What is “Russia”, when all creativity and dissent are destroyed, and only conformism remains?
In his poem for 1926 “Debt to Ukraine “Vladimir Mayakovsky wrote:” It is difficult to confuse people, not to brag about yourself. ” And then he continued: “Do we know the Ukrainian night? No, we do not know the Ukrainian night. “
But Vladimir Putin is trying to “crush people into one.” He claims that the Ukrainian soul is the Russian soul. And God himself allegedly told him about it. History has allegedly shown him that Ukraine wants to be with Russia. Even the Russian language “allows” him to invade the countries where it is spoken. Russian media dispelled any ambiguity a few days ago, publishing a text that called for the complete destruction of the Ukrainian people as such. So Ukraine needs to be destroyed, as well as everyone who thinks or talks about it.
With his misconceptions, Putin has placed the Ukrainian people at the center of world history, where everyone sees him. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is now the most recognizable person on Earth. The world has seen not only a bold, democratically elected president, but also functional institutions, an impressive civil society, journalists, activists and musicians appearing on television and in newspapers, writes Yale University history professor Timothy Snyder. p>
Meanwhile, things are worse in Putin's Russia. A war based on a great lie deals a severe blow to its culture. Everyone is looking at the Russian people, or rather trying to find them at all. What makes society believe in deep deception and start a war against a neighbor whom it allegedly “loves”? Americans have not yet recovered from the lies they have been told about Iraq for two decades. Russia's campaign of deception is much deeper. How much have Russian parents changed if they argue with their own children in Ukraine, denying the existence of war? Which nation unleashes bloodshed and then forbids the use of the word “war” itself?
We can say that this is Putin's war. But that would be too easy. It is conducted in the name of Russia. Tens of thousands of Russians are being killed, maimed, abducted and deported. Hundreds of corpses of civilians from Bucha and other cities were found after Ukrainian citizens liberated cities in the central-northern part of the country. And everything points to horrific atrocities, including rape, torture and executions.
Read also: Business Insider: In Bucha, Russia committed genocide and nothing else
“This is how Russia will now be seen the state. Your culture and human image died along with the Ukrainian men and women you killed, “Zelensky said.
Mass executions have become a normal Russian practice of occupation. When Russians commit war crimes, violating the right of Ukrainians to exist, they are told (and they believe) that they are going through World War II again and fighting the “Nazis.” This is a big lie. And a big lie hurts for a long time.
Active suppression of freedom of speech and assembly leads culture to the abyss. Efforts must be made to produce television propaganda and suppress other media. The last sources that reported a real war have disappeared in Russia. It took violence from thousands of Russians to silence those who were willing to speak in public. Russians who read poetry are arrested. Russians carrying banners with Bible lines are arrested. Russians, who simply carry pieces of paper without any inscriptions, are also thrown behind bars. Everyone who wears yellow and blue hats is caught because they are the colors of the Ukrainian flag. Russians with anti-fascist banners are also being arrested.
“Putin's police know that anyone who speaks seriously about fascism is actually talking about it. Fascism glorifies the nation, but moves society towards a completely stereotyped behavior, stimulated by the regularity of the threat and liberation from it. The police are always the hero in the regime's propaganda videos. At first, her appearance is frightening, but then relief comes when it becomes clear that the police are on your side, provided that the regime's demands are met. In one such video, a police officer jumps out of a van into a group of people. This should scare the audience: the crowd will be beaten now! Instead, police and civilians join hands to form the letter Z, a symbol of invasion. Well, senseless violence is not aimed at you, but against Ukrainians. Everyone relaxes. Is this culture? ” – Snyder writes.
Like Adolf Hitler's swastika, the letter Z used by the Kremlin does not matter. It functions as a substitute for culture. The point is simple: you are showing a silly symbol to gain time to justify the massacres that you will invent later. You stick ribbons with the symbol on your clothes so as not to say anything. You form a letter with your bodies, showing loyalty to a certain goal. You express your willingness to accept the definition, whatever it may be. This is obedience in advance. You write Z on the door of people who think differently to intimidate them.
