1
(Links to previous Chapters are available here: Volume I and Chapters 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
June 14, 2011.
PART ONE. ACTIVITY
In the beginning, I want to discuss our organization and its activity.
If we are only talking, if we are educating one another, and even if we have intelligent discussions on forums or at conferences, then there is no organization. An organization means activity. Activity, which needs to be planned. Activity, which needs organizational and intellectual support.
The power of our initiative is that from the first moment we created our organization, it began to act. We had not yet completely elaborated its structure and formed long-term plans, but we immediately began to act, and rather successfully at that.
The report on the problem of de-Stalinization, the survey regarding de-Sovietization – this is all activity. We conducted a survey. We created a report. We managed to make an intellectual weapon out of this report; in other words, we connected our intellectual activity with the mass media. We obtained a political result.
A new poll is now underway. It has already begun, and it is progressing successfully. This means that we are acting. Many are justified in calling our initiative poorly organized. That not all messages to the eot.su forum receive an appropriate response. That sometimes we have different kinds of ungainliness happen. That people’s responses are structured incorrectly, that feedback is weak. And that all this is bad.
May I give this an assessment? It is not bad; all this is terrible. Currently, everything is organized terribly.
But I have three remarks on this subject.
First. Mr. Sharp [1928-2018, US political scientist and founder of the Einstein Institution, one of the key architects the so-called “color revolutions” in a number of former Soviet republics – translator’s note] will have everything well-organized. If you go to him, then everything will be organized fine and dandy. Because a large number of well-paid professionals will be working there.
Second. Even though we have everything organized terribly, the car is actually moving. The other cars, on the other hand, perhaps with better drivers, are just standing still and making engine noises. Meanwhile, we have already done something, we are performing the next task, and we will continue working.
Third. We cannot afford to have everything still organized so badly and haphazardly by September. But to have everything organized otherwise, about 50-100 people have to engage in a certain self-sacrificial activity; they have to take the initiative, to assume responsibility, and to start organizing everything with the necessary quality. Receiving messages from all our participants, classifying these messages correctly, answering them, organizing every step, providing real infrastructure for each initiative. They have to take this step forward. And these have to be people of sufficiently high quality. Then everything will be organized better than what Sharp has, and better than anyone else, because we are on our own land, we know what we are fighting for. And we truly know that this fight may be the last. The question is: will such people be found?
So we ask: criticize by all means, express your whims, condemn us for everything. That is all inconsequential child’s play. Is that how you want to live? Is that what you want engage in? Go ahead. Do you want act like we offended you? Be offended. That is your right.
The question is: how many people will want to work, will they want to and be able to, and will they come to us? If it does not happen immediately, then it will also be because this activity has swallowed us whole. This is absolutely without personal gain, but it takes away our last strength, standing in the way of everything people call “prosperity”. We are doing this work as intently and with as much dedication as everyone else, as our volunteers, as those who are bringing their separate projects to completion. And we know why we are doing this, because we believe that there is no other option.
Conducting the summer school will be a great step forward for building our organization. After the summer school, during which we will be able to build our approach to carde and our ideology with greater precision, the organization will become more mature. It will start working a little more effectively, and then a bit more effectively after that. In this way will grow more effective with every passing month. Here it all depends on whether a response will follow from below. And whether this response from below will consist of dreams and whims, or if it will be people’s bare determination go all the way, without jokes.
And so, the summer school. Since it is serious business, I will read the plan for the summer school, or our declaration concerning it point by point.
- We must conduct the school. There is no alternative, for Navalny is conducting one. The events are unfolding too quickly, and we have to conduct the school and not miss the chance to discuss everything in greater detail that has to do with ideology, as we also have to conduct a more meaningful cadre policy.
- The participants will be responsible for their own transportation, living and food expenses. We have no other opportunities or sponsors. The event is very big. There are no alternatives. Even if there was an alternative and I started running around looking for sponsors; then first of all, we all know how that kind of thing ends, so I will never do that. And secondly, it would add even more confusion and mental turmoil. Therefore, this is the only way it will be. Those who don’t like it don’t have to participate.
- No one will collect any money from the participants. I am not Navaly, to start saying “Send us money.” Then next everyone will say, “Well, I bet they’re embezzling the money for themselves.” There will be nothing of the sort. Everything will be transparent for the participants. They will buy their own train tickets. They will buy food themselves or bring it with them. And so on.
- What are we taking upon ourselves as the school’s organizers? We are finding the optimal place, with your help. We can and will realize everything only with your help. If you do not want to help, then there is no organization. If you want there to be a school, then find an optimal place, and find it quickly. We have already found something. Tell us quickly if there are any alternatives, because we have one week left to make a final decision.
We are doing everything for this place to be as cheap as possible. We are not dividing people into rich and poor. We want as wide of a circle of people as possible to take part in this undertaking. The thing we find most important is that people are smart, effective, and that they have a truly correct ideal goal. A goal to rescue the country, not to engage in petty dealings under the guise of this rescue. We will closely watch for this. We need people like that, not people with wealth. Therefore, we are doing everything to make sure the event is as cheap as possible. We are responsible for that.
