Originally Posted by
Summit
One side of my family fled the Russian Empire to escape persecution around the turn of the 20th century. They came from an area south of Pinsk probably on the (now) Ukrainian side of the border.
Anyone who didn't flee was dead by 1944: killed by Czarist mobs, the Soviets, the Nazis, or their minions.
I do NOT identify as Ukrainian, Belarusian, Russian, or even European. I don't feel personally attached, not even in the slightest, to the traditions nor the history of those nations.
What I do sympathize with is the fate the Ukrainians suffered under the Russians, the Nazis, the Russians again, and now the Russian once more. I sympathize with people who yearn for freedom and self-determination, and I fear for the freedom of "who's next."
Wouldn't you like to play a nice game of chess?