Ok this blog is not about politics, but somehow it’s about my life. So here I am, living in Russia, the country with beautiful people: talented musicians, artists, dancers, amazing doctors, teachers and all the other professionals who know how to be a good person and how to do things right.
But the rest of the world judge us just by one politician. Radical, homophobic, aggressive. The world says – that’s their leader as a representation of the nation. So let me show you what our nation is.
Today, on March 26, we had meeting protests against the government throughout the country in 99 (!) cities and towns. People were clamoring against the system and corruption with slogans ‘Russia shall be free’, ‘Russia without Putin’, ‘The criminal has to go to the prison’. In Brazil or South Korea that would end for the government in a fair law court… But what we got as a feedback? When thousands of unarmed russians went to the street to shout out for justice, thousands of policeman and soldiers started to arrest them. There was no exception for women, children or oldman. I was there, in the heart of Moscow, protesting with others.
And here I want to say that it literally hurts me when I see in social networks like tumblr all the hatred adressed to Russia. When you are afraid of russians, when you think of us as rude homophobic savages who barely know what civilization and human rights is. Please, try to look deeper on what happens here. We are people. And we need your support.
As a bonus, photos from another date in St. Petersburg
If we want to survive as a species, we must learn to work together. The Russian people are not the Kremlin any more than we Americans are our White House.
We must not war with each other. We must support each other.
Russia is our sibling as a country. We have aided each other; we have bickered and harmed each other. What one does affects the other. We’re not enemies, yet we have forgotten how to support them.
We must not give in to hatred and pettiness. As our politics continue, there is legitimate fear, I think. We may easily cause great harm to the world if we fight again.
We must not aggressively react to what happens in the news. We must not give in to the fake news, to the propaganda that parties are spewing out.
Please share and connect. If you will, seek a connection to the Russian culture and people. Help support them–spread news such as this. Break down anti-Russian propaganda. Research and keep apprised of Russian news. No, it will not all be heart warming. It will not be simple or easy.
We cannot ignore it. Russia is important to our country and how we CHOOSE to react will determine our futures.
Excuse me for a second for my nerdiness, but this is the point Gene Roddenberry was trying to make with Star Trek. He believed that the success of our planet relies on the WHOLE working together. He explicitly states this in Next Generation, but if we continue to war with each other as we are, we will endanger ourselves, potentially to extinction. Even if it is out of self preservation, we cannot continue to treat Russians as some cheap Hollywood villain.
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