In the second century AD, the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius often secretly kept a journal in which he recorded his thoughts about life, trying in this way to help himself deal with the challenges faced by a Roman emperor. Marcus Aurelius belonged to the Stoic school of philosophy, and his journal, written in private, is today considered one of the monumental works of ancient philosophy. Having survived the fall of Rome and the Dark Ages, it became popular during the Renaissance. Today, his journal is known as Meditations, depending on the publisher and translation. His work, as well as Stoicism itself, is often regarded as an ancient precursor to cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). This psychotherapeutic approach connects thoughts, emotions and behaviour, starting from the assumption that changing the way we think can also influence our feelings and actions. The aim of this approach is to recognise negative or distorted patterns of thinking and replace them with more realistic and functional ways of thinking and behaving.

According to historical accounts, Marcus Aurelius was certainly able to control his emotions and avoid surrendering to them, instead adapting and taming them and, ultimately, changing his behaviour. This statesman is remembered for developing public services such as hospitals and orphanages across the Empire, freeing slaves, introducing state budget planning and adopting final accounts for the state budget of the previous year. Freeing slaves in a slave-owning system is certainly an act worthy of praise, while his contribution to public finance was immeasurable. Modern states would only begin adopting budgets and final accounts at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. Marcus Aurelius’s contribution to a more humane understanding of the state was therefore immeasurable, and sentences from his private journal are still quoted today, almost two millennia after they were written.

One of those sentences is connected to the subject of this analysis:

“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.”

Although this sentence appears very simple, it is logically sound and carries a deep philosophy. It places action before words and explains one of the great misconceptions of modern man. Simplified, it would read:

“Do not say that you are a good person. Be a good person.”

If we applied it to our topic, it would read:

“Do not say that you are a normal person. Be a normal person.”

Normality does not need to advertise itself. One simply is normal. If someone persistently insists that they are normal, the truth is very often the opposite of that claim. Either some manipulative intention lies behind such a claim or, at times, both manipulation and abnormality are present.

Normality is precisely what the Sandžak Democratic Party is now attempting to invoke.

Before analysing the slogan itself, we will devote some attention to the current political situation surrounding SDP and Rasim Ljajić. Turmoil on the domestic political scene, more precisely developments involving what is currently the strongest and most influential Bosniak political party, the Sandžak Democratic Party, continues. Bosniak parties have decided to contest the parliamentary elections separately, something the author of this text concluded in earlier articles. Quite simply, if they united on a single list, all of the lists would lose.

However, the situation has now become more complicated because SDA and SPP have decided to contest the parliamentary elections independently, while SDP announced that it would run together with the Montenegrin Democratic Party, CDP. This has been accompanied by numerous media reports claiming that Rasim Ljajić created a fictitious Montenegrin minority list, because Ratko Minić, an activist from his former party, SDPS, appears as the representative of CDP, which was entered into the register of political parties only around ten days ago. This also confirms the author’s earlier claims that Ljajić would reach for SDPS voters outside Sandžak, with CDP now creating a cover that makes votes from outside Sandžak appear to be votes from Montenegrins.

Whether Montenegrins will actually vote for this list can be seen once the parliamentary election results are published. If the SDP-CDP list receives a certain number of votes in a municipality, that number should be equal to or lower than the number of Montenegrins recorded as living in that municipality. Therefore, if CDP is not a fictitious party, out of approximately 20,000 Montenegrins living in Serbia, the SDP-CDP list should receive up to 4,000 votes in Vrbas and up to 5,000 votes in Belgrade. If the SDP-CDP list does not receive strong support in Vrbas, a place considered the unofficial capital of the Montenegrin community, then it will become clear that CDP itself is in fact a fictitious party.

Interestingly, the already existing Montenegrin Party decided not to participate in the elections and instead called on Montenegrins in Serbia to vote for the Students’ List. Although the developments surrounding the registration of CDP do not constitute a criminal offence, because declaration of national affiliation is free in the Republic of Serbia and no one can be criminally prosecuted for claiming that they do or do not belong to a particular nationality, ODIHR, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, issued recommendations for the upcoming elections in Serbia, one of which concerns minority lists. ODIHR identified abuses of minority lists and issued recommendations aimed at eliminating this practice. Although CDP formally meets ODIHR’s recommendations, one can still speak of a substantive abuse of minority lists.

