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Lyudmila Ulitskaya
Writer
A war has started on February 24th, 2022. I always had thought that my generation, born during World War II, was lucky, that it would live their entire lives without any new wars, as written in the gospels, ‘peacefully, painlessly and with nothing to be ashamed of’.
Apparently, we failed at that. It’s impossible to foresee the consequences of these events. The madness of one man and his loyal accomplices defines the fate of the whole country. We can only try to guess how history books will describe these events fifty years from now, and what opinion psychiatrists will have on the mental health of the leader of our country. Pain, fear and shame are our main feelings today.
The pain, because the war is destroying life: the grass and trees, animals and their offspring, humans and their children.
Fear, because all living beings have a biological instinct to preserve their own and their offspring’s life.
Shame, because it is obvious that the leadership of our country is responsible for this situation, which may bring much more distress to humanity as a whole.
A share of the responsibility lies with us, the contemporaries of these tragic events, who have been unable to foresee or prevent them. It is crucial to stop this war, which escalates with every passing moment and to counter propaganda lies that are being spread to our compatriots throughout all the media.