The role of culture for just and sustainable peace

Putin started a full -scale invasion not to capture yet some Part of the Ukrainian lands. It is naive to think that RThe axis put hundreds of thousands of Russian soldiers in order to occupy Avdiivka or Bakhmut. Putin began a full -scale invasion to occupy and destroy all Ukraine and move on. His logic is historical. He dreams of recovering the Russian Empire. Therefore, people in others European countries are in relative security only because Ukrainians continue to restrain the offensive of the Russian army.

Human nature is unchanged. When reality is scared, people will deny it. They will find dozens of explanations for this purpose. And they will behave accordingly. MIt was difficult for international partners to imagine a full -scale invasion of Russia into Ukraine. Now it is difficult for them to imagine that Russia can invade Poland. I call this psychological protection mechanism “Debtohm imagination ”. As he says Orban: ”Ukraine is a country with a very difficult destiny“, and ussay, This is not about.

But the truth is that The results of this war Determine What will Europe look like And the world as a whole. Decades of freedom after the fall of the Berlin Wall They can easily change for decades of survival.

So when I am asked like Ukrainians see achievements just and stable peace I always Please to reform its right. This is a problem Not only Ukraine, When A permanent member of the Security Council crosses the statute UNbegins an aggressive war and tries to change internationally recognized borders. Unable to build paradise even if you island when part of the world continues to drain blood. Many things are not limited to the border at alls.

Therefore, it is no coincidence that I will talk about one of these things. About Rolls culture to achieve a fair and sustained peace.

And my first thesis that For Ukrainians this war genocidal.

Putin openly He says that there is no Ukrainian nation, there is no Ukrainian language, there is no Ukrainian culture. All these years we document how these words rotate on a terrible Practice. RossiYana physically destroy active people on occupied territoryYah – mayors, journalists, children’s writers, priests, teachers, businessmen. They prohibit Ukrainian and culture. They plunder and destroy the Ukrainian culture of the heritage. They take Ukrainian men into the Russian army. They give Ukrainian children to the re -education camps, where they are told that they are not Ukrainian, but Russian children, that their parents or relatives have refused, and they will be given to Russian families who raise them as Russians.

ROsia tries to present our resistance of occupation and destructionYu Ukrainian identity as an action underdig peace. So we have to constantly explain the obvious to us, but not obvious to the world things. Mir does not come when the country to which They attacked, stops protecting itself. Then it is not peace, but occupation. Occupation is the same war, just in another form. Because occupation is not just a change in one national flag to another. Occupation is a violent disappearance, rapetorture, forced adoption of your own children, denial of your identity, filtration camps and mass graves.

When Putin on Alaska spoke Trumpthat will lead the war to the elimination of its “root causes”, then these root causes are our existence. In order to destroy the national group, you do not need to kill all its representatives. You can forcibly erase their identity – and the whole national group will disappear. So pOsers deliberately use violence of this level of intensity so that the only way to escape is He obeys. Then another psychological mechanism of protection “Identification with the aggressor” is started. When in order to survive it is necessary convince yourself that you with them, Because it is better be a cat than his victim.

Ago We can’t to stop Resistance Russian aggression. IKit Russia It occupies Ukraine, we will simply not. Tired countries to prove their identity – disappear.

My second thesis is that this war is changing the perception of Ukrainians in the world.

Every nation – it Narration as a story about yourself. But several For centuries, Ukrainians lived in the shadow of the Russian Empire. ANDMrperia is not just about owning land, resources and people. Is the knowledge of knowledge of how we speak ODin About one. It about the right to give things names. We entered a full -scale war as Society without context. People on other continents knew about our part of the world just what is here RThe axis. Our story was not written by us. We are a country with undigested classics. I am still asked if the Ukrainian language is different from Russian.

In response I I often tell the story of a picture Dega at the Metropolitan Museum. She depicts girls in national dress. But in a picture with the name “Russian dancers” The girls are dressed in embroideries and wreaths. For many years, Ukrainian art critics sent letters and asked to rename the picture or Add a note with an explanation. NI did not pay attention to these voices. And only after a full -scale invasion of the subway changed the name of the picture. Now it is called “Dancer in Ukrainian costumes”. Probably the museum administration is still thinkswhat are the Russian dancers, which Just in Ukrainian costumes were pulled. But this is an important shift.

Ukraine begins with‘to appear On the mental map of the world. However, a very expensive price. Mand a vivid testimonythat the country’s subjectivity is measured not by the level of national income or the presence of nuclear weaponsand the willingness of citizens to defend their freedom. Freedom to be an independent state, not a Russian colony. Freedom to maintain their own identity rather than re -educate Ukrainian children as Russians. Freedom to have your own democratic choice as possibility To build a country in which everyone’s rights are protected, the authorities are accountable and controlled, the courts are independent and the police would not‘There is not to disperse peaceful student demonstrations.

