Fun and Games and Silly Hats

Tradition gives our ancestors a vote, that is what they told us. My mother had a different saying though; tradition is following a dead dictator – surely this is the truth. The elders, those sordid tradition lovers, ritual-philes, they held our beautiful town hostage for generations. Only through strength of spirit and unrelenting perseverance did we break the shackles of oppression and free ourselves.

Of course, these things that I speak of are almost fifty years old and were it not for my resolve I might have forgotten too. I see confusion in your young faces and so ask that you let me remind you of our history. Let me tell you our story and how we came to be the people we are today.

The Infallible Tenets is what they were called. Three unchallengeable rituals that my mother, that all our mothers and fathers were burdened by. The first fealty - absolute obedience to the elders. It once was, that when in the presence of an elder, you were to bow down in reverence, to bend your knee and dip your head as a peasant does to a king. It was supposedly nothing more than a sign of respect to those who led our town, but in truth its design was cunning and sinister. The act of bowing; of lying prostrate, teaches the mind and the body that you are inferior – that they are worthy, and you are not.

The second tenet had a similar design. Honour - to uphold the rite. The responsibility of being an elder was, they said, beyond the understanding of those who had not completed the rite of eldership. Do not ask what the rite entailed; it was such a closely guarded secret that even when the tenets fell the revolutionaries never discovered its process. The reward, other than the title of elder, was an elaborate feathered beret. The elders would prance around in their berets day and night, but those who were not elders were forbidden to wear any head coverings. They said that to do so would overshadow the significance of the elders’ accomplishments.

Finally, and most insidious of all, the third tenet, humility. For this tenet, I must tell of the Festival le Timbre. Once a year, every citizen was given two Campanillas, small silver bells with metal hooks. For the next twenty-four hours our town bustled with people running this way and that; everyone trying to attach their Campanillas to one another. You were allowed to run, but once the hooks had pierced your clothing, you were not permitted to remove them. After the day was up, those who rang through the streets loudest, that is, had the most bells attached to them, were rounded up and placed into the stocks. From there the rest of the town would pelt them with rotten fruit and vegetables.

Harmless fun you might think? Merely a game? And you would not be the only one. I have many now-soiled memories of leaping through these cobbled streets, an ignorant child - bells in hand and searching for those I disliked most among my neighbours. My favourite preys included old Grunon, whom all my peers despised and Simone, a grossly plump boy whom we would regularly flick snot at. It was not until my mother one day caught my arm as I sprinted along a smile stretched across my face, ear to ear, that I realised my folly.

At first, I did not understand my mother’s scolding, but she explained to me as I do to you now. The festival was not as they claimed, to teach us to be humble, but instead a way to humiliate us. It turned our focus away from the tyranny that we lived under and insisted that we distrust each other rather than those whose trust was undeserved. Was my mother crazy to think this? Delusional perhaps?  I do not think so, for why else was it illegal for any elder to have a Campanilla placed upon them?

You see, fealty, honour, humility – these were lies; lies that blinded us to reality. The revolutionaries were the ones who saw the truth. For months they tried to persuade us, but their arguments fell upon deaf ears; we were all too distracted by the fun and games and silly hats of our rituals. But they knew that these were simply the seductive spots of a viper. A mere distraction from the venomous bite of tradition. What was the price of failing to bow? How many years of prison awaited those who dared cover their heads? What of those who refused their turn in the stocks? We all knew the dire cost of speaking out, and yet only a blessed few did.

It was no game when my mother and the revolutionaries burst through the garden gates. The elders at their party bowed in shock and disgust when they saw them wearing on their heads, berets adorned with bells. They had created the first Cambonetas, the very same hats we celebrate today. Fifty years ago though, the Cambonetas did not incite joy but anger from the elders. The revolutionaries were immediately arrested and then tortured through the night. I like many others, can remember the calling of the town criers the next day, summoning every citizen to this same square. Six nooses hung swaying in the morning breeze, and in their shadows stood our revolutionaries. Mothers and brothers, husbands and daughters, their bodies beat but their spirits unbroken.

