Binary is for robots

I see a worrying trend online, of people who appear to see a binary world, where there are "goodies" fighting against "baddies". Naturally, it follows that if they classify one side as a "baddie", then the other side must be a "goodie". Let me take an example that is close to heart, given my roots, that of recent events in Ukraine.

Today this is most obvious when you see cultured people declare things like:

• "The United States is an imperialist warmonger [therefore] Russia is just defending its interests"
• "Western media is biased [therefore] I trust the Russian news more"

Both leading to...

• "The US and Western media say that the MH17 was downed by pro-Russian separatists [therefore] it must have been downed by the fascist NATO-led Ukrainian junta".

This does not compute.

I'm by no means a "supporter" of the foreign policy of the United States. But surely when two imperialist countries fight a cold war, it makes no sense that one of them must be "good and trustworthy" simply because the other is "bad and untrustworthy".

To put it in scientific terms, the two hypotheses (of "goodness") are not mutually exclusive. This logical fallacy comes from a false dilemma, a forced choice between two poles.

Similarly, when you see bias in mainstream media (yes, I'm looking at you, Fox News, Russia Today, etc.), why should you rush to poorly documented websites that are:

1. rife with conspiracy theories
2. have no credible sources
3. describe events in terms of "fascists",  "nazis", "juntas", etc.

Instead, perhaps try to find sources that are:

1. independent international agencies
2. bloggers who are on the ground at the events
3. in different languages if at all possible

And importantly, start asking yourself questions, some of these, for those who support Russia against the "annexation by NATO and the EU" are:

• Why is Russia's annexation of Crimea acceptable?
• How exactly were Russian people oppressed or hurt because of their language in Donetsk and Lugansk, or elsewhere?
• Why are the separatist leaders Girkin and Borodai Russian nationals, rather than Ukrainian, as well as many of their soldiers?
• Where do all the tanks, heavy artillery and rocket launchers that these men use come from?
• Why the noble Russian mainstream media post lies about crucified children, conspiracy planes filled with corpses (i.e. MH17) and spanish flight operators?

And a final note, this post does not mean that I approve of every decision made by either the EU, USA or Ukrainian governments, nor that I trust every Western media outlet. Nor does it mean I hate Russians (amongst whom I still have many friends), or any other nation.

All it means is that I oppose lies and imperialism in all its guises. It means that I believe Ukraine should decide its own fate, without the interference of any foreign power. It means I seek truth and peace.

The Dragon's Daughter

I offer you the transliteration, more than translation, of another Ukrainian folk story recorded in the book "З живого джерела". I have taken the artistic liberty of changing some elements of the story and elaborating on some others.

Once upon a time, a wealthy man travelled to a distant realm to trade. But water was scarcer than precious stones in that kingdom, so the merchant turned thirsty as death. Desperate, he went to the Tsar, who surely must have water. How could he not? For he was not only lord of all that land, but also a Dragon and a skilled sorcerer.

"Sir. If you give me that which you have at home, I shall let you drink the water of my well," said the Tsar, smirking.

"Except my wife, I will part with anything," replied the man and signed the vow. But he did not know that soon after he set out, his wife bore him a son, and one such that words can't describe! Swift as grass he grew and strong as an oak. When the merchant returned home, a boy ran to embrace him, saying: "I am your son, Ivan."

Hearing this, the man first rejoiced but, remembering the vow, started weeping.

"Why do you cry, papa?" asked the boy.

"Never you mind."

Time passed and the boy quickly became a young man. One day, as father and son were building a cattle shed by the river, Ivan spotted a scrap of paper hidden in the dam. Unfolding the paper he discovered the vow made between the merchant and the Tzar.

"Papa, why did you not tell me that I'm given to the Tsar? Prepare me for the journey, for I will go to the Tzar."

The father and the mother dressed their son in his dearest clothes and their direst tears - as many as they could muster - their liquid sorrow could quench his thirst in that desert land.

When Ivan reached the Dragon's palace, he was greeted by the lord himself and his three daughters. The youngest one loved him at once.

