Russian fatalism could have catastrophic consequences for Russia amid COVID-19:

[DetlefK]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/up-against-covid-19-russias-old-fatalism-has-fatal-consequences?ref=home

Basically, it is an attitude that “life is unpredictable and uncontrollable, and one shouldn’t overestimate the powers of reason, logic, or rational action,” she says: “The best one can do is to count on luck.”

But if Putin seriously wanted Russians to dispense with avos’ in the face of this deadly pandemic, that, too, was wishful thinking. Indeed, one might wonder if he was trusting in luck himself the day he visited a hospital filled with coronavirus patients last month and conspicuously shook hands with the director, who subsequently came down with the disease.

In any case, what we see on the streets of Russian cities today, especially outside Moscow, is fatalism with potentially fatal consequences.

In spite of hundreds of detentions—and fines for violating the self-isolation regime that even Muscovites consider huge—the metro is full of people and kiosks continue to sell fast food.

...

Generations of Russian poets and novelists have written about our blend of carelessness and fatalism in the face of a devastating crisis. Leo Tolstoy, for instance, saw these attitudes rooted in the wisdom of the people, who share a deep belief that life is like a river that cannot be resisted and demands to be accepted for what it is. A philosopher peasant in Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Platon Karatayev, teaches noble Pierre Bezukhov to live “not by our mind, but by God’s judgment.”

One of today’s popular writers and poets, Dmitry Bykov, says fatalism is just as appealing to Russians now as to those who came before: “One person’s role is absolutely meaningless here,” Bykov said recently on Radio Echo of Moscow. “History takes its predestined, cyclical course and a man cannot stop that cycle, at least for now. Maybe plans and projects make sense somewhere in the world. They don’t mean anything in Russia where we make a plan in order to just step away from it later. It is interesting, I see it as a peculiar challenge.”

A 57-year-old factory worker in the small town of Kstovo, Nizhny Novgorod region, was waiting in line outside the Lukoil refinery’s checkpoint on Thursday. Like many of the people there, he wore no mask. “They do not have them at our pharmacies,” he told The Daily Beast. So, he reasoned, why bother?

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I guess, this explains why Putin keeps winning huge in elections despite having only a slight margin in popularity: The people have accepted his rule, his attacks on civil rights, his corruption, as an avoidable fact of life.

And what do you do when life is bad in Russia? Do you blame the politicians and demand change? No, you toughen up.

[DarthDem]

1. I find this very sad.

Thanks for the read.

[Mike 03]

2. Of course, these ways of thinking aren't unique to Russians

“life is unpredictable and uncontrollable, and one shouldn’t overestimate the powers of reason, logic, or rational action,” she says: “The best one can do is to count on luck.”

“One person’s role is absolutely meaningless here,” Bykov said recently on Radio Echo of Moscow. “History takes its predestined, cyclical course and a man cannot stop that cycle, at least for now.

But when citizens think this way, it sure works out conveniently for Dictators and authoritarians.

Maybe these are conclusions you arrive at when you're beaten down and live near the edge of survival.