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Writer's pictureWesley Trueblood III

No, Ukraine Is Not Like Your Identity Politics Bloc, And Saying So Is Insulting


Firefighters work to extinguish a fire at a damaged city center after a Russian air raid in Chernigiv, Ukraine, Thursday, March 3, 2022. Russian forces have escalated their attacks on crowded cities in what Ukraine's leader called a blatant campaign of terror. (AP Photo/Dmytro Kumaka)

Lately I have seen just about every body politic compare itself to the situation in Ukraine. A short list includes: The Black American Community

The Undocumented Immigrants Community

Those Who Want More Mask Mandates And Restrictions

Those Who Want No More COVID Restrictions At All

The Religious People Who Feel Persecuted By A Secular Society

And More...


It seems like everyone in the world wants to see themselves as the victim of humanity instead of looking at actual victims of inhumanity and realizing that their life is not actually as bad as it could be.

 
 

Yet, perhaps that is what it means to be human to a point. We always see everything from our own perspective and so we tend to see ourselves in every situation around us.


But as humans, who can be rational and thoughtful, we should be able to separate what issues we are facing from true and real tragedies. And memes that say, "All these people standing with Ukraine weren't standing with (so and so) just a few months ago" are just a way to either over glorify your situation or to discredit the human tragedy going on in west Asia.


Tanks, cluster bombs, thermobaric bombs, bunker buster bombs, helicopters with rocket pods, indirect fire with shrapnel rounds, anti-personnel mortar rounds, new minefields... the list goes on. None of the above groups are facing these things.


NONE...OF...THEM...PERIOD...


So, to try to insert your own situation into something so tragic, it is not only tone deaf, it is truly unimaginable. Just imagine if someone attempted to compare having their boss yell at them at work to being lynched; or someone comparing having to walk home from school to having to trek from South America to the US' southern border. That's how egregious the comparison is.


And DO NOT get me started on those who want to compare mask mandates and COVID restrictions to the Ukraine situation. I have neither the time, nor the crayons, to explain that to you.


How selfish have we become that we can look at something barbaric like the Russian onslaught and think that we can use it in some twisted attempt to further our own social narrative.


The depth of that moral abyss... I cannot fathom it...


The PEOPLE of Ukraine are being slaughtered. Not their Soldiers, not their government, not just their infrastructure, but the PEOPLE. If that does not move you to be decent towards their situation, then you have something very twisted growing inside of you. You need to pluck that root of hatred out of your heart towards whatever it is you hate, because whatever it is that you are putting in Russia's place? Well, the comparison is not even close.


You are not "Ukraine." Your "enemy" is not "Russia." Your life situation does not even begin to compare.


Seriously, unless you live in Ukraine, or Russia and are protesting against the war, you have no right to use this.


Grow a moral conscience.


A lot of people in our country appear to need one.

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