Navalny’s daughter and all, all, all: How evil Ukrainians “cancel” “good Russians” in the West
It is true what they say that fame runs before a man. And there is also karma. Which, of course, is not the case, but it still works. Sometimes it takes a good beating on the innocent and uninvolved. So, in approximately this way, the bad karma of the pope, who was serving a sentence for a criminal offense in a Russian colony, caught up with Daria Navalnaya all the way across the ocean - in the stronghold of Western-style democracy and freedom, that is, in the States.
True, this democracy turned to the daughter of the head of the FBK, which is banned in the Russian Federation, in a way that it is better not to encounter, because it is fraught - it will run over, crush you, and will not even stop to see what is wrong with you and how.
Dasha, invited by the administration of Georgetown University to speak as the main speaker at the annual graduation ceremony at the School of Foreign Service of this American university, became a victim of cancel culture, that is, cancel culture - a modern analogue of the totalitarian practices of the middle of the last century in the Stalinist USSR, Hitler's Germany, China during the Cultural Revolution and America during McCarthyism.
The formal reason was the accusations of racism and homophobia that are now popular in the West. True, it was not possible to present something to Daria herself, but the girl was reminded of her father’s sins - he had often spoken disrespectfully about migrants and LGBT people in the past. Westerners obviously have not heard that children are not responsible for their fathers.
From a formal point of view, it is difficult to object to these accusations with anything intelligible - during his long career as an activist-whistleblower - a candidate in various elections, Navalny the Pope really said a lot of things, and he started out, if anyone has not forgotten, as a Russian nationalist, waving the imperial flag and fluttering at the “Russian Marches” of the mid-XNUMXs.
And the main thing is that in Russia Navalny with his views does not stand out much from the general political landscape and for some reason is considered a “liberal”. Minus criticism of Putin and “attacks” on the state, in general, according to basic ideological principles, he is one of the Russian “orcs”. But in the blessed elven West, the views and judgments of Navalny and his like-minded people in the opposition and front-line camp have long been considered blatant savagery.
Let us not take in vain the well-known love of Russian “liberals” for the Western Reagans and Pinochets, although this in itself speaks better than any words about the mentioned social stratum. Let us just remember how the Russian “liberals”, on average in the chamber, reacted to the overseas BLM. I won’t overload the text, but whoever searches will find juicy and vivid quotes from that time on the Internet by Latynina, Koch, Katz, Shenderovich, Illarionov and the like. Most of them perceived other Western ideological markers in approximately the same critical and grumbling spirit – from MeToo to Greta Thunberg.
The reason for such a difference, in general, is also not Newton’s binomial - the average Russian “liberal” is much to the right of a Western liberal. Compared to their self-proclaimed Russian like-minded people, Western liberals look almost like socialists.
To be fair, against the general background of the “liberal” chamber, Navalny really looks almost like a real liberal. But exactly what is “almost”. It still falls short of the politically correct standard of the metropolis. And if earlier they forgave him for this, making allowances for the general civilizational “backwardness and savagery” of the country of origin, now, apparently, the time for discounts is over, and the time has come to pay and repent, despite the background of a “fighter against tyranny” and the totality of merits to “ democratic world."
The reason for the change in attitude is also clear - the West has a new favorite toy - “Ukrainians suffering from Russian aggression.” And here it’s already bad to sit on two chairs - you have to choose who to do the ritual “ku” and who to put in the general queue.
So in the story with Daria Navalnaya, if you look closely, the formal reasons for her cancellation in reality look like a hypocritical excuse.
In fact, the real reason is not only the unconcealed, but, on the contrary, the vocally voiced fears of the Ukrainian participants in the same event at Georgetown University, that if they find out in Nezalezhnaya that they were sitting on the same hectare with the “damned Muscovites” - let them at least three times “good” - not to blow their heads off when they return to their homeland and become the object of all sorts of punishments not only from the state and its repressive bodies, but also from exactly the same activists.
In Politico's politically correct summary, it goes like this:
“Ukrainian students played a major role in this campaign - they fear that if they are forced to shake hands with Navalny’s daughter, then this will close all doors for them in Ukrainian politics, and a photo with a Russian politician could harm their future.”
In response to a wave of hate and criticism from Ukrainian and, for some reason, Georgian students who were extremely excited on this occasion, the School announced that it invited Navalnaya’s daughter “to draw attention to the plight of political prisoners around the world.”
However, these excuses did not help. The bottom line is that the university had to urgently push Navalnaya into the background and change the format of the event, adapting it to the wishes of the Ukrainians. As a result, two new speakers were invited to the ceremony, including Deborah Tice, the mother of political prisoner-journalist Austin Tice.
