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A recent event that I’m sure fully counts as culture war is the official removal in Odessa of the monument to the city’s founders, mainly Catherine the Great. The justification, which is rather easy to predict, is that Catherine was a perpetrator of Moskal imperialism who repressed Ukrainian patriots (supposedly they already existed back then), committed cultural genocide and erased Ukrainian nationhood (which obviously we’re also supposed to believe existed back then). There isn’t much to comment on this, I think (though I’ll again point out that Odessa would never have existed in the first place without Catherine), but an educated redditor was eager to point out* the curious fact that the removed monument is actually a replica erected in 2007, largely as a response to the events of the so-called Orange Revolution, as the original was removed (and supposedly destroyed) by the Soviets in 1920. So yes, it was originally removed as an imperialist relic, by powers that the Ukrainian authorities claim later perpetrated genocide specifically against Ukrainians because they were Ukrainians i.e. it was an incident between opposing factions of Ukraine deniers. This is where we’re at, which actually doesn’t surprise me that much because I believe we’ve been in a clown world for a long time.
*https://old.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/zyccgk/catherine_the_great_statue_taken_down_in_odesa/
I am mildly interested in how the quest for Ukrainian nation building will develop my lifetime. Right now they manage to co-opt two very opposing sets of political and philosophical schools, largely due to wartime mobilisation censorship and patriotism. On the one hand the Ukrainian identity is being based on 19th/early 20th century style blood and soil rhetoric. The defenders of white Christian (even pagan) Europe against eastern orc hordes. Unspoiled real Slavs against the crypto-Tatar Muscovites. Real European Christians unlike those Eastern Orthodox peasants. On the other hand their only hope for national survival in this day and age is to tightly integrate with the “GAE”. So the Ukrainian army puts up EU flags in newly reconquered territories. Their parliament is busy rushing through gay agenda bills. Their politicians are making deals with Blackrock and learning the ropes of the WEF circuit.
But when the war ends these two stories cannot coexist for long. You cannot arm neo-nazi battalions while going through the EU integration process. You cannot outright ban one of the largest churches as well as the linguistic communities in your country and try to enter the Schengen area. It’s not for nothing that half the EU funded ads targeted to my demographic on social media has some visible minorities (ie blacks) posing as proud Europeans. The nationalist Ukrainian state, if it ever stops being such a poor corrupt shithole and enters the EU, will have to cope with millions of African/South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants as well as the European Court of Human Rights rulings which will not tolerate the blood and soil rhetoric in practice. It’s ridiculous contradictions all over and makes me profoundly sad that so many young brave people are dying for a political project doomed to fail if it ever succeeds.
Something has to give in at some point. I don’t know what but I am not very hopeful about the results.
I agree that Ukraine founding fathers and founding myths are lame.
Imagine alternate timeline where CIA during Cold War chose different group of hopeless exiles, timeline where today's Hero of Ukraine(TM) is not this cringe nerd, but this majestic based Chad.
Everything else is the same, but the flags, symbols and songs so much more kino.
But it does not matter at all.
Every nation had to be built sometimes, mostly ad hoc out of very unsavory and contradictory material that just happened to be there at this time and place. Ukraine is no different.
If you are nationalist who sees mankind turned into unified faceless shapeless blob as the worst nightmare, if you see diversity of nations as good thing, you should celebrate, you should be thankful you can see birth of new nation.
Nothing contradictory about these positions, they can be resolved easily.
"Ukraine is Europe! What is Europe? Europe is, and always had been, land of free market and LGBTQ+ rights, as opposed to communist homophobic and transphobic orc hordes from the East!"
The more Russia celebrates their past, the more Russia bases its identity against LGBTQ+, the more natural this reaction is.
Yes they can.
Yes you can.
If.
Millions of Ukrainians already entered EU on their own, and millions more would follow.
Ukraine is already part of Council of Europe, people already complained to ECHR about blatant sexist discrimination and breach of European Convention on Human Rights in today's Ukraine where men, only men, are banned from entering the country and subjected to draft due to their gender identity alone.
ECHR reply.
Compared to this, overlooking some edgy flags and symbols is nothing.
Color me shocked that nobody selected a peasant Anarchist who was easily duped by Bolshevik salami tactics to be the symbol of united Ukrainian nationhood. Instead they had to chose the cringe nerd for the sole but very obvious reason because they knew they could always portray him to the normies as a victim of Nazi repression, because "he was in a concentration camp". (In reality, he was under the equivalent of house arrest under comfortable conditions, because he had qualms about one aspect of the proposed National Socialist European New Order, namely that it didn't include an autonomous Ukrainian state.)
sure...lol. We'll see how much of a good political sell this will turn out to be. I suggest you don't hold your breath.
People who were on the German side in the second late unpleasantness are still considered sus (even if they eventually got on their wrong side) , and Bandera is, to use modern woke term, problematic figure, especially in Poland.
In addition of being much more charismatic, Hollywood blockbuster worthy figure, Makhno would not have any of this baggage. (well, the Mennonites might object)
Bandera was picked as Hero(TM) and Founding Father(TM) of Ukraine not only because CIA chose to support OUN, but also because Soviet propaganda made him into Big Bad and gave him in this way great name recognition. Not because of anything he personally did.
In contrast, Soviet propaganda was nearly silent about Anarchists - all Civil War books and movies portrayed it as exclusive struggle of Reds and Whites, with Blacks shown only as ocassional perpetually drunk comic relief guys (and Greens absent completely).
It worked excellently so far. Look outside of your bubble - general public in Western world loves capitalism and loves LGBTQ+.
You know what Ukrainian nationalists mean when they speak of "Europe", don't you?
What they want Europe to mean does not matter, what Europe really means does matter.
Look at Ukraininan laws that are actually passing now - these are not laws about defending "Aryan race purity", these are laws about deregulation, privatization, restricting labor rights and protecting LGBTQ+ rights.
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