Since there appears to be some confusion, I'd like to clarify that hating on people because they are ethnically Russian or have a Russian passport is very bad and you should really not do it. On the other hand, refusing to do any business with anyone based in the Russian federation is good and you should do it. You can't keep doing that without indirectly supporting the Russian state, given the tight control of the economy they have. Yes I know this hurts a lot of people who are mostly innocent or even opposed to putin and it sucks. But almost literally the only alternative that does not do that and also does not not prop up putin's war is a cia organized coup in Kremlin and I'm sure that the Russians will be the first to recognize how bad idea is that.
(I think it'd be maybe a reasonable idea we could put together some online resources for people in Russia to use like servers, VPN links, domain names and such, so they still have access to them even if they don't have means to pay, if someone is doing this, or needs it, I can contribute some money. Also tbh if you fall within possible conscription age bracket, I seriously think you should leave, like, for real. It doesn't look like it's happening yet, but it'll be too late when it will.)
> I'd like to clarify that hating on people because they are ethnically Russian or have a Russian passport is very bad and you should really not do it.
What you call for is not to conflate actions of the government with the attitudes of individuals under that government's rules.
Sure. That's just basic human decency as I (and clearly you and I hope many too) understand it.
And yet, it's more complicated than that when we think about it. Because it's not only about government vs. individuals, but also about government vs. the society vs. the individuals that comprise that society. And shall we blame the society here? Or at least ascribe responsibility to it?
My personal take is, yes, we can. even though I feel "dirty" about it because I never expected myself to make such swiping generalizations. But here I am, I do make them - as clearly do 70+% of Ukrainians today and I happen to agree with them (begrudgingly). Why?
1. I just read some stats, it seems 70+% of Russian society agrees with the policies and actions of their government. I don't care whether they are brainwashed or not (from our perspective, which is biased!), I effectively see human beings agreeing to inhuman actions. It tells me they don't share values with me. Now if you find yourself trying to tell me that 70+% is not all, my counter would be that in the countries you or me live/lived/know elections are won by a thin margin, so 70+% is HUGE.
2. over the last 3 decades Eastern European societies spent vast amounts of energy and resources and experienced a lot of pain and went through huge struggles to bootstrap themselves out of the quagmire left after communism fall in '89. We all worked f**ing hard to get somewhere, to build civic societies and as a side effect also some level of economic prosperity. The price for that was vast uncertainties about our ways of life, never-ending barrage of corrupt cronies trying to usurp the rule n our countries and our societies struggles against them so as to make something better out of our societies. This costs energy and requires mobilisation of large swaths of the society. And what did Russian society did during all this time? Figure yourself. Even the lights of hope they produced were weak and dim without much support. In the end their society's non-actions produced this horror in Ukraine. And you know what? I do blame them for it. All of them. Including my friends, members of Russian society who now regret and try to separate themselves from these horrors their society produces. Exactly as I am blamed and take responsibility for wrong-doing of my own society in present and in the past, even though individually I don't support those policies either.
Is this a coherent and "clean" philosophical stance? No it isn't. But I will go and argue there's something about it. As a member of a society you cannot escape some level of collective responsibility.
BTW, the last 3 decades we saw this struggle in Easterm European nations including Ukraine. But it's nothing new. Western-EU, or even US societies went through exactly such struggles in the past too. And my great hope is that one day, Russian society will also liberate themselves from that backwards-staring mindset and will one day start to constructively and positively look onto the world around them. Honestly, I am not sure it will happen in my lifetime. It's a tough multi-decade and multi-generational process.
