Putin’s fascist ideologists have made another attempt to seize the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The reason is the dismissal of a certain Z-patriot Chernyaev, whom they have long promoted to the leadership of the Institute. The oligarch Malofeev is behind this campaign, and Tsargrad, Zavtra, Readovka, Dugin, Chadaev, and other urapatriots are participating in it.
The most interesting thing in this story is the argumentation of Institute’s accusers, which testifies to Russia’s final transition from authoritarianism to totalitarianism. Now people (in this case, employees of this institute) are required not just not to resist the crimes of the authorities (as in authoritarianism), but to actively participate in them (as in Stalinist totalitarianism).
Compare two quotes. The first is from the author of the book “Putin. His Ideology” by Alexei Chadaev, denouncing the staff of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The second, demonstrating the same totalitarian logic, is from Voynovich’s “The Cap”.
1. “And who else from the Institute has traveled there (to Donbass) at least once during all this time? Or at least said, wrote something publicly, somehow outlined a position (on the war)? Do I have to explain specifically why it is so important from philosophers and exactly now? The only IPRAS employee, apart from Chernyaev, who has taken a very clear, unambiguous, and public position, is the former deputy director of the Institute, Y.V. Sineokaya, who is now fighting an aggressive aggressor from Paris. But I repeat: even this choice deserves much more respect than the others – “it doesn’t concern us, we are reading books here”.
2. “Will you write about good people, pretend that there is no such thing as Soviet power and no such thing as raykoms-obkoms at all, and wear the same hat as me? No, my dear. If you want us to be really equalized, you should not avoid equality in other things. You, like me, write boldly, without turning your face: “Always with the party, always with the people”… You were on a tour in Paris, too. Did they ask you questions there? They did. And what did you say? You answered that you are not interested in politics, geography too, and you don’t know exactly where Afghanistan is…Do you think you don’t write against the Soviet power, and we will thank you for it? No, we won’t. It’s not enough for us that you are not against it, we need to be for it”.
I think that the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences is doomed. Any attempts by Russian intellectuals to hide from totalitarian ideological mobilization behind “small businesses” or in the silence of scientific libraries are doomed. If Putin’s regime lasts even a couple more years, the intelligentsia, which has not managed to escape and is not in a hurry to go to jail, will be forcibly conscripted into the ideological service of the regime.
