Russians will always venerate the dead like no other nation. W | Russians With Attitude

Russians will always venerate the dead like no other nation. We might hate the person when he's alive or even wish death upon him - but the moment he departs from this world he enjoys the status of a proper human being. We reflect on the good qualities of the deceased. If there were none - we manufacture them. The world will never be the same again after his departure - even if his name was Boris Yeltsin

Those who stubbornly refuse to fall in line of only speaking good of the dead will be harshly reprimanded. There was perhaps a single exception to hagiography - the brutal murder of Nicholas II with his family. An exception that proves the rule. The Soviet ghouls tried to erase it - the brutal murder - from people's memory. You wouldn't have read about it in Soviet Pravda. Even in this instance, the Soviet, still a Russian, remained true to his instincts. Yes, he might have fallen for all the communist fabrications about the man - but it would only concern the time when Nicholas II was a formal emperor. A coward, a bloodthirsty fool, an enemy of labour and all that. Yet his brutal death was never a joking matter. When Russians finally found out what actually happened to Nicholas II and his family - 70 years after the fact - an overwhelming majority of Russians have agreed that he must anointed as a new Orthodox Saint

I believe the anglo-american approach is a bit different. A lot of Brits would gleefully chant "The Witch is Dead" on the anniversary of Thatcher's death. This is not a moral judgment, but a difference in our approach to the dead. Americans are similar - the pure joy when their political/ideological enemy passes away is palpable. It's not the case in Russia

Russian veneration of the dead might even be irrational. It's like a switch that changes your perception entirely - and all the cynical remarks and even well-deserved hatred fades away into eternity - along with the soul of the deceased. What I'm trying to say here is that Prigozhin will turn into a fabled hero from now on. In people's memory, he will be fondly remembered for centuries. In his case, what critic could stand against him - even after he embarked on his bloody March of Justice crusade. His hero status will quadruple - no - octodecuple! He will become the new martyr of the new Russia that is about to come

The same treatment awaits Dmitry Utkin. I wonder if that understanding of Russian psychology is - in part - what has caused this plane crash. If the necromancer discoursemongers of one of the Kremlin towers have decided that these people have better utility being dead than alive. We will see that very soon. Now millions of Russians will exclaim: Prigozhin is a hero. The world will never be the same again after his departure.