{"id":27756,"date":"2024-05-27T03:38:06","date_gmt":"2024-05-27T03:38:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/river-gas.com\/?p=27756"},"modified":"2024-05-27T03:38:06","modified_gmt":"2024-05-27T03:38:06","slug":"in-russia-letter-z-has-become-symbol-of-ultra-nationalist-obeisance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/river-gas.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/27\/in-russia-letter-z-has-become-symbol-of-ultra-nationalist-obeisance\/","title":{"rendered":"In Russia letter Z has become symbol of ultra-nationalist obeisance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Until a few days ago, almost nobody outside his native land had heard of Ivan Kuliak.Not many people, after all, follow junior artistic gymnastics.<\/p>\n

Even when, a few days ago, the 20-year-old Russian won bronze in the sport’s World Cup in Doha, he seemed an unlikely candidate for infamy. But then Kuliak took his place on the podium, and suddenly it seemed all the world was staring at his chest.<\/p>\n

For there, clear for all to see, was a taped white Z \u2014 the same symbol painted on the Russian tanks grinding into Ukraine, a reminder of their naked violence.<\/p>\n

It’s tempting to say that it’s just a letter.But, of course, it’s more than that.<\/p>\n

Military experts first spotted the Z signs during the Russians’ so-called exercises a few days before their brutal invasion.<\/p>\n

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Until a few days ago, almost nobody outside his native land had heard of Ivan Kuliak<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Nobody is quite sure what it means: some analysts think it stands for Russian zapad (\u2018west’), while others think it’s a way to distinguish the two sides.<\/p>\n

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Russians and the Ukrainians don’t agree on a definition, with the Kremlin claiming the Z stands for the phrase za pobedu (\u2018for victory’), while the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine says it denotes units from Russia’s Eastern Military District, and \u2014 if encased in a square \u2014 Forces from Crimea.<\/p>\n

Kuliak maintains it stands for \u2018victory and peace’, and insists he would wear it again, even though he now faces a lengthy international ban. But to most of us, he’s at Best Private University<\/a> a brainwashed stooge, at worst an apologist for slaughter.Either way, Ivan Kuliak surely has no place in world sport.<\/p>\n

Across Russia, the letter Z \u2014 which doesn’t actually exist in the Cyrillic alphabet \u2014 has become a symbol of ultra-nationalist obeisance to Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin is selling T-shirts and hoodies with the Z symbol, and his cronies have organised nationwide Z-themed demonstrations.<\/p>\n

Pro-Putin celebrities have taken to wearing Z badges, and youth activists have released videos of themselves in Z\u2011branded T-shirts, screaming: \u2018For Russia!For Putin!’<\/p>\n

This week a video posted on social media by German journalist Julian Roepcke showed students with the letter Z emblazoned on white hooded pullovers raising their hands in a clenched salute and chanting in support of the invasion at a mall in Kazan, Russia.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Roepcke appeared to draw comparisons with the Hitler Youth and the Nazi salute during World War II.<\/p>\n

Perhaps most sickeningly, terminally ill patients at a children’s hospice in Kazan were taken outside to form a giant human Z, to be photographed from the air.<\/p>\n

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