I am the cause for this war.
A difficult but important topic that is reluctantly raised in wide circles. It is better to think about it silently before going to sleep or not to think at all.
Not everyone is capable of self-criticism, only a few are capable of adequate self-criticism. And when this self-criticism is accompanied by painful discoveries, this is where the most interesting thing happens.
Evolution.
Everything affects everything.
Each of us, as a part of the world, is a direct participant in any universe process.
Scale, power of influence, human condition are absolutely not important.
Even dead, even erased into ashes affects being.
It was, it is and it always will be.
The phrase “I am the Reason of this war” sounded in my world not so long ago, about the sixth month of russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
It wasn’t an epiphany or some discovery, it wasn’t a surprise to me.
I just started this conversation with myself, which I had been putting off for six months, waiting for better times.
Better times have not come, and there is a probability that they will not come.
So I sat down and admitted to myself: “I am guilty of this war.”
The feeling of guilt did not destroy me.
All because I never regret anything.
I sat, remembered the stages, individual events of my past life and little by little realized how exactly I turned from a Ukrainian child into…
My own reflections on how I led an openly pro-russian life and how I became the cause of this invasion were not clear. I grew a complete description of my journey little by little, and each of the events resounded in one way or another with russian notes.
I simply acknowledged this fact:
I lived almost my entire conscious life – not as a Ukrainian
There are such topics and questions that you have been carrying around for some time. Maybe weeks, years. And then suddenly on the way there is a person who voices your words from his head. It happened this time as well with me.
I was overtaken by an apt post on a social network, which I am quoting here without changes (made my own translation from Ukrainian to English). I saw the first words in text and everything else was no longer important. This combination of words described something that I could not say to my face. This is a personal story and has little to do with my life, but the main idea stuck with me and I decided to share this post with the world.
Text by Olexandr Mudriy
“I am the cause of this war. Yes, yes, it became possible because of me. I think about it all the time. Now I will try to explain.
Again, this is my personal page, where I express my personal opinions, with which you may not agree.
I am a russian-speaking Ukrainian. I am a resident of a 95% russian-speaking city. Despite the fact that 30 years of my life out of 33 I lived in the independent country of Ukraine with a single state language. I studied in russian until the 8th grade. Most subjects at the lyceum and university were also taught in russian.
I watched russian films, read russian classics and listened to russian music. At the same time, I never considered russians to be “brotherly” people – I never lived with them in the same country (at least at the age when I could understand something), I never visited this country.
Until 2014, I considered all peoples of the world to be fraternal, because it is necessary to be friends, associate and learn smart things with the whole world and all countries. For me, russians have never been different from Americans, Kenyans or, say, Ecuadorians. Everyone around is the same, I thought.
In my family, we communicated in russian, with friends, at work or in companies – too. At the same time, I never had any problems with Ukrainian – I even won school Olympiads, and it was even more convenient for me to conduct formal events in Ukrainian (especially official events).
It’s just that everyone around speaks russian – and so do I.
That’s more convenient.
It’s just easier that way.
Even when I received my passport in 2004, I wondered – why is it that in a country where the official language according to the Constitution is only Ukrainian, a citizen’s passport (the most important document, for a moment) is filled out in two languages? I was even more surprised when in 2016 I received a new passport-book (I lost the old document), where my first name, last name and patronymic are also written in russian on the second page. Strange, I thought. How else can you talk about “injury” when such nonsense is happening.
In 2012, I had a daughter and I read books and fairy tales to her. In different languages - Ukrainian, russian and even English. But at home, in everyday life, I spoke russian with my daughter. She called me “Papa” (russian ‘father’ – 3B), not “Tato (Ukrainian ‘father’ – 3B)”. Although I should mention that when she started reading on her own, I bought books for her exclusively in Ukrainian. It seems that some principle has awakened here, but, unfortunately, not completely.
In 2014, war broke out in Ukraine.
russia has clearly become an enemy for me personally.
But russia, first of all, as something general, as a state first of all.
The war then bypassed the Kherson region and I began to live as before – work, family, the opportunity to rest and so on.
The war (a very unpleasant analogy now arises – after all, Ukraine officially called the events of 2014 – and until February 2022 an anti-terrorist operation, and then an operation of the joint forces, and not a war) was going somewhere far from me, and I honestly admit that in the last 7 years about I didn’t think about her that often.
When I read the news, I simply laughed at russian propaganda like many of my friends (not suspecting its terrible threat). I did not doubt that Donbass and Crimea are Ukrainian lands – but the war was going on sideways. In the theater where I worked, there were performances in russian (including with my participation). I organized star concerts in Kherson (including russian stars).
In the fall of 2020, I decided to switch to Ukrainian in my social networks. I don’t know why exactly, but I made this decision. In everyday life, I still continued to communicate in russian. I watched russian liberal bloggers, listened to russian music, although I stopped watching russian films. My daughter, coming home from school, often said to me, let’s speak Ukrainian at home? I agreed, but half an hour was enough for me at the most.
This was the case until February 24, 2022.
