Lester Golden
1 min readJul 17, 2023

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Here's the Ukraine language law's wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_policy_in_Ukraine

Ukraine's language law is less restrictive for Russian than Latvia's and Quebec's is for English. The genocide of Russians through language suppression is pure Russian disinformation that you swallow hook, line and sinker. But I expect this since you speak nothing but English and know nothing about language politics or policy.

Given the centuries' long history of Tsarist, Communist and Putinist Russification and language prohibitions, equality or rebalancing to Russians looks like genocidal oppression, which you mindlessly and uncritically repeat.

When I speak Latvian to my Latvian basketball mates they constantly tell me I speak it better than many local Russians who refuse to learn it. I ran into the same idiocy from Spanish immigrants to Catalunya. Coming from L.A. I learned Catalan in less than six months while they failed to do so in 20-30 years. The psychology of the conqueror at work.

Given Russia's permanent threat to invoke its "right to protect" across borders and to alter borders to do so, gradual de-Russification in Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia is a geopolitical imperative. My stepchildren who speak perfect Russian need and want no protection from Russia.

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Lester Golden
Lester Golden

Written by Lester Golden

From Latvia & Porto I write to share learning from an academic&business life in 8 languages in 5 countries & seeing fascism die in Portugal&Spain in1974 & 1976.

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