"Ivan," the Dragon spoke. "This night my river must be dammed and my field ploughed, the wheat sown, grown, ripened and reaped, threshed and winnowed, the grain milled and a bun baked for breakfast."

The boy walked away heavy-hearted, but on the way to his quarters encountered the Dragon's daughter again.

"Do not despair, Ivan, all will be well!" she said to him. "Go and rest until the morrow."

As great a mage her father was, his power was still shadowed by hers. When darkness fell, she whistled, and before her loomed two wispy servants. She whistled again and they flew to the field in a flurry. When Ivan woke in the morning, a hot bun lay ready on the table. This he took to the Dragon, who ground his teeth in rage, for he had failed to abase Ivan. Curbing his fury, he spoke:

"Ivan. This night my best horse must be tamed; it stands in my stables, behind twelve doors."

Ivan was a good horseman, and eagerly made for the stables, but his way was barred by the Dragon's daughter, who warned him:

"Ivan, don't be fooled. This task is harder yet than the last! The horse within is Father, and as soon as you approach him, he will trample you to death." Then she thought, and added, "It's too late, I will help you. Go and rest until the morrow."

As soon as all lay to sleep, she whistled and her airy servants appeared. She whistled once more and they soared into the stables, squeezing through the twelve gates and they grasped the horse's mane and rode upon it through the night until it was winded and so wetted with sweat that it seemed it had been drenched in water. The wild horse galloped and galloped, but eventually stood still. The servants took the fatigued horse back to the stables and vanished.

In the morning the Dragon called Ivan and spoke to him, the cold sweat on his brow barely concealing his choler:

"This eve you must come to me!"

As soon as Ivan left the court, the Dragon's daughter appeared to him and urged him:

"Ivan, if you go see Father, he will strangle you! You and I must flee."

Quickly they gathered their things and left the palace.

They walked and walked when suddenly they heard a rumble. The Dragon's daughter pressed her ear to the ground and whispered:

"They are pursuing us. We must hide."

She took a blade of dry grass and ripped it in twain, and at once she became a field of wheat and Ivan its watchman. Soon arrived a horseback host, the Dragon's servants, who asked Ivan the watchman:

"Did you not see a boy and a girl running past?"

"I did see them run past when this field was sown."

Discouraged, the servants returned to the palace, where the Dragon enquired:

"So, did you overtake them?"

"No, we did not."

"Did you not see anyone?"

"No, only a guard keeping ward over a field of wheat."

"That was them! Had you but torn the smallest kernel of wheat, you would have grasped her very head. Go forth once more, and catch them this time!"

Soon again they were on the heels of Ivan and the girl. Hearing their hoofs hitting the ground, she took a pebble from the road's side and broke it in half, whereupon she became a church and Ivan a priest upon the porch. The horsemen, having reached the church, asked the priest:

"Did you not see a boy and a girl running past?"

"I did see them run past when this church was built."

The irresolute riders returned to the palace, where the Dragon scolded them once more:

"It was them once more! Had you but clutched the knocker, you would have held her very neck." With this, he rose from his throne, climbed to his highest tower and called to his servants, "fetch me my pitchforks!"

He propped each of his eyelids with A fork and, as he watched the horizon he caught a glimpse of his daughter and Ivan. He spread his wings and dashed after them. Hearing the whistling of the wings, the daughter gasped:

"We are lost, Father is after us! But there's still one chance. Do not let him drink of me."

She then took a tear from her eye and tore it in two, turning herself into a well, and Ivan into a Cossack, a sabre at his waist. Soon, the Dragon reached the well and asked the Cossack if ever he saw run past a girl and a boy.

"Never did I see" replied Ivan.

But the Dragon glanced in his eye and realised the truth at once, so he said to the Cossack:

"Let me satiate my thirst!"

"You may not. From this well only the Ataman¹ may drink."

But the Dragon did not take heed, and instead stooped over the well. As he took the bucket to his mouth, Ivan, in one swift stroke severed his head. The well turned back into a girl, and the Cossack into a boy, who together walked back home and idled in wedding feasts.

