By the end of the first year, the Levada Center * asked the Russians a question about the attitude of Russians to Ukrainians and Ukrainians to Russians
The results show that the question was understood as a question about the attitude of people of one nationality to people of another. And they answered it on behalf of the Russians as an ethnic group, and not on behalf of the Russians as a civil, political nation.
Answers, as usual, differ depending on the gender, age and other characteristics of the respondent, but — and this is unusual — not on his political position. There is no difference in the reactions of people approving and disapproving of the country's political course, approving and disapproving of the activities of the top leadership. In other issues on a similar topic — for example, in the issue of supporting the actions of the Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine — their opinions are completely opposite.
And to the question about the mutual relationship of peoples, we repeat, they answer the same way.
Let's try to explain this, starting from the president's words that these are «fraternal peoples.» These words were not invented by him, but their appearance in his speeches means that such an image of relations between these peoples is relevant. Considering the contexts and word usage to which his words refer listeners, it can be said with confidence that in this case we are talking about the Russian people as the “big brother” and the Ukrainian people as the “younger one”.
The thesis about “ brotherhood”, as well as in general everything from the code of family relations, is very strong because it means that these relations are from nature (for someone — from God). Brotherly relations are good, they presuppose a special closeness, attachment to each other. Therefore, they must be appreciated. But — and this is the main thing for politicians — these are relationships that also involve unconditional inequality.
The older brother is more important than the younger. Why? Because he's the eldest, it seems like a matter of course, it's natural. The Russian word «senior» contains both meanings at the same time — «A lived more than B» and «A is more important than B», that is, B must obey A.
These family codes are often used to designate and establish relationships in politics, but real relations, not formal protocol, when everyone is equal. And if they say “fraternal people”, then it is useful to ask: are you talking about a younger brother or an older one?
There are funny stories here. Elderly people whose childhood was spent in the USSR remember that the so-called «People's China» was called «little brother». Now you can't call it that. In terms of strength, he seems to be older. But now, while becoming friends with China (and now 85% of Russians treat it “good”, the family code is not applied to these relations. The Russians do not want to become younger brothers to this giant — this means being subordinate to him.
Demonstrating a view from inside the Soviet Union, from Moscow, Soviet politicians and propagandists called both the countries of the socialist camp and the Soviet republics «fraternal». Among them, Ukraine was fraternal. (Although both «Russia» and «Ukraine» are feminine words.) And in these fraternal relations, Russia's seniority was, at least for her, taken for granted. The older brother was sure that he was big, even great, and the other was small. The words about «Great and Small Russia» were in the titles of Alexei Mikhailovich and Pyotr Alekseevich.
We have our own evidence that they were not forgotten. The Levada Center* has repeatedly conducted research in cooperation with the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, one of the best or best public opinion research agency in Ukraine. We in Russia found out the attitude of the inhabitants of the Russian Federation towards Ukraine, and they in Ukraine — the attitude of its inhabitants towards Russia. It would seem that there were and are reasons to expect that relations should be symmetrical — equally good or equally bad. And if they are not symmetrical, then there is reason to expect that Ukrainians will have more historical claims to Russia than Russians to Ukraine. But no, it's the other way around.
For the entire period of observation, except for the most recent years, the surveys showed less positive (or more negative) attitudes of Russians towards Ukraine than in relation to Ukrainians towards Russia. When we asked Russians in focus groups about the reason for this asymmetry, they were not surprised by it, but by our question.
For them, it was a matter of course that they (“Khokhols”) should respect us more than we respect them, because we are older, they are younger.
The idea that the younger should respect and obey the older belongs to the body of norms that psychologists and sociologists call attitudes — they are taken for granted by people. Only foreigners or children ask about their origin and the source of their legitimacy. In response, they refer to tradition or nature. Speaking of brotherhood, they usually mean love relationships, but now it is worth emphasizing that, due to the same attitude, the direction of aggression and repression is asymmetrical between the elder and the younger. If now it is said that the elder can punish the younger, but not vice versa, this will seem self-evident. Let us point out a more subtle point: the elder is sure of his right to be angry with the younger, and the latter cannot be angry with the elder in response. Because to be angry, and even more so to hate, means, even passively and mentally, to stop obeying.
As far as relations between the two «brotherly» peoples are concerned, a fundamental shift seems to have taken place.
According to the observations of Ukrainian sociologists, in the traditionally positive attitude of Ukrainians towards Russia, already undermined by the annexation of Crimea, now the negative (finally?) has prevailed over the positive. It is unlikely that we will find this surprising,
knowing everything that has happened over the past year. But here we are going to talk about the amazing thing about how the people of Russia see the picture of mutual relations between Russians and Ukrainians.
In the responses offered to the respondents to the corresponding two questions that the Levada Center asked at the end of January, the following options were offered: “with love”, “with sympathy”, “indifferently”, “with suspicion”, “with hatred”.
