Of course, it’s disgusting that Biden, Trudeau, and all the rest of them are hiding their egregious failures and crimes behind the bodies of dead Ukrainians. It makes me want to vomit but I can’t because I don’t eat anymore. (This solved all of the challenges of the Great Lent for me.) I’ll never forget these mealy-mouthed woke bastards for what they did to us. I’m now even angrier at them than before. And don’t even start me on Obama because without him we wouldn’t be here in many different ways.

None of this makes what’s happening in Ukraine “not a war.” None of this excuses the Russians.

This is not a difficult view to hold. It’s proving impossible for some people but I don’t know why. The invasion of Iraq by the US was wrong. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia is wrong. See? Easy.

(I’m not arguing with anybody on this blog. Everybody on here has been amazing, and I’m forever grateful. I’m responding to some painful conversations I’ve had elsewhere. I swear, if I hear once again “but the US invaded Iraq, was that OK?” I have been against that since day 1. I’ve been very outspoken on the subject. I marched, I protested, I spoke out. And the destruction of Libya by Obama was absolutely wrong, too. I’m for peaceful civilians not being slaughtered anywhere. Why is that so hard to process?)

First, the Dean and now the Provost are offering me paid vacation time, a reduction in teaching and service loads, administrative help, all sorts of things. This is very kind. I’m grateful that people understand the state I’m in. (They are offering the same help to the only other Ukrainian professors on campus, so it’s not me personally.)

I’m not going to take the offer because if I sit at home alone, I’m going to go nuts. At work, at least, there are people, things to do. But it means a lot that nobody expects one to remain unaffected and continue working like a robot.

There’s a purposeful, methodical targeting of helpless, innocent civilians.

I have already seen people claim that the images of the Russian bombing of Kharkiv are actually from the Donbass in 2014. Apparently, the BBC or whatever posted something.

I have no idea what the BBC said but I spent my entire childhood and youth in Kharkiv and Donetsk. What are the chances I wouldn’t recognize the buildings I saw every day of my life for 20 years?

Yes, Kharkiv is being bombed. Two days in a row with no end in sight.

This is right across from my university. I will see this in nightmares for the rest of my life.

I don’t even live there anymore, and my hatred for the invaders is burning. Imagine what the people who are there feel.

Adolescents rebel against their parents because that’s how they figure out how to become their own people. It’s a good and important process. Children of good parents rebel earlier and more than children of domineering, emotionally abusive parents. Of course, children of neglectful parents also rebel hard to try to get the parents to pay attention, so the rebellion itself is not a sign of good parenting.

Now, the real adulthood begins when a person stops rebelling. He’s demarcated his boundaries, has traversed the final stage of separation, and is ready to function independently. Somebody who keeps rebelling hasn’t grown up. She’s still letting the parents direct her every move. They are still the center of her world, and that’s not healthy. It’s not adulthood. An adult does what he does because that’s what he decided, not to demonstrate anything to mom.

The position of “if Trump / Soros / Elon Musk / Hillary Clinton is in favor, then I’m against” is a sign that one is stuck in the same adolescent dynamic where I’m a kid and Trump / Soros is my daddy. An adult sees herself as independent of these people and an equal to them in intellectual and moral authority. Sometimes, they are right and sometimes they are wrong. I’ll see if it suits my purposes to agree or disagree.

In very simple words, letting anybody live rent-free in your head and condition your every response either positively or negatively is a sign of immaturity. Or putting it even more simply, don’t worship idols.

I keep hearing “but did you see what X said??? How can you agree with such an evildoer?”

What do I care what X said? I know my own mind. That’s what matters to me.

“So now you agree with Trudeau???”

I despise Trudeau. And that’s precisely why I won’t change my mind about what I know to be right no matter what he says or does. It would be too much honor to the little prick to go back on my beliefs because of him.