Photo: imago/Xinhua
Because of the weaker sex. Women also engage in physical arguments, as demonstrated by MPs in Seoul. Only recently there was a fight between several representatives of the people in the Georgian parliament during a debate on the so-called agent law. The exchange of powerful “arguments” between politicians is common practice in many places. After a fight in the Turkish parliament, a member of parliament ended up in intensive care. In Kosovo, a prime minister was pelted with eggs by the opposition. Ukrainian politicians favor fistfights. Indians like to throw microphones, and in Jordan a member of parliament has already brought his Kalashnikov into the House. A South Korean politician received applause online when he defeated his opponent with a neatly executed judo throwing technique instead of rhetoric. Ippon.
The literal power of the legislature is not a newfangled phenomenon; it has existed at all times. Even in ancient times, in the Greek agora or in the Roman Senate. Then someone was stabbed. “You too, Brutus?” groaned Caesar as he sank, covered in blood, on the Ides of March. In the motherland of parliamentarism, England, it was hoped to prevent such casualty riots by requiring that at least two sword lengths be maintained between representatives of the government and the opposition.
This Sunday, June 30, is International Day of Parliamentarism, established in 2018 by a resolution of the United Nations General Assembly. Even in this illustrious body, things sometimes got heated. One thinks of Nikita Khrushchev angrily tapping his shoe on the desk. And in the course of the invasion of Iraq by the USA and its allies, shoes were sometimes thrown against their emissaries. What do the common people learn from this?