Alas, not all animals are equal in the proverbial farm!
Take the bghula as an example. The mules are strong and particularly useful for hard work. However, in our culture we associate them with bad things. A baghal is someone extremely cruel; a characteristic that the beast does not possess. We have even outdone ourselves and have given the word bghula a more sinister meaning which is very difficult to translate. The word that comes close though not close enough is the word "bastard". Once more this has a double meaning: a disgusting guy or nasty way of referring to an illegitimate child. Not a nice appellative to carry around one's neck or on one's identity card!
The word bghula was used in this way years ago. It was a sign of a very crude and intolerant attitude. As people became more refined they stopped using it. Even the use of the word illegitimate (which is a nicer words that bghula) was eliminated from our legal statutes. Social reality changes and the words we use should reflect these changes.
I am 60 years old and I have never heard anyone refer to a child born out of wedlock as a baghal. Today people living together without being married are generally referred to as partners, though pogguti is still used. They are socially accepted and their children are similarly accepted and legally protected.
Society has moved on; or so I thought till all of a sudden the pro "divorzju bla raguni" movement who abrogate for themselves the labels of progressives and modern, have started using the word bghula once more. They said that they used it to shock us. Ah, I see; since we are degenerate enough to think that the word bghula is offensive and passé, we needed to be shocked. They are as shocking as an eighty year old doing a strip tease. The spectacle is more disgusting then shocking.
The pro-divorce lobby started their campaign saying that children should not feature in it. Now they changed gear and are using children on billboards and insulting them by referring to them as bghula.
The "divorzju bla raguni" movement are fortunate that many in the media are also pro-divorce; otherwise they would have been not just criticized but continuously lambasted.
Consider the following.
Imagine the reaction of the media if Zwieg bla Divorzju filmed their publicity spots at Net TV or if they refuse to say who is producing their spots! The pro-divorce lobby on the other hand can record its spots at One TV. It seems that this is not an important enough fact to make the headlines.
This is not the only sign of a media which is antagonistic to the anti-divorce movement.
This antagonism is most evident in the media of the Partit Laburista, which is directed by one of the leaders of the pro-divorce movement, and in the media of the GWU.
Malta Today, comes next in the league. One of its reports, for example, alleged that the bill boards of Zwieg bla Divorzju Movement are the property of the PN. The Movement strongly denied this.
I have been in the firing line as well.
Like the bghula it seems that I have few or no rights at all. On at least two different occasions It-Torca wrote the vilest insinuations about me. I challenge the editor to be explicit. A certain blog that was explicit is registered overseas under a false address and consequently I cannot take legal action. Perhaps the editor of It-Torca will pick up some courage and repeat what this blogger wrote.
My email inbox was hacked on more than one occasion. This is a criminal act; but as everyone knows we bughla do not have rights, legal or otherwise.
The Malta Independent accused the Curia of the diocese of Gozo of intimidation because the Curia referred to its legal rights vis-à-vis a letter sent as a right of reply to the paper. I cannot understand why in a country governed by the rule of law anyone should feel intimidated if someone else takes recourse to the rights protected by the law.
Then stupid I remembered: not all animals are equal on this farm.