cyber soroka šŸ‡ŗšŸ‡¦ Profile picture
intercultural psychology and diversity management | @jacobs_bremen | synthwavekage of hidden borscht village | she/her | https://t.co/kaZhxPZKKH šŸŒ» #Š“яŠŗую_Š—Š”Š£
Jul 11 ā€¢ 17 tweets ā€¢ 3 min read
So, #NATO75
After reading various NATO-related analyses in the past days, itā€™s clear that the political problems (corruption, fear, miscalculation) and their origins are well understood.
However, practical solutions remain elusive, as time continues to become increasingly scarce. Many good analysts today precisely name these political shortcomings, adding, ā€œLeaders must see, understand, realizeā€¦ā€ ā€” but any psychologist will quickly point out a problem with this line: practically no one will see, understand, or realize anything simply because they must.
Feb 5 ā€¢ 19 tweets ā€¢ 3 min read
Accusing someone of being on the Kremlin payroll is wrong, at the very least, because without evidence, itā€™s legally liable slander. However, when someoneā€™s talk is frequently indistinguishable from Russian ā€” it should be a serious feedback to consider.

/long šŸ§µ Many foreign journalists and experts on Ukraine often blame unproductive dialogue for their decision to mass-block feedback from Ukrainians, expressing frustration at insults, especially accusations of affiliation with the Kremlin.
Sep 7, 2023 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
Iā€™ll put it simply: If powerful democracies, after decades of disarming Ukraine and empowering Russia, fail to help Ukraine secure victory swiftly now, weā€™ll have more violence, more wars, sooner than we think, in places that are now unthinkable. Itā€™s a matter of when, not if. The post-WW2 victors of the West inherited the role and status of the worldwide ā€œpeaceā€ police, enjoying its many privileges. However, over decades, they failed to instill in the next generations the responsibilities that accompany these privileges.
Aug 16, 2023 ā€¢ 11 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Every day individuals on the front and within occupied territories are fighting Russia. Itā€™s their perspectives that need backing, far more than the arguments of experts and politicians who, amidst other weak excuses, claim that ATACMS/F16 are not crucial for Ukraine. Children take up arms to defend occupied Berdiansk and fall victim to Russian aggression, while adults in Sachsen vote for the Russia-backed AfD. One is a tragedy unfolding, the other, a tragedy in the making. Both come from a shared lack of political resolve to defeat Russia.
Jul 18, 2023 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
My communication experience is that outside of SM the people I talk to don't really get the concept of ā€œimperialismā€.
Using it to explain Russia often confuses them more than helps to understand the subject. Simple terms that explain evident, frequent destruction go a longer way. The word "empire" evokes arcahic images of ceasers or jade palaces.
Russia has built itself an image of a secular country that's been good at imitating democracy and has a KFC and a Pinko shop in most remote cities. So, the word "imperialism" creates a contemporary dissonance.
May 16, 2023 ā€¢ 4 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Since the ā€œearliest daysā€ of Russiaā€™s war against Ukraine, much of the Western world was none of the described.
Unless the ā€œearliest days of the warā€ for @galbeckerman is 2022. Image Itā€™s just such a huge and overlooked problem: some of the main sources of information about Ukraine for the broad majority of foreigners are media outlets like this. And they weave casual misinformation right off the bat. And theyā€™ve been doing it for years with no qualms.
May 16, 2023 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
ā€œWe need to have a meaningful conversationā€ has to stop being an excuse to help facilitating Russian talking points into the English-speaking spaces. First, because ā€œmeaningā€ will get lost in the ā€œconversationā€ part, which Russia still dominates quantitatively and partially qualitatively - by the sole absence of pushback.
It would be magnitudes more ā€œmeaningfulā€ to increase the needed pushback for starters.
