Public Enemies_ Dueling Writers Take on Each Other and the World - Bernard-Henri Levy [32]
Having done a little research over several elections, I quickly discovered that all the parties courting my vote held almost identical positions on these public health issues; that there existed a broad consensus of opinion on the subject. So what did I do when I came to the ballot box? With a goodwill that in retrospect seems to me absurd, I hesitated endlessly, painfully, sometimes for hours between different candidates, different electoral platforms; I hesitated for a long time before eventually, on almost every occasion, abstaining. You see, I have never had the sense of living in a democracy; I’ve always had the sense of living in a sort of technocracy, though without necessarily feeling that this was a bad thing; maybe the technocrats are wise and just; maybe I should give up alcohol; maybe I should even give up smoking.
And I would be wrong to accuse these decent technocrats who doubtless have all the relevant qualifications necessary to carry out the difficult task of formulating laws; these public health measures would no doubt be approved by our fellow citizens in a crushing majority. Thereby literally crushed, all I can do is shut up and accept that I live in a world where the general will “exercises too great a pressure on the will of the individual.” In practice, I can try to find a corner where I can go and die, some isolated spot where, all alone, I can give myself over to my modest vices.
It must be said that in the years since I have been living in Ireland, things have been better. Not that the public health policies are any different, they are European, and Ireland has enforced them more swiftly than other countries; but my situation here is profoundly different. The Irish government has never proposed that I participate in the democratic process, nor given me the impression that I had to take part in any way, shape, or form in the political decisions taken by the country. The level of taxation, which is extremely low for earnings relating to artistic work, is quite low in general; almost no one in the country pays much tax; it is a different concept of State. With this level of taxation, you can feel you are dealing with essential, incontestable expenditure—law and order, refuse collection, road maintenance; you never think that the government has committed itself to some bold policy on which you would be called on to have an opinion, for which they would ask for your support. All this is calming; you don’t really have the impression of participating, or at least you don’t have to ask yourself any questions; all this, in a word, depoliticizes. I suppose there is a psychological threshold, which it is dangerous for a government to go beyond. On that subject, it is interesting to note that different churches, regardless of the geographic or historic conditions that shaped them, are more or less agreed on the extent of the financial contribution they can expect from their faithful: 10 percent of their income, no more.
A few years ago, I remember talking with Sylvain Bourmeau. This, incidentally, is a second honorable reason for my lack of political commitment: never has my friendship or my respect for people, little though it might be, been marred by their political opinions. I know that Sylvain Bourmeau is a fine representative of la gauche morale—the moral left—and indeed he is passionate on the subject, which, to be honest, bores me, but it’s his pet subject. I nonetheless consider him to be an honest and thoughtful literary critic, one of the few in France whose opinion