Thread by @erstefoundation

In 2019, historian @TimothyDSnyder gave the anticipating Speech to Europe called “Judenplatz 1010”. Its main message was simple yet powerful: “You are more than your myths.”

Almost four years later, his speech is more relevant than ever. Here are some insightful quotes 🧵 [1/22]

"You are more than your myths.

For those of us on the outside, you are also a source of hope; perhaps the only source of hope for the future."

[2/22]

"There is one way to remember which leads you back to yourself, to a story about how you were always right, to a story about how you, or people like you were always innocent.

That is a myth. That is a national myth."

[3/22]

"There is another way of remembering, which is history.

History allows you to take what you remember and add it to what others remember, add it to other sources and other perspectives, constantly and critically so that you see for what you are responsible."

[4/22]

"If the discussion about the future of Europe is held on the basis of myths about things that never took place, the discussion cannot be a fruitful one."

[5/22]

"Your myth of Europe, your idea that ‘you as nation states came together to create Europe’, as opposed to ‘you as failing empires came together to create Europe’ turns your head away not just from responsibility for ‘empire’, but from the scale of your own achievement."

[6/22]

"The history of the 20th century is that European powers, which for the previous 500 years had dominated the world, found themselves forced to pull back to Europe, and there in Europe created something new."

[7/22]

"When I say you are more than your myth, I mean that you are more terrible than your myth.

I mean that you are more powerful than your myth."

[8/22]

"I mean that the myth that you have, diverts you not only from seeing the scale of European responsibility for the past but it also diverts you from the scale of European responsibility for the future."

[9/22]

"There are at least four ways that the European Union can protect.

The first is, anti-monopoly. The second is, education. Third, factuality. The fourth is sovereignty."

[10/22]

"The big question is always: where do the populists come from?

It’s easier to answer that question if you realise that populists are in fact the digitalists. Populism assumes that there are people somewhere behind it."

[11/22]

"But isn’t it strange or interesting that all of these new populist parties are the same ones who have been so effective in using digital techniques?

And isn’t it interesting that they are the same ones that attack the European Union using digital techniques?"

[12/22]

"And isn’t it interesting that there is always an overlap between these populists and the denial of global warming, and some questionable attitudes about the state?

Isn’t it interesting how this all hangs together?"

[13/22]

"Isn’t it interesting that you have enemies?

Isn’t it interesting that your enemies are always the defenders of a completely untenable status quo? That your enemies are the imperialists of an exhausted Earth?

You have enemies because you have a future."

[14/22]

"You are responsible, you Europeans for where memory goes.

Memory can go into reassuring myths, in which you are small, in which you are innocent and in which you don’t have very little responsibility for the past or for the future."

[15/22]

"Or memory can go into history in which you ran the world for half a millennium, created something new in the second half of the 20th century and now bear particular responsibility for how things turn out in the 21st."

[16/22]

"The myth will lead you into comfort, and fragmentation, and humiliation. The history will lead to pain, but it will also lead to power."

[17/22]

"We are gathered here, on this day, May 9th, to remember the speech of Robert Schuman, his declaration, on this day in 1950.

Schuman spoke of a living Europe: ‘Une Europe organisée et vivante.’

He spoke of a Europe that would create, ‘Une Europe créateur’."

[18/22]

"What I hope and what I ask is that when we think of these last 70 years, we only think of them as flowing into the next 70 years.

Schuman spoke of Europe providing peace not for itself but for the rest of the world."

[19/22]

Watch the full speech by @TimothyDSnyder on YouTube:

🎥

#SpeechToEurope #EuropeDay

[20/22]

Taking up the lecture series on Judenplatz, the upcoming Speech to Europe 2023 will be delivered by Oleksandra Matviichuk (@avalaina), a Ukrainian human rights activist, lawyer and head of @ccl_ua, a 2022 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

[21/22]

Join us on Europe Day in Vienna or virtually via livestream!

🗓 9 May 2023, 19:00
📍Judenplatz, 1010, Vienna

Speech to Europe 2023. A joint event by @WienFestwochen, ERSTE Foundation and @IWM_Vienna. In cooperation with @jewishmuseumVIE.

More ⬇️
erstestiftung.org/en/events/a-sp…
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