Apr 17, 2023 ā€¢ 12 tweets ā€¢ 4 min read
If ā€œwesternizationā€ is about the culture of democratic values, then Russia has never even adopted it. They pretended to play along while they could grit their teeth and abuse the value system for their own gains. But there was never any acceptance, just advantageous tolerance. šŸ§µ The emerged post-SU Russia has been laced with anti-Westen sentiments from the beginning. Western prosperity being continuously juxtaposed to Russia being ā€œmore humane than the soulless money-worshippersā€. The moods got louder, more perverse but theyā€™ve always been mainstream.
Apr 1, 2023 ā€¢ 11 tweets ā€¢ 4 min read
Itā€™s a contemporary error to think that autocratic states purchase (pardon, ā€œinvest intoā€) foreign assets in Europe directly.
Like the Hamburg Port or Frankfurter Airport incidents, that produce international headlines and make security specialists express vocal concernā€¦ 1/9 Coscoā€™s Hamburg port entry nears completion  Photo of AdisDubious China-Russia deal in Germany A country loses controlFirst the airport should go to the Shanghai Yiqian Trading CLegally, there has been nothing to complain about so far. Be In reality big, direct, visible cases like that are comparatively rare. Most of the time investments trickle in via something like perfectly secular Swiss companies ran by, say, Russians with Singaporean citizenships.
A more elegant version of the Cyprus šŸ‡ØšŸ‡¾ scheme. 2/
Mar 2, 2023 ā€¢ 8 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
šŸ§µCultural literacy, historical and linguistic accuracy being not as important as military aid is a priority management fact.
Which only makes it more painful to realize that Russia can afford spending large resources on both military aggression and cultural lobbyism. 1/ ā€œWhy are you so bothered by ā€¦? Donā€™t you worry more about your people dying?ā€
I do. For years. I also worry about all the anti-Ukrainian work in media, sports, arts that Russia has done to validate and justify killing my people, while living a comfortable life in impunity. 2/
Feb 28, 2023 ā€¢ 4 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
The anniversary produces a lot of ā€œletā€™s-pat-each-other-on-the-back-for-good-workā€ content from many speakers that I struggle to resonate with.
Nobodyā€™s out of the woods yet.
The balance of positives and negatives still, unfortunately, doesnā€™t quite add up. All I see, all I can think of, all where my focus is - are the negatives. Monumental negatives. My reflections are not on the war, because the war is the worst.
But not the scariest.
The scariest is the systemic unwillingness to deal with the mistakes that led to it.
Jan 19, 2023 ā€¢ 24 tweets ā€¢ 7 min read
There is something everyone needs to understand. The issues being raised about #AtomicHeart aren't about the ethics of you, the gamer, buying the game. It's about the ethics of the publishers and their eagerness to embolden warcrime supporters to make an extra dollar. A šŸ§µā¬‡ļø First of all: MultiPlatform has an amazing and thorough article documenting the chaotic development practices and close Russian connections enveloping AtomicHeart.
I'll summarize some of its points below to elaborate on. multiplatform.com/2023/01/18/whaā€¦
Dec 12, 2022 ā€¢ 6 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Sometimes I think many bright minds followed me out of solidarity, but see the views I share on the Russian ā€œoppositionā€ or Germanyā€™s role in this war as crass.
Well. I think calling Zeitwende policy ā€œnaiveā€ or propagandists who equip Russian terrorists ā€œoppositionā€ is crass. I insist for Germanyā€™s whole political tradition to be addressed. Thinking about nepotism under Kohl I struggle to pin all slowness of innovation on Germansā€™ cultural aversion to change. Thinking about foreign policy under Schrƶder & co. ā€œnaiveā€ is the last adjective Iā€™d use.
Nov 26, 2022 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Some Ukrainians donā€™t have detailed family stories about #Holodomor to share. Iā€™ve learned that my grand-grandmother always got quiet and her eyes would fill with extreme, inarticulable terror if someone gently asked her about it. One time she merely said: ā€œStarvation is the worst. You can willpower your way through many hardships. But not famine.ā€
She survived the NS German occupation. And when Ukrainians share this experience itā€™s not to whitewash nazis. Itā€™s to give a perspective of how terrible the Soviets were.