We are taking all the work to organize the event upon ourselves, and this is a hefty amount of work. Everyone who has organized big schools understands it. We are creating a curriculum and implementing it. And we are selecting participants. Those who do not like this can create other organizations based on other principles.
- Everything needs to be very ascetic and even strict. We will gently and promptly remove anyone who makes the slightest attempt at transforming the school into a party or some kind of college music festival.
Everyone who feels enticed by the possibility of some kind of relaxation, some form of intellectualized relaxation all that is now referred to by the vile word “chilling”, let him stay at home or look for another place to “chill”. People who do not like iron discipline don’t need to come to our school. Please take this statement of mine quite seriously. I do not throw such words into the wind.
- 6. The school is for those who have already somehow shown their worth, and who have truly worked for the common cause. Otherwise, this school will not be a school, but a kindergarten for reasoning infantiles or a bohemian party session. I repeat once again that we will drive this all out of the door.
- We need to conduct the first school in Central Russia. This is in the interests and meets the capabilities of most club members. In the future, we will definitely conduct regional schools in order to reduce costs for participants who do not live in Central Russia. This undertaking of ours is only the first step in this direction. We ask everyone to consider it as such.
- It is impossible to completely work out the details of the school without knowing at least approximately how many people who have shown their worth can and want to participate in the school. What kind of camp should we look for: for 200 people, for 400, for 300, for 1000? Therefore, I ask you to immediately send your personal applications to the section “Summer School” at eot.su.
The text of each application is as follows (I will read it, and it will be posted on the website):
“I (surname, first name, middle name, year of birth, profession, place of residence) am aware that the Essence of Time school is organized on the basis of strict discipline, and that it is in no way an event for entertainment or amusement.
I am ready to devote my time to participate in an intense brainstorming session.
I am ready to strictly comply with all the rules that the school organizers will propose.
I am ready to pay the cost of travel, food, and accommodation.
I fully support the organizers’ intent to reduce the costs to the school participants as much as possible.
I fully support the principle that there is no place in the school, nor in the club as a whole, for any form of differentiation of the participants according to their material wealth.
I am aware that my support for such positions of the organizers means I consent to live in extremely ascetic conditions, and I am ready for this.
I inform the organizers that I have shown my worth in the previous period as follows (then give a brief description in a few lines of your specific actions, as you have shown yourself in our undertaking).
I also inform you that I have the time and ability to participate in the school, which is scheduled for mid-August. If the dates are adjusted, I will make every effort to adjust my life plans and take part in the school.
I would like the following considerations to be taken into account pertaining to the work of the school (then just a few lines with your specific considerations).
I understand that the school’s organizers will be forced to select a limited number of participants, and I will not have any complaints if I am rejected.
I ask you to send information on whether my candidacy as a participant in the school is supported to the address (indicate address).
Please inform me of additional information by phone (indicate phone number). ”
That’s it. The issue of the school has been resolved. No matter how many people express a desire to go, 10 people, 100, or more. Next we will consider the measure to which they fit in with our undertaking, and we will strive to ensure that there are as many of them as possible.
If we do not accept someone to school, do not be bitter. This does not mean that we are boors of impolite people. It means that this is what we need to do now, in order to solve our common problems.
This is the first thing I wanted to say in terms of specific activities.
Now about the structure of this activity, which is also important. All the principles on which the structure will be built have now effectively been formulated.
Here is the most important thing. The project team will be the basis of our organization’s structure. A team that is implementing a specific project. This team will be formed from the bottom up; it will enter into dialogue with our political center, and it will receive support and approval from us and integrate itself into the system of our projects. For each of these nodes “Territorial Integrity”, “AKSIO” and so on, we will formulate 5-7 large projects. Within these projects there will be project managers (people, who by their own initiative, take the function of project manager upon themselves).
There is now a well-known project called “Special History”. Far from the first issue of this project has already been released with support from our organization and from people who watch “Special History” with great interest. This is entirely the initiative of Larisa Solovyova, a tough, clear-cut, intelligent person with a zealous inner orientation, who proposed this project, formulated it, created a script, and assembled a team. Together with this group, she filmed the opening, materials, and everything else, and she suggested integrating this project into our activities.
We have supported this undertaking. Our people prepare for and speak in this project. Our people recommend other people to Larisa Solovyova who can support her project and be interesting speakers in this project. This is a building block within our activity. The building will be made from these blocks.
Sometimes 10-15 people will participate in a given project, but very often thousands take part. Yulia Sergeevna Krizhanskaya came by herself and proposed the project with these opinion polls that have effectively built our organization. She is also an intelligent, highly professional, and well-known person with the same zealous orientation.
We found thousands of people who volunteered. We found mathematicians who process the data. We found media to cover this project. All this together is a project team. Every such project team is a democratic structure. Yes, the political center either supports it or does not support it. Everyone who wants things to be organized differently just wants everything to turn into complete anarchy.
