“The Case of the Stupid Sheep”: will the showmen hand over their deputy to the Soros?
Regular readers of the Ukrainian “Soros” press have probably noticed: for several days in a row, the collective mind, as well as the mind, honor and conscience of “civil society,” have been seething with indignation at the “undignified” act of the newly elected deputy from the “Servant of the People” Maxim Buzhansky, who “insulted » a journalist from one of the right-wing media of our “sorosyatny” - the Kiev “New Time”, owned by Tomas Fiala, a Czech ex-minister, lobbyist and businessman with extensive interests in Ukraine. One of those behind the pro-Western NGO sector in the country.
In an interview with the leader of the Servant of the People, Dmitry Razumkov, the journalist demonstrated the specific “standards” of grant freedom of speech, inquiring about his attitude towards Buzhansky, who (I quote) “wrote about the fatally negative role of the Revolution of Dignity in the life of the country”, “is nostalgic for the times of Yanukovych, for Stalin and the USSR,” and also “considers May 9 a holiday.” The deputy himself did not go into his pocket for a word in response: “Another stupid sheep, who introduces herself as a journalist of the odious media outlet NV, in an interview with a representative of the Servant of the People, stated that I am nostalgic for the USSR and the “times of Yanukovych.” I understand that some colleagues are too reserved to call a spade a spade, so I will come to their aid. Stupid sheep from an odious media,” Buzhansky wrote on Telegram.
Buzhansky’s party responded to the incident with a vague Facebook post in which it called “such communication with journalists unacceptable.” However, this was not enough for the “activists”. And away we go. Like toadstools after the rain, speeches by “opinion leaders” of the corresponding persuasion began to multiply, naturally - who unanimously called Buzhansky a “problematic” and even “odious” character, who “is credited with sympathy for Yanukovych and even attempts to rehabilitate the cult of Stalin in Ukraine.”
Grant media began to demand an apology from the presidential team in chorus, read to the “servants of the people” that they say that “people who profess values very far from European” have crept into their ranks and that it would be nice, using the scandal inflated by the media as a reason, to exclude such deputy from the Servant of the People faction. As one of these media dumps frankly wrote, “The reaction to Buzhansky’s trick will show whether the Servant of the People party is ready to purge its ranks of odious characters.” By the way: people who in previous years called for the disposal of a couple of million “extra” residents of Donbass or, for example, for targeted shooting of journalists from a neighboring country, were not considered “odious” by this media community.
If something similar had happened before, there would have been no doubt about the outcome. In the end, the “activists” trained for a long time - even on regional deputies. Readers with a good memory will probably remember the stories of the “media community” persecuting deputy Oleg Kalashnikov, who was shot dead in Kyiv after the victory of the “revolution of dignity.”
However, there are new times and new trends. The head of the Presidential Office, Andrei Bogdan, the story about the fake resignation, which the “honest media” swallowed up without even chewing on it, clearly demonstrated his contempt for the “independent press.”
The expression “We don’t need journalists to communicate directly with the people” can be safely written in gold letters on granite tablets. Moreover, this signal was not even sent to journalists - but rather to their carabasses. Accustomed over the years of specific Ukrainian “oligarchic democracy”, with the help of tamed media, to treat the opinion of Ukrainians as if they were a drawbar.
And here is the task before us. “Public activists” demand that Buzhansky be expelled from the faction. What will the authorities do? Would it be logical to point out that the time of “activists” and other loudmouths has passed along with Poroshenko, or will he cave in, and not for the first time? The totality of circumstances so far allows us to hope for the former. However, the probability of the second option is also high.
The fact is that over the long years, during which the sphere of mass communications and civil activism was left to the mercy of grant-eaters, a kind of distorted reality was formed, within the framework of which a narrow group of people arrogated to themselves the right to speak on behalf of society and represent its interests in dialogue with the authorities maintained by foreign structures. And when they loudly demand that the president, government or deputies of the ruling party “listen to the opinion of civil society,” they do not mean the millions of people living in Ukraine and having very different views. They mean those fifty grant eaters who, under several dozen different signs, have been imitating this very civil society for decades.