Nov 26, 2022 ā€¢ 7 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Wish people who come at Ukrainians with their expectations about conduct would give themselves a general privilege check. Try to survive this winter with little-to-no utilities, hustle between war trauma and obligations, hold a breath when reading updates from the frontlines 1/ Spend half of the time in bomb shelters, wondering how to live with the knowledge of what another torture chamber in places like deoccupied #Kherson uncovered.
Every day deal with death, sicknesses, struggle and uncertainty ā€“ 2/
Nov 8, 2022 ā€¢ 14 tweets ā€¢ 5 min read
Dostoyevsky was an outspoken believer in Russian superiority via its Christian-Slavic moral exceptionalism. His literature flirts with these ideas, while his diaries explicitly capture Russiaā€™s timeless chauvinism that resonates with many casual fascists up to date. 1/14 Our goal is more profound, immeasurably more profound. We, R Nonchalant chauvinism remains prevalent in Russia in a way that makes Dostoyevskyā€™s far from being outdated. He sounds like everything a typical, modern, educated, ā€œfree-thinkingā€ Russian would unabashedly concur to just about a few years ago. Elaborate verbosity included. 2/ Let me take only the Slavophiles: what have we heard proclaiat the head of a free, all-Slavic union, was destined to pro
Nov 7, 2022 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Strasbourg is one of the pinnacles of European discourse about democracy and human rights. The coda at the end of a session that frequently addressed the genocide of Ukrainians by Russians looks a bit out-of-place, to put it mildly.
Fun is good. Tactlessness - less so. And if I were completely honest it looks a bit like mocking. Especially in the presence of speakers whose family and friends are either under pure hellfire at the frontlines or hiding in cold bomb shelters, without water and heating.
Nov 7, 2022 ā€¢ 4 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
Remember Iranian drones being called ā€œscrapā€? That scrap killed people. Tractors beating tanks? The tractors still run into mines.
Those ā€œill trained, poorly equippedā€ will fire at my friends.
Itā€™s very important not to lose perspective while laughing at Russians: they will kill. Only ā‰ˆ1/10 of the 300k drafted Russians are untrained. They are by far not as unmotivated as I read of it English-speaking spaces. And their volunteers buy them gear. In Germany. Fly off to Turkey with it easily and everyone gladly pretends not to know what those items are for.
Oct 31, 2022 ā€¢ 9 tweets ā€¢ 2 min read
The past two weeks have been grim. But itā€™s especially hard to understand that theyā€™re just a small fraction in the bloody streak of Russiaā€™s continuous terror that no generation of Ukrainians was really able to escape. And that Russia faced no consequences for it. 1/9 My professional mission is to help people of different cultures understand, respect each other, avoid and solve conflicts, make better decisions.
As a Ukrainian I wish the countries that care about human values and rights would isolate Russia. It needs the self-reflection. 2/9
Oct 21, 2022 ā€¢ 5 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
When I talk about Russians to foreigners Iā€™d often hear a subtle contradiction to my words that starts with ā€œbut you have to understandā€¦ā€

And I want to interrupt right there to say ā€œno, please, you have to understand: what itā€™s like to be killed by Russians, for generationsā€ Part of me wants to cancel all ā€œrealpolitikā€ solutions simply because they donā€™t apply. If Russia is your neighbor ā€œsecular diplomacyā€, ā€œcooperationā€ are empty words. Whole countries get coerced into deliberately vulnerable positions for the sake of business and IR theories.
Oct 19, 2022 ā€¢ 4 tweets ā€¢ 1 min read
Muskā€™s wording about providing Starlinks ā€œfor freeā€ wasnā€™t clumsy or accidental. Anyone who thinks that his caricature of a comic book philanthropist is the real deal visionary - is delusional. Heā€™s an egoist in godmode, pitching Kremlin formulas from his massive platform. People who donā€™t understand, donā€™t like, donā€™t care about other people, hide their aloofness or disdain behind words like ā€œreasonā€ or tough choices in moral dilemmas - canā€™t make the world better.