Я Русский and outlawing the music and art of Russians and Canadian indigenous people
A very interesting thing happened on Twitter in June 2023.
A Canadian tweeted a short video clip of Russian young people dancing and singing somewhere in Russia supposedly at a high school graduation. The Canadian tweet was re-tweeted by several American influencers, and it soon went viral around the world.
The comments to the tweet followed a common theme, with many in the West remarking on the beauty of Russians, their fitness, their obvious wealth, and more remarkable still, their joy and happiness captured at that moment with that song.
The comments from Westerners on the viral tweet then made news in Russia because they were surprised that Westerners were surprised at what real Russians looked like. It goes to show how little we know about each other.
The Russians in the tweet were singing and dancing to a refrain of a song that I had never heard before. The refrain was “Я Русский”, which is “I am Russian.” Below is the tweet that was made into a short on YouTube by someone else.
I still had no clue.
It was just a tweet, and I was happy to see young Russians happy and full of life, dancing and signing when the whole of the West, the West I live in, and its apparatus, was working 24/7 to cancel and impoverish them with the most onerous sanctions ever imposed in the world, and to make every Russian everywhere in the world feel unwelcome.
I would not want the whole of the Western apparatus, or any part of the world, to do that to Canadians, or any other people in the world. We do not own the world and it is not our right to isolate people in it, or from others in it.
A week after that, Andrei Maryanov, a Russian and now American, military expert, published a post on his blog about two separate but related events - high school graduates in Russia and the song in the viral tweet.
The first was a video of a celebration in St. Petersburg called “Scarlet Sails”, named after the novel by Alexander Grin, which is a fireworks festival for high school graduates. It’s spectacular. And for high school students to celebrate their graduation!
The second was a video of a scene from a live concert of a song called “Я Русский” - the song in the viral tweet. Until then, I did not know what song it was. It is sung by a Russian pop singer named Shaman (Ярослав Юрьевич Дронов).
Like in the viral tweet, the audience (video below) is very animated and in love with the song, especially when Shaman sings the refrain “Я Русский”. That song makes two things crystal clear - that there is no shortage of nationalism in Russia; and that we in the West have lost some of our own nationalism without even knowing when, how, or where, it happened. It is most pronounced in the United States, but also evident in France, Germany, the UK, and Canada.
While on Twitter, the reaction of the viral tweet of young Russians happy and singing leaned all one way, it caused a completely different reaction among the powers that be in the West, and the video of that song and the Twittersphere response to it, seemed to have instilled some fear in them.
Shortly after that tweet went viral, Canada out-lawed Shaman, and imposed economic sanctions on Shaman and his music, an artist of whom few Canadians had heard of.
At the same time, Canada sanctioned The Hermitage in St. Petersburg, the most prestigious art museum in the world, bar none, and founded by a woman, Catherine The Great.
It was and remain unclear, what fear we have of a museum filled with famous art pieces by the world’s most renowned artists.
Apple made a 5 hour movie (link below) of The Hermitage to promote the iPhone 11 three years ago, filmed in one phenomenal take. It is a beautiful movie in every sense, from the Russian music, the modern dance, the Russian ballet, the composition, the gold-encrusted ceilings, walls and doors, and of course the art. Rooms are filmed around themes so that the viewer experiences two things at once.
For example, around 02:18:00, a school boy with a knapsack appears, wandering through the museum by himself, and so we see the art from his view until 02:42:00, where we see him sitting on the floor of The Hermitage, in a red velvet room, looking up at a series of paintings of Jesus.
Another theme covers Russian navy portraits, with a young navy officer who slowly looks at the portraits. You get the feeling from the iPhone film that he is looking for spiritual inspiration to be a great navy leader one day. The portraits are remarkable by virtue of the beautiful and masterful manner in which they are curated, starting at 00:49:50, by Professor Mikhail Piotrovsky (Михаил Борисович Пиотровский).
Canadian sanctions only apply in Canada and if they hurt, they are designed to hurt Canadians and if we understand that, as we do, in this case then primarily just Russian Canadian are meant to be hurt by restricting their ability to have access to, and enjoy their own culture and heritage.
Why? To erase their Russian-ness?
It seems to me that discriminating against the culture, art and heritage of Russian Canadians breeds intolerance, and shuts the door on inclusion and appreciation for the different cultures that make up Canada, and takes us further away from peace and national resilience.
In Canada, we have banned the culture of others in the past.
In the early days of contact with the French, the Iroquois (Kanienʼkehá꞉ka) were prohibited from honoring their culture by bans on their songs and dances, and were prevented from passing down their history and heritage to younger generations.
Eventually, across the land, Canada criminalized the expression of some forms of indigenous culture, particularly songs performed during dance rituals. In 1884, there was a ban imposed on the indigenous potlatch, and later on the sun dance, which made it an offense punishable by a jail term, to participate in those ceremonial events (participating was through song).
Why? To erase their indigenous-ness? Yes.
In a 1905 article in the Globe & Mail, the potlatch was described as being “disgusting, and barbarous”, it being imperative that the indigenous people stop it and accept “the customs of the white man.” One of the problems, the article explained, was that the “redskins” shared goods with other families, which was apparently bad for “white man” owned commerce.
A potlatch is a four-week ceremony of high intensity and athleticism. The so-called “white men” in the Globe & Mail article considered it “disgusting” because indigenous families shared food, money and supplies with each other, which was a form of social distribution, meaning that at the end of each year, wealth was distributed among families through a singing ceremony, so that no one in their society went hungry. It was founded upon indigenous values of giving.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb9339038-f27b-484a-b8d0-b067d1c3f3de_1508x939.png)
Only in 1951, was the ban removed from the legislation and indigenous songs and ceremonies de-criminalized. By then, generations were gone, and much of the rich cultural heritage with it.
Canada was eventually accused of having perpetrated a cultural genocide against indigenous people by banning their language, their literature, their songs, their traditions, their clothing, erasing their history, and taking down their historical monuments. Whatever was indigenous, throughout the whole country, was erased by practice and by law.
I would have thought that we Canadians learned from our inappropriate banning, censoring and out-lawing of indigenous culture, not to do it again. To anyone else. But alas, no.
Shaman, The Hermitage, and countless Russian artists have recently and continuously sanctioned, censored, banned and out-lawed by Canada and can’t be enjoyed by Russian Canadians, or any Canadian.
I think another cultural genocide is coming in the West exactly identical to the one against indigenous people, only it will be against Russian culture. Whatever is Russian, throughout the whole of our West, will be erased by practice and by law.
It reminds one of that time in history when civilization went backwards and we entered that period of time we call the Dark Ages, when we became insular, and art, culture, and reason left us.