Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
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Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
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Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#2not really in favor of this characterizing countries thing. it’s like how China calls Hongkong it’s child and it finally was returned to its mother in 1997. Nowadays same terminology is applied to Taiwan, I’m just disgusted by this figure of speech, saying China is a mother and hongkong and Taiwan are her children just signals that you don’t want to treat them with respect in the first place. Same thing with this story, saying Russia is husband signals the bias in author’s mind: Ukraine is the weaker and smaller one thus the wife.
sorry for my broken English, hopefully you understand what I’m trying to say…
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#3I was thinking about writing something exactly from this perspective today. Based on what Putin said about Ukraine, how it use to be part of Russia. The fact that Ukraine has declared their independence from Russia is exactly like an abusive husband that won't let go of the relationship and he is willing to put everyone in jeopardy to get his selfish desire of grandiosity met. Everyone one around him sees that its over and nothing is going change that. No amount of violence is going to bring everything back to the glory days. Its over, move on.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#4not really in favor of this characterizing countries thing. it’s like how China calls Hongkong it’s child and it finally was returned to its mother in 1997. Nowadays same terminology is applied to Taiwan, I’m just disgusted by this figure of speech, saying China is a mother and hongkong and Taiwan are her children just signals that you don’t want to treat them with respect in the first place. Same thing with this sto…
Yea Politicians use that language to try and convince political states and countries are things, but they are just ideas that people can either believe in or not.
I like the idea of using the OP as a metaphor to help everyone understand the dynamics. It doesn't mean that in practice it really exists.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#5not really in favor of this characterizing countries thing. it’s like how China calls Hongkong it’s child and it finally was returned to its mother in 1997. Nowadays same terminology is applied to Taiwan, I’m just disgusted by this figure of speech, saying China is a mother and hongkong and Taiwan are her children just signals that you don’t want to treat them with respect in the first place. Same thing with this sto…
Ukraine was a part of the Soviet Union. They spoke Russian. They married Russians. It happened. But it's a history now. No one can force-continue the marriage.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#6I feel that the Russian identity has been dealt a fatal blow.
The load-bearing pillar of the Russian identity is the idea that we are a nation of defenders, who fought off the biggest invasion in history. We defend, not intrude.
If you remember history, there was another guy who attacked a slavic country, in the morning, without declaring war, hoping for a blitzkrieg. We are that guy now.
I thought about renouncing my Russian nationality. I may have Russian origins, and I may speak Russian, and I may live in Russia – but my nationality would be blank. Null. Nothing. Empty string.
I decided against that. By renouncing my nationality I would also renounce Lomonosov, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Tchaikovsky, Vavilov, Surikov, Vrubel, Tarkovsky, Korolyev, and Gagarin. I refuse to let a single tyrant tarnish the Russian contribution to human civilization.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#7I feel that the Russian identity has been dealt a fatal blow. The load-bearing pillar of the Russian identity is the idea that we are a nation of defenders, who fought off the biggest invasion in history. We defend, not intrude. If you remember history, there was another guy who attacked a slavic country, in the morning, without declaring war, hoping for a blitzkrieg. We are that guy now. I thought about renouncing m…
> a nation of defenders
Nonsense. Russian history is full of invasions. That is how empires are created, and that is their mode of existence.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#8not really in favor of this characterizing countries thing. it’s like how China calls Hongkong it’s child and it finally was returned to its mother in 1997. Nowadays same terminology is applied to Taiwan, I’m just disgusted by this figure of speech, saying China is a mother and hongkong and Taiwan are her children just signals that you don’t want to treat them with respect in the first place. Same thing with this sto…
Ukraine was a part of the Soviet Union. They spoke Russian. They married Russians. It happened. But it's a history now. No one can force-continue the marriage.
> It happened.
Well, before that there was another war (the Red Army vs. the Ukrainian nationalists around 1920); and Stalin killing millions of Ukrainians in the man-made famine in the early 1930; followed by the mass repressions in the late 1930s, with hundreds of thousands executed. It's never been a happy marriage, not really.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ukraine was a part of the Soviet Union. They spoke Russian. They married Russians. It happened. But it's a history now. No one can force-continue the marriage.
> It happened. Well, before that there was another war (the Red Army vs. the Ukrainian nationalists around 1920); and Stalin killing millions of Ukrainians in the man-made famine in the early 1930; followed by the mass repressions in the late 1930s, with hundreds of thousands executed. It's never been a happy marriage, not really.
I agree. This is another reason to stop trying to make it happen, when it wasn't a happy marriage in the first place.
Re: Hi, I’m Russian. Ukraine and Russia is a story of a divorce
#10I feel that the Russian identity has been dealt a fatal blow. The load-bearing pillar of the Russian identity is the idea that we are a nation of defenders, who fought off the biggest invasion in history. We defend, not intrude. If you remember history, there was another guy who attacked a slavic country, in the morning, without declaring war, hoping for a blitzkrieg. We are that guy now. I thought about renouncing m…
> a nation of defenders Nonsense. Russian history is full of invasions. That is how empires are created, and that is their mode of existence.
To be fair, more often than not, Russia was on the receiving end of invasions. Even when they invaded others, it was often in response to being invaded first.
Look at how the Russian empire formed: it was Moscow re-taking all the Kyivan Rus lands that were conquered by Muslim invaders. Or all the European countries that attacked/invaded Russian lands: Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Poland-Lithuania and I'm probably forgetting some.
So yes, it's fairly apt to say that, more often than not, Russia was defending its own lands.
The fact that Russia is wrong today doesn't mean that it hasn't been wronged many, many times before. A parallel is that many abusers were once abused themselves (and yes the cycle needs to end).
Also, Ukraine's unfortunate history: they were the part of Rus/Russian lands that almost always were passed back and forth. The name "Ukraine" itself suggests that...