Emmanuel Todd and Edgar Morin: “Russian Party” raises its head!
Edgar Morin, who appeared first, publishes a short essay, “From war to war“(editions de L’Aube). The eminent sociologist – many of us have read with passion his famous book La Rumor d’Orléans, published in 1969, which explores the French city gripped by anti-Semitism – this time he is playing his senior year. (101 years ), his personal commitments (anti-Nazi resistance) and eight decades of observation, research, major political-military conflicts, to teach us a hard lesson in geopolitics, which has no sympathy for the Ukraine issue. knew the author of. In his spirit and under his pen, Washington and the White House are responsible or guilty for universal ills in the world. It is almost an ontological way. President Biden also avoids this criticism. We had no doubt that he would surrender easily. Because Morin is strong.
Russian propaganda
When he talks about Ukraine, aside from gross factual errors, no doubt due to a lack of solid historical documentation, Morin borrows key elements of the language used by Russian propaganda. Examples? They are in abundance.
– This is not a war with the aggressor and the attacked, the guilty – the Putin government and the victim – the martyred Ukrainian people, but an “internal conflict”. The Kremlin, its media and social networks claim nothing else.
– According to Morin, there can be no doubt that Ukraine will restore Dombas, because if so, “the Russian-speaking population would be oppressed and subjected to repression.” Putin is on the stereo again. Although it may seem obvious to a sociologist, nothing warrants this bleak prediction. As for the fate of Crimea, there is no need to mention or discuss it, because it is rightly “returned” to the Russians. According to what principles anyway? It is so, and Morin the priest dare not explain it…
– Morin also insists on “hysterization”. We want to believe then that he wakes up and deciphers the hateful, racist, ultra-nationalist, even homophobic statements of Putin’s megaphones with all his authority and all his knowledge. No way! This hysteria is “reciprocal”, sending Russians and Ukrainians back to back; and this means hysteria, “Manicheanism”, that is, systematically unfavorable analyses, hostility to Russia; and finally, hysterization and Manichaeism together lead to a “contextualization prohibition,” hence excuses for “special operation.” But Edgar Morin “contextualizes” it so brilliantly when he has the nerve to equate the Russians who attack the people and the Westerners who “help” the Ukrainians. Again, (voluntary) confusion is a sign of a mind that has chosen sides
“World War 3 has begun”
This is where Emmanuel Todd, a geographer with a more virulent anti-Americanism than Morin’s, intervenes. Speaking in Le Figaro – full page! – and neither one nor two decrees that “the 3rd world war has started”. Oracle Todd, but we already knew that, does not doubt his genius as a soothsayer. But whose fault is this “World War III”? To Putin? No. Todd found the ideal culprits: West and Biden’s “forward flight”! Let’s read: “It is clear that the conflict, which went from a limited territorial war to a global economic conflict between the West on the one hand, and Russia supported by China on the other, has turned into a world war”… The West has started this “global economic conflict” and Russia will win this conflict. Let’s read Todd again: “The resistance of the Russian economy is pushing the American imperial system to the brink.” Seriously? Yes, seriously, because our esteemed colleagues at Figaro give Todd the royal seat. And perhaps some are not worried about the new breath of the “Russian party”.
And breath, Emmanuel Todd does not miss… Poutiniennene logomachy must get again before it fails.
– Ukraine before the war? “A collapsing society (…). It can find a new kind of equilibrium and even a horizon, hope in the war. The Russians could not foresee this.”
– The main reason why Putin declared war? “NATO’s main axis is Washington-London-Warsaw-Kiev (…). The Russians have declared that they will never tolerate Ukraine, which is a member of NATO. Therefore, they are waging a defensive and preventive war.” How to “whitewash” Todd or an attacker.
– Putin always says in Todd’s mouth: “For the Russians, this is an existential question. We should not be happy about their difficulties: the harder it is, the harder they would hit.” Todd once again finds excuses, not explanations, for the ultra-violence of the Russians.
– Finally, the certainty that Putin and his people are about to win the mother of all battles, the cultural war, the ideological battle against this decadent West: “For non-Westerners, Russia affirms a reassuring moral conservatism (…) Russia is not only ‘anti-colonial’, was also modified as the archetype of a large state that was patrilineal. [traduction: anti-LGBT] and the conservatives of traditional customs may be more deceived.” Todd celebrates this triumph, which he considers inevitable, without the slightest emotion or regret.
The Russian Party is indeed making a comeback. This is hardly encouraging.