For crimes against the elders, for disregard of their values and tenets, a rope was secured around each neck. It was then that the voice of fate spoke up - a passing emissary of the king, a royal servant. His voice cried out above all others. He declared the king was against these tenets; for what good could there possibly be in a law that would execute people for wearing hats? He did not have an army or a sword, but he held aloft the king’s great seal. In an instant, the spell was broken. He had spoken the same words we felt in our hearts but were too afraid to utter aloud.

Infallible they had told us, immutable and unchangeable. Yet the king himself decreed otherwise. Thus began the Battle of Libertad. We raised our voices, our fists and brought them down upon the elders. In the end, it was their own tenets that heralded their demise. For those who did not bow had not learnt to scurry along the floor, those of distinguished honour had targets emblazoned upon their heads, and those who had never felt the sting of a Campanilla did not know how to escape the sting of our blades.

Many died that day, heroes of our town. Even my mother was injured but not killed, and when the last elder fell, she, along with the remaining revolutionaries, was placed in charge of our great town. The first decree being an end to the tenets, for it should be known to everyone that all people are equal and no one should ever have to bow to another. They helped heal our town and brought us a time of blessing and prosperity. Years later, when my mother finally succumbed to her injuries, we had established a great town, a place of freedom, equality and loyalty.

Yet, and it boils my skin to even honour the notion, there are those here today who would threaten this great place, its proud people and the integrity of our history. We fought for freedom – freedom from oppression. For so long, we were forced to distrust one another, but if we do not stay vigilant, then the trust we have built will come crashing down. Even now these… these rebels are spreading criticism and gossip. They slander myself and other upstanding members of our society. Such behaviour can do nothing but spread mistrust and suspicion. How can we live in freedom when our neighbours can at any moment turn their words against us? I beseech you all with the charge of not allowing this behaviour to persist; if you hear anyone engaging in criticism, gossip or slander, it is your duty to report them.

Rest not though, for freedom is not the only virtue that we must protect; we must also turn our swords against they who would take away our equality. For too many years, it was commonplace for those who believed themselves better than most to flaunt their superiority with elegant berets. In our victory, we reclaimed our equality, and now all proudly wear Cambonetas, a magnificent symbol of our unity. So, should we lay back as these rebels discard their Cambonetas and instead wear fascinators and scarfs and bowlers, all decorated extravagantly with flowers and ribbons and feathers? No. If we allow them to discard our past, then the streets of our town will no longer ring out with the bells of equality.

So, they would do away with our freedom and our equality, but their greatest crime I have not yet spoken of. So heinous is it that I ask you brace yourselves. We all know the great price paid by the revolutionaries, all of them tortured at the hands of the elders for standing up against their tyranny. Our great statue was erected in their honour; for their sacrifice, we captured them in marble so that not even time could forget. Thus, when I learnt that the rebels had defaced our statue, I could no longer stand idly by. I knew I must act.

You may look at our great statue and wonder what mark they left upon it, for it stands before us now physically unblemished, but they did not mar it with mud or faeces or paint or any other substance that can be washed away and forgotten by time. No, they soiled it with their actions, a stain that may well last forever. Yesterday afternoon they approached the statue with slander in their mouths and egotistical fashion upon their heads, and when they stood at the feet of our brave founders, they… they did not bow.

Not a bend of a knee nor a dip of the head. Instead, they stood tall with insulting pride and used their platform to attack the very foundations of our town. They claimed that we have achieved no progress and have only moved backwards in our morality. They proclaimed that we have not achieved freedom or equality and that our loyalty is misplaced. They said that we had merely traded one set of rituals for another. It is these very criminals that stand before you today.

Following the death of my mother, I was chosen to lead our great town; I was elected because I had the ability to uphold the values given to us by my mother and the other revolutionaries. I do not take this responsibility lightly. It is why these criminals must be given to death. For if we fail to remember our past, then we will be forced to relive it. If we forget the wisdom of our parents, then we are no better than the fools who oppressed them. These rebels treat our history as if it was a game, a joke, a silly hat, but we know that the teachings of freedom, equality and loyalty are ineffable. It is by our actions we must keep our ancestors alive, or their voices, their sacrifices, their… vote will be lost forever. Surely this is the truth.