Let’s start with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Over the course of a few weeks, his reputation in the West rose from general obscurity to geopolitical celebrity. He is beloved by the press, and social media can’t seem to get enough of him. He’s sexy and heroic. He’s rallying the people of Ukraine.
Zelenskyy was an actor and a comedian—a detail which adds to his charm. Once a goofy television figure, he is now the heroic president who stayed in Kyiv during the invasion of his homeland. He stood up when the moment demanded it. It’s hard not to root for him.
The press mentions little of his journey from television star to wartime president, in part because it’s an odd story. He is a member of the Servant of the People Party, a party named after the television show he starred in.
Servant of the People—the show, not the party—was produced by Zelenskyy, who starred as an middle-aged, everyman history teacher who is unexpectedly elected president after a video of him ranting about corruption in politics goes viral. The show follows this unexpected presidency of an honest, normal man trying his best to be a virtuous leader among corrupt politicians. It was a hit.
According to Zelenskyy, cynical actors tried to take advantage of the show’s success and rename their party “Servant of the People.” To prevent bad actors from taking the name, the production company behind Servant of the People, Kvartal 95, seized the opportunity and formed a party under the show’s name. Zelenskyy commented that this saved money on advertising—he could advertise the upcoming season of his show and his presidential candidacy simultaneously in 2018.
The 2019 election came down to a battle between Zelenskyy and incumbent Petro Poroshenko, the owner of Ukraine’s Channel 5 station. There were a number of others candidates, but the Central Election Committee rejected 45 because of their inability to pay the nomination fee of 2.5 million hryvnias (roughly $90,000). Zelenskyy won the first round against the other 39 candidates with 30% of the vote. During the final round against Poroshenko, he won 73% of the vote.
Zelenskyy’s popularity during the election came in large part from his portrayal of an honest, uncorrupted president on Servant of the People. His role on television merged with a real political role, as his comments about advertising suggests. Of course, both his political and fictional characters are exactly that: characters. In 2021, Zelenskyy’s ties to offshore companies and real estate in the UK surfaced with the Pandora Papers. Of course, this revelation was a PR hit. By the end of the year, Zelenskyy’s approval rating hit 31%.
Then the invasion happened. Zelenskyy took his famous stand, and his approval rating soared to 90%, in part because he had to step into the role that he knew best. He needed to become the character of everyman who rises to the occasion, and he did exactly that.
Of course, it is commendable. Zelenskyy is genuinely rallying the country, and he risked his life by remaining in Kyiv. The troubling aspect of this story, however, is less Zelenskyy’s virtue or vice, but rather the merging of the virtual and the real—an epidemic in the discourse surrounding the invasion of Ukraine.
Holding out for a hero
An early look at this phenomenon is Jean Baudrillard’s essay The Gulf War Did Not Take Place. Reflecting on the events of 1991, Baudrillard believed that what actually occurred in Iraq was different than what Western media presented to the public. The war that the West experienced through the prism of propagandistic imagery and stylized misrepresentation did not take place.
This isn’t to say that Western media lied, but that they emphasized some aspects and left out other, uncomfortable details.
Adam Curtis makes a similar argument in his very short documentary Oh Dearism (2009). During a short section on the Rwandan genocide, Curtis notes that, when aid workers and press flooded into the country, they found an uncomfortable reality. Many of the people they gave food and aid were not the Tutsis, but rather the Hutus who had perpetrated the genocide. The reality was more complex than the narrative about heroic Western workers helping the victims.
When a mass, violent event takes place, there is a temptation to find the hero. In this case, the heroes are the Ukrainian fighters and Zelenskyy. This view flooded social media and for good reason—a global power has invaded a smaller neighboring country for imperial aims. Russia is clearly the bad guy. However, placing the invasion within this story means pushing out uncomfortable details.
One of those details is Zelenskyy’s unpopularity before the invasion and his presence in the Pandora Papers. Another one of these details is the presence of neo-Nazi paramilitaries within Ukraine such as the Azov Battalion. Bringing up this reality is often met with accusations of whataboutism. Liberals will often say that this is not the time to talk about the Ukrainian far right, and that this is Russian propaganda.
And they are correct. Ukrainian neo-Nazis are Russian propaganda, in the same way that Zelenskyy is Western propaganda. However, Zelenskyy has been able to rally the country, and neo-Nazis groups do exist in Ukraine. These facts become propaganda when placed within a story.
Neo-Nazis are a big part of the Russian story about Ukraine. The aim of the invasion, according to Putin, is the denazification of Ukraine. In the Russian narrative, the Euromaidan protests and the subsequent Revolution of Dignity in 2013-4 was not, as Westerners claimed, a democratic revolution but rather a far right takeover. It was coupled with Ukrainian nationalists who began to mistreat Russian minorities within Ukraine.