^{1 Cossack chief.}

Münchhausen: Byronic or Baronic

Karl Friedrich Hieronymus, Freiherr von Münchhausen, hitherto known as the Baron, is Byron's lost progeny. Historical inaccuracy and the relative non-linearity of time come to my rescue afore critics even unhinge their mouths and unfasten their minds. As the Baron never once said, "It's much more than a fact. That's how it really happened!"¹

Though the Baron's blood may not belong to Byron, they do share one ink-pot. The Baron is a Byronic hero disguised by humour, but familial features manifest clearly in the traces of Raspe's plume: his rebellion against the crude rules of reality, fuelled by intellectual and creative passions that bear oft-destructive aftermaths.

But the distant nephew becomes a bastard son when Grigori Gorin (Григорий Горин) Olivetti's claws scraped out the paper a darker, melancholy, and vitally, more human Baron. From the ashes of Gorin's nigh-forgotten play "The most truthful" (Самый правдивый) rose the tragi-comic film "That very Münchhausen" (Тот самый Мюнхгаузен), which profited from Oleg Yankovsky (Олег Янковский), whose brilliant acting gave this Baron the compelling charisma, magnetic charm and keenness of a true Byronic hero.

This forgotten classic turns the concept of Münchhausen on its very head, since here "Baron Münchhausen is famous not because he flew [to the moon] or not, but because he never lies"², therein lies his greatest strength and fatal flaw. He lives isolated from a society that regards him first as a deceiver and later as a madman, estranged from people who eagerly shift from living one lie to the next, collectively as a herd of cattle. Our Baron simply knows that one cannot hide from truth by closing one's eyes, as children do, he "can't do anything secretly, [...] only openly"³; his maturity is even more evident in his courage, since he does not "fear appearing funny. It's not something anyone can afford."⁴

But he exists not merely in exile from the rest of the human race, but also in disdain of all hierarchies and ranks. He acts not merely like a king, when he threatens war against England lest it declare the Americas independent, but as a God, dispelling inclement weather, defying time and brandishing the power of death and life (over a duck). He openly rejects and ridicules the relationship of master and servant, whose orders and mandates he regards as arbitrary. As a guard is about to arrest the Baron under the Duke's orders of "using force in case of resistance", he replies "who is to use force - you or I? [...] Let us both carry out the orders. Logical?"⁵ and goes on to theatrically caricature their execution. When he finally arrives to the plaza where the Duke has assembled his entourage, he does so unbound and followed by a band of music. For Münchhausen, society's ways and laws are incomprehensible, as someone remarks: "First we were planning the festivities, then the arrests. Finally we decided to combine them"⁶



But it is the very creative and destructive passion that fuels Münchhausen that also leads to his demise when he is forced to compromise for the sake of love. Like Samson, he is rendered powerless, chained by love between two pillars when on the one hand his beloved mistress Martha, bent on marriage, threatens to leave him, and on the other hand his divorce with Jacobine won't be approved lest he declare in writing that he is a liar and his stories fabrications. Reluctantly, he concedes to the request, but the weight of the columns tears his soul in twain, and though even Galileo abjured, Münchhausen "always preferred Giordano Bruno."⁷ His persona humiliated and destroyed, Münchhausen finally turns unstable and, revolted by his own actions, mutinies against himself and Life, murdering the Baron and turning into a common gardener - Müller...

Yet later it is that same energy leads his rebellion against Death, his resurrection three years (not days) later, when he realises that denying his nature is futile as Martha is unable to love his empty carcass: "To return her, I'll have to return myself"⁸. More tragic still, is that his absence sires a cult of personality whose profiteers are those who wrought his downfall. These very leeches try to thwart his return by imprisoning him, labelling him an insane impersonator and setting up a fraudulent court hearing and a sham test of his identity. The Baron easily sees through the ploy, realising that the cannon that is meant to loft him to the Moon is filled with damp gunpowder meant to result in his public ridicule, and recharges it with dry black powder. Ironically the Duke, afraid of killing the Baron, declares his identity restored and his trip to the Moon "accomplished", launching the general merriment and urging: "Join us, Baron. Join us."⁹ But the Baron is "too tired of dying"¹⁰ to forfeit again, a promise is a promise, he will fly to the Moon... His last, exhausted words burst out thus: "A smart face is not a sign of intellect, gentlemen! All foolishness on earth is made with precisely this expression. Smile, gentlemen. Smile..."¹¹

I'll leave you with a mind- and tongue-twister: Is the Baron a Byronic hero, or is Byron a Baronic villain?

