“You have alienated your only ally, the Russian intelligentsia”. The appeal of a Russian woman to the President of Ukraine Zelensky

Today I will share with you the appeal of a Russian woman, journalist and publicist Anastasia to the President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky.

“Dear Vladimir Alexandrovich. You are calling on the people of Russia to come out to protest against the war in your country. I would like to explain why I don’t do this specifically,” — this is how Anastasia’s appeal begins.

“I’ll start with the main thing: I don’t go out because I don’t want to. I do not think the war is right and justified, I did not support it, but I have no desire to speak for Ukraine. Most will stay at home, although, I assure you, they do not welcome the war.

Let me show you by my example why I’m sitting at home. In short: it is unpleasant for me to risk myself, to go under the batons, under the threat of arrest for the sake of a country that had been sarcastic to me for eight years before. In 2014, when a misfortune happened to your Ukraine, I filmed anti-war gatherings and joined them entirely as a citizen myself. I was running from the riot police.

I have never worked for the state and have never helped to implement its policy in any editorial office. In general, I have always, since my youth, been a tough, irreconcilable journalist and did not support this government in any form, even at the time when you worked for Russian TV and earned money from our state. I live in seclusion in the village, keep a farm and still refuse to work for propaganda.

What have I seen from Ukraine over the past years? I will say without exaggeration: over the past eight years, my rare day has gone without someone from Ukrainians coming to my pages and insulting me. Your citizens considered it necessary and right to constantly remind me how stupid and ugly we Russians are, and how disgusting I am in particular. They staged real squabbles and roundups.

For years, your people have been poisoning the lives of the minority, which in Russia could still somehow influence public opinion. Your citizens did not distinguish between the oppressed Russian opposition and Vladimir Putin. They constantly let us know that they consider us, who did not cooperate with our government for a minute and were the first to suffer from it, to blame for what happened.

From all this, I personally concluded that ungrateful people live in Ukraine. And they are not worthy of taking risks for them.

And Ukraine should now draw its own conclusion: you personally, Vladimir Alexandrovich, have stated a bitter fact — your country is left alone. But you were wrong when you said that, apart from the Russian politically active minority, you have no assistants. You are alone. The Russian opposition and the Russian independent press are not your helpers. Let’s leave the question of how ethical it is to call on the population to oppose their army during the war. Let’s limit ourselves to just one statement: Ukraine has behaved so short-sighted with us during all these years that almost no one has come out for it now. And there is no one in Russia to stop Vladimir Putin.

To motivate a person to go out against his army and against the war to protect people, you need to be very convincing. Ukrainians could not. You have never addressed your Russian-speaking population in Russian. Promising negotiations and a neutral status, you promise nothing to the Russian people of Ukraine. At the same time, you want the same Russians to marry you in Russia.

Ukraine has alienated the Russians. And she alienated the Russian intelligentsia. You are so boring us with your stories about our genetic code of slavery. We have turned away from you. And I personally don’t see any reason to forget the troubles right now. You are supported by a few in Russia. The rest, even if completely crushed, stayed at home. Because when there are already dead and prisoners in our army, it’s a shame to come out with the word “Ukraine”. I am against war. And I wrote about it even when you were making a lot of money on Russian television. However, I will not marry you. And I’m not the only one in Russia.

You should have thought earlier what you would do when you find yourself alone with the Russian military machine and no one, except our intelligentsia, can help you.

You should have thought, but you didn’t. You have not done anything in eight years for the Russians to come out to protest against this car at the risk of themselves. On the contrary, you persistently squeezed the Russian language in Ukraine and called the Russian-speaking residents of the east of your country second-class people. What were you waiting for? What will Russian people come out in Russia after this with a demand to protect Ukraine?

You made a mistake.

Vladimir Putin is our big problem. And you are personally to blame for calmly taking Russian money, making faces on our TV channels at a time when I feared for my freedom, when my friends went to court or fled to political emigration. For a long time you refused to understand at all that the population of Russia has long been a hostage of this military machine. Now that Vladimir Putin has become your problem, you expect us to marry you.

I personally won’t come out. I don’t want. In the interests of historical justice and for the edification of the future government of Ukraine, which may also want to solve the Russian issue, I wish you to stay with Vladimir Vladimirovich face- to-face. You have no allies in Russia in the fight against Vladimir Putin. Deal with it yourself”.