after a few months in prison I wasn't sure of anything.
I was drilled and pushed and cajoled by him until I finally signed. He even made me chose a clandestine code-name. I was told that I do not need to do anything, they'll find me. I never for a moment had any intention of honoring that agreement.
What have I got to lose, I asked myself? I'll discuss this outside with people I can trust. If I'm smart enough, I might as well take advantage of this. They'll be my sources of information... If I can't, I've got nothing to do but compromise myself to people whom they want me to watch. What can they do to me? I only have to do three months. When my parole is up, they'll have to justify why they want to lock me up again and they can't make a fool of themselves by locking me up for not wanting to snitch. Signing is just a gesture, what matters is whether I do something.
The question of the moment:
How many people have been like me? Who signed just to be left alone.
Who signed but never reported.What is the value of a gesture? Does the signature count or the deed?
In the moral accounting, does the risk I took in sending the books outweigh the ‘sin’ of not signing seriously?Who is more despicable - the anonymous renouncer-snitch or the one who signed but did nothing? (“The fifth seal” will help you understand this question)
The third moment
After I was released, I discussed with some close friends the fact that I have ‘signed’ and of course the possibility of being a double agent. That I don't tell these people anything, but I can inform those I am asked to inform on, letting them know that they are in the crosshair of the authorities.
The result of every conversation was the same: dangerous and pointless.
Sneaky, insidious hiding in the dark is the weapon of the system, a weapon that could only be used against them if we were also conspirators hiding in the dark.
I took a wait-and-see position, waiting for the inevitable phone call. Twice I was called, twice I met them, both times I played the feeble-minded.
That was it. I didn't have to observe, report, write reports. They left me alone. I still don't know why, but most likely the news of my dishonest turncoat intentions got back to them. They never confronted me with it. I was compromised, therefore useless. My gamble worked.
A few weeks after my release, I was picked up by a woman (Ö.Á.). It was a bit unusual, I always had to work to get my women. It was too easy. She appeared somewhere in my environment, where, although she didn't quite fit in, she didn't stand out too much.
To illustrate my naivety, I should mention that it was only a few months ago that I began to suspect that she was the agent who had been set up to inform on me. I didn't suspect it then, I was enjoying the summer, the sex, the togetherness. The idyll was short-lived.
I found it the most natural thing in the world for her to be interested in my recent past. I made no secret of the fact that I had signed, nor that I had discussed it with others. I explained my motivation. Our conversation turned into an argument. You didn't have to sign, she said, but once you did, you have to stick to it. You can't just break a promise like that.
I was speechless. How could I owe anything to these bastards who robbed me of my future? That the paper they made me sign with obnoxious pressure and thinly veiled threats was binding on ME? I was beside myself with indignation, this dispute was the end of our relationship.
The most interesting question for me is probably laughable to the reader, but it would be this:
Was I completely blind? (I was in love.)
If she wasn't an agent (which I find increasingly unlikely), how was she able to make these amazing moral leaps?
If she was, did she really think that she was serving some higher purpose when she was fucking me?
Did she see herself as some sort of Mata Hari?
OK, we lived in the age of sexual liberation, but did she do it out of ambition or compulsion?
Did she enjoy it?
The fourth moment
I was not in contact with my former 'accomplices', but with one of them, U.G., we moved in overlapping circles. On a few occasions we even worked together for a few days.
I knew he was spreading the word about me being a snitch. I wasn't. I never said a bad (traitorous) word about anyone to the authorities, but I couldn't confront U.G. What could I say to him? "Listen, buddy, I know you think I am, but I'm not. I'm sorry. So I signed it, but I didn't do it. I really didn't."?
I really wanted to talk to him about everything, but I couldn't initiate that conversation, and neither could he for lack of trust. I was deeply troubled by the untrue accusation, but I was helpless.
I loved my life between 73 and 79. I was surrounded by beautiful people, my work was not only interesting and important but also well paid. I just detested the system with an ever-increasing vehemence. I left in 1979, lived in Paris for a year and finally settled in Toronto.
In 1987, I wanted to visit Hungary as a Canadian citizen, but my visa application was refused. There was never a question in my mind that this was the penalty.
In 1987, anyone could get a visa, except me, the traitor agent who fooled them.
I met my family in Komárno.
I flew from Amsterdam and on the way back I visited U.G. who was then living near Paris. We were in the car about to leave when I asked him what made him think I was an agent?
Because, he said, when his parole was denied, they used a phrase in their justification that he had used exclusively in a conversation with me. I did not understand. My mind was working madly as I tried to recall where I had spoken, but I was 100% sure that I had not mentioned the conversation to any authority figure.
Impossible, I said - never mind, said he.
A few kilometers from his house, the realization hit me like an icy shower.
In my mind's eye I saw K.J. putting his finger to his lips with his other hand pointing to A.J. pretending to sleep.
Still today, I would put my hand in the fire for K.J., just as I am sure A.J. had reported everything he had overheard.
I was the reason. U.G. did an extra two and a half months because of me.
I sat in the car wondering if I should turn back. What could I say?
That I was just careless, not a villain? Would it have made me feel any better?
That encounter was 18 years ago, I haven't spoken to him since, but I still feel guilty.
The questions of the moment:
Are we any less responsible for the harm we do out of stupidity than the harm we do out of malice? Once the harm is done, does motive, does intent matter?
Is the two and a half months that U.G. had to serve because of my carelessness no greater 'sin' than the signature that was never meant to harm anyone or anything but my own self-esteem?
The fifth moment
I don't know what it's like to be an agent, but I do know that there were a billion ways to serve the system.
There were thousands of people who had to write "collective attitude reports" solely because of their position.
The person who reported on me during the investigation was saddled with the task. It was the price not only of his own career but of the very existence of the institution that employed us both. Are they also considered informers?
The KISZ secretary who organized the annual ball for the students, was serving who exactly? The state or the students? Was he a cooperator or someone who cared in a world where we have seen less and less caring? There are so many layers of crime, victimhood, responsibility, blame that cannot be sorted out by a sane mind.
Even in prison, I have met guards who were more deserving of pity than hate or contempt.
Tearing open the wounds of the past can only have one positive social function: we must learn from it. We should have learned that it is the system that is to blame, the system that breeds corruption and abuse of power. We should have learned from communism that the corruption and the corrupting influence of the state are in direct proportion to its power.
We should have learned that the only way to control the power of the state is to reduce its scope to the minimum. That money should not be put into the hands of politicians because even in the best of cases it is squandered but usually stolen or used to bribe supporters.
We should have learned that society is not the same as the state.
We should have learned that superficial judgements on the sins of the past can create new injustices in the present.
We should have learned that what anybody says is far less important than what they do.
Instead, I see election campaigns in which the loudest voices have the best chance of being the most vocal.
I feel heartbreaking sadness when I see articles spouting hate with comments saying "good insight, good wording" or when I see an entire party accused of pedophilia because they have a picture of a child on their campaign poster.
This is the fifth moment today, as I watch from the outside (just looking in) the accusations, the sniggering, the pandering of yesterday’s wimps.
When I see that no one has a fundamental problem with the redistributive role of the almighty state - provided, of course, that the team they are rooting for steals and redistributes, then I slowly formulate the only question of the fifth moment:
Will we ever learn from our disturbing past?
[i] You can find more on the events here: (1) My story. Finally.