Footnotes (the original Russian citations):
^{1) Это гораздо больше, чем факт. Так оно и было на самом деле.
2) Барон Мюнхгаузен славен не тем что он летал или не летал, а тем, что никогда не врёт.
3) Я не могу в тайне. Я могу только открыто.
4) Я не боялся казаться смешным. Это не каждый может себе позволить.
5) Кому применять силу — мне или вам? [...] Тогда оба будем выполнять приказ. Логично?
6) Сначала намечались торжества, потом аресты. Потом решили совместить.
7) Я всегда больше любил Джордано Бруно…
8) Чтобы вернуть её, придётся вернуть себя
9) Присоединяйтесь, барон. Присоединяйтесь.
10) Господи, как умирать надоело!
11) Умное лицо — ещё не признак ума, господа! Все глупости на земле совершались именно с этим выражением лица. Улыбайтесь, господа. Улыбайтесь…}

The Sabre-nosed Hag

This is the artistic translation of an archetypal Ukrainian folk story written in the book "З живого джерела" edited by Упоряд. Л. Дунаєвська, and illustrated by Олександра Міхнушова. The black humoured ending of this tale is, again, typically Eastern...

Once there was, or perhaps not, a place beyond dark forests and deep seas; seventy seven kingdoms away and further yet - by ten sparrow steps and twenty flea jumps. There lived one man, who had as many children as holes in a sieve and one more.

The man grieved, thinking what to do with his babes, since he was poorer than a church mouse. Looking at the children, his heart tore: pale, hungry and so weak that the wind toppled them. Long he thought how to remedy his plight , but was incapable of inventing anything. When his wife still lived, they had somehow managed from day to day, but when she died, all troubles tumbled upon his poor shoulders. He turned and twisted his mind this way and that, but the more he tried, the worse it all seemed.

"I can’t endure this any longer," he told himself. "I will go to the world, and find fortune, for if I stay sat still, we shall all perish.”

Having fed his children with whatever was left, he threw an axe upon his shoulder and went into the wide world. He went, walked and wandered until he got lost in a deep forest. Night caught him unawares: so dark it was that an axe could cleave it. Though he was nigh too weak to walk, he was too fearful to rest, lest a wild beast tore him apart; so he marched on.

Suddenly, something shone in the distance. The man darted after the light, which poured out of a small hut amid the forest. He looked into the window and saw a lit lamp and a burning blaze in the oven, sparks wildly flying, as if some invisible force were clawing the flames.

"It would be good to warm and dry myself by the fire," the man thought; for rain poured on his soaked clothes and thunder began drumming so furiously that the man’s soul nearly leaped out of his body. "Whatever happens, I must enter this hut. Surely, they won’t kill me, and if they start hitting me, I have my axe!"

He knocked once and again: nobody, nothing.

He pressed the door open and crossed the threshold, welcomed by warmth and a pleasant smell. But the home was empty, for wherever he walked, wherever he scoured, not a live soul was to be found.

He dried his clothes by the fire and sat on a bench to warm himself. His belly grumbled to the ever-present smell, and glancing on the table he saw all sorts of food and drink: baked meat, Borscht, chicken, scones and Kvass – everything one could wish for!

He jumped onto the table and started gorging himself, one plate after another, sipping as he chewed right until he was more than stuffed. Then he filled a pipe, fired it up and smoked it like a chimney.

Suddenly he noticed a shaggy black cat staring at him, eyes wide. As he was about to shoo her off, she disappeared.

"I did not see her appear, nor disappear," thought the man. "On my soul, I must have stumbled upon a demoniacal hut."

"Indeed you have…" a voice answered.

