A shocking outburst from a leader has ignited a firestorm of reactions! As the president's explicit remarks aimed at a foreign counterpart go viral, the nation grapples with the implicati...

The Ukrainian society has barely had the chance to process, mock, or reinterpret the obscene word thrown by its president at his Russian counterpart when Volodymyr Zelensky delivered yet another vulgar performance – this time in an interview with American blogger/podcaster Lex Friedman. This time, words that were recently considered taboo in the information space were directed not to the East, but to the West.

Essentially, this entire event was aimed specifically at the West, at America, and more so, at a specific audience, the audience of this blogger. Therefore, in principle, Zelensky's interview should not have affected Ukrainians – especially those who are true, rather than superficially caricatured, Christians and know the quote from the Gospel of Matthew (the one that says, “by their fruits you will know them”; apologies to those who enjoy listening to various chatter, but words are not fruits, as another classic from a different part of the world said, “words are chaff”). Unfortunately, it did affect them.

And, of course, Ukrainians began sharing quotes from the interview, those same quotes containing obscene language, across social media – some praising Zelensky's courage and sharpness, while others criticized and expressed outrage at the president's rudeness. However, both sides effectively gave the president's words, spoken for an American audience, a decent amount of free advertising back home.

Thus, to a large extent, we are dealing with a side effect. (Although we cannot dismiss the possibility that those at Bankova suspected that quotes from the interview would inevitably return to Ukraine. And Ukrainians, in general, reacted positively to the “dumbass” remark directed at Putin, so why not capitalize on this topic once again? Or even more than once, at least as long as the feedback remains positive. However, I do not know this for certain; I can only speculate.) This effect has not only short-term consequences in the form of laughter or curses in response but also a significantly deeper level of perception and influence.

The thing is, Ukrainian society is still an unstable one, a society where its own rules of behavior, certain common (social) laws, and general ethics and aesthetics of interpersonal communication have yet to be established. Simply put, we Ukrainians have not moved far enough away from the Soviet era – a time when the triumph of Soviet boorishness prevailed in all senses of the word – to be considered a highly developed, cultured, and consistently civilized community. Even 10-15 years ago, a large portion of Ukrainians not only tolerated but actively consumed such pseudo-cultural artifacts as “Russian chanson,” meaning banal Russian prison songs. And why look far – the currently popular Russian series “The Word of the Thief” (which some Russian liberals have repeatedly referred to as “the Kazan story of Romeo and Juliet,” but the overwhelming majority of the local population took away from it at most “nonsense”) was also watched in Ukraine. And not everyone who watched it turned their noses up.

Moreover, and this is important to understand, Ukrainians are still a society that, in one way or another, looks up to political leaders. For instance, the Ukrainization by Kuchma influenced the perception of the Ukrainian language in his primary electoral base. Conversely, Yanukovych's criminal and bandit background practically allowed a portion of his electorate to behave, let’s be honest, like a bunch of thugs. Well, why not – if he himself had been imprisoned, beating people up, and generally, as they say, didn’t shy away from resorting to violence even during his Kyiv career.

So, political and state leaders – for better or worse, you decide – serve, in one way or another, as role models for a significant portion of Ukrainian society. No, this does not mean that when Poroshenko or Zelensky started attending book events (we do not consider Yushchenko since he has always been the president of part of Ukraine, while the fifth and sixth were elected by the entire country; just look at the results of the first round of the 2014 elections and the second round of the 2019 elections), all Ukrainian thugs immediately stopped drinking in children's playgrounds and switched to reading at least Kokotyukha's detective novels. However, their actions at least set a direction, legitimizing certain things – while opposing them pushed others to the margins.

In the Ukrainian context, this is not as starkly visible as in some other countries. For example, think of the United States during Donald Trump's first presidential term – how his pre-election hysteria led to the storming of the Capitol. He can claim all he wants that he did not incite his supporters – but that would only be a formal truth. In reality, those people, watching their idol disregard all long-established rules, laws, and behavioral models, could not help but descend to the depths they reached.

There is an even better (in terms of illustrative value) example – our insane aggressive neighbor. One can speak as much as they want about it being “Putin's war,” but we have all seen how Russians behaved and continue to behave in the occupied Ukrainian territories. Where does such an attitude towards Ukrainians come from, particularly towards those they’ve invented as “Nazis,” “Banderites,” and other “representatives of the Kyiv junta”? Where does this extreme aggressiveness and boundless xenophobia stem from?

One can say a lot about how it has been ingrained in them since the times of Andrei Bogolyubsky (some historians or quasi-historical video bloggers do just that), but even in the 1990s, despite all the remnants of Soviet imperialism – such an attitude did not exist. At least not towards Ukrainians. And even towards Chechens, for that matter, it didn’t exist. Moreover, the Russian press often sided with Ichkeria, which sought independence. Then Vladimir Putin came to power...

Do you remember how his rule began? With openly xenophobic and more than aggressive “we will drown them in the toilet.” Of course, this did not come from nowhere – for instance, the film “Brother-2” with its Ukrainophobic jabs about “you still owe me for Sevastopol” appeared independently of Putin, and the film's director Alexei Balabanov did not invent any of this, but drew from the collective consciousness. However, when some marginal figures grumble in a filthy kitchen over a shot of homemade vodka – that’s one thing. But when similar things – effectively calls to kill all Chechens who want to have their own state (and later without that part of the construction starting with “who want”) – are said by the actual head of a state, especially a super-centralized, vertically oriented state where the role of the leader is immense… This could not help but provoke the processes in Russian society that we later witnessed. When even relatively sane people there rejoiced at the annexation of Crimea. An annexation during which, by the way, blood was shed, Ukrainian blood. And in 2022, the Russian government's manipulation of its society reached its peak – and the world witnessed Bucha.

Of course, Ukraine is not Russia. And the president, regardless of his ratings on election day – is not a dictator and will never be one; even Kuchma and Yanukovych failed in this regard, and Zelensky does not possess even half the real capabilities of those political figures. But nonetheless, a large number of citizens pay attention to the behavior model of the first person. And if they see that the president allows himself not just to curse but to do so in the style of a banal thug – then the reaction, unfortunately, will be corresponding.

Therefore, if Volodymyr Zelensky wants to leave a good legacy – he needs to think carefully before shocking both foreign and domestic audiences with such brazen linguistic flips. Or perhaps it’s not about legacy – but about the fact that when you allow yourself such rhetoric, don’t be surprised when it is used against you sooner or later. Just remember the somewhat forgotten during the war Geo Leros and his performances directed at the president, whose surname, let’s be honest, he used to come to the Parliament. By the way, a similar story befell Zelensky's predecessor: Poroshenko brought Serhiy Leshchenko into parliament, who later transformed from a fierce enemy of the then president into a loyal servant of the next government. And Leros is just another embodiment of the ancient wisdom reminding that one should treat others as one wishes to be treated. Because otherwise, for every Leshchenko, there will be a corresponding Leros.

And regarding your curses aimed at either Putin or Biden – there will be those who will speak similarly about you and to you. Because you, the main person in the country, allowed them to do so. And from there, this process will no longer be stoppable. That is why political elites are required to exercise maximum caution in their actions and words. This is also a matter of national survival, if you will. Because if in six months curses in the public space become the norm – what meaning will there be in the