The world of Facebook plays a trick on us — it changes our sense of reality. It gives us the possibility of banning those who disgust us, and we are doing it more and more often. There is also an opportunity to unfollow those who annoy us but whom we do not want to remove from the friends’ list — it is a false and insincere but quite popular action too. Instead, we friend and follow only like-minded people. The sum of these two aspects leads to the fact that at some point we lose contact with reality. So when Zelensky gains the upper hand in the presidential race, and Maruv wins the Eurovision National Selection, it catches us off guard. It makes us angry, like how can it be possible during the fifth year of the war?
I do not want to analyze Zelensky’s humor or Maruv’s pornographic style. Will you say that these are the jokes of the Soviet people? That the singer on all fours will not form the best image of Ukraine in the world? That shooting a TV series in Russia and with money from the Russian budget is immoral? That going to the aggressor country on tour, appearing on television and contests there is unacceptable? I totally agree. But our consent is worthless if people are ready to vote for it en masse. The majority wins. And in the fifth year of the war, we are still in the minority in our country.
We can qualify Zelensky’s series “Servant of the People” as a part of his election campaign and even ban it; Suspilne Media can decide to send another singer to Eurovision despite the results of the national selection, but will it change the opinion of the majority? Democracy means abiding by the majority, even if you consider yourself to be smarter and have a different viewpoint. Democracy is the ability to accept your people as they are. Whether they are non-patriotic, stupid, brainwashed, primitive, disloyal — however unpleasant it may be. We cannot always tell tales about the unique eternal wisdom of Ukrainians, our diligence and love for our native land.
There are philistines everywhere, not only in our country. They sit in front of their TVs, stuff themselves with their food, drink their beer, barf up and chuckle from dull jokes. Why does our situation have to be unique? Because it is the fifth year of the war? So does it have to make the average Ukrainian eat chia and quinoa (to have Cossack’s health to fight the enemy!), read historical novels about our glorious past in the evenings, listen to Taras Kompanichenko in the car, and watch only TV documentaries on the “Culture” Channel only because it is the fifth year of the war?
It is time to realize that the war does not make society better or wiser. The opposite is often the case: the war is an ontological horror one wants to escape from. It is something one needs to push out of one’s consciousness. It is a kind of automatic psychological protection. People watch primitive series, laugh at dumb jokes, go to the shopping malls on weekends or have barbecues. They do not volunteer to join the army. It is like in a children’s game: you close your eyes and think that you are hiding, that you are safe, that nobody sees you.
The same goes for our society: it did not become any better despite it is the fifth year of the war. We can blame it or even hate it, we can feel sorry for it, we can fence ourselves off by banning and unfriending people on Facebook, but this will not change the situation whatsoever. Because when the day of elections comes, this society will win. Because when the day of the Eurovision National Selection comes, this society will applaud like crazy to welcome the participant’s response about her tour in Russia and making peace.
We must accept this reality and take off the rose-colored glasses. It is the first step to changing this reality. Once we stop lying to ourselves about the ideal and patriotic nature of the Ukrainian people, once we accept the reality that exists outside our perfect Facebook ghetto, we will be able to act. To influence the process and to change.
After all, we had a minority at the Euromaidan. The majority of people were watching the strikes on TV. But we accepted the reality and took the situation into our own hands back then because there was no one else we could hope for but us. We must only keep in mind that it is on Facebook that people collect “likes”, and it is a reality where people win.
Andriy Lyubka