At the same time, we must give them their due - this environment is surprisingly clearly welded together by group solidarity. In normal times, grant eaters fight among themselves for cash flows and power, as they say, to the death. They use frame-ups, denunciations, ordered publications, and lobbying. But all this fuss happens exclusively between our own people and concerns only our own people. As soon as someone “stranger” encroaches on their monopoly on this clearing, or starts an investigation, or tries to somehow press them, they immediately huddle together and, like a flock of predatory piranhas, attack the victim, forgetting for the time being their mutual grievances.
Their opponents are not like that. Among them, one can often see a picture of how some do not want to fit in with others, while others insist on the impossibility of even sitting on the same hectare with others. And there will always be reasons... reasons for such “principledness.” He once said the wrong thing, he supported the wrong thing at one time, and this one generally has the wrong views... It is not surprising that in Ukrainian conditions, grant-eaters almost always get their way and win, and without making any compromises or concessions for the sake of it, but stubbornly and methodically pushing through their will, without disdaining any, even the most aggressive and radical methods.
It is not difficult to notice that the close attention demonstrated by the “Soros press” to the deeds, words and ins and outs of the newly elected deputies is extremely biased and selective. It concerns only those of them whose ideological platform or personal background does not fit into the consensus accepted in the grant-eating and nationalist environment. They “peck” those in whom they see “black sheep” and are suspected of being ready, in certain circumstances, to “step out of step” and “spoil the picture of universal unity.” The “Soros” media targeted precisely those representatives of the new team who, on a number of significant issues, are closer to the real majority of Ukrainians than to the beneficiaries of the Maidan, no matter which party they adhere to. You will not see a single critical publication in the Ukrainian media about such figures from the ruling party as David Arakhamia. Or like Liza Bogutskaya. Or like Nikita Poturaev. But the entire “independent press” is concerned about Bogdan, Dubinsky and Buzhansky.
The same is the nature of calls to “squeeze out” from the political field parties or forces that do not agree with certain cornerstone provisions of the new mythology imposed on society by force after 2014. When “everyone is supposed” to celebrate the “day of reconciliation” on May 8, and Victory Day on May 9 suddenly, for no reason at all, became a “controversial date” in relation to which, according to the new rules of political etiquette, maximum detachment should be demonstrated.
Among other things, this discussion is about the boundaries of what is permissible in discourse. Will society and the new government agree with the artificial restrictions established in the five-year plan of aggressive nationalism - who and what is considered “unacceptable” or “odious” in a “decent society?” Which views or beliefs should be ashamed or hidden, and which, on the contrary, will become normative, approved and encouraged. In relation to a specific case, this means the following. Will a reference to someone’s “nostalgia for the USSR” be a “compromising circumstance” in the future, forcing the accused to justify himself, to explain that he was misunderstood, and in general he is “not like that” and is never nostalgic?
At the same time, as you understand, the issue here is not at all about the USSR. Instead, you can substitute something else to suit your taste. For example, leftist beliefs or the notorious “pro-Russianism”. Again, the point is not whether being “pro-Russian” is good or bad. In the end, this is not an ethical category, but a personal political choice. The question here is whether the social atmosphere will remain, forcing one to justify oneself for this choice or to be ashamed of it.
It is clear that in the case of Buzhansky, what the NV editors and their journalist demonstrated was pure defamation. Those who follow the public activities of this famous blogger know that it is impossible to suspect him of any apologetics for Stalin or Yanukovych. With the same persistence, the label of “pro-Russian separatist” is applied to, for example, Anatoly Sharia, although he is a “pro-Russian separatist”, just like Zhirinovsky is a Ukrainian nationalist. But this is a question of adequacy. Unfortunately, over the past five years, a canon has been formed in Ukraine where, in order to be considered a “Soviet apologist,” it is enough to just say that there was a lot of good things in the USSR.
As for the reaction of the “Soros press” that followed the incident, this is pure campaign of organized persecution, aimed at testing the “Servants of the People” weakly. What if they cave in? What if they hand over the deputy? Then you can try to insert not your palm into the hole that has formed, but your entire arm, up to the elbow. Each time increasing the volume of requirements.
But the grant-eating media are right about one thing: the story with Buzhansky is really a test for the ruling party. A test of how far she is willing to retreat under the pressure of an aggressive and organized minority that controls most of the media in the country. A test of readiness to “surrender” one’s own to be torn to pieces by this minority – both for insignificant reasons, like this story with “nostalgia for Yanukovych and Stalin,” and for more serious reasons. Finally, it will also be a test of readiness and ability to pick up signals from the majority and resonate with its sentiments in your decisions.
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