With the beginning of a full-scale war, I completely switched to the Ukrainian language.
I deleted all russian-language music from my phone, deleted all subscriptions to russian YouTube channels.
In Kherson, until my departure (it happened on April 16), I spoke only Ukrainian. In all public places, shops, transport or queues.
Mostly, when I started talking to my friends, my friends also switched to Ukrainian (although I didn’t ask anyone for it).
I left [Kherson] on April 16. On the evening of April 17, I found myself in the Stryi district of the Lviv region. There was an opportunity to stop there, but since I had another option, I decided to try it as well. But on the evening of April 17, when I was a thousand kilometers from my native home with one backpack in the house of people completely unknown to me, I remembered the question that the hostess of that house (a girl my age, maybe even younger than me) asked me after how we were fed and shown a room where we could stay for the night: “What do you think about the Language?” And her father-in-law, inquiring about the situation in Kherson, said: “They (russians) will never come here. They fear us more than anything. Because they know that here they will be shot at from every window.”
The next day, April 18, we went to a small town near Ivano-Frankivsk (15 km from it). I am still here. It’s been almost a month and a half. I recently caught myself thinking that I had never in my conscious life left my native Kherson for so long. This is a beautiful town, where the people are wonderful and hospitable, where there are no drunkards and quarrels on the streets, and people’s houses are better than in the elite Melnytsy of Kherson. And everyone communicates with each other perfectly, greets each other and is interested in each other’s lives.
There is no language issue at all. Do you know why? Because everyone speaks Ukrainian.
Once in line at the military commissariat, I overheard a conversation between two local men: “I have a job and a family, I’m 50 years old, why should I go anywhere [it means going to the front to fight – 3B] ? Let the people of Donetsk and Kherson go fight. They were calling for russian peace.”
I stood five meters from him and understood that he was absolutely right. Yes, it was me who called for russian peace. And when the war started in 2014, I didn’t even go to the Military Commissariat. And I finally put all the dots above the “i” for myself – I am the cause of the war.
Because I read russian books, watched russian films, listened to russian music and spoke russian, walked along Suvorova Street past the Potemkin monument [Suvorov and Potemkin are famous people in russia – 3B].
I can shout as much as I want now that Kherson is Ukraine, but when I lived there, I did nothing for it. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that russian-speaking regions and cities are being bombed – I gave a reason to someone there “beyond the border” to consider us their lands and one people.
We talk a lot now about the collective responsibility of the russians in the fact that they remain silent or support the war. And now I want to admit my personal responsibility for having made it possible to start this war.
Today I removed the russian layout from the phone keyboard. And if I hear from someone the phrases “what’s the difference” [a widely used phrase in disputes on the topic of the language issue, which means a shortened version of the argument to speak Russian instead of Ukrainian, which in full sounds like “what’s the difference, in what language we speak” – 3B] or “I know Ukrainian, but I will speak in the language I want” – then I will only support guys like the guy from Frankivsk who punched a street musician for singing in russian, or a volunteer from Lviv who refused to help refugees from Kharkiv, who fundamentally did not want to speak Ukrainian.
Because behind “language” comes war. It is followed by the same russian peace.
And I personally know for sure and nothing makes me more confident now – that “language” must follow the russian ship.
Throughout.
Everywhere throughout Ukraine.
And then I, and all of us, former russian-speaking Ukrainians, will become the reason why we shall win this war. Because when we throw out the word “russian-speaking” from our vocabulary, then the last clue in the nonsensical delusion about the “brotherhood” of peoples will disappear. Only Ukrainians remain, whom they fear more than anything and who are ready to shoot at the invaders from every window.
Glory to Ukraine!”
ⓒ Olexandr Mudriy
(the translation is imperfect, because the text uses special linguistic techniques that will resonate only with russians or Ukrainians; it is physically impossible to translate such places, so the main idea is conveyed – 3B).
the cause for its end
I deliberately did not indicate at the beginning of the text that this phrase refers primarily to Ukrainians and russians, as two warring parties. But even being a citizen of another state, you can somehow influence the course of events, because everything is connected with everything.
Living on the other side of the Earth, one can equally support the actions of the aggressor or not openly condemn the aggressive, terrorist steps of russia, starting from 2014 (and if we take a broader view, then from the first Chechen one).
Living thousands of kilometers away, you can be close to Ukrainians and share their pain and thirst for victory. It is not necessary to send money, it is enough to have a relationship and thoughts.
A person, having nothing to do with russia, can be a source of aggression, anti-human acts, terrorism and thereby tolerate what is happening in Ukraine now.
That is, the phrase that exists in the title of the text has a broader meaning, although the main idea still touches on one’s own thoughts and self-reflection on the topic.
And everyone who finds yourself on these lines can ask this question: “How much war is in me? What am I willing to do for the sake of peace?”.
If I am the reason for this war between russia and Ukraine, then I must be the cause for its end
I can see the end. But this is not the final phenomenon.
The end of hostilities and heroic deaths is only the beginning of a new stage.
And this stage, in my opinion, is much more complicated…
