Sebastien S. says:

Hi Max! I’ve been glued to my screen for the past few weeks watching all of this unfold, and it’s frankly been hard to focus on work.

When you read and hear about all this online, it sometimes feel unreal. I guess our brains still have trouble connecting the information we find online with real life. This year, as time went by, this reality has become more real to me as I met more and more Russian and Ukrainian people who had fled their countries because of the war. I am in Turkey, and after the announcement of the mobilization it didn’t take long until I met more young Russians like you who left on short notice. The first ones that I met a few months ago in Armenia seemed to have a better plan, many had online jobs or worked for international companies. This new wave feels more like a refugee crisis. They don’t really have a plan for the future.

I’m following quite a few YouTube channels in English and in Russian from people who oppose the current Russian government and who left Russia, and what I see is an opportunity. Because yes, to a lot of Russians the situation in Russia feels hopeless, as protesting only gets you a free trip in prison (or worse), and there is no real opposition leader that can rally protesters and demand change.

However, those who are out of Russia and have a big audience on YouTube or on other social platforms have a voice. My hope is that all those voices will be able to reach all the Russians that left Russia this year, and start organizing a real opposition. There is now an opportunity, as the Russian government has gotten weaker and Putin’s grip on power has become (or will become) shakier.

Russia should be shown a real alternative. Not simply an opposition, but something better. They need to be shown a world with a better government that doesn’t wage senseless wars on their neighboring nations, a government where corruption is harshly punished, a government that won’t destroy the hard work of Russian business owners and will be open to cooperation with the rest of the world.

I can’t tell you how to do that, because after all, I’m not Russian, I’m just some dude on the internet who was luckily born in Belgium and never had to fight for a democratic society. But in this insane mess that we’ve seen over the past few months, there is an opportunity to build something better. It might be the only shot you have in a generation to promote change. It shouldn’t be wasted.