It can be wondered what is going through our minds in Switzerland right now. While many of us today look back with regret on how we once made racist jokes as comedy stars on Swiss screens, the same people now seem to be fighting with great enthusiasm for the Ukraine war – and that “until the last Ukrainian”. This double-faced attitude, driven by a moral overkill, could hardly be more embarrassing.
For example, Viktor Giacobbo, the former “Comedy King” of Switzerland, made a name for himself in the 2000s by making fun of everything and everyone – from blacks to other marginalized groups.
Today, with the wind blowing in a different direction, he presents himself and explains how much he “regrets his mistakes” and how much he values respect and equality. But wait a moment: These self-proclaimed repentants, who have distanced themselves from racism and comedy, have now plunged into the Ukraine war hysteria.
With full fervor, they become loud proponents of a war that they still recently rejected in the form of a military intervention in the same way.
This is the contradiction of the hour: Those who today present themselves as the moral elite and try to convince us that they are against racism have thrown themselves with the same fervor into the Ukraine war.
Just as they will deny in the future that they ever made racist jokes, they will also claim they never supported the Ukraine war. Perhaps one or the other, who today sees it as a moral duty to support Ukraine until the last Ukrainian, will one day play the same role as Giacobbo – and apologize for their war support because the wind has blown in a different direction again.
Time will show who today really believes what they say and who will look back and be ashamed of what they expressed yesterday.
But for the moment, we can enjoy this hypocrisy – with all its absurd contradictions. How the “moral apostles” of today will retreat on their own words, we will see. But one thing is certain: Hypocrisy knows no bounds.