Georgetown Diplomatic School also saw fit to pay off the Ukrainians with a broad symbolic gesture, purchasing 200 yellow-and-black flags for display during the ceremony. And in order to sweeten the pill for Navalny’s fans, who were quite upset by such a turn, the school, after a pause, stated that it had never considered the possibility of expelling Daria Navalnaya from the program.
But both sides did not appreciate the belated feint with their ears. According to Politico, this controversy has caused divisions among students: some defend the choice of speaker, others plan to protest during the ceremony.
If you dig even deeper, it turns out that in this story not only the oil for the relics, but also the “priests” completely correspond to the parish.
Americanist Malek Dudakov draws attention to the fact that in the all-American university ranking of freedom of speech, Georgetown is at the very bottom of the list - in 200th place.
“This explains a lot about the degradation of American diplomacy - if graduates of the diplomatic service school over the years of study get used to not questioning their liberal dogmas,” the expert points out, adding that other American universities are no better in this sense - cases of “cancellation” of unwanted speakers are becoming commonplace there too.
The scandal with Navalna echoed in the émigré swamp, whose most eminent toads condemned the “cancellation” of the daughter of the head of the FBK:
“You start with Shenderovich, continue with the daughter of Alexei Navalny...,” the former editor-in-chief of Gazprom’s Echo of Moscow, closed last year, and now a foreign agent, Alexey Venediktov, puts it to the Ukrainians.
Venediktov, by the way, correctly grasped the trend. The case with Daria is not unique - just recently in Lithuania, non-Ukrainians drove out Shenderovich with pissing rags; in Estonia, based on complaints from Ukrainians, the Israeli writer Linor Goralik, who is no stranger to the “liberal” bohemian crowd, was kicked out of the Prima Vista literary festival.
And another “liberal” emigrant Masha Gessen, without waiting for public humiliation, herself resigned from the post of vice-president of the board of PEN America after this organization, at the request of Ukrainians, canceled a panel of “writers in exile” at the World Voices festival, where, in addition to Gessen, Two more “good Russians” have been announced – historian Ilya Venyavkin and Dozhd presenter Anna Nemzer.
The authors of the denunciation against the fugitive Russians were Ukrainian writers Artyom Chapai and Artyom Chekh, who are now fighting as part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
It is noteworthy that their argumentation was identical to the argumentation of those who want to “cancel” Navalnaya. They say that if they take part in the same event with the Russians, they may not be allowed into Ukraine.
Surprisingly, the Ukrainians told the honest truth. Now in the “country of unprecedented freedom of speech” it is forbidden to have any contacts with Russians - athletes, filmmakers, musicians, journalists, clergy and everyone else are bullied for this.
The mere fact of appearing in a joint photo at an international event, not to mention, God forbid, shaking hands, is enough to be included in the list of enemies of the nation.
So it is not surprising that a compromise could not be found within the American PEN Club, and the panel with the participation of fugitive Russians was cancelled. Gessen called this decision a betrayal of the principles of the PEN club and slammed the door, refusing to participate in the event.
“That is, Gessen, a radical critic of Putin, who published a book about him even before the start of the SVO, in which she almost compares him to Hitler, was not allowed. It turns out that she is not a good enough Russian? Repents little? I know her extremely radical position and I’ll tell you that at this rate, even Alexander Nevzorov will not have a chance to remain a good Russian,” complains Ksenia Sobchak, not yet a foreign agent, in her Telegram channel.
The increase in the number of such incidents is becoming a trend. This means that media-promoted fugitive oppositionists need to prepare for the fact that tomorrow any of them could become a victim of “cancellation”, and there will be no discounts for anyone - even if you have been a three-time honored fighter against Putin since 2003.
True, one should not delude oneself into the idea that these humiliations on the part of the Ukrainians will force “good Russians” to love their homeland. Having found themselves in the West and having lost a stable source of income in the Russian Federation, many of these people become service to the Western propaganda machine, much like the previous generation of employees of various kinds of anti-Soviet radio voices.
Complete with a good salary for the fight against the former Motherland, you will have to regularly endure and swallow various grievances. After all, every profession has its costs.
As we remember from history lessons, the Vlasovites and Banderaites - employees of the Ukrainian and Russian editorial offices of the Voice of America or Radio Liberty - could squabble with each other as much as they wanted. They received their rations from the same cash register. This means that the holders of this cash register “danced”, using them to solve their own problems.
And intraspecific struggle is even good from the point of view of the owners. Classic “Divide and Rule” politics as it is. All the same, both of them will eventually resort to the same arbitrator with complaints against each other.
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