If the projects are simple and obvious, and the support of the political center is not required, then still, at least out of courtesy, and in order to cut out completely destructive undertakings, please contact us, and we will simply support the project. If something more is needed from us, our intellectual and other participation, then let’s engage in a dialogue about these projects. I repeat, within each node, 5, 6, 7, 12, or I do not know how many projects, should be formulated. When these projects appear, and people start consolidating around them, and all this will be assembled together into project nodes, each of which will have many projects, and then it will all be coordinated into a single system of activity, a house will appear. A house in which everyone will live. The initiative will come from the bottom up. And no one will turn this initiative into district party committees.
Talented people with a corresponding moral and intellectual orientation, one that is correct, selfless, and serious, will create the projects, and these projects will enrich our activity and integrate themselves into it correctly. Then the real power of activity will manifest itself. A large ideological actor with many branches will appear, which, when combined with the media and local club activities, will already represent the core of a large, real, and serious organization that can change everything.
Why am I talking about the club structure in the field, about cells, and discussion groups? Because closing oneself up only on projects means that a person takes a molecule of activity, but he stops seeing and discussing activity as a whole, activity as a worldview, activity as a strategic megaproject: what exactly we are creating as a whole, what kind of building we are making from all these bricks. In order for all this to be, we need discussion groups that will work through everything that we create together as a whole from a worldview perspective. People cannot stop seeing the forest behind the trees. They can’t get carried away and lose the whole behind the particulars. This whole is ensured through the activity of these worldview discussion groups.
Their leaders emerge from the bottom up. Yes, we are taking care to ensure that the process does not undergo malignant transformation, and that a war of ambitions does not begin. But we are very pleased with any initiative from below, if it is a healthy initiative, if it aims for consolidation instead of collapse. If a game of competing pride begins, and everything turns into that commonplace thing, which has already filled the political space and has managed to achieve nothing over the past 20 years, we will remove it from our undertaking. And this is our prerogative.
And so, we are making a building out of bricks. Let’s talk about these bricks to make things a little more clear.
Take Historical Dignity as an example. Let’s imagine that within the framework of Historical Dignity, we will be able to write textbooks for schoolchildren. Real, eloquent, and robust text books without bias in either direction. Honest textbooks, which will use Zemskov’s figures instead of Solzhenitsyn’s. In which the real truth will be told. Such a truth, after which the children will see their history as Russia’s both grand and tragic movement towards the great universal human metaphysical goals.
If such textbooks appear, then I will not ask for our organization to have a monument erected in its honor, but I believe that it would deserve this… Is that political activity or not? It is real, strategic, and serious political activity. Which in no way means that we abandon any actions of a direct political nature in a situation that requires it. We are ready for these actions as well. But we see this strategic activity as incredibly important. The same applies to all the other directions.
This is what I wanted to say about the structure of our activity and its specific steps, as well as about the principles of its organization. This concludes the first part of this chapter. We have discussed activity, let us now discuss relevant politics.
PART TWO. RELEVANT POLITICS
I would like to acquaint you with a very positive article by Vladimir Karpets “The Battle for History” in the Zavtra newspaper dated June 1, 2011 [http://www.zavtra.ru/cgi/veil/data/zavtra/11/915/print24.html].
I will read Karpets’ article because I see it as fundamentally important. I am very glad that this is Mr. Karpets’ opinion, and I don’t have to speak on every single issue. In this situation, I am not at all concerned over the disagreements between Mr. Karpets and myself regarding the fate of Russia, its future, and the meaning of its historical existence. We will analyze that later. The main thing for me now is that Karpets, as a nationalist and a patriot, as a person of the imperial persuasion, has made a very important political statement. I will read this statement so that everyone can get acquainted with it.
“Just now (this is a statement by Karpets. – SK), on May 23 this year, at the round-table discussion entitled ‘The Russian Question on the Eve of the Elections’ in the State Duma of the Russian Federation, the well-known publicist and poet Aleksey Shiropaev spoke on behalf of the so-called The National Democratic Alliance (notice this, the National Democratic Alliance. – S.K.). In a certain sense, his speech can be considered a turning point, of course, for official structures like the State Duma. The National Democrats (or National Liberals)…”
Pay attention to this concept that Karpets introduces, because I have already been talking about it for a long time: that there will be “shrinking nationalists”, nationalists acting in support of color revolutions, who will come into direct contact with the pseudo-liberals, and that this will be an analogue of what happened in Egypt, where there was an alliance between obviously pro-American movements such as the April 6th movement, Egyptian pseudo-liberal movements, and the Muslim Brotherhood. In our country, no one even wants the Muslim Brotherhood, because they are full-fledged fundamentalists. Here they instead create a kind of national-democracy. They do so in an accelerated and feverish pace. And now they are bringing this virus into the State Duma…
I continue reading Karpets: “The National Democrats (or National Liberals) are a name used by those Russian nationalists who most radically reject historical Russia and openly call for its division into independent ‘Russian republics’ oriented toward ‘Western civilization’ and liberal market reforms.”
