As Ukrainian forces retake territory and force the demoralized Russian occupiers into a retreat, Russian President Vladimir Putin has escalated his threat to use nuclear weapons. Various politicians have sent stern warnings to the Kremlin and some commentators have compared the current moment to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and other high-tension episodes that could have ended in a nuclear apocalypse. But some 15,000 Ukrainians seem to have responded to the prospect of annihilation in a less abstract way: by signing up for a mass sex party.
Those who participate in the “Shchekavitsia: official orgy” outside kyiv will be asked to “make marks on their hands to express their sexual preferences. People interested in having anal sex must paint themselves three marks; those who are interested in oral sex, four marks”. Similar groups have popped up elsewhere, including one announcing an orgy on Deribasivska Street in Odessa.
Why, after eight months of Russian bombing and brutal fighting, would anyone have an interest in such an event? According to a Ukraine enthusiastic about the proposal: “It is the opposite of despair. People will look for something good even in the worst scenario. That is the mega-optimism of the Ukrainians.”
This testimony must be accepted literally. In a time of extreme distress, an orgy can be a life-affirming project. No more “deeper” pseudo-Freudian explanation is needed, in which the collective trauma precipitates the disintegration of individual inhibitions and conventional social norms. The only uncivilized sexual acts here are the ones being committed by Russian soldiers and their leaders. Pramila Patten, the United Nations special representative on sexual violence, told Agence France Presse that Russian commanders are distributing Viagra to their troops, adding that sexual attacks on Ukrainian women are a “deliberate tactic to dehumanize the victims.”
Unfortunately, there are other outside observers who have effectively sided with Russia. To my country’s shame, Matjaz Gams, a member of the Slovenian Council of State, reacted to the news of the orgy by suggesting that when a civilization enters its period of decline, “strange, sick ideas” appear. But, I insist, what is stranger and sicker: a sex party (where everything that is done will be voluntary and consensual) or Russia’s indiscriminate attacks against civilian infrastructure and against the civilian population (including the systematic use of rape? as military tactic)?
Putin’s latest nuclear threats were accompanied by the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian territories over which he does not have full control, but which, the Kremlin insists, “are an inalienable part of the Russian Federation (…) The provisions for their security are of the same level as those of the rest of the Russian territory”. What is implied, of course, is that Ukraine has already earned itself a nuclear attack, because it is making inroads into territories that are supposedly within the Russian nuclear umbrella. It is not surprising that betting sites on the Internet ask about the probability that Russia will launch a nuclear attack this year, and that thousands of Internet users are gambling for money.
To give the threat more credibility, the Russian authorities ordered the evacuation of Kherson, which is now almost completely surrounded by Ukrainian forces. The intended message is clear: if the Ukrainians retake the city, they will be the perfect target for a nuclear bomb. In the fight against “satanism” (according to Putin’s recent words), everything is allowed.
But just as sick is the Western pacifist argument that Europe should send a large delegation to Russia to start negotiating peace terms. It is obvious that we must do everything possible to avoid a new world war; but the first step to achieve it is to have a realistic vision of what Russia has become. This implies abandoning the idea of Eurasian unity and rejecting the argument that Europe must form a power bloc with Russia in order not to become a junior partner of the United States in its conflict with China. Right now, the biggest threat against Europe is Russia, not China.
Furthermore, in order to negotiate with Russia, Europe would also have to put pressure on Ukraine to agree to a deal. Which is exactly what the Kremlin wants: it would reinforce Putin’s argument that Ukraine is a mere pawn of the West and not a real autonomous country.
What is there to do? It is obvious that Russia cannot be ignored, so the best option is to appeal to those in Russia and its satellites who oppose the war. As Slawomir Sierakowski recently pointed out, the government of Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelenski has a natural ally in the Belarusian opposition, which has been quietly doing what it can to thwart the Russian war effort. But the alliance has not been formed. Instead, Ukrainian officials have expressed public contempt for Belarusians, describing them as “cowardly and conformist.” As Sierakowski points out, that is not only immoral, but also “politically stupid.”
The Russians who oppose the war find themselves in the same awkward position: the Putinist establishment criticizes them as traitors and Ukraine criticizes them as Russians. But this obscures the meaning of the war in Ukraine: it is not a struggle between a “European truth” and a “Russian truth”, as both Putin’s ideologue Aleksandr Dugin and some Ukrainians say. Ukraine is a front in the global fight against the new nationalist fundamentalism that is growing stronger everywhere, including the United States, India and China.
If anywhere the Ukrainians have given up an inch of their moral superiority, it is here, in the fact of not universalizing their struggle, and not in some Dionysian dissipation on the outskirts of kyiv.
