I was talking to a friend who grew up in Yugoslavia. He’s about ten years older than me and recently moved back to Serbia. What struck me about his recounting of the years just before the war began was the sense of banality, a kind of timelessness. Despite all the vitriol, it didn’t really feel like anything was going to happen right away.
But what set off the Homeland War—the conflict between the new Croatian state and Yugoslavia—was a single bus attack. A group of Serb paramilitaries opened fire on Croatian police officers near Pakrac, killing several and wounding others. That moment lit the fuse. From there, everything erupted. The war turned brutal very quickly, with civilians swept into atrocities. Imagine being raped in your own bedroom, beheaded in front of your family in the garden. Grenades thrown through your window, your bones later collected and dropped into a village well.
And when I see a young woman today mocking the death of someone she disagrees with, or speaking with ambivalence about an assassination, I can’t help but think she has no idea how fast things can change. She doesn’t know that violence, once unleashed, doesn’t stay contained. I feel sorry for her, and for people like her, because they don’t realize what may be coming.
The truth is, it’s almost impossible to imagine. The shift happens too fast, the violence too unforgiving and traumatizing. The pain lasts generations. I see it even in my own family. My grandparents still pinch pennies, mistrust everyone, swear that people are out to rob them. That fear has been passed down, and it lingers.
If Americans speak with such disdain for people they disagree with, they should be prepared to endure these traumas too, for themselves, and for their families, for decades to come.
"The banality of evil" is a very tired phrase, but it's taken on new meaning in the last 18 hours. These people pour coffee or spend their days working on spreadsheets, but they're as evil as any Cheka torturer pouring earth down a prisoner's throat.