<https://tinyurl.com/2h9kh5rf> globaltimes.cn

Putin: Russia to Pursue Only Those Policies That Meet Its Vital Interests

... "Russia is a strong, independent world power. On the international
stage, we are committed to pursuing only such policies that meet the vital
interests of our Fatherland," Putin said on the occasion of National Flag
Day, celebrated on August 22 in Russia .. "The national flag symbolizes
our faith in our traditional values ..

....

Full text of the Putin's speech is here <https://tinyurl.com/2emf96mm>.
The SputnikNews' headline <https://archive.is/WpkvE> makes it sound
somewhat similar to the Trump's "America First" rhetoric, and the terms
like "Fatherland" in English-translated texts provide a pretext for evil-
minded pundits in the Western media to speculate that "Putin's Russia" is
akin to Nazi Germany. It might be better if the editors and speechwriters
chose more accurate words and accents, but we have what we have.

One should take into account the context. The context is so that Russia is
under a massive pressure from the Atlanticism, and the Atlanticism expects
Russia to give up some of its vital interests. So these "only those
policies that meet our vital interests" should be understood / translated
as a statement "we surely won't give up".

With regard to "traditional values", it is also similar. One can remember,
the major Atlanticist onslaught on post-Soviet Russia had been launched
during the Obama era, from the "liberal progressive left" messianic agenda
<https://tinyurl.com/obama-is-messiah> (while understanding "the Left" in
the American mainstream / Democrats' context).

At the time, there was a growing stream of angry claims against Russia in
connection with its real or alleged unwillingness to comply with
"progressive practices" / follow Atlanticist "guidelines" on quite a wide
range of issues: from general "democracy" / "human rights" / "civil
society" talking points to more special issues (like innovative treatment
of drug addicts). While some of those claims might be seen as relevant and
reasonable to some extent, the entire campaign was in the nature of blunt
blackmail: either you submit to our "progressive" cultism or we - i.e. our
powerful MSM machine - will ostracize you as a pariah / outcast. No wonder
this approach strengthened within Russia a negative sentiment towards both
"the West" as a whole and the domestic "pro-Western" activism.

There was especially hysterical noise about gays, and also one can recall
the insane fuss with regard to "Pussy Riot" case (which wouldn't be such a
big deal if it wasn't for such an incredibly unbridled tantrum around it).
These two particular smear campaigns "completed" damage to image of Russia
among the Western "leftist" camp, so that common man should have imagined
Russia as an ultra-conservative, obscurantist, bigoted backward repulsive
"prison of people(s)". Thus they had carried out their blackmail.

In turn, within Russia these liberal-progressive encroachments didn't lead
to any progressive developments, but rather the opposite, it stimulated
emboldenment of pro-traditionalist / conservative groups, including those
who might be called reactionary and obscurantist without exaggeration (and
the latter may be seen as an element of over-reaction on Russia's part).

Generally and essentially, the Russians are surely not alien to various
progressive developments, but in the Russian predominant view, the modern
Western "progressivism" includes some excessive, extremist or even clearly
insane narratives and provisions. Or, say, with regard to the traditional
religions, many Russians would dislike rigid religious fundamentalism, but
at the same time they would also dislike vicious mockery of believers and
religious practices, what the Western progressivism encourages. Previous
Soviet experience (and the historical impact of the steppe nomadism) makes
the Russians skeptical towards the modern Western "progressive" concepts.

For example, Russian "feminism" in real action works so that the share of
women business owners in Russia is the highest against European countries
<https://tinyurl.com/y79ue6pj>. And inter alia it looks pretty weird that
in Sweden - which is commonly recognized as the most feminist nation - the
share of women business owners is the least against other European nations
(and 1.5 times less than in Russia). In 2017, Grant Thornton's "Women in
Business" report <https://clck.ru/AhyTk> found Russia the world leader in
"percentage of women in senior management" (with 47% of senior roles held
by women vs. 25% world average). So a reasonable suspicion arises: whether
the Western "gender equality" obsession is about real life or it's rather
about fuss, posture and gesture. And such statistics are little discussed,
the Western media would instead like to rapturly overact Russia's domestic
violence (which must be as extremely huge in scale as extremely "hidden").

So, when Putin makes the accent on "traditional values" it also should be
understood within the above context, as largely a reciprocal response to
the "liberal-progressive" campaigning against Russia in the recent years.

Out of the context, such accents may look not very nice. Pursuing "only
our vital interests" may be interpreted as a declaration of disrespect for
legitimate interests of others, which is not nice (an analogy to a selfish
egoist). And the sticking to "traditional values" may also be interpreted
controversially, because many traditional things and customs in the past
were known to be not nice (from various obscurantist superstitions to ugly
social practices). Also, many tend to associate "traditional values" with
"family values", and in this particular respect Russia is in no way a
proper example. For example, it's at the very top in divorce rates (which
is mostly a consequence of the national social welfare combined with the
"feminism") which is against the traditionalist, conservative stereotypes.

This "our own interest / our own tradition" rhetoric largely reflects a
defensive stance in the current situation, when Russia rejects the Western
cultism but it also doesn't have its own alternative vision / "project" of
progressive future, or at least it does not have it in well-conceptualized
and well-verbalized representation.

Many in the world see Russia as a one of the powers that counter-weight to
the Atlanticist hegemony, and many of such sympathizers would be happier
if such powers offered more positive/universalist agenda/vision on common
development of the humankind, but Russia in its current condition can not
provide such vision in coherent and internationalist terms.

Given that America / the West is indeed in decline, for Russia and other
nations, who feel strong and independent, it becomes an issue to undertake
more intelligible and more global thinking on their own.