Borrowed Values
"Only pilgrimages and folk dances"—this summer, Kremlin's favourite "philosopher" and one of the ideologists of the "Russian world," Alexander Dugin, put forth this proposal. As Russia slides further into totalitarianism and religious obscurantism, Dugin, resembling a mix of Dostoevsky, a St. Petersburg vagrant, and the "miracle-working elder" Rasputin, suggested banning all forms of entertainment in the country except for folk dances, pilgrimages to holy sites, and domestic tourism.
"A healthy people should have healthy leisure. Everything else should be banned," Dugin stated in his tweet on the social media platform X.
Technological regression, conservatism, and a return to the traditional Russian model of state-citizen relations, i.e., serfdom—all this heresy was marketed domestically as "ancient Russian values." But is this really the case? After all, all of Russian science, culture, and history is a series of blatant thefts, borrowings, or appropriations. PR strategist Serhii Didkovsky reflects on this.
Traditional values in Russia are also borrowed from abroad, specifically from the integral traditionalist René Guénon (a Frenchman who later became an Egyptian and a Muslim). Guénon's ideas were introduced into the modern Russian construct by his follower—Alexander Dugin, the so-called Russian ultraright philosopher, political scientist, and public figure, father of the propagandist Darya Dugina, who was killed in 2022. In his time, Dugin was part of the occult-alcoholic "Yuzhinsky Circle." It seems that occultism there arose from the regular consumption of "ink" and vodka in large quantities. Their metaphysics emerged in the form of hallucinations and devils.
Guénon himself criticised (in the early 20th century) modern society and the state for abandoning spirituality, secularism, and technological development. Guénon was a metaphysician, which is very convenient because metaphysics allows for any idea without rational argumentation.
Physics deals with the material world. Ethics concerns the questions of good and evil. Dialectics is the knowledge of the world (Hegel refined it, but the essence remained unchanged). And metaphysics is the immaterial, the unknown, the unexplained.
Thus, Dugin set out to implement Guénon's ideas in life, striving to apply the concepts of revisionism and Luddism to Russia in his vision. The idea appealed to Kremlin elders because it provided justification for their greed for money, territories, and power.
Incidentally, the only person who genuinely turned back the clock in history was Cambodia's bloody dictator, Pol Pot. He literally forced people from cities to villages and killed those who wore glasses (because they were too intelligent).
Tradition in Russia is quite specific. If we consider the peak of tsarist power (the tsar—the vicar of God on earth!) in the 18th-19th centuries, most of the population was illiterate paupers. Russia was technologically backward compared to European countries. Polygamy and daughter-in-law marriages were the norm in Russian villages. Slavery existed, as we know.
As now, it was a resource-based economy. The rent from resources was collected by Russian tsars and their close entourage, as well as various favourites like the Golitsyn and Orlov princes. Therefore, a return to those traditions of "Great Russia" is possible only through the methods and tools of Pol Pot. Of course, Guénon's idea, which Dugin is the proponent of, has nothing in common with the ideas of the Kremlin and the members of the "Ozero" cooperative. They also diverge from the ideas of the methodologists (Vaino-Kiriyenko-Shchedrovitsky the Younger).
The "Ozero" cooperative seeks power and maximum assets. The methodologists crave recognition as a marker of their intellectual excellence and assets. Traditionalists aim to implement in life an outdated (even at the time of publication in the early 20th century) concept of returning to primordial tradition.
All the above-mentioned believe in Russia's unique historical path, its mission, and its special place in human history (a topic that was once the subject of much humour by the pro-Putin stage comedian Mikhail Zadornov). They have the tools to work with because we live in the times of postmodernism and post-truth. People do not need rational arguments. The most important thing is to influence their emotions.
If a typical Russian lives very poorly but does not believe in God, it is necessary to create a worldview for him where emotions and the metaphysical replace the rational and physical.
Flat earth, the global Illuminati government, and Gagarin being abducted by aliens, etc. Other nations and countries also have many conspiracy theorists, but given the low social and technological development of Eastern Eurasia, conspiracy theories thrive here longer and better. They thrive and, as we all see, prevail over common sense.