[Multi-culture News] Why do Russian people impersonate Ukrainian?

While Russia is being criticized by the international community for its war against Ukraine, cases of Russians living abroad deceiving their nationality are found, and another form of civil conflict between Ukrainians and Russians is taking place. Ukrainians have blamed the Russians have been silent on the war their country started and have impersonated Ukrainians only when necessary.

A Russian woman shared on her social media an anecdote about what she experienced when she entered a store with a warning sign saying Russians are not allowed to enter. Image=TikTok 'masharoko'
A Russian woman shared on her social media an anecdote about what she experienced when she entered a store with a warning sign saying Russians are not allowed to enter. Image=TikTok 'masharoko'

“Russians are not allowed to enter”

This is a warning message that a Russian woman living in Korea encountered when she tried to enter a convenience store. Despite seeing the message, she went into the store to buy the things she needed. The waitress looked at the guest's appearance and asked where the woman is from. She replied that she is Ukrainian.

She shared the experience on social media, describing the horror she felt. “The convenience store employee told me that both Putin and Russians should die,” she said. The video she uploaded caused quite a stir when about 200,000 users clicked 'Like' (there is only a 'Like' button due to the nature of the social media concerned). A Ukrainian media introduced the behavior of the Russian woman and distributed condemning articles. Some Ukrainians who watched the video and article commented expressing their anger at the Russian woman’s action.

A case of misunderstanding occurred in a situation where Ukrainians' antipathy toward Russians who cheated their nationality increased.

A Russian woman and her family became famous by appearing on TV together. She is living in Korea and raising three kids. One of her children is a daughter who belongs to a model agency and is working as a kids model. Her daughter has received a lot of attention, appearing in advertisements. The agency is actively promoting it by posting a picture of her daughter on its website. What was strange, however, was that the agency has introduced her daughter's nationality as Ukraine, not Russia.

A message was written on Facebook that blamed a Russian woman impersonating her daughter as Ukrainian. 
A message was written on Facebook that blamed a Russian woman impersonating her daughter as Ukrainian. 

A woman from Ukraine who had known the Russian woman for a long time discovered the content and criticized it by sharing it on her social media. She claimed that the mother of the kid cheated on her daughter’s nationality in order to allow her daughter to continue her career as a model.

However, as a result of the coverage, it was a simple mistake to introduce the nationality of the kid as Ukrainian. “The person in charge of recruiting the child filled out a personal profile without verifying the nationality. In addition, this content was written before the Russian-Ukraine war broke out so that there was no intention to deceive the kid’s nationality," the model agency said.

The mother also claimed that she never told the agency that her nationality was Ukrainian and already asked the agency to correct it.

Considering the time when the post was written and the explanations of the parties involved, the Russian woman had no intention to deceive the nationality. As in case 1, some Russians who lied about their nationality were confirmed, but applying this to all cases could make a serious generalization error. Nevertheless, it was a passage that showed how huge the distrust and hatred of the Ukrainians toward the Russians are.

According to the situation, a psychological expert explained why Russian people have impersonated Ukrainians. "It is not their fault that Russians cheated their nationality. In a situation where their country is being condemned by the international community for having started a war, they have no choice but to lie to protect themselves. In addition to protecting their personal safety, they may feel ashamed of the situation in their country that caused the war. We need an attitude to understand why they had to hide their nationality” she said.

By Seyong Lee

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