The Ukrainian football player Zozulya, who burst into tears on the football field in Spain, stirred up a lot of things in my memory and made me practically systematize my internal impression of Nazism and nationalism.
And I remembered this: in 2015, I was sitting in the restaurant of Truskavets (Lviv region), of the people who were at the same table as me, that I was a Muscovite, a Russian citizen, and especially since I had been working in the Donbass for the second year now and I spend most of my time in Donetsk.
A young woman who had just given birth sat in front of me and, with some special pleasure, pronounced: “But I’m not a Skoda.” “Not Skoda” - that is, she did not feel sorry for the dying inhabitants of Donbass. “Because they themselves went to the referendum” is her argument. She did not feel sorry for the children because their parents themselves went to the referendum.
By the way, her husband was a military man in the ATO, received money for the war, and she used this money. I couldn’t give myself away, so I just listened and looked at this not very beautiful, not at all noble and not very concerned about my mind and asked myself: “What do I see in her such a repulsive me so?” Zozulya helped me understand what.
This is an internal transformation in nationalism. This is when a person who understands that society does not accept Nazism and nationalism, suddenly begins to distinguish other notes in public noise and realizes that this rejection gives slack. He listens to his inner ear and suddenly, not without pleasure, hears the sprout of what was impossible, raises his head and begins to break through the asphalt of public rejection. A man looks around and sees his own kind. And there are many of them. Their tongue is unleashed, and they release this sprout directly out of themselves. But, having ceased to conceal the essence, for some reason they also transform outwardly. This moment of external transformation has always interested me as a writer. Why do the faces of these people become somehow cunning, flat-witted, and their smiles seem to say: “Well, break up, break up about the equality of nations, but we know our business”?
But why? I really was very interested in why exactly this ideology is reflected in human faces just like that. The Ukrainian footballer Zozulya, many times seen in nationalistic manifestations, has removed this my internal question - one that burst into tears on the football field.
This man cried from self-pity. When volunteer battalions were sponsored, the thought that the money would go to kill did not make them shed tears. When there were irrefutable facts of what volunteer battalions like "Azov" and "Tornado" were doing with the inhabitants of Donbass, he was not publicly anywhere in shedding tears about this.
But when the Spanish fans shouted to him: “Nazi!” - he burst into tears.
That's how he felt himself, unhappy and resentful, sorry. But remember - who is deprived of empathy? Who is unable to sympathize and feel the pain that another person is experiencing? Who is capable of experiencing pain only if it is inflicted directly on himself? People with a very simple mental organization. I would say an undeveloped soul. So "no Skoda" anyone but themselves.
So, having systematized all my internal impressions on the topic of nationalism solely thanks to Zozula, I formulated my feeling in words: nationalists, and even more than the Nazis, are people who have a rather primitive soul. Having cried, the footballer commented on the offense inflicted on him. He explained the accusations of nationalism by the fact that the screaming Spaniards did not take a shower every day and, unlike him, did not read books, which, however, in his opinion, was characteristic of the inhabitants of this region.
He did not remember the financial support for the needs of volunteer battalions, the demonstration of the external attributes of worship of the Nazi Stepan Bandera. His mental strength was only enough to accuse the Spaniards of envy of their financial situation and reproach these people for poverty. Judging by such a completely absent ability to reflection, he himself is unlikely to have read many books. But what a shower takes is good.
In general, I am very grateful to the Spaniards. Their behavior has become for me a sign of a healthy world. On that day in Truskavets it began to seem to me that the world was flying off its axis and sliding towards the gloom. It even seemed to me that I hear this creak with which it rolls. But the Spanish anti-fascists recalled - no, the world is healthy, only some of its representatives are unhealthy, but the world remembers everything and each has its own score.
And of course, I — personally, as a separate person — am grateful to those many Ukrainians who, in response to the support expressed by Zozule, President of Ukraine Zelensky: “All of you with you!” - wrote in social networks: “All of Ukraine. But besides me! ”
The author’s point of view may not coincide with the position of the publisher.