Ukraine was not “like Iraq or Afghanistan”. Ukrainians were “civilised”, they were “European”, they “watch Netflix and have Instagram”, they looked like “us”.

There we had it. It was out in the open. This was how western journalists, whether they would admit it or not, viewed the world. That racism, often hidden, informed which stories got covered and which ones got ignored.

a majority of my family members are white passing and they used to share with me the racists things people would say to them when they assumed that they were white like them and the most troubling things that they shared were how commonly those beliefs were shared.

i remember it from time to time and more show now that they’ve gone into the maga fold themselves.