…no matter how many times I extended my invitation [to a debate], the answer was “Vučić, you’re on ‘Ignore'”.
So I have prepared here, in the backyard of my father, in Jajinci, a special set-up [sic], and, as you can see, here’s the chair, Mr. Srdanović’s [the first on the Student Election Ticket] picture is there, a since they claim that even a sour cabbage rock will defeat me [at the ballots] i’ve placed a sour cabbage rock to support them, so they can be sure of their victory.
I’d like to give an answer to the claim they made yesterday…
There is a method to this madness. The pro-student netizens started a meme that they would vote for a rock if the rock ran against Vučić. It is a variation of the Serbian dissident mentality “I’d vote for the Devil himself just to see them gone!” that’s been a thing ever since the first elections in 1990. Welp, voting for the Devil is what got us the party of Devils we now have in power.
So why does Vučić debate a rock from a meme? His party often makes self-deprecating agitprop, and many times it works in their favor. For example, Vučić’s supporters are commonly referred to as “ćaci”, which at one point, the ruling Progressives decided to own it by launching an online campaign: “I’m a ćaci, too!“
See, the opponents of Vučić’s popular front tend to dismiss him and his supporters as “psycho idiots” or whatever. Which is a mistake – never underestimate your opponents. Vučić became an MP in 1993, he was 23 years old. The next year, he was the person number 3 of his party. He and his cohorts are NOT inexperienced in politics.
Even if your opponents are, in fact, psycho idiots, that doesn’t make them magically go away or trip over their own shoelaces. You still somehow have to win the elections against psycho idiots.
Vučić did teach his opponents a valuable lesson here, and he did it free of charge – run a sour cabbage rock as an opponent, and the sour cabbage rock will lose, on account of not being a human, adult citizen of Serbia, so it cannot hold office.
[CAPTION: A Serbian political graffiti: “It is time for freedom, we waited for it for a long time!”]