Furthermore, this situation is legally questionable under Article 15 of the Council of Europe Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, which obliges states to create conditions for the effective participation of persons belonging to national minorities in cultural, social and economic life, as well as in public affairs, particularly those affecting them. When a fictitious list enters parliament with the votes of the majority population, it usurps, effectively takes, parliamentary seats that, in the spirit of the law, are reserved for genuine minority representatives. In this way, authentic minorities are marginalised and their right to effective political participation is rendered meaningless. This would violate the right of the Montenegrin minority to representation in the Serbian National Assembly, and representatives of, for example, the Montenegrin Party could address the competent court in Serbia regarding a violation of this Convention, since Serbia is a signatory and its provisions form part of the domestic legal order.

Furthermore, if CDP is determined to be a fictitious list, this would also violate the Code of Good Practice in Electoral Matters of the Venice Commission, the European Commission for Democracy through Law, which is a key reference document and set of European electoral standards adopted in 2002. When the political machinery of one party deliberately redirects part of its electorate toward a fictitious minority list, the will of voters is distorted and the principle of political pluralism is undermined. In its opinions, the Venice Commission stresses that rules on minority representation must not become a space for abuse and manipulation of election results. Therefore, one could also consider addressing international organisations regarding violations of this code.

Finally, the creation of a fictitious list is entirely contrary to European Union recommendations concerning electoral laws in Serbia. In more recent reports, including the European Commission’s 2025 Serbia Report, the EU expresses concern about pro forma, or fictitious, minority representation. The Commission directly notes that certain minority lists and councils fall under the political control of the governing majority, thereby losing their fundamental role of protecting minority rights. For this reason, the EU and ODIHR have directly recommended that the Republic Electoral Commission must not make decisions hastily or politically, but that the law should clearly define what makes a list a minority list, for example, the historical continuity of the party’s activities, a programme focused on the rights of that specific minority and the candidates’ connection to the community. All of this is disputed in the case of the Montenegrin Democratic Party.

It has also been recommended that, when minority-list status is granted, official national minority councils should be consulted so that the communities themselves can provide an opinion on whether a political group genuinely represents them or whether it is a case of political engineering. Serbia ignored these recommendations and continued its earlier practice, which, according to media reports, Rasim Ljajić also used by creating a fictitious political party of the Montenegrin national minority with the aim of attracting SDPS voters outside Sandžak and thereby formally avoiding a violation of the legitimacy of minority representation. The election results will show whether the SDP-CDP list received votes in areas where, according to the latest census, ethnic Montenegrins live. Therefore, in legal terms, the entire SDP-CDP list is “on slippery ground” and serious violations of the law could occur. Most interestingly, a party that has often described itself as “European”, SDP, is now openly acting against European Union recommendations.

Returning to the subject of normality and the use of slogans such as “Vr(ij)eme je za normalnost” (“It is time for normality”), “Normal”, “Right”, “Human” and similar messages, we return to the problem raised at the beginning of the text. It is clear that this is a position of the extreme centre, a centre determined at all costs to place itself in the middle of the political spectrum and present itself as the only rational and correct choice, and therefore as normal. A particular form of manipulation occurs here: “normal” is treated as self-evident, while everything else becomes extreme, radical and “abnormal”.

The question, however, is in relation to what exactly SDP is the “normal” option. Is it the normal and moderate option between SNS and the Students’ List? SDP has been in coalition with SNS at state and local level for more than a decade. On the other hand, SDP also actively cooperated with the student movement, which was visible on 12 April 2025, when the student protest in Novi Pazar would probably not have been possible without the support of SDP, Rasim Ljajić or his minister in the Serbian Government. Primary and secondary schools whose directors are affiliated with SDP were open to students, and there were also claims that services such as mobile toilets were part of SDP’s support for the organisation of the gathering. The delayed transfer of republican funds to Novi Pazar last year can also be viewed as a kind of confirmation of this relationship, since it was interpreted in public as a form of SNS “revenge” against SDP for supporting the students and flirting politically with the Students’ List.

In addition, Boban Stojanović, a researcher engaged on several projects of the Ministry of Tourism and Youth, headed by Husein Memić, an SDP official, and who is himself close to the Students’ List, repeatedly emphasised that students must take SDP and Rasim Ljajić into account if they want to win, and said, paraphrasing, that “where Rasim Ljajić is, victory is there too”.

So why are SDP and Rasim Ljajić considered moderation and the political centre between SNS and the Students’ List when they cooperate extensively with both actors? Why are cooperation with SNS and “political flirting” with the Students’ List considered normal and moderate? Is this not instead a characteristic of adapting to every system, devotion to self-interest and an absence of clear principles? Why are moderation and normality being confused with unprincipled coalitions?

