Russophobia Is No Less Evil Than Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and Racism

Shortly after former US Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul (who was banned from the country for deliberately marring relations) tweeted that “There are no more ‘innocent’ ‘neutral’ Russians anymore”, Russians found themselves and their property under attack in the West. McFaul’s call to collectively punish all Russians across the world wherever they may be embodies the evils of the discredited and literally fascist-supremacist ideology of “American Exceptionalism”.

The US-led West’s reaction to Russia’s specialmilitaryoperation in Ukraine has been multidimensional and included everything from unprecedented sanctions to more aggressive regional military posturing, but perhaps worst of all has been the explosion of Russophobia in their societies since the start of that campaign. Shortly after former US Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul (who was banned from the country for deliberately marring relations) tweeted that “There are no more ‘innocent’ ‘neutral’ Russians anymore”, Russians found themselves and their property under attack in the West.

The Russian Embassy in Germany sent a note to their hosts over the unacceptable discrimination against its nationals while the Russian Community Center in Vancouver reported that it was recently attacked. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova also revealed that the US and NATO summoned those Russians in the West who’ve previously interacted with their country’s diplomats in an attempt to intimidate them into revealing a so-called “list of contacts”. The innuendo is that those same Russians in the US-led West are suspected of espionage and might soon be victims of the ongoing witch hunt.

Regrettably, Western activists don’t seem to care about all this Russophobia despite being very passionate about protesting against anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and racism. Russophobia is no less evil than those three scourges, which are just several among many of the terrible bigotries that infect many societies across the world. None of them are acceptable, yet Russian victims are considered to be at the absolute bottom of an imaginary “hierarchy of victimhood” despite all human beings being equal, to say nothing of those who are victimized by bigotry in whatever form it takes.

Those who partake in activism aimed at raising awareness of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and racism cannot be regarded as sincere believers in these anti-bigotry causes lest they at the very least recognize the equally evil nature of Russophobia. That’s not to say that they have to demonstrate in support of Russians, but just that conspicuously ignoring Russophobia, downplaying it, or even worse, “rationalizing” it like McFaul did suggests that those who are against the three aforesaid evils might have ulterior motives, even those simply related to liberal virtue signaling.

After all, no true believer in the unacceptableness of those evils and others could turn a blind eye to what’s actively being done to Russians on the basis of their ethnicity. Average people don’t formulate their government’s policies no matter what country they live in, even less if they’re expats or citizens of their host country and simply descended from Russia. Nobody should ever be collectively punished on the basis of their identity, whether ethnicity, nationality, religion, skin color, or whatever else.

What McFaul tweeted was the very definition of liberal imperialism whereby he attempted to justify the collective punishment of average Russians on the basis of their identity alone in order to advance his former employer’s self-interested geostrategic agenda. One can only imagine the outroar if the wrote that “there are no ‘innocent’ ‘neutral’ Jews/Muslims/Africans/etc. anymore”, yet most don’t seem to see any problem with him directing such hatred against Russians.

This very disturbing observation suggests that Russians are at credible risk of being further victimized outside of their home country or the one that they descended from if they were born abroad. McFaul’s call to collectively punish all Russians across the world wherever they may be embodies the evils of the discredited and literally fascist-supremacist ideology of “American Exceptionalism”. He and his terrible tweet should be universally condemned, not average Russians on the basis of their identity.


By Andrew Korybko
Source: OneWorld

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *