Putin, his acolytes and their criminal war on Ukraine represent a global existential threat. The invasion requires democracies to rethink realities of the world order, recognising those who would destroy, and the dangers presented by opponents, and how best to counter them.
Is perhaps the plainest lesson to the West from Ukraine that it is time to recognise some home truths and reverse the complacency, self-satisfied righteousness and self-indulgence which has softened the ability of democracy and individuals to attend first to the basic fundamentals which underpin a free society? It is surely necessary for countries, institutions and individuals to re-examine and prioritise what they hold dearest.
FUNDAMENTAL VAUES MUST BE REASSERTED
Ukrainians are inspiring each other to unite against and defeat a common enemy whose prime agenda includes removing their right as a people to determine their own future freely and democratically, and even to die for their cause. They long to have a privileged society, for example like the UK’s. But the UK’s and other nations’ perspectives have become skewed in recent years, and perhaps now is the hour to reassert the fundamental values. It is to the shame of past leaders that it takes a humanitarian crisis and mass murder to awaken souls.
The issues which have elicited most passion in recent years in the free world have largely been soft issues. Climate change is an existential threat which is being taken seriously but has it achieved day to day urgency? Undoubtedly in due course the urgency to tackle that crisis will ramp up, but perhaps only when huge damage has been done. Rather, it is issues such as sexuality, gender, ethnicity, diversity, the sins of the past, the sacred cows like the NHS, and Covid restrictions and lockdowns and the like which have been the subject of vigorous offence and defence. So much so that often but not always debate has turned into intolerance, with the rejection of people who disagree with a particular proposition.
Freedom of thought and belief have been under attack by a fascist-like obsession of extremists for a single cause of their choosing, so that people who do not share a philosophy, probably a minor issue in the scheme of life, get threatened with violence at least of language and sometimes physically, with often their job being lost or put at risk due to malevolent zealots. All facilitated by the anonymity of social media. Issues which have at their centre fairness and how people are treated are very worthy of debate and resolution in a way which improves life overall and do and will always matter. But the very ability to debate and hold beliefs of one’s own depends on the fundamentals of individual freedoms, justice and meaningful caring values. The reality is that these are far more important than the various causes of special virtue which have been dominating political life, and which leaders use to virtue signal and are changing society in a dangerous way. The “pronoun and virtue culture” needs to be set in context. The very fascist idea of “cancelling” people needs to be buried, as the world observes the ultimate cancellation, that is cancellation of an entire nation, being attempted by Putin in Ukraine.
NEGATIVISM, MENTAL HEALTH AND RESILIENCE
Negativism – Sherbhert has written consistently about the need for people to learn to take offence and endure it, confident in their own self-awareness, and how it is the role of a child’s parents or other teachers to grow that quality. Also, negativism has been too prevalent and emphasised during the pandemic. The daily media diet of sad Covid stories, often with a diatribe about lack of support and Government failure, has fed the culture that somebody else is always to blame for an individual’s problem, invariably summoning up some need for government support. Wallowing in misery was perhaps as damaging as the pandemic itself. It was as if, outside of Covid, there were not every day countless sad tales. People and communities, with the media, need more focus on a glass half full.
Resilience – Some seem to believe that upsetting people needs to be stamped out by Government, but it is part of the daily cut and thrust of life, which individuals must learn to cope with. Advocates of absolute safety portray that cut and thrust as causing mental health problems, so diminishing the serious need and ability to tackle the major mental health issues. Time now to change as a manmade tragedy of epic proportions has to be coped with in Ukraine. Ukrainians, no doubt consumed with fear and anxiety, are battling those emotions and driving each other to overcome them.
Similarly, is now the time to challenge the ego culture in which the individual preens themselves for presentation online, obsessed with appearance and publicity and popularity. This expanding egoism weakens thoughtfulness for others, causes damaging inward-looking narcissism and reduces a person’s growth to cope with life’s pressures. Concern for children’s mental health is a correct and natural worry, heightened by pandemic effects, but indulgence for fear of a bit of upset is surely not an answer. The obsession to stay safe at all costs is not a life philosophy which stacks up. Learning resilience, understanding realities and what is good or bad, and other such values surely are a better bedrock.