Did the Revolution of Dignity empower Nazis and far right nationalists or was it a democratic revolt against Russian interference in Ukrainian politics? The answer to both is yes. Euromaidan does not fit neatly into any one narrative—on the streets battling police officers and protesting the Yanukovych presidency were both Nazis and liberals, anarchists and nationalists, social democrats and Svoboda. Ukraine cannot be boiled down to a story of good guys and bad guys because there are a lot of groups vying for power and incoherent coalitions that form in opposition to mutual enemies.
With the invasion underway, wartime media is attempting to create a narrative. It’s a narrative of Western solidarity with the Ukrainian people against the Russian invasion. I unequivocally hold this position, and yet I wonder what we mean when we refer to the “Ukrainian people.” Does this mean solidarity with the Russian-speaking minorities? Does this mean solidarity with the Azov Battalion?
Much like Rwanda, the West is running into difficulties surrounding their narrative. NATO, in a since deleted Tweet, posted a picture of a female Ukrainian soldier in celebration of International Women’s Day. They removed the tweet after several accounts observed that the women had a Sonnenrad patch. This joke continues to play out repeatedly—a hero is found and later revealed to be a far right militant.
Whataboutism all the way down
The invasion has short-circuited the story the anti-interventionist left, myself included, uses to make sense of geopolitics. Leading up to the invasion, Putin’s chief concern appeared to be NATO expansionism, and the seeming refusal among Western powers to negotiate with Putin on this matter was infuriating. If we wanted to avoid a war, clearly stating that Ukraine will not join NATO seemed a good step.
As things continued, U.S. intelligence began to warn of an invasion. It was Iraq in 2003 all over again. The press fanned the flames, and the anti-interventionist left put its foot down—no war, no NATO expansion. The best rule of thumb for thinking about U.S. intelligence is to doubt it and to anticipate malicious motivation.
Then Russia invaded, and they didn’t just invade Donbas—they invaded the whole country.
If NATO expansion was Putin’s concern, this was the worst thing he could have done. Ukraine will understandably fight to join NATO. This invasion guaranteed Ukraine’s move toward Europe’s sphere of influence. However, Putin didn’t use NATO to justify the invasion. He talked explicitly about denazification and Ukraine’s false national identity. This goes back to old grievances. This is about nationalism, and imperial expansion.
Now the anti-interventionist left is put in an odd spot, and the narrative is fractured. Some absurd and authoritarian leftists throw their hat in with Russia and wholeheartedly believe his denazification statement. Others continue to repeat talking points about NATO. Some choose the lesser of two evils and throw their hat in with Europe and the West. The mainstream press has picked up the pejorative “tankie,” while tankies argue that this word is a slur. Some say they stand with the antiwar protestors in both countries (an odd position, seeing as one country is getting invaded, so the idea of “antiwar protestors in both countries” feels nonsensical), others call for sanctions, the arming of Ukrainians, or U.S. intervention (all with historic precedent, most producing poor or cruel outcomes). Everyone accuses everyone else of whataboutism, and the discourse machine churns. Of course, this all occurs online and impacts little in regards to policy—but as a moral question of solidarity, it is troubling to see the conversation devolve into incoherence.
This situation arises from the need to fit the event comfortably in a narrative. The invasion of Ukraine can be the story of non-Western power checking NATO’s expansion, or the story of Russian forces being fought off by heroic militiamen, or the story of Zelenskyy being hot to liberal moms on Facebook—regardless, it’s an attempt to fit a complex reality into a comfortable story of good versus evil.
And what about the Ukrainian people?
Contrary to the title of this piece, the invasion of Ukraine is taking place. It’s just not quite the easy story we want to accept. The people of Ukraine—Nazis, liberals, and leftists alike—are fighting Russian imperialism justified by the mistreatment Russian minorities and the existence of far right paramilitaries. If this resistance halts Russia and Ukraine remains independent, this tense coalition will disintegrate. There will still be tensions in Ukraine, and there will still be unresolved questions about Ukrainian national identity. Russophobia will certainly be worse, and Russian speaking minorities will certainly suffer for the sins of their Eastern neighbors. Already Russophobia is growing in the U.S., and I doubt that angry Americans will be able to distinguish Ukrainians from Russians when Slavic refugees begin pouring in. The situation is messy, and an even more messy situation is on the way.
Right now, the challenge is to look at these events carefully as they unfold. At the end of the day, Ukraine is resisting an imperialist invader, and my solidarity lies with those who are resisting it. We cannot be callous to these events, and we cannot cheer for the spectacle like a sport. We must be wary of our hero and villain myths as we form them; they will have far reaching impacts. Russophobia will impact Russian immigrants in the U.S. more than it will Putin. Lionizing Zelenskyy launders much of his past and endorses performative, entertainment-based politics. Don’t catch the war fever, but don’t become callous in your rejection. Solidarity must be international—this means solidarity with the Ukrainian people, as well as solidarity with Russian antiwar protestors and the victims of Ukrainian far right violence.
The morality of the situation is only ambiguous when we attempt to fit it into a narrative, but it becomes clear when we place ourselves on the side of those resisting imperialism and fascism in all forms and hope for a tolerant, democratic, independent, and egalitarian Ukraine.