Condemnations echo in chambers, alongside excuses about cumbersome bureaucracy, bumbling acts of “philanthropy,” and demands for pats on the back. Word goes around that “things are slowing down”, talks of “peace deals,” succession of territories, demilitarized zones, …etc.
These quick answers suit a lot of peoples convenience. Cognitive dissonance took hold in corona time and its not letting up. Neither is the russian aggression and terror. There is no lull in ukraine. There has been no reprieve from daily—constant air raids, strikes, deportations of children, ecocide, etc. etc.
There are plenty of articles out there explaining why we should all care about the war in ukraine, how ukraine is defending all of our futures. Our freedom to relax in the sun with our friends, eat dinner safely in our homes with family, travel, go to school, sit in the safe, green grass (without mines), and gaze at the peaceful sky above. When you go down the escalator in the subway, do you imagine ever having to seek shelter there with the other thousands of people around you?
If you are reading this, you probably DO care.
Yet, evil is a toxin, fascism is a disease, and once it spreads, there’s no controlling it, like a wildfire, it destroys everything. 111 people have died in Hawaii due to fires, emergency services in Tenerife estimate that 26,000 people will need to be evacuated due to 3, 273 hectares blazing.
I’m reminded of Lina Kostenko (a Ukrainian, philosophical poetess whose works were banned from publishing for 16 years for supporting the dissident movement in the 1960s).
Quote: The wisdom of a human is to remain silent when environment is speaking.
She doesn’t mean silent in the way that french, british, and german authorities are using preventive detention measures, surveillance, and legislations to target climate activists. We have all reaped (and raped) the benefits of fossil fuels, but we have also been aware for decades that there are alternative methods for living. We know it, we ask for it, but it is often suppressed out of convenience, profit, and/or upholding dirty deals that prop dictatorships worldwide.
We are all complicit when we watch on in idle mode, or even worse— choose to look away—completely in denial, while recollections of middle-school history classes summon images of the holocaust, and we mutter– “genocide? it cannot be! Didn’t we all agree, never again…never again?”
The ‘west’ never supported ukraine appropriately for decades, politics are based on the interests of those holding power over the people, not the other way around. These world leaders allowed an ex-KGB man to hold office for 19 years and 100 days, and still counting, the Hague still waiting…and waiting.
I am not a weapon enthusiast, of course peace is our common desire.
However, western weapons in adequate quantities, appropriate to task, and timely provided, will protect the lives of ukrainian soldiers and civilians. Utopia is a fantasy and there are plenty of weapons going around and used against us everyday. As a reminder, the “peace-broker” china has sent tens of thousands of chinese shipments of drones, helicopters, and other military equipment to russia and continue to do so.
It is Ukrainians who will solve the urgent problems on the ground to liberate the territories seized by russia. It is up to all of us to push back against injustice and prevent the spread of russian aggression and fascist ideologies as they sneak and seep into society, and by all means do not let that orange criminal anywhere near a podium, unless he’s made it himself from scrap toothbrushes in his prison cell.
We are not perfect. I am not innocent, I am not doing enough. I’ve also laid in the green grass, I’ve swam in the cool mediterrean waters, the same waters where over 26,000 refugees and innumerable animals and ecosystems perish. When I kiss my child, I think ‘we could be any, we are every, mother and child.’
We are not living on, we are part of this organism, and what we do and choose not to do has a direct effect on us as well as our environment. Our choices in action and inaction have direct effects on our livelihoods, homes, comfort, and food. We could, can, and many of us will be victims of terror or environmental disaster. Supporting ukraine means that you understand this and have the capacity to place your soul in the skin of another human being.
Safety and privilege is a fluke, what’s worse, for many— a complete unknown. The possibility of that turning can happen at any moment. Maybe you will be lucky in this lifetime, I hope so. But just in case reincarnation is real, lets err on the side of karma and do what we can in the bodies we have.
Ukraine has long needed the appropriate equipment and measures to protect their skies… the time is NOW!
Art & Think 
Leave a comment