Where conscience rules - laws are not needed

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

… Our people have one unreported proverb: in anyone there is shame, in that is conscience. And if you look closely at the essence of all kinds of experiments performed on us from this angle, a quite tangible picture appears: the deliberate replacement of shame with shamelessness is in fact a sight to the conscience.

I was prompted to write this article by the daring winter antics of a bunch of Russians, who, having taken off their pants, rode around the capital metro in front of the bewildered public. That is, in fact, they conducted a test attack on the cultural codes of a huge ancient country.

And for this reason, I was interested in how those who are supposed to react by title and vocation would react to an open challenge. Moscow policemen - just imagine! - turned out to be "agitated", and involuntary spectators - in a silent shock. Young non-porters, cheered up by such an effect, and most importantly, as it was promised to them in advance - with complete impunity due to the lack of corpus delicti, published photo reports on social networks with a feeling of deep satisfaction. The main "goat-provocateur" of this half-naked herd - a certain Mark Vesely - promised that the conducted flash mob is just the beginning, and that they are OVER the law, since "moral norms are not regulated by law." At the nearest police station, he received a portion of moralizing and proudly went out again, promising Internet fans to repeat the underground promenade next year.

In the domestic media, there is almost silence in this regard. Either the authorities were seriously afraid of replicating the initiative, or they considered it a trifle unworthy of attention. But these kids, raised by someone, circling the Moscow subway, in fact, conducted a socio-psychological experiment on the presence or absence of shame and a defensive reaction among the people. And because of the "irrelevance" for public discussion in our media of the topic of shamelessness as a norm of behavior, it seems to me that it is high time to reflect on the factor of shame as a reliable seal against any tolerant "viruses".

Sometimes, in order to understand the big, it is necessary to look closely at the small. In the sense that someone's advantages can open their eyes to your disadvantages. What is the beauty of our Russian life arrangement for me is that any of us always has the opportunity to be ashamed of ourselves by looking at the life of a neighbor with habits that are not yours. Especially when he, though smaller than you, manages to live healthier. There are, thank God, places in Russia where common sense and the traditions of ancestors are placed above the right to permissiveness and where attacks without trousers "will not work." However, Citizen Vesely and his company can check my forecasts at their own fifth points at any time.

In my spirit I belong to Russian culture, I was brought up in it and I confess its values. However, the blood of a small but ancient Ingush people also flows in my veins. Last summer, having visited the homeland of my father's ancestors, I was able to draw some life sketches. And, against the background of the above-described capital clownery, the most contrasting episodes from Ingush memories emerge in my memory …