Copyright © 2024 Euromaidanpress.com

The work of Euromaidan Press is supported by the International Renaissance Foundation

When referencing our materials, please include an active hyperlink to the Euromaidan Press material and a maximum 500-character extract of the story. To reprint anything longer, written permission must be acquired from [email protected].

Privacy and Cookie Policies.

Seven things Russians need to understand about their country and themselves now

A Russian tank, which served to defend the state's Far Eastern border and a symbol of its military power, simply abandoned to rot in its position (Image: dementievskiy.livejournal.com)
A Russian tank, which served to defend the state’s Far Eastern border and a symbol of its military power, simply abandoned to rot in its position (Image: dementievskiy.livejournal.com)
Seven things Russians need to understand about their country and themselves now
Edited by: A. N.

Many of the problems Russians now face are rooted in their firmly-held misconceptions about the nature of Russia and Russian national identity. To help them out, Dmitry Olshansky, a columnist for “Komsomolskaya pravda,” identifies seven things that he says Russians must recognize about Russia and themselves.

  • First of all, he says, “Russia is a small country. It only seems large on a map.” [Stress here and below is added.] Most of the territory within its borders is inhospitable to life. Indeed, Russia’s “biggest deficit” is warmth and the sun. A few small islands in warm seas would mean more than vast Arctic wastelands.
  • Second, Olshansky continues, “Russians are a small people.” Given the demographic disasters of the last century, Russians are so much smaller than they should be that they need to be entered into “the Red Book” of peoples who require special protection to survive. “We need rules of life as in a preserve,” i.e., no migrants and no competition from stronger cultures.
  • Third and despite what Moscow claims, “Russians live worse than all others on Earth,” the result of “the combination of the [Russian] climate and the [Russian government].” The climate is “unbearable,” and the state administration is “at an African level and with African attitudes toward human life.”
  • Fourth, “Russia is not the Russian Federation.” Within the borders of the country, Russians have no place of their own; and abroad, there are many ethnic Russians. As a result, “the genuine national borders of Russia and the genuine borders of its cultural and political existence do not have the slightest relationship to those of the Russian Federation.”
  • Fifth, “Russians are a stateless people,” very similar to the Kurds or Palestinians although they are in a somewhat better position because the whole word recognizes that they don’t have a state of their own, something few recognize as being true of Russians. Moscow makes this worse by focusing and spending abroad and not on its own citizens.
  • Sixth, “the main drama of Russian history is the gap between the individual and the state.” There is no state that has achieved so much territorially, militarily and culturally that at the same time has treated its own people so shabbily, concentrating all power in the hands of a few at the center and leaving everyone else struggling for existence.
  • And seventh, Olshansky concludes, “the main Russian problem is the absence of a nation.” The commentator says that “there is a people but there is no nation,” and the state is “alien” to it. As a result, there is no common language between the people and the state, the sine qua non of a political nation.

Edited by: A. N.
You could close this page. Or you could join our community and help us produce more materials like this.  We keep our reporting open and accessible to everyone because we believe in the power of free information. This is why our small, cost-effective team depends on the support of readers like you to bring deliver timely news, quality analysis, and on-the-ground reports about Russia's war against Ukraine and Ukraine's struggle to build a democratic society. A little bit goes a long way: for as little as the cost of one cup of coffee a month, you can help build bridges between Ukraine and the rest of the world, plus become a co-creator and vote for topics we should cover next. Become a patron or see other ways to support. Become a Patron!

To suggest a correction or clarification, write to us here

You can also highlight the text and press Ctrl + Enter

Please leave your suggestions or corrections here



    Euromaidan Press

    We are an independent media outlet that relies solely on advertising revenue to sustain itself. We do not endorse or promote any products or services for financial gain. Therefore, we kindly ask for your support by disabling your ad blocker. Your assistance helps us continue providing quality content. Thank you!

    Related Posts