Let's start with «love». On the whole, a little more than one-twentieth of the polled Russians dare to talk about the love of Russians for Ukrainians, and one-fiftieth of the reciprocal love of Ukrainians. It is clear that in the current circumstances, love is not a topic. But the “sympathy” of Russians for Ukrainians is often spoken about. Some are particularly common: a third of our retirees and more than a quarter of our executives. One could think of the good-heartedness of these people, but among them, respectively, 82% and 77% express personal support for the actions of the Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine. It is not easy to understand how a certain part of pensioners and bosses manage to combine these two aspirations of their souls. Maybe for them in one or both cases these are empty words?
So, if more than twenty people out of a hundred say about the sympathy of Russians for Ukrainians, then less than five people out of a hundred decided to say about the counter “sympathy” of Ukrainians for Russians.
The most common response about how Russians feel about Ukrainians is “indifference.” This is the answer of more than a quarter of all respondents, men more often than women, young people more often than the elderly. This is the most comfortable position — I don't care what happens there, I don't care about them (all). Since there is no case, it means that I do not even mentally participate in all this. And this means that I have no responsibility (moral). (According to past polls, about two-thirds of the respondents denied their personal responsibility for what is happening in Ukraine.)
One may ask: how so, because a significant part of these people further answer that they support the actions of the Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine, approve in In general, the activities of V.V. Putin as president of the Russian Federation (as well as commander-in-chief of these armed forces)? Do not these words mean support and approval of everything that was done by our side during the military operation?
This is a very important question, and we have been doing a lot of analysis of how our public understands it and their responses to it. This analysis showed that for the respondents, the words “I support” and “I approve” used by them do not have a detailed meaning, not related to specific actions, but an extremely general one. They are the designation of a position, which in ordinary speech is often expressed in other words: “we are for him”, “we are for ours”. Such generalized support and such generalized approval are a priori. The actions of the military and the activities of the authorities were supported and approved not on the basis of specific results, but in advance and in general. And, of course, those who say “we approve” do not have such thoughts in their minds — they say that we are responsible for what they do, and they must answer to us.
This is our comment on the answer of more than a quarter of those surveyed about indifferent attitude of Russians towards Ukrainians. But about the “indifference” of Ukrainians to Russians spoke three and a half times less often (7%). Russians seem to understand that those who now live in Ukraine cannot remain indifferent towards Russians.
Among the responses about the attitude of Russians towards Ukrainians, the second most common answer (24%) is that they treat Ukrainians “with suspicion”. This is the answer, first of all, of women and most often of those who prefer to learn about the news from neighbors and acquaintances.
In an environment living with rumors and gossip, conspiracy theories are most actively spread, often launched from the screens of our TV. The “suspicious” attitude of Ukrainians towards Russians is mentioned almost half as often (14%).
The last option is about the attitude “with hatred”.
The special operation has been going on for a year already, some of them lost their sons and grandchildren, but most of our compatriots do not see hatred towards Russians towards Ukrainians.
Only 13% of respondents declare this feeling. And Ukrainians are credited with hatred for Russians five times more often (63%). Among the authorities about the hatred of Ukrainians for Russians, almost 70% interpret. (We don't know how many of them think this reaction is legitimate or legitimate.)
«Hate» is serious. It's like an adult. Returning to the discussion about the older and younger brother, let's say: the Russians — of course, not those who are on the battlefield, but those who are in the far rear, where the bulk of our respondents live — can, by inertia, allow themselves a condescending and indifferent attitude towards the former younger brothers. But the survey showed that they already understand that after everything that happened, they are no longer younger. And they no longer feel like brothers to us, no matter what is said on our part.
There is another part of the matter: who fights against whom. Again: we can only talk about the words (and the thoughts/feelings behind them) of the rear Russians. So, as it has already been reported more than once, by now they have agreed that Russia is not in conflict with Ukraine in an armed way. It is at war with the collective West with the US at its head. (Because, by the way, according to polls, the attitude of Russians towards the United States all this time is worse than the attitude towards Ukraine.) Such an interpretation of events does Russia credit: the opponent is huge, strong. And this is not a «limited operation», but a great battle. If something does not work out very well for us, this is due to the innumerable (and even diabolical) strength of our adversary.
In this picture, the Ukrainians are assigned the role of either miserable accomplices of the West (such as Bandera), or a poor deceived by the West (former ) brotherly people. From that, the attitude towards them, as we have shown, is not very serious and not affected.
The question of who and why the Ukrainians are fighting against, the Russians prefer not to ask themselves. In general, our respondents were forced to think about Ukrainians and their feelings because our interviewers asked them this question.
Sound recordings of interviews show that the answer is not thought about for long. In a matter of seconds, they manage to figure out that if the enemy for us is the West, an indefinite force that is somewhere out there, consider it across the ocean, then the Ukrainians have to see us as an enemy, and only us. Us as Russians. See and hate. Alas.
The author wishes to finish by expressing his point of view on the raised issue of the relations of ethnic groups. The question is insoluble. And it becomes more insoluble the longer the military clash lasts. The warring masses of people identify each other completely, mark each other with names-metals of hatred. And these mass labels, if the war is not civil or not religious, are usually basically ethnic or, as we say, “national”. This must be recognized.
But there are estimates not mass, but individual and human. You can use them.