The Case Against Russia: 10 Rotten Realities
American has now joined Russia, China, and Iran in the Axis of Genocide.
Vladimir Putin is committing genocide in Ukraine.
The entire purpose of his war of choice is to destroy the Ukrainian state and national identity. Russian forces have intentionally targeted civilians, engaged in mass executions, and tortured people. Russia has kidnapped thousands of Ukrainian children and taken them back to Russia, a crime that meets Article 2 of the Genocide Convention.
The European Parliament has specifically labeled Putin's actions genocide.
And now, under the direction of the Shadow President and his marionette, the Reality TV Show President, the United States has chosen to switch sides in the war, now choosing to align with Putin.
In other words, America has now joined the Axis of Genocide. China is committing genocide against the Uyghurs and is preparing for genocide against Taiwan. Iran is committing genocide against Israelis and is preparing for genocide against all world Jewry. And their ally, Russia, has now received the endorsement of the world's wealthiest and most powerful men in its war to obliterate Ukraine.
An essay that I wrote a year ago has gained some new readers lately, both those it inspired to subscribe and others challenging my thesis, sometimes indignantly, on the Substack Notes platform:
I argued in my characteristic provocateur fashion that the root of Russia's war to conquer Ukraine was the deeper Russian cultural patterns and attitudes that go back centuries. Having thought about the subject further over the last year since I wrote this original broadside, I now believe that much of this simply has to do with geography, that the nature of the Russian empire is such that they have a border too huge to defend. So their method of defense has been offense. They stay safe by perpetually seeking to grow their borders, which requires inflaming the population with lies about foreign enemies. This is how Russia has operated for centuries, they still function as such today, and they likely will continue to for as long as the international community will allow:
The land shaped the people in Russia, just as whatever geography we choose to live in will, in turn, shape us. I chose the desert and, accordingly, it has helped to heal me. How does the geography and climate of where you live manifest in your culture and even your personality?
And so Russia, over the centuries, developed a culture dynamically opposed to the liberal values that manifested in Renaissance and Enlightenment Europe, and which saw their ultimate expression in the United States.
However, this is not apparent to everyone enjoying a life of American freedom. Many of us are fish unaware of the water in which we swim.
Here is a recent poll showing the third/third/third breakdown of Americans' views of Russia, with a notable difference among Republicans:
These numbers offer reason for hope: There are a whole lot of people seemingly in the middle, who recognize Russia's problematic nature, and are thus open to considering how severely the cultural differences fuel the geo-political implications of these facts.
So here are 10 unpleasant facts to consider regarding Russia and the depth of the fundamental cultural disagreements it has with Western free societies. I hope you enjoy.
1. The Vast Majority of Russians Approve of Vladimir Putin’s Genocidal War Against Ukraine
It's important to understand that the reason Putin has managed to stay in control of Russia so long is because he understands what the Russian people want and he gives it to them.
When I wrote my original essay a year ago, I reported that 86% of Russians approved of Putin, up from 71% just before he invaded Ukraine. Now it's up to 88% approval. The war to destroy Ukraine is happening because the Russian people want it to happen.
2. The Vast Majority of Russians Celebrate Joseph Stalin
We can see other empirical measures of the Russian people's endorsement of authoritarianism and genocide. One 2019 survey from the Levada Center shows that 70% of Russians believe Stalin played a positive role in the country's history, and 46% think his mass killings were justified. Another from 2021 featured 56% of respondents calling him a “great leader,” and another 39% saying he was the most “outstanding” figure of all time.
Scholars place Stalin's body count anywhere from 9-20 million people.
3. Russia is Not a Free Society
Given the broad public approval of authoritarians who commit genocide in the name of Russian imperialism, it should come as little surprise that Russia is ranked as a "not free" country, according to Freedom House. See its map of states colored green for free, yellow for partly free, and purple for not free:
Here are Russia's scores compared to the United States:
vs:
I refuse to visit Russia as long as it remains one of these purple, not-free states. My general travel policy is to avoid all purple states and most yellow states. Mexico and India are ones I'd most make exceptions for, but even then, I'd be cautious. I encourage you to adopt the same policy. There are plenty of tourist destinations where you don’t have to risk your human rights being violated by an authoritarian regime.