The poor man glanced towards the voice and saw a hag whose mere sight sufficed to incite horror: as many wrinkles as ruffles in a Gypsy skirt, and a nose so long and curved that when she bowed her head, it touched the ground. This nose was pure iron, ringing like a bell whenever it hit something.



"So, man, you’ve stumbled upon the Devil’s hut. I’m his mother. Soon my son will come from Hell and take you in hand. And if I tell him you’ve eaten his lunch, wretched you shall be!" To these words the man felt frost course right through his spine and his teeth chatter . "There’s no helping here, you’re lost forever! In Hell, demons will pierce you with pitchforks, give you smouldering tar to drink and bathe you in sulphur every day. A real treat, eh?"

"Mercy!" the poor man begged. "Dearie, help me. I’ve a heap of children, what will be with them? They will all die without a father, without a mother!"

"Go to Hell! That is your place. I could have helped you, yet will not!" she mumbled.

"Darling, help me! I’ll do whatever you like, just don’t let your son take me to Hell!"

"Oh well. I’ll help you so long as you follow my orders. It’s not a hard task"

"I’ll do anything!"

"Then I’ll save you from Hell, and make you rich and happy... if you take me as your wife." When the man heard this, his knees nearly gave way. Lord! To wed to this sabre-nosed hag! What would people say if they saw the witch he brought home?

"So, my lad!" she went on. "You’re poor and you’ve children, but no wife. Take me and you’ll see how well I will treat you and your children. I will bathe them in butter and milk, and beat their backs with a stick. Agreed?"

"Good, I will take you as my wife, but save me from Hell!"

"That’s a deal! And now we have to set out for your home, so we can be there by the morning."

And all at once she ran out like a young lass. Minutes later she returned with a donkey and some sacks. She then led the man to an underground store filled with golden and silver coins, precious stones of every colour, expensive clothes, food and drink. Everything one could desire lay there.

"Dear husband, this is yours and mine," said the hag. "Pack everything that will fit and we will take it to your house."

They put the bags on a wagon that stood ready by the hut. After the man yoked the donkey, they set out on the path and rode the night entire, nodding on the wagon. When it cleared, they had already reached the border of the forest.

"Don’t hurry, husband. Let’s rest here on the green grass."

The man stopped the donkey, they stepped off the wagon, opened the bags and started feasting.

"Eat, my dear, eat!" the hag insisted, choosing the tastiest bits for him. But she also stuffed herself, drank an entire boot of liquor and another yet, soon rolling into a drunken stupor.

The man needed nothing more. He spat on his palms, took his axe and hit the hag’s iron nose so hard it split in twain. The hag screamed, then curled up like a cat on a lap, convulsed once or twice and died. But the sound of the broken nose resonated throughout the forest and reached Hell.

"Ho-ho!" shouted the Devil as he jumped out of Hell. "Someone has broken my mother’s nose! After him!"

Meanwhile, the man spared not one instant, but sprang on the wagon and started flogging the donkey. The poor animal did not know what the matter was, but galloped so wholeheartedly that the wagon was thrown from one side of the road to the other. They were not far from the village when the Devil left the forest and found his mother coiled beside her broken nose. Looking round he saw the wagon and after it he ran! He caught up with the man at the very moment he was turning into his yard.

"Thief, murderer;" shouted the Devil, “your days are counted!"

"Let me go!" snapped back the man. "Here I’m master!"

But the Devil pulled at the man, who stubbornly clung to a pole. Hearing his shrieks, out of the house ran the children: clothes torn, shabby and covered in dirt.

"Oi, oi!" they shouted. "Dad has brought us the Devil! Let us skin him and make moccasins out of his skin!"

"And we’ll have meat to eat!"

"And from his horns we’ll make flutes to play on!"

The Devil, scared stiff, started asking the man: "Leave me be and I won’t harm you ever again."

But the man, seizing the devil's fur, replied:

"I won’t let you go, lest my children go hungry"

Hearing this, the Devil darted and managed to escape, only turning his eyes back when he reached the forest. He clutched his mother and jumped back into Hell. From that day on the man was so rich that he had no equal in the entire province.