This applies to our direction of Territorial Integrity. We called it “Russian shrinking nationalism”. And we always emphasized that we were ready to enter into dialogue with any Russian nationalism, but not with the “shrinkers”. These are the enemy.
I continue to read Karpets’ text. Here he quotes Shiropaev:
“We, the National Democrats, believe that a fair solution to the Russian question is directly related to rejecting the imperial nature of Russian statehood,” said Shiropaev. “Through constitutional procedures, Russia should be transformed into a symmetric federation consisting of equal entities － national republics, including Russian republics (did you hear that? RUSSIAN REPUBLICS. – SK), created on the basis of territories and regions inhabited by ethnic Russians that are not included into any existing national-state formations (bold italics by Karpets. – S.K.). We see seven Russian republics as part of the Russian Federation. Their regional arrangement: the Far East, Siberia, the Urals, the Volga region, Central Russia, Southern Russia, the Russian North ” [http://shiropaev.livеjournal.com/66673.html].
Russia’s dismemberment has begun! And they are not having this conversation just anywhere, but in the State Duma.
Karpets writes: “The above leaves no doubt what this is actually about. The National Democrats themselves, have long been discussing the independence of Siberia, ‘Cossackia’, ‘Zalesye’, and ‘Ingermanland’ on their websites. ”
Then Karpets again quotes Shiropaev, no longer from Shiropaev’s speech in the State Duma, but this is the same Shiropaev; these are not two different Shiropaevs. Here is what Karpets quotes: “‘Russia cannot be remade. It can only be abolished, of course, in a bloodless and civilized manner,’ this is the same Shiropaev. ‘Who has trampled down Man, his freedom, spirit, and thought, to a greater extent than Russia? The Russians, in their turn, are the victims and hostages of this Evil. And quite often accomplices, voluntary or involuntary… Russia is a historical anomaly, which came about thanks to the Horde’s violent influence on the Russian character,’ this is from Shiropaev’s well-known article ‘Darkness-Motherland’”.
“The National Democrats,” writes Karpets, “openly admit that they do not need Russia. ‘It ultimately turns out that nationalism reduces the concept of Russia to borders even smaller than the Principality of Moscow in 1547,’ as they themselves admit [http://3dway.org/publications/natsionalisty-vragi-imperii] (Karpets notes which particular National Democratic website this is published on; I once again propose that you carefully read Karpets’ article in the Zavtra newspaper – S.K.), considering themselves the only ‘Russian nationalists’.
But why Shiropaev, of all people? I remember him well from the late ‘80s. He was an Orthodox monarchist. But Aleksey is a poet, first and foremost. And as a poet, he could not come to terms with the moral and aesthetic limitations that Christianity contains within itself. And which the Russian state contains, which was born in Orthodoxy. Count A.K. Tolstoy, who was really Shiropaev’s predecessor, and who also rejected Moscow and loved Novgorod, also suffered from similar questions. Shiropaev acquired a keen sense that Christianity was introduced ‘from the outside.’ All this together took possession of Aleksey, and it gave rise to his radical turnaround. His book Prison of the Peoples (2001) is an outcry. Aleksey Shiropaev could not stand the extreme pressure of what A. Blok called ‘the antinomies of Russian history.’ His political position (not his poetry) is a gnoseological nervous breakdown.”
This is Karpets’ personal opinion. He’d know better, since he knows Shiropaev. From my point of view, this is a fairly broad special project, which is being implemented to the fullest extent. Even if some of its participants have “breakdowns”, it’s their own problem. Those who direct them do not break. They are coldly and mercilessly finishing Russia off. If earlier they said that they were amputating an arm or leg so that there would be no gangrene, then now they are eviscerating the patient, tearing out her heart, and cutting off her head. And they are not at all shy about; they are not abstaining from anything. People act like this only in the end times.
Karpets again quotes Shiropaev: “I dream that finally such a concept will appear as the Russian burgher, which means freedom from the psychopathic craving for the ‘ultimate and transcendental’, from its lack of concern for the material existence and from ‘god-bearing’… Accordingly, cultural, social and, above all, psychological bourgeoisness is fundamental for national democracy.” [http://www.jerusalem-temple-today.com/maamarim/drugie/10/Shiropaev.html ]
And its sake, it is necessary to dismember Russia, so that bourgeoisness could appear, right?
Then Karpets writes: “But the whole point is that this very ‘burgher’ has absolutely no need, first of all, for the poet Shiropaev himself. He would, at best, be thrown away as something used. Let us add one more thing. The ‘Neopagan’ Shiropaev, who has rejected historical Russian Orthodoxy, turns out in his apologetics of democratic freedoms and ‘bourgeois values’ to purely be a ‘Christian personalist’, but of a Western, not even of a Catholic, but of a Protestant kind…”
When did Protestants want to dismember something so much? In my opinion, he turns out to be who he turns out to be: a traitor and an exterminator of Russia, but this is my personal opinion. The Protestants built the great America, and never had any intent of dividing it into parts.