Moderation and normality imply positions that reconcile and reduce polarisation, not political positioning toward everyone who has power and authority in society. Furthermore, is SDP considered the centre and normality between SDA and SPP, meaning that these two options are automatically abnormal? SDP was in coalition with SDA at local and state level, they are currently in coalition in the BNV, and SDP is also in coalition with SPP at state level. Are SDA and SPP now abnormal, or do they become abnormal at the beginning of an election campaign? Is everyone outside SDP abnormal, radical and extreme, while only SDP guarantees normality and moderation?

The next issue is the slogan itself, which says that “the time has come for normality”. SDP has been in power in Novi Pazar for almost 20 years and at state level for more than 25 years. Were all those years abnormal, so that now, finally, the time for normality has arrived? Why did SDP participate in something that, according to its own slogan, was apparently abnormal? And the most important question: does the slogan imply change?

Logically speaking, a slogan should represent a value or ideal that a party stands for. Since normality is only now appearing as a political message, and only in this electoral cycle, does that mean that everything else in which SDP or SDPS participated was abnormal? Are the students crazy, or is SNS crazy? Who exactly is crazy here, so that SDP can now bring normality?

At the very end, we return to the very beginning of this text: where does the need to advertise normality come from? Is it evidence that this political party needs to convince others that it is normal, because normal people do not need to pay for advertisements to persuade others that they are normal, they simply are?

This brings us to the core of the matter, the pathology of normality, as the phenomenon is called in the title. If we examined the history of SDP and Rasim Ljajić, we would find many things, but it would be difficult to find precisely what is now being advertised as normality. Countless compromises have been made, cooperation has taken place with virtually everyone in order to preserve power, while SDP officials have been arrested and accused of corruption, trading in influence and abuse of office.

For years, SDP rule in Novi Pazar has been the subject of accusations by the opposition, civic activists and others concerning corruption and misuse of public resources, electoral irregularities, political pressure and control over the local political space. During 2025, particularly in the context of student protests and political tensions, activists and opposition representatives accused the city authorities of putting pressure on dissenters and attempting to control opposition and civic activity, while SDP rejected such accusations and claimed that they were attempts to destabilise the city. These kinds of accusations, even when they are not true, are far removed from the image of normality being advertised today.

At this point, a specific disorder enters the picture: anosognosia. It is primarily a neurological disorder characterised by a complete lack of awareness of one’s own illness, deficit or health problem. A person suffering from this condition sincerely believes they are completely healthy despite obvious medical evidence or physical limitations. This condition differs fundamentally from conscious denial, a psychological defence mechanism, because due to physical damage, the patient’s brain is literally unable to register that something is wrong.

Although the author of this text is neither a psychologist nor a psychiatrist, for the purposes of analysis a metaphorical parallel can be drawn: SDP, Rasim Ljajić and particularly those who devised the new slogan may suffer from a kind of political anosognosia, a complete lack of awareness of their own political disorder, and therefore feel the need to persuade others that they are entirely normal and healthy. Only such political “anosognosia”, of course in a metaphorical sense, could explain a slogan like this without assuming that it was created for manipulative or malicious purposes in order to convince the public that SDP is the only “correct” or “normal” option.

Recently, another slogan has also begun to appear, carrying a similar message: “human”. The message could therefore be interpreted as suggesting that only SDP and Rasim Ljajić have a human approach to politics, while everyone else is presumably a beast, an animal, or simply not behaving humanely enough.

Here we are no longer talking about any pathology, but about political manipulation through which this political option is attempting to humanise itself. They are very much aware that, after almost 20 years in power, they have become considerably demonised, naturally, to a significant extent as a result of their own actions.

Ultimately, perhaps the greatest irony of this slogan lies precisely here: the more SDP tries to explain that it is normal and human, the more it reveals how important it is for the public to forget what has been done. After twenty years of political power, normality is no longer proven by a billboard, nor is humanity printed in large letters. It is proven by what remains behind when the posters are removed, the advertisements are switched off and the slogans disappear. What remains then are decisions, compromises, alliances, the way political opponents were treated, the relationship with institutions and responsibility for what was done while in power. A slogan can change the words, but it cannot change a political biography.

That is why “normal” and “human”, in this case, look far more like an attempt at political rebranding than a description of reality. When a party, after so many years in power, has to explain to citizens that it is normal and then assure them that it is human as well, the question is no longer why it says this, but why it feels the need to say it now.

Perhaps because it knows that its own political past is becoming increasingly difficult to defend with facts, making it easiest to offer a new label. But there is one problem with this marketing: citizens are not obliged to believe a slogan when they have twenty years of experience. Normality is not advertised. Humanity is not branded. And no billboard can wash away a political past. A political party is not what it says it is, but what it has shown itself to be. No slogan, however well designed, can change that fact.