Laying the demons to rest

Are we prepared to face our history without fear or passion? Can we accept that we have avenues named after royalty and that the former summer palace at Tatoi needs to be salvaged because it is a piece of our collective memory? Can we finally be ruthless about the historical truth, while also respecting its monuments, institutions and protagonists?

If the answer to these questions is yes, then this means we have finally matured as a society and are past the phase when it was considered anathema to give voice to any other opinion but the prevailing one. I remember, for example, being hassled when I first interviewed former king Constantine or coup leader Stylianos Pattakos, or the first time that Konstantinos Mitsotakis spoke frankly about the events of 1965 in a television interview. The reactions were fast and furious, like a religious zealot faced with an offensive book...