“The very realization of the goals of national democracy, supposedly saving the Russians from the ‘cop and clergy-dominated state’ and ‘black dominance’ [when used by members of the Russian far-right, the word “black” refers not people of African origin, but to people with their origins in the Caucuses, and less commonly in Central Asia, in a derogatory manner – translator’s note], will mean the end of the Russian people (this is what Karpets writes, and I completely agree with him. – S.K.). No matter how the fates of the various ‘Russian sub-ethnic groups’ develop, they will be a different kind people. They will become parts of other empires, be they European, American, Chinese, or the Islamic caliphate. They would be incorporated on the rights of reservations (I support every word, every letter of what Karpets says here. – S.K.). Today large empires are created and recreated, and whoever is not engaged in building his own empire works for that of someone else (I entirely agree. – S.K.).
And now the most important thing. National Democracy was released ‘like a genie from the bottle’ by Medvedev’s own administration. Not to the least degree through the ‘de-Stalinization’ that it started. ”
And again, Karpets gives the floor to Aleksey Shiropaev: “Shiropaev: ‘A genuine and profound de-Stalinization inevitably leads to criticism of historical Russia as such… Genuine de-Stalinization involves a consistent historiosophical and culturological revision up to the era of Ivan the Terrible, and even further, up to Muscovy’s destruction of the Novgorod democracy [http://shiropaev.livejournal.com/65304.html].
Why was this process launched? (Karpets asks, citing this deadly quote by Aleksey Shiropaev. – S.K.). Moreover, on the eve of the elections? For the ‘greedy crowd of people standing’ at the Old Square [the site of the Russian Presidential Administration building – translator’s note], for the sake of a new conversion of power into property through separatism. And for those who, in turn, stand behind them, on both sides of the border, people ‘without faces and backs’, agents of the ‘nothing that turns all into nothing’. ”
I read Karpets aloud. I read him, among other things, because he quotes Shiropaev in detail; and moreover, he is a representative of the ideology that ought to defend nationalism from pseudo-nationalists like Shiropaev. And there will be many such people. Now it is very important how the nationalists will begin to define themselves. I for one do not belong to their camp. But at this stage, when it comes to combating Shiropaism, I am ready to support them in every way.
Now I will transition from Shiropaev’s de-Stalinization with the dismemberment of Russia to another kind of de-Stalinization, the democratic kind, to show how this pseudo-nationalism, this parody of nationalism, this freakish entity, which was created in the way that viruses are created in biological warfare laboratories, joins with the pseudo-liberal moods. How they join together on the topic of de-Stalinization and how all of this is immediately thrown into the dismemberment of Russia.
Lev Gudkov, who heads the Levada Center after Yuri Levada’s death and who published some kind of pseudo-polls in Novaya Gazeta, trying to prove that our population does not like Stalin; and that therefore, de-Stalinization is possible, now propagates a different kind of nonsense in Die Welt. He is thrashing from side to side. First he claims that the population does not like Stalin, then he says something different. Dislike for Stalin is a topic to write about in Russian newspapers, for the Russian media consumer, but in Die Welt one needs to write the following.
Here is a Lev Gudkov’s statement, which he gives in the article “The Immortal Homo sovieticus”. I repeat, this is Die Welt, Germany (I quote from inosmi.ru) [Russian translation: http://www.inosmi.ru/russia/20110606/170356650.html, original German: https://www.welt.de/print/wams/politik/article13412744/Der-unsterbliche-Homo-sovieticus.html]
“At that time (meaning the late 1980s. – S.K.) we had the illusion that it would happen quickly and without complications. The young people in big cities were liberal and pro-Western. We believed that each new generation will change even more and we only had to register these changes… ”
They thought so. And everything seemed to be right at first: really pro-Western moods were widespread in all of the universities in the country. But after the pseudo-liberals took full advantage of the country and showed their true face, these moods have sunk into oblivion. And what does Gudkov say about this?
“But the type of Soviet man turned out to be very resistant (do you understand? He “turned out” to be very resistant! – S.K.). In the meantime, the institute’s studies concentrate on examining how the ‘Homo sovieticus’ (Soviet people) (this is the disgusting name of Zinoviev’s book, for which he later repented; another name is “sovok” – S.K.) reproduces itself over and over again and is carried over into the generations… ”
But how does he “carry over,” Mr. Gudkov? Does he carry over? Or did you create hell under the guise of reforms? And now these young people understand that they have been driven into hell without any chance of escaping, with absolutely blocked channels of social mobility, with an absolute absence of a future. And then they begin to look closely at the past, and they begin to find something there, something quite desirable in every sense. Both in the material sense, as it was somehow possible to live and receive free apartments, and in the ideal sense, as there was a great project, a great country, and there was the happiness of taking part in a great common cause. They are examining all of this because you created hell. But you want to spin all this… Take a look at how Gudkov spins it:
“This person (Homo sovieticus. – S.K.) was formed by a society that was structured strictly hierarchically. In his consciousness, the limits of what is possible do not depend on individual talents and qualifications, but only on the place in the hierarchy… ”
And now the limits of what is possible depend on what?.. Did they “depend” on the place in the hierarchy for Gagarin? Did Korolev’s possibilities “depend” on his place in the hierarchy? And now they depend on what? On how much you stole and whose ass you kissed? Can one be compared to the other? Ordinary people back then became academicians, and these academicians occupied the highest levels in the hierarchy, but now an ordinary person cannot do anything, and even if he becomes an academician, then will he be a lumpen, or will he have to steal?