The impressive courage of the rest of the Russians can be measured by their disagreement with this tacit violence through an empty ritual. These Russians shape culture by speaking and acting unpredictably. That is why they are immediately repressed. Public culture has already taken hold, as talents are either fleeing the country or punished. Educational culture is under threat as schoolchildren and students are fed military propaganda. Prospective teachers are no longer taught social sciences and world literature.
Read also: Russians confirm murder of civilian men in Mariupol
Snyder reminds that in Ukraine people speak Ukrainian and Russian easily. And now it is the world's most important refuge for Russian-speaking creativity. One line in Russian, said by Zelensky during his speech, is more viable than all Russian television after the war.
“Putin does not protect Russian-speakers, as he says. He kills them. For most Ukrainians killed during the complete destruction of Mariupol, Russian was their mother tongue. Putin claims that Russians in the West or those who think Western in some way are scum, traitors and pests. What's left? When a culture is isolated, it ceases to exist. Isolation-related procedures of denunciation, persecution and conformism give rise to a semblance of culture, but, unfortunately, absolutely mediocre, which has nothing to do with the country where it takes place, “the article reads.
Culture must participate in unpredictable contacts. Russian culture has so far been in close contact with Poland, Germany, the United States, and all that is now considered alien and inviolable. Putin complains that the West is “abolishing” Russian culture.
They have now applied a culture of abolition, even removing Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, and Rachmaninoff from billboards. Russian writers and books have been abolished, ”the Russian autocrat complains.
He reached his peak of tyranny, and hence the peak of irony. It is true that some Russian works have been canceled in the West. However, it was a reaction to a completely unprovoked war. And the word “abolition” trivializes what Putin himself has done to Russian culture, shutting his mouth to his own country, trying to destroy Ukraine and calling Russians abroad scum. Culture begins with contact, and contact requires restraint. According to a poem by Mayakovsky, a Russian, culture emerges when we realize that our arrogance is a mask of ignorance. And cultural contact only happens when we can't say for sure how another person will react. Freedom of speech does not mean that everyone in the country is immediately lined up in a giant letter as soon as they are told. Putin's freedom of speech is not violated when Ukrainians act in accordance with their beliefs and resist him.
The actions of Ukrainians during the terrible war earned respect and humility. The Americans and the West did the right thing when they listened to the Ukrainians, to their desire to exist as a nation and a state, to their belief in victory. This is a contact that the West did not expect and the consequences of which will be unpredictable.
Read also: Zelensky handed Putin a peace note, but the dictator promised to destroy Ukraine – The Times
“From this point of view, we are all indebted to Ukraine. Just like Russia. As American culture is inconceivable without English, so Russian is impossible without Ukrainian. Kyiv and Chernihiv, the cities that Russia is shelling, were home to schools that raised priests, professionals, and bureaucrats for the Russian Empire, where such people were in high demand. All Russian literature comes from Gogol. And Gogol himself comes from Ukraine, “the article reads.
Russia will now be even more indebted to Ukraine. The sooner the Ukrainian army wins the war, the greater the chance that Russian culture will survive.
See the special topic: The first US ambassador to Ukraine for CNN: The West mistakenly allowed Putin to impose its rules Popadyuk believes that Washington has pursued the wrong policy towards Ukraine and Eastern Europe in general from the very beginning. If negotiations with Russia can prevent such events in Bucha and Kramatorsk, we should use it – Kuleba The Foreign Minister of Ukraine noted that it is extremely difficult to even think about sitting at the negotiating table with people who commit such atrocities. Finland is ready to strengthen sanctions against Russia – Marin The head of the Finnish government has called on all Western companies to cease their activities in Russia. The Azov Regiment, which defends Mariupol, has reported “ignorance” from some politicians The new commander of Russian forces in Ukraine will increase the terror of the civilian population – Sullivan He has already distinguished himself during the war in Syria.