Mental Health – During the Ukraine war, children in the UK and around the world will be experiencing pictures and stories of wanton extreme violence by one nation against another, talk of nuclear Armageddon, and the harsh reality of evil people doing evil things to innocent people. Children will need the wherewithal to thrive and overcome any effects. Just as earlier generations did in WW2. Adults, especially parents, guardians and teachers, will have to contextualise these events, explain and reassure, but not denying reality. Perhaps it will be a good time to demonstrate and count blessings and how most daily things people moan and complain or worry about are trivial in the grand scheme of priorities – like lockdown parties and healthy children catching Covid. The mental scarring of those children removed from, but witness to, the crimes, will of course pale against the permanent scars of fear and desperation experienced by children being shelled in Kyiv or made refugees abroad. Understanding and empathising with those in much greater pain helps perspective and balance. Children perhaps need to experience risk not cotton wool, be taught to hope, have confidence in who they are and learn to seek solutions to challenges, not be depressed by them.
Perhaps now Universities might reconsider whether shielding grown up students from possibly upsetting novels or bits of history, warning of or censoring things which might “trigger” worry, a fear, a little nervousness or uncertainty, is not doing students any favours or preparing them for real life. Real life is happening in Ukraine and the young need to be prepared to deal with that should it happen to them. To do that perhaps real values, strength of mind and will, and care for fellow citizens, and respect for and love of freedom matter more that the issue of a person’s favoured pronoun or the risk of giving offence or being offended. Is it not also the time for old and young to stop mourning lost years, blaming one generation for the plight of another, and bemoaning how hard it is to grow up in the UK? Rather, with respect for Ukraine, is it time to appreciate UK and other democratic societies as a privilege and work to realise all the good that is there for the taking and sharing for everyone’s benefit. Unity of purpose, not division, must be a guiding principle and the young must be engaged in the development of their future, facing brutal realities and their unpleasantness in order to overcome them.
The idea that education needs to prepare people to cope with the really tough exigencies of living and the real nastiness that every day is rife in the world needs to predominate again. That real nastiness includes autocrats murdering, torturing, stealing and imprisoning globally, as well as famine, disease and misery often induced by corruption and violence against the innocent. Schools and businesses and other institutions too might recalibrate in a similar way. This is a lesson from the brutality of the Ukraine war, and from the courage of Ukrainians to even die so that their nation can keep what they hold dearest.
SEIZING THE DAY
Is the Ukraine war a chance not to be missed when reassessment and action could transform societies’ paths? It will be a fact that security and defence will have to be reprioritised so that fundamental values and rights can be protected, but in a balanced and thoughtful way, not as a panicked knee-jerk. The UK, as well as others, will have to re-evaluate how it prioritises spending and address the elephants in the room, including the failures of the NHS and education and resolve how to fix them in the long-term. This must be cross party: can the political parties grow up to focus on grave matters of state together, without petty point-scoring, as they now realise, they have to do when global peace is at stake? A re-examination and reassertion of what core values and priorities matter most is essential for every individual, the Government, and every business and institution. How valuable it would be if the younger generations joined that re-examination. Fears of truths like the inevitability of death and that big state cannot keep everyone safe from everything bad can be confronted. Politicians can embrace statesmanship and the media can embrace the most important issues with objective truth and decency at front of mind, instead of trivia and dramatising it.
If lessons are truly learnt, the ultimate cancellation of Ukraine by Putin will surely fail and perhaps even, after some have paid a heavy cost, some lasting improvement in world behaviour will emerge.
See also: –
RESILIENCE – BOUNCING BACK, RESILIENCE – MORE BOUNCING BACK, RESILIENCE – STRESS AND BOUNCING BACK
PUTIN BRINGS DESTRUCTION TO 44 MILLION PEOPLE
