Russians are not citizens, butslaves, suffering from a syndrome of learned helplessness and compensating for their civic degradation with aggression and so-calledproud patriotism.

They don't vote. "They'll decide for us anyway!" They don't protest. "They'll disperse us anyway!" They don't fight for their rights. "At least we are alive." 140 million people are in a state of somnambulism, on the verge of losing their survival instinct.

They hate power but are pathologically afraid of change. They perceive injustice and uncertainty, yet despise civil rights activists. They hate bureaucrats and the government, but support total state interference in all areas of life. They fear the police but still want more police control across the country. They feel betrayed yet continue to trust television.

They chant the mantra "As long as there's no war," but secretly rejoice in war. They are victims with a sense of general superiority, unwilling and unable to change anything.

Imperial Mindset and Learned Helplessness

For those ashamed of the present and fearful of the future, the past is all that remains to boast about. If people have no reason to love their country, at least they can hate others. If they cannot change their own lives, they choose instead to destroy the lives of others.

After more than a century of annihilating intelligence, murdering it, and driving it out of the country, the majority of Russian society today consists of animperial mob. That reality will not disappear even if the strongmen decide to remove Putin and replace him with another "tsar."

The “Deep People” and a Bloodthirsty State

Russia would remain a bloodthirsty monster, and the so-calleddeep peoplewould continue to support its atrocities. When their miserable