4. Russia is a Nation Plagued by Political Corruption
Let's consider another international watchdog group's analysis about how Russia stands apart from the global order. It receives a 22/100 CPI score from Transparency International, ranking it 154/180 for corruption levels, which makes it one of the world's worst:
The corruption of government is an expression of the corrupted soul of a people.
5. Alcoholism Has Devastated Russia for Centuries
Russia's cultural norms toward alcohol are widely known. We can count their costs empirically with corpses.
A 2009 study in the Lancet found that from 1990-2001, among Russians 15-54, 52% of the deaths were alcohol-related causes. Today 16.29% of Russian men are alcoholics.
Thankfully, we are starting to see some improvements in these statistics, with the rates of alcohol consumption falling in Russia from 15.76 liters of pure alcohol per capita to 10.5 liters in 2019. This compares to the US with 9.6 liters in 2019.
So it's good to know that even Russians could no longer ignore so severe an alcohol problem.
6. Russia Has One of the World’s Highest Suicide Rates
Just as one can measure the health of a culture in its alcoholism and the accompanying "deaths of despair," one can also look at another dark number: the suicide mortality rate, another category where Russia ranks in the world's top 10:
This compares to 22.4 per 100,000 for American males that year.
7. A Majority of Russians Embrace Antisemitism
One of my long-preferred metrics for measuring the varying levels of evil in different cultures is the ADL's Global 100 survey of antisemitic attitudes. It shows by country the number of people who agree with at least six antisemitic stereotypes, which meets the ADL's definition of possessing "antisemitic attitudes." They just released new data in January, and here is where Russia stands:
They are one of the most antisemitic nations on the face of the earth: 62% of people hate Jews, placing Russia worst in their region and number 84 out of 103 in the world. Think about that. Two-thirds of the people believe conspiracist, evil bullshit. How hard could it be to manipulate such people (and more who aren't outright antisemitic) with anti-Ukraine conspiracy theories?
Compare this to 46% worldwide and 24% of Americans.
8. Russia is a Poor Country
When I wrote my previous essay about Russia, I did so in the context of "cultural capital," the idea, popularized by Thomas Sowell, that certain cultural attitudes can produce greater wealth, happiness, and prosperity than others.
We can correlate the above disparities between Russia and free societies with economic production. The Gross Domestic Product numbers speak for themselves:
$36,000 GDP per capita in Russia
$76,000 GDP per capita in the United States
It's not complicated: Societies which idolize authoritarians, repress citizens' freedom, foster government corruption, inspire alcoholism, provoke suicide, and promote antisemitic conspiracy theories end up creating a whole lot less wealth than those which do not.
However, the flip side of this, for those of us living in freedom, is that a people who are very good at lying to themselves will also be very good at lying to us.
There's another hard number that empirically demonstrates the perversion of Russian culture ...
9. Take a Guess About Life Expectancy in Russia
How long a people live is perhaps the starkest way to measure the value of its culture. The figure is the culmination of all the impacts of a country on its people's quality of life.
In Russia, male life expectancy is 65.51 years in 2021, down from 68.24 years in 2019, pre-Covid. Compare that to 73.5 in the United States then, with it reaching 75.8 years in 2023.
10. The World Knows How Terrible Russia Is
Of course, I must clearly admit: These are not especially original points to make. The evidence is so overwhelming and empirical that most of the world knows this about Russia. A Pew poll found that 65% of adults in a survey of 35 countries possessed a negative view of Russia, while 28% had a positive view - a pretty similar figure to the thirds-breakdown of American views reported above by YouGov. In many of the countries polled, the anti-Russia opinions are far higher than 65%.
Pew also found comparable numbers doubting Putin, with 73% saying they have not too much or no confidence in him.
Folks, this is what a pariah state looks like. This is what a country poisoned for centuries with authoritarian lies and nationalist bullshit looks like.
Don't be duped by the highly-developed Russian disinformation pumped out daily online by one of the few industries where Russia is truly the most skilled, devoted leader on the planet.
Now is the time to stand with and advocate for Ukraine as it resists Russian imperialism and another KGB-implemented genocide.
Russia’s elites throughout its history never had the backbone to oppose the tsar or anyone in absolute power. They allowed themselves to get slaughtered. Don’t forget about that.
Excellent analysis, David. Many thanks.