The More Western Parts of Europe vs. Czechia
1. Insight into music genres known or respected on an international level
Many people often seem not to understand the values of certain music genres and their international significance. They often fail to understand the meaning of different kinds of music because their perspective remains closed within one linguistic and cultural space. They focus mainly on music in one language and within certain genres that, outside of Czechia, have almost no reach. No one in the world listens to it, and no one truly becomes visible through it beyond the borders. Because of this, it is difficult for some people to understand that someone can be, and is, known precisely on an international level.
2. Knowledge about the more Western parts of Europe
They do not know the general reality outside of their own environment, and therefore they ask questions such as “what is actually happening?” If they had a broader understanding of the reality around them, these questions would not arise at all, because the answers are obvious from the context of reality itself.
3. Thinking about reality through the mentality of one’s own environment
The way people ask questions and perceive situations comes from the mentality of the environment in which they live. This mentality is strongly shaped by language, social habits, and a certain kind of closedness, which is much less common in Germany or the more Western parts of Europe, or such thought patterns simply do not appear there. A Czech person often unconsciously does not understand the way people from the more Western parts of Europe think, just as they do not understand some common expressions of Czech mentality—although the West does see them—for example, the degree of envy, hatred, or toxicity that in Czechia comes from its own mentality, over which Czechs themselves often do not even reflect, because this mentality feels like their own natural state. In these surrounding countries, this is not so common, and that is precisely why meaningless questions, misunderstandings, and surprise arise in the minds of Czechs.
Even one’s own international recognition comes from this—for a Czech person, it is difficult to understand why someone is known abroad, because they do not understand, through a lack of knowledge of values and environment, the context in which it naturally happened.
4. Isolation
Most of this comes from ignorance of the broader European environment. To a large extent, Czechs are cut off from the reality of Europe by themselves. They close themselves within their own space, keep distance from other European countries, do not commonly cooperate, do not communicate with people from abroad (also because of the language barrier and the rejection of an international language), and do not travel between countries as naturally as is common in the more Western parts of Europe. In doing so, they create their own isolation. The result is that their own reality remains insignificant on an international level and, often because of mentality, also difficult for the surrounding world to accept.
5. Mentality
Because of this isolation, Czechs often create ideas about the surrounding world that have little to do with reality. They do not know the real conditions elsewhere, and therefore they judge others according to their own environment and mentality. This was visible even after the pandemic—many people did not realize how bad the situation in Czechia was compared to the more Western parts of Europe, where such a long post-pandemic period in a similar form did not exist. They also fail to realize that some conditions are not coincidence, but the result of specific intentions and the setup of society. In the West, such a setup often does not exist at all—rather the opposite. Because of this, someone can easily fall into certain political manipulations, especially if something internal is being deepened—they do not realize that their reality is not universal reality, but specifically their own conditions. And from these personal conditions, they then judge the surrounding world. They do not realize that their perspective is shaped by an environment that is completely different elsewhere. A Czech person asks these questions because they do not know the reality around them. The more Western world embodies this reality and does not need to ask these questions about itself. That is also why it can be easy to maintain a society in conditions that would be unacceptable elsewhere—people accept them as normal. It resembles a state as if socialism never completely ended: not through a physical barrier, but through mental closedness toward the surrounding world itself. The difference is only that today people create this isolation themselves. And this is often what makes me stop and think—that people often do not realize reality, while people in the more Western parts of Europe often see reality much more clearly. In contrast, a Czech person commonly stops to reflect on the complete opposite. If someone do not understand and do not know the reality of the surrounding world, this person also do not understand or realize the reality of the person in question. It is also a certain kind of naivety—like stealing while there is camera footage, which the person is unaware of, and they think no one will see the theft. They may later be surprised that everyone around them has seen the recording.