Be good at someone else's expense

Alina Vitukhnovskaya, writer

"I will be in prison, I will sweep the floor,

And at night, in order to sleep, I will look at the flock

Of jumping living children who could be saved.

And let them hate.

But let them grow"

A sort of tortured sadomasochism on the topic of the day. However, sadomasochism must be forced. The problem is that, as a rule, such people want everyone to suffer. No matter how ostentatious martyrdom they declare. While I watch the crowds of penitent poets. And also especially sensitive non-public people who literally went crazy from what happened in Russia. Again. Literally went crazy. They live in an agitation of self-flagellation, hysterical reflections and a complete lack of prospects.

And on these examples of poets and sensitive people, we see how the concept of guilt will work in the future. It will smear the "universal feeling" on the weakest and vice versa, save the real perpetrators of crimes. After all, we need a picture of working with the masses and a picture of the processed masses. The simple-minded people who sign up for this are dangerous in their simple-mindedness. And yes, poetry "on the topic of the day" is almost always bad.

Poets and writers have always been characterized by excessive reflection, a heightened sense of justice. Art critic, cultural historian Yevgeny Yermolin writes:

“Soviet writers of the 1930s are a gallery of manifestations of acute mental trauma, often irreparable. In a certain sense, many, if not all, who had a cultural experience went psychically into the 1930s, just in different ways. The century is waiting on the pavement, concentrated like a sentry. Time dictated a new norm that was unbearable for the old mental apparatus. Bulgakov, as a doctor, also knew how to observe himself and others; from here he pulled the theme into a novel straight off the bat. Others went crazy in their own way. Throwing from curses to hymns by Mandelstam. Panic explosion at the Oberiuts in the 1930s. Babel has a painful attraction to the Chekists. Disappearance of Dobychin. Reporting on colleagues. Accusatory logorrhea at writers' meetings. Leaving in the aesthetics of the canon, where the personality is imperceptible. Hypnosis of creative collectivization. Pauses of silence. In principle, it was absurdism, but experienced acutely personally, and not just as a theoretical credo (as with Sartre or the playwrights of the theater of the absurd). Tsvetaeva came to such a madhouse. And I guessed that she could not survive here.

But what is understandable and justified for a modern person is incomprehensible in the case of a modern person, even if he is hypersensitive. Sometimes it seems to me that this mass repentance of poets is a game for the public, a form of social presentation, nothing more.

Recently, in the light of catastrophic events, it is customary to talk about Russians as a fiend. And by the Russians themselves. For whom the only way to feel good is to separate from the “evil” group. Pretty cheap and hypocritical way. Which is actively used by writers, either taking revenge on literature itself, or in an attempt to be relevant.

Everything that is said about Russians can be said about other peoples and other countries at different historical moments and in different contexts. Although it is possible to bring the post-homosovieticus into a special group and consider it separately. But then we will not be talking about a nation with its properties, but about this narrow group. And it should be considered from the point of view of social psychology or even psychopathology. This is the view that would be the most appropriate.

There is an obvious dilemma. Who constantly kicks and reproaches the people will never be able to lead the protest, not to mention come to power. Then why? Rhetorical. Reflections under the guise of politics are the essence of anti-politics. It seems to you that you are settling scores with Russia, but in fact you are settling scores with yourself.

Reflections of cultural layers - from self-flagellation to forgiveness. Like another dangerous extreme. Pitying everyone, namely the murderers, you not only blur the idea of guilt and responsibility, you give the green light to the continuation of the bloody banquet. You explain this by the need to "be human". That is, being good to others. And again at the expense of others! To be human, in the local way, is to experience a certain set of prescribed feelings. The problem is that these feelings do not resolve anything. If we understand morality as social expediency. And here it is correct to dot the "i", and not to spread with Dostoevsky ellipsis.

The same people who play blame and forgiveness like to appeal to opinion polls, which, in their opinion, indicate the agreement of the masses with the current policy. I want to note that the myth of support is primarily beneficial to the authorities. It is also beneficial for those who are in a hurry to separate from the conditional "Russians", and not only to look good against their background, as I wrote above. But also not to help anyone. This is such a packaged form of "conscience" whose name is local benefit, nothing more. Being good at the expense of others is a form of Soviet hierarchy and Soviet "humanism" rolled into one. Exactly just as disgusting is the all-devouring "Christianity", forgiveness, also at the expense of others. The forgiveness of those who feel sorry for everyone equally (!).