Impact of Russian Propaganda in Crimea

Yeah, we start.

Okay. Uh, just Faki, just tell me, uh, what,

what happened, you know, when the Russians came to Crimea.

I mean, where, where were you and, uh, you know,

what, uh, you know, happened to you

and, uh, how did the Russians try to rob you of

your Ukrainian

identity?

P- please, can we, can we just repeat because you're giving

me stop for

zooming for on him and yeah, I'm not explaining. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

So tell me what happened when the Russians came to

Crimea, and how did they, uh, you know, treat you

and other, uh, you know, Ukrainian kids and work

to, uh, you know, rob you of your Ukrainian identity?

Yeah. Uh, that was, uh, like, for example, uh, when I

was in school, uh, after twenty twenty-two, um,

a lot of Russian soldiers came to our school and,

uh, what I mean when I say propaganda, they came to our

school and started to, uh,

explain from their side how, uh, Russia,

uh, just, uh, helping Ukraine, uh,

to live a better future. For example, they told us

about, uh, that Ukrainians is not a people, that not a

nation. Uh, you should just go and kill Ukrainians when you

turn eighteen and you should go to serve the Russian army.

You should go to, uh, to be-- to become a Russian soldier,

and you will become a hero. Uh, you,

um, Ukrainian is not a country. Uh, they said

about, uh, Ukraine, uh, is just

a failed state and, uh, Ukraine is, uh,

in the better way, Ukraine is shouldn't be existed on the planet.

And, uh,

we had a lot of propaganda like that.

Uh, propaganda in another way, it's military propaganda

and for example, a lot of propaganda was, uh, in school with,

uh, weapons. Uh, we, uh, reassemble and assemble,

uh, the AK-forty-seven, for example, and having a lot of

that and tactical medicine, uh, medicine, uh, we talked

about a lot of, um, that and, um,

because of that, people can, uh,

cannot, um, just, uh,

don't go to these lessons. You should go to these lessons because

it's,

uh, um, lessons, uh, for everyone in

school. And, um,

for example,

they just, uh, propaganda that Russian

soldiers who serve Russian army go to schools in Crimea

and, uh, talk about war, how it's, uh, cool

to kill people in another country, and, uh, how it's, uh,

how you going to do that.

So, uh, I mean,

you clearly, uh, have a mind of your own and, uh, did you

see a lot of, uh, your, uh, classmates, uh, you know, becoming more,

uh, Russian? I understand that you, uh, weren't allowed to

speak Ukrainian. You had to si-- uh, sing the Russian

national anthem, and, uh, you had to think of

yourself as Russian. So, uh, you know, how did

people around you, uh, you know, react and were,

uh, you at all, uh, treated differently

by your peers because, uh, you, uh, remained

Ukrainian?

Yeah. I seen a lot of, uh, that happening in my schools because, uh,

for

example, in my class, a lot of people, uh, since twenty

twenty-two changed their minds to the Russian, uh,

side because a lot of pro- propaganda like that,

people cannot hold, uh, it in their minds and think about it's

not true. They started to believe in that.

And, um, for example, history lessons, for example,

they taught about we gonna fight with NATO,

with, uh, United States, with Europe, uh, in Ukraine battlefield.

And, uh, Ukrainians, uh, even not, um,

fighting right now. Right now we, uh, prepare to fighting with, uh,

United States and, uh, a lot of people just

believe in that. And, uh, a lot of people...

I, I know people who from another classes who

believed in that

propaganda are now serve in Russian army.

So they believe that, uh, you know, Russia was, uh,

justified in invading and, uh,

annexing part of Ukraine because America

invaded Iraq or, uh...

Yeah. They told it about like,

if America can, um,

uh, can invade another countries, why we cannot do

that? And, uh, we just, like they said, we,

uh, going to,

uh,

going to Crimea, for example, to just liberate people,

to get them freedom. But it's not true.

They, like they said in television or news.

So are they basically trying to, quote-unquote, "liberate"

Ukrainians of their Ukrainian identity because

being Russian is, you know, the real thing and,

uh, Ukraine is just part of Russia and that,

uh, Ukrainians need to, uh, toe the Kremlin line?

Yeah, yeah. Just like, uh, in the USSR, like Ukraine was,

uh, all in the union, uh, with Russia and another

countries, and they said like we should, uh,

bring it back and even, uh, for another countries like

Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and, uh, Poland, and

we, after Ukraine, we should go to another countries,

maybe in the

US, uh, fight with US and, uh, we

shouldn't afraid of the nuclear, um, weapon.

We, if, if we need it, we use nuclear weapon to just, uh,

turn all the, the world, uh,

uh, in, uh, just nuclear dust.

So, uh, are they, uh, you know, trying to, uh, you know,

revive the Soviet Union? Is that, uh, what they're, uh, kind of, uh,

trying to, uh, tell the kids and get them

to, uh, have kind of a, uh, neo-Soviet

identity?

Yeah, yeah. In schools, a lot of, uh, history lessons about,

uh, we was in the Soviet Union, and right now we should, uh,

bring it back and, uh, to

not only Ukraine and another countries, uh, to bring

back like Soviet Union.

Well, I mean,

do, uh, the, uh, kids, uh, end up becoming

like pro-Soviet or, uh, you know, uh,

idolizing the Soviet past?

I think they just become like new Russian, uh,

ideologically form of mind. Like it's,

it's not, uh, like Soviet Union, but it's compilation of

Russian and Soviet and it's, uh, bringing

together to one, uh, uh, thing that we

should fight with, uh, Ukraine, and after Ukraine, we should

fight with another countries to bring our territories like they said.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Perfect