The debate that followed Pierre Ellul’s Dear Dom evidences the recalcitrance of metaphysical chi­meras in local historical or pseudo-historical analyses.

Statements like history will emit such and such a judgement about this or that political figure or history will do justice with this or that political movement prove these fantastic tendencies.

“History” is treated as something existing over and above historians and/or flesh and blood human beings who make considerations about the past from their limited and partial perspectives. That there is no such thing as “history” existing independently of these concrete beings; that history is merely a succession of events that do not speak, judge or lead anywhere might disappoint some writers.

Regarding the film, I believe that it has been rightly and resoundingly criticised for its many failings and there is very little I could add that was not highlighted by other reviewers. The only thing I would like to note is that, regarding the events narrated in the film, fairness and consistency would have demanded that just as the film contained interviews with individuals who at the time of the politico-clerical dispute of the 1960s stood on opposing sides of the political divide, a similar approach should have been adopted with regard to other issues, like the medical issue of the 1970s.

I use the words “fairness” and “consistency” rather than “objectivity” because of the abuse to which this word is frequently subjected, even by supposedly professional historians.

Facts are sacred, in the sense that they occurred and cannot be changed.

That on July 14, 1789 the Bastille was stormed is a fact. This is, however, where objectivity ends. How one evaluates the fact in question (The start of Europe’s decline? The birth of a bright new era?), how one describes it (The beginning of a revolution? Only the symbolic beginning of an event which, in fact, began at some earlier/later stage?), what causes led to the fact obtaining (or what were major causes and minor ones) and other aspects that have to do with the way in which “facts” are transmitted and considered is inevitably partial.

Even what facts one takes into consideration or cites in a historical narrative (be it a book, film or documentary) betrays one’s partial attitudes, values and perspective rather than revealing history “as it occurred”.

These partial attitudes, values and perspectives do not just reflect one’s party allegiance. Other factors, both personal (the judgements one makes, the conclusions one reaches) and supra-personal (class, gender, historical epoch, sub-culture) might play an important part.

To give one example, one whose payslip involves many digits might consider the inability to buy foreign-produced chocolate or the stupid censoring of the word Nazzjon in Malta in the 1980s as the supreme deprivation when evaluating the epoch in question.

Someone else who nowadays is forced to take a part-time job for the best years of his/her life to pay her/his mortgages given the cost of property but who, back then, could have purchased a house for a much more affordable price that would have enabled him/her to spend more quality time with his/her family or elsewhere, might (I shall not be categorical) be willing to renounce to Mars and Cadbury.

Unfortunately, even in this respect the contribution of historians to the debate that followed the film was not very enlightening. Many kept referring to a “history” (meaning one history) that needs to be definitively and unbiasedly written. Most failed to acknowledge what in many European academia is considered as a given, namely that we cannot write “history” but “histories”.

Moreover, some of these historians keep referring to “history” as being the history of a “people” rather than the histories of different classes and groups (each with its own interests and perspective/s), paralleling the more popular discourse regarding happenings like Dom Mintoff’s rule being “oppressive” of/“beneficial to” the “people” or the “Maltese nation”.

That the latter approach is fallacious is evident if we consider one simple datum. Consider those who claim that the Labour government of the 1970s/80s oppressed a “people”.

At its worse, a few months after Tal-Barrani incidents, the Raymond Caruana murder and the Peter Paul Busuttil episode, Labour could still garner 49 per cent of the popular vote. If the historical situation could be simplistically described as a “people” harassed by an “oppressive regime”, where do these 49 per cent fit into the picture? Why was Labour able to obtain this conspicuous amount of electoral preferences?

Not all these voters approved or condoned violence, or preferred Deserta to Bounty. Moreover, unless one believes that they belonged to some inferior intellectual/moral species, one cannot dismiss all of them as brainwashed, opportunists or political masochists who enjoyed being oppressed. (Obviously, similar questions may be asked in relation to those who considered Mr Mintoff or Labour, particularly when these had the approval of the majority of voters, as representing some “will of the people”.)

Asking these kind of questions and seeking honest answers may encourage the writing of serious histories, if not abet true national reconciliation.

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