“…Therefore, there are no universal values and ethical norms…”
Oh, I see! There are no values and norms not because they threw everything into theft, into an orgy of consumption, into lawlessness… Not because they destroyed the ideals… But because the Soviet man was “like this”, he “did not have” universal norms and values … Zoya Kosmodemyanskya “didn’t have” the universal norm of self-sacrifice, right? Gudkov probably has it… Alexander Matrosov or Gastello were “not prepared” to die patriotically for their homeland, right? That is the same norm as in any kind of American patriotism. But Mr. Gudkov “possesses” these norms… Here is what Gudkov writes about the “Homo sovieticus” (or “sovok”, or the “anthropological disaster”, as his accomplice Pivovarov calls it):
“The Soviet man is suspicious and therefore hypocritical and cynical. At the same time, he has infinite resources of patience and adaptability. (He writes this about our fathers and grandfathers, correct? That’s how he writes. – S.K.) His whole life strategy (of a Soviet person. – S.K.) is to adapt to the pressure from outside and survive. He only trusts family and close friends. He treats more complex social ties with suspicion, which complicates the emergence of political parties. The person raised in the totalitarian system is ready to demonstrate approval for power, even if he does not believe in it. He has no reason to be proud (compare this with Karaganov, do you feel how they play the same tune? – S.K.) And this feeling of weakness is expressed in aggression – towards the West or towards other groups who still show idealism or believe in values. ”
Got it, right? Maresyev, Gastello, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Gagarin, Korolev and others did not show “idealism or belief in values.” Gudkov, Pivovarov, Svanidze, Mlechin and others have a monopoly on showing idealism and a belief in values… They created a social hell, and within it they demonstrate boundless cynicism, spitting in the face of the people. And while doing this they say that the Soviet man, who built everything that is stolen piecemeal and that has still not been entirely cannibalized, who won the Great Patriotic War, who saved the world, who took Man into space – this man hates others because they, these others, these thieves and their minions, have “idealism and believe in values”… What values?
So, on the one hand, and herein lies the relevant politics, shiropaism exists… And it should not be viewed as something minor. It is one of the major threats. And on the other hand, we have Gudkovism, Pivovarovism, Karaganovism, Fedotovism… And they exist together.
Therefore, (I have said this already, and I’ll say it again) everyone who loves Russia, who does not want its dismemberment, who loves the Empire, the Moscow Tsardom or anything else, everyone — white or red — must understand that today’s de-Stalinization, AKA de-Sovietization, AKA de-totalitarianization is not about Stalin, it’s not about the “commies”, nor is it about anything red. It’s about the Russian soul. They want to destroy everything completely. And they are already directly talking about it, be they in the State Duma or in Die Welt.
Why is all this possible? Why do we need to talk about this seriously? Why can we not treat these as individual manifestations of some marginal views? Here I turn to political theory.
PART THREE. POLITICAL THEORY
We cannot treat it this way, because processes, both external and internal, are moving in a certain direction. And as long as they are moving in this direction, and for now they are moving in this direction inexorably, everything will be exactly this way. There will be 8 Russian republics, reservations, ghettos, uprisings in rebellious provinces, de-Stalinization, and the final fall of the Russian people into a beastlike state – everything will happen if the processes will move in this direction. Therefore, we need to find strength within ourselves. We have no one else to count on. Strength for what? In order to turn the processes around, both internal and external. To block the most destructive things, and then to turn the rest around, too. If we do not turn them around, we will not save the country. Ever.
And now we can only talk about one thing – that people from the masses will engage seriously in this salvation. That is what we are addressing Essence of Time with. We are addressing you. Not individual members of the elite, who have decayed to a greater or lesser degree, but you. Because there is no one else. There is no one else who loves Russia and wants to save it. It will either be you together with us, or no one. That is how fate has determined. And we have no other choice.
What processes are we talking about? Why do they require political theory (we have already provided this theory, and will continue to provide it in a more comprehensive and detailed way)? The point is that a megaproject exists for the reorganization of human life in general. A megaproject to reorganize what is called a human being. A megaproject, that our perestroika was a part of. This megaproject is implemented in several phases.
