Why support the Eight Brave Ones:
We are commonly accustomed to taking people’s nationality as a useful characteristic. Especially when their nation does something we consider unacceptable or reprehensible. After World War II, for example, the practice of writing the word ‘German’ with a lowercase ‘g’ became widespread here, to emphasize how deeply we despised the Germans. This was also reflected in the expulsion of the German-speaking inhabitants of pre-war Czechoslovakia.
Even today, one might “briefly” state that Russians are committing terrible things during their aggression in Ukraine, constantly violating international law and committing egregious war crimes. Strictly speaking, these are often non-Russians (Buryats, Chechens, Chuvash, Bashkirs, etc.), but that is not so essential right now. It is much more fundamental to understand that just as Nazism was the unifying element of what Germany “demonstrated” during the war, the “driving force” behind the crimes of the Russian Federation is “Putinism”—a Russian variety of fascism.
It can, of course, be argued that just as the Germans “chose” Hitler and his Nazism, the current majority of Russians have chosen “Putinism.” This is, of course, true. And it shows that democracy in a society that is not sufficiently mature regularly ends in dictatorship. After all, in our country—despite all the talk about our democratic tradition—nearly a third of the people would quite like to choose Andrej Babiš to manage our society “like a company,” which is also an authoritarian system.
A true reflection on our period of the “dictatorship of the proletariat” has not yet taken place. Nevertheless, at least most of us remember quite well that those who tried to resist that immoral regime in one way or another numbered a few tens of thousands at most. Millions of others “adapted.” This is certainly happening in contemporary Russia as well. Heroes are always few.
All the more reason to point them out. Ever since the occupation of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union and its satellites, I have carried in my heart with deep admiration those “eight brave ones” who, knowing that their protest would at first glance only result in their imprisonment for many years, nevertheless went out to Red Square in Moscow. For in Russia, there have always been people who possessed this almost insane courage to stand up against an evil regime, regardless of the personal consequences.
Today, Anna Valentová writes about them systematically. Thanks to her, they will not be completely forgotten, and their sacrifices will surely contribute to a better future for Russia, and thus for all of us. At the same time, she patiently and persistently teaches us to distinguish among Russians: criminals, “ordinary people,” and heroes.