At the same time we see that interest in Our country a little fades. AND It is naturalyo. This war Not the only hot point on the globe. GUntreal crisis and hostilities Sudan is longgo more than 20 years. MIlions of women in Afghanistan were forbidden to speak in the presence of men. Third inseven Up‘Ins Writers in the world are in the prisons of China. AND ppserve at this moment a lot of people in different partsX The world is fighting for their freedom and human dignity. On the world media Units fall.

If Ukraine will be perceived solely through the lens of victims of Russian crimes, and Russia through its “great culture”, then we lose. Image bodies on the streets of Bucha or Destroyed Drama Theater in Mariupol easily replace images of other victims. We can be interesting outside our pain and suffering. MOzhna is tired of sympathizing, but you cannot get tired.

The third thesis, culture is the legitimization of the state.

Culture as an autonomous phenomenon has emerged relatively recently. Before that she It was part of church life or served monarchs and contributed to their strengthening. The process of rupture of culture and The authorities stretched for several centuries. For some reason “art out of politics” began to understand how art outside all that causes unpleasant experiences or encourages to do action. Although pAnnife meant that art simply does not serve the ruling elites. NAsh Theme for the coming years is a matter of war and peace. If we talk about something else, we will be out of reality.

Culture is tOh about CONSULTION experience between present and past. And this experience was often torn in Violent way. So we belong to restore these breaks and to give voices to those whom the empire crossed out of history. The destruction of the Khan’s Palace in Bakhchisarai is not just an act of barbarism, but a conscious politics. Archaeological Pam‘The Crimea is silent witnesses that the power of the Russians does not come from ancient times. Moreover, they make you understand that This one Power is temporary.

Culture is not just about works of art Or mass use products. It about the meaningthat are transmitted from generation to generation and form established in this society Patterny behavior. The problem of our society has long been in its inability to call evil evil. We lived in a country where the streets were named after the battles of Ukrainians. These executioners were monuments. And this was especially not about anyone.

This war has a value dimension. It is not the war of the two countries, but the war of two systems – authoritarianism and democracy. Each of them corresponds to its set of values. Established relationships between people reflect the idea of ​​a society that may be political power, What is the place of freedom man and violence over a person This power takes away. And we We are not only fighting because we are not them. And because we defend values ​​that are incompatible with the Russian way of life.

The fourth thesis, culture creates and promotes the meaning.

Like many in Ukraine I nationsLady on the wreckage of the Soviet WITHOyuz. ANDWe became Europeans in this struggle. Because Europe is not about geography, but about valuesand. INCountries retireyu values freedomsand and safetyand, which Western societies for a long time perceptionSay as a given.

First, freedom for us is not the value of self-expression, but not paradoxically-the value of survival. We would not survive or have emerged as a nation if all these centuries did not seek freedom.

Secondly, we do not oppose freedom and security. We need freedom to security and safety for freedom, because we are losing one, we will inevitably lose.

Third, the state is a habitat for us, not just a set of services. This is what preserves our identity. LYou can not ideal. NAwait is not ideal protect And keep.

Fourth, we believe that all efforts ordinary people make sense. We had never had luxury to rely on effective state institutions, so self -organization and grassroots sub‘Activity our Greeting power.

PpThe question is as to us about it all speak? Reproachintimidation or hysterics – Not workgo. I often use a mirror test when I remind myself as a Ukrainian societyatXia to full -scale invasion. THERE AREThe melon is correct Tone of Voice – It’s dignity.

I recorded the testimony of a Ukrainian scientist, philosopher Igor Kozlovsky after 700 days of Russian captivity. Prior to that, I interviewed more than a hundred people who survived, and they told how they were beaten, tortured, hammered into wooden boxes, cut off limbs, crushed knees, conducted a current through genitalsforced to write their own blood. So I could have little surprise. But Igor mentioned the detail that was not important for the evidence base. And she impressed me.

He described his weekdays in a single chamber. It was a basement where mortals were kept in Soviet times. There were no windows in the cell, there was no sun, there was a lacking air and it was difficult to breathe. The dirty floor was sewage. Rats came out of the opening of this sewage. And the well -known scientist told me how he read these rats lecture on philosophy, to at least hear the sound of human voice.

Igor Kozlovsky was a victim, in the legal sense that he was abducted, kept in inhumane conditions and tortured so that he learned to walk again. But even it’s not He became a reason for him to treat himself as a victim and live himself as a victim. Because the basis of our existence is dignity, not the victim. And dignity is an action.

MOva not just about being feltAnd your responsibility for everything that happens, but also to do the right things that it is to change. Dignity gives strength to fight even in human circumstances. We are not hostages, but participants in this historical process.