First, perestroika-1 arose, during which the Soviet Union and the world communist system were dismantled. And our man, the Soviet or the Russian man, was deeply damaged. After all, he suffered the deepest of injuries. They wanted to kill him; they had to kill him. He had to be killed. But he was not killed. He is still alive, and he is resisting this damage. He is licking his wounds. But the damage is deep, and they have made their bet on it. This was perestroika-1.
Now, since this man has not been finished off, he is moving, he is licking his wounds, and he is trying to somehow regain his authenticity, his identity, and his worldview, a second blow is being dealt to him – this is Shiropaev’s and Gudkov’s perestroika-2, de-Stalinization, which encompasses the rejection of our entire historical self-consciousness. The deepest trauma has to be inflicted at this stage, so that all of his movement would end, so that this man would not try to rebel, so that he could not recover himself. The blows must be dealt in a directive fashion, as during an occupation, to kill – to complete paralysis, to self-denial, to suicidal convulsions. Then, against the backdrop of all this, it will be possible to start dismembering the country. And this is perestroika-2 with its main components, which are only important in the sense that they are combined.
What harm is there in democracy in and of itself? Let us have it. The man you tried to destroy has awakened. See, Gudkov says: he is like a Stoic. So give him the right to choose! But he is a “non-human”, he is a “sovok”, he is a “bastard”. Therefore, he must not be given the right to choose. He must be ruthlessly suppressed, while everyone else should be given this right. Since he, this “non-human”, this “sovol”, still loves the Motherland and wants to protect it, while others do not love it, but rather they hate it and do not want to protect it, then these others, who will be given all the democratic rights, could destroy this Motherland completely.
Development. Who is against development? Does anyone want degradation or stagnation? Naturally, if we do not develop, if we do not do so rapidly, then the other countries that are developing will destroy us. They simply swallow and crush us. Of course we need development. But equating development to Modernity is a provocation from perestroika. It’s a lie. Development does not equal Modernity.
And why is this false equating happening, along with praising Modernity at the moment when Modernity has kicked the bucket? Why? Because if the surviving Russian man saddles the Russian “goat of development”, then no one will be left unimpressed. Furthermore, the world will be saved from non-development. These forces, on the other hand, who seek to finish Russia off, and who are making all these moves, want there to be non-development. They have made staked their wager on non-development. They are most profoundly transforming humanity. They are creating a multi-tiered humanity. They are putting the unity of the human species into question. They are creating such an impenetrable hierarchy, compared to which Ancient Egypt in the era of the pharaohs looks like a democratic society. This is what they are creating with the help of these perestroikas.
From an international standpoint, they first destroyed the Soviet Union; now they are transforming the Arab world in a certain way, and what will they do next and to whom? Is it really not clear that this is all going after Russia?
And so, political theory lies in explaining the nature of perestroika. That perestroika is a global phenomenon. That this is not one perestroika, but a plurality of perestroikas. That the chain of these perestroikas is supposed to build an entirely new and unprecedentedly inhumane order. And that everything in the world is under attack: humanism as such and Man as such are under attack. An absolute evil, incredibly reminiscent of Hitler’s occult fascism with its will to death, with its rejection of development, with its absolutely impenetrable hierarchies, with its sophisticated vile elitism, which hid behind words about love for the German people. But in fact, it dreamed of ending history, of humanity’s ultimate enslavement, of returning this humanity into the most terrible times of impenetrable anti-democratic hierarchies. In which there will be no place for anything: not for love, not for happiness, not for freedom, not for humanism, not for development, for nothing. For crushing Man. This is all again looking at us through the sniper’s scope. We can’t afford not fighting this intellectually, informationally, politically, and otherwise.
For this war, we are gathering an army on the basis of strict discipline, on the basis of project-centered democracy, on the basis of a meritocracy that creates opportunities for everyone, and at the same time on the basis of mercilessly picking out everything useful for the cause and cutting off everything that our cause does not need.
And now about what the cause needs and what it does not need. In other words, here we transition from political theory to political philosophy.
PART FOUR. POLITICAL PHYLOSOPHY
I draw attention to how people are performing various kinds of somersaults on this topic.
Mr. Krylov has an article entitled “Old Patriotism” [http://www.apn.ru/publications/article24317.htm], which he begins by again absolutely firmly stating that, “In historical terms, Russian nationalism is an offshoot of the traditional Russian-patriotic ideology, but in terms of content, nationalism is its negation. This dubious position is still insufficiently realized, first of all, by the nationalists themselves. Many still experience something like a sense of guilt before the tradition of thought that brought them about, and try to somehow justify their departure from the dogmas of traditional Russian patriotism with all sorts of excuses, for example ‘tactics’.
… The opposing side understands the situation much better, and it perceives the nationalists as those who ‘originated from us, but who are not part of us’. This explains the growing irritation that the nationalists cause to ‘patriots’, even when they say ‘what would seem to be the same things’ (and what are the same things? Shiropaev says the same things? – S.K.), and even more so when they say something different. However, irritation is a weak word: now it has already reached open hatred… ”
Then he references me: “For example, the well-known Sergey Kurginyan, who was always considered to be both a leftist and a patriot, recently openly declared Russian nationalists to be the enemies with whom ‘the jokes are over’, and a war of annihilation has begun. The even better-known Prokhanov, our main statesman, recently said essentially the same thing. Other patriotic figures speak somewhat softer, but the tendency is obvious… As, for example, Leonid Borodin, a former political prisoner who served two terms precisely for ‘Russianness’, and who has now become a consistent opponent of Russian nationalism.” (So, they call Russian nationalism the assassination of Russia, its dismemberment, its absorption by other empires. And they have the audacity to say that they are hated “because they are nationalists”! – S.K.)
“The old patriots’ rejection of Russian nationalism has now crystallized into a special ideology, which for some reason is called ‘imperial’. It is a system of views, according to which ‘Russian nationalism is fatal for Russia,’ ‘the multi-ethnic nature of Russia is a given, which the nationalists have to accept,’ ‘Russians must endure any humiliation in order to preserve the unity of the country,’ ‘Russians must serve non-Russians and improve their lives’…”
Where is all this coming from? When did Prokhanov or Kurginyan say that “Russians should serve non-Russians and improve their lives”? What is this nonsense? When did we say that “the Russians must endure any humiliation in order to preserve the unity of the country”? This is dirty false advertising, calculated to smear everything that is genuine in nationalism and patriotism, and to pass Russia’s death off as nationalism. This is postmodern swindling. This is a dirty advertising abomination. It speaks directly about who is behind it. This is not an honest conversation. They talk like that when they are already completely sold out, and they know perfectly well to whom and for what.
“If only it was just Kurginyan or Prokhanov, but many of those who now curse the nationalists were and remain honest people who paid a considerable price for their beliefs…” (next he references Borodin).
Tomorrow, everyone who called themselves nationalists will understand everything if they love Russia. And they will join our ranks. Tomorrow, everyone who called themselves anti-communists and anti-Stalinists and cursed the “commies” will understand that the de-Stalinizers are coming after Russia. Tomorrow a broad front will form against the pseudo-nationalists and the pseudo-liberals. The pseudo-nationalists, the nationalist reducers, and now exterminators, are enemies. Real nationalists are our friends. The line runs between them, as it once ran between those who joined with Hitler to destroy Russia, and those who began to fight against Hitler for Russia, casting aside all ideological differences. This kind of moment is coming.
We work for one great goal – that this would be understood completely and in a timely fashion. And so that a sufficiently broad movement would be formed that would sweep the evil away and stop the enemy. And this is the enemy. He makes faces and tries to shift the blame.
We admire the Russian people and the greatness of their historical destiny. And they are saying that we want the Russian people to serve someone there? So that they would wash someone else’s feet? It is Mr. Krylov who wants Russian girls to become prostitutes serving the Chinese. He wants to surrender the land to plunder. Everyone already understands this. And those who still do not understand will understand.
And then it will be of paramount importance that only enemies stand on one side, and not confused people. And on the other side, a real broad coalition will form.
Source (for copy): https://eu.eot.su/2020/03/03/essence-of-time-chapter-20/
Essence of Time: The philosophical justification of Russia’s Messianic Claims in the 21st century
Sergey Kurginyan
Experimental Creative Centre International Public Foundation
Essence of Time is a video lecture series by Sergey Kurginyan: a political and social leader, theater director, philosopher, political scientist, and head of the Experimental Creative Centre International Public Foundation. These lectures were broadcast from February to November 2011 on the websites, www.kurginyan.ru and www.eot.su .
With its intellectual depth and acuity, with its emotional charge, and with the powerful mark of the author’s personality, this unusual lecture series aroused great interest in its audience. It served at the same time as both the “starting push” and the conceptual basis around which the virtual club of Dr. Kurginyan’s supporters, Essence of Time, was formed.
The book Essence of Time contains the transcriptions of all 41 lectures in the series. Each one of them contains Sergey Kurginyan’s thoughts about the essence of our time, about its metaphysics, its dialectics, and their reflection in the key aspects of relevant Russian and global politics. The central theme of the series is the search for paths and mechanisms to get out of the systemic and global dead end of all humanity in all of its dimensions: from the metaphysical to the gnoseological, ethical, and anthropological. And as a result, out of the sociopolitical, technological, and economical dead end.
In outlining the contours of this dead end and in stressing the necessity of understanding the entire depth, complexity, and tragedy of the accumulating problems, the author proves that it is indeed Russia, thanks to the unusual aspects of its historical fate, which still has a chance to find a way out of this dead end, and to present it to the world. But, realizing this chance is possible only if this becomes the supreme meaning of life and action for a “critical mass” of active people who have in common a deep understanding of the problems at hand.
Dr. Kurginyan’s ideas found a response, and the Essence of Time virtual club is growing into a wide Essence of Time social movement. In front of our very eyes, it is becoming a real political force.
