Do Not. Fucking. Dare To Say To Me Shit Like "oh, But Not All Russians Are Bad!"

February 2015: Damage in Mariupol, Ukraine about a year into the russian invasion.

Sometimes I see this misunderstanding and I'd like to clarify it. When Ukrainian say "russian drones/shahed drones/iranian drones," we don't mean this kind of drones:

We mean THIS kind of drones that can carry a warhead and are essentially used as missiles:

While they're not as large, destructive and difficult to intercept as, say, ballistic missiles, they can still cause significant damage. Russia launches them at us every night, but most are successfully shot down.

sometimes i think about how i’ve effectively dug myself a grave with this blog. half my internet presence is about being queer and ukrainian, famously two things russia hates the most.

if trump proceeds with the “peaceful negotiations” that happen without ukraine even present, if he pushes to implement another leader in ukraine (meaning, of course, a pro-russian puppet) and makes my country a quote unquote neutral territory, it obviously means occupation. when there are bombs over my head, i’m at least an abstract target, i can rely on luck not to get hit. if russians come to power tho? i’m toast.

i wish i was exaggerating, but this is already happening to people in occupied parts of the country. those who had social media posts in ukrainian, about queer rights, etc. are being seeked out and threatened. my acquaintance was once on call with her friend on crimea, who had weird noises in the background. when questioned, she casually said that they were coming from russian police beating her neighbour for listening to ukrainian music.

i constantly hear from people who miraculously left the occupied territories how they had to delete everything from their phones, because russian soldiers would do random phone searches — both just on the street or when a person tries to leave the occupied city. it’s not uncommon that people get shot over it.

everything about “peaceful negotiations” and “compromises”, trading “land for a peace agreement” promises me a death sentence

❗A museum of retro cars in the Kyiv region was destroyed by a Russian drone attack

nICE work

For the past month, russia has been bombing Ukraine with shahed drones every single night, probably detecting the location of our air defense in preparation for a large missile attack on our power grid. Or just because. And it usually lasts all night too. Air defense shoots most of them down, but, obviously, it's still scary if it's close to you. I sleep with earplugs, so I rarely hear the drones flying by or getting shot down, only when they're super close to our house. But I know whether the night was loud or not by the way my dog crawls on half-bent legs in the morning or tries to fit under the couch at night.

idk where I'm going with this. fuck russia.

2024: Ukrainian modern cemetery near an old Cossacks cemetery.

Those Cossack graves are 300+ years old.

They claimed that Ukraine is full of Nazis - yet they were the Nazis all along. They claimed Ukraine is the most corrupt country in the world - yet they are the oligarchs who openly bought their way into the government. Now they claim that Ukraine isn't the victim, but the aggressor who wants war - yet they threaten numerous countries with invasion. Now they claim Ukraine is ungrateful and greedy - yet they demand us to give up our country's resources to them while gaining nothing in return. Now their leader claims Ukraine is ruled by a dictator - yet he praises the real dictator, who's been ruling a totalitarian regime and starting wars for 25 years. Now they claim Ukraine isn't a democracy - yet they openly call their leader a king and want him to rule forever.

Every accusation is an admission. Always.

On this day, 10 years ago, russian occupation forces, namely the "Oplot" brigade, in an act of terrorism, fired a Grad missile at a Ukrainian checkpoint near Volnovakha when there was a passenger bus. Twelve Ukrainian civilians were killed, and 18 were injured. Russia never admitted guilt or paid for the crimes, the consequences and continuation of which we see today.

This story is more personal for me because I was on that same bus earlier that day, heading from Donetsk city to Volnovakha. If, for some reason, I’d decided to return that day, I could have been one of the victims.

I had to pass by the remnants of the bus a few days later, which was horrifying. Subconsciously, I was expecting this to happen again, only this time to the bus I was in. It didn’t, and I’m still here. Although drones flying above my roof remind me every day that it could be any of us, any time, as long as russia exists.

It wasn’t even the only terrorist act by Russia that felt too close to me. But I’ve talked about this before.

Anyhow, later they completely isolated the russian-controlled (annexed) part of the Donetsk oblast from the rest of Ukraine, banning public transport (like these buses) at first and then essentially banning even smaller private mini-buses, allowing only cars through the checkpoints (to profit from bribes). Then, when covid happened, they banned all civilian movement through the checkpoints, allowing it only with special passes that were impossible to get. So Ukrainians, born and raised in Ukraine, to travel from one Ukrainian (illegally occupied by Russia) city to another, would have to go through russia... if they could.

The world didn't care then - when they were killing us, separating families, isolating us, re-educating, forcing us to get russian citizenships, etc. Now, ten years later, they’re doing the same things on a much bigger scale. If Ukraine falls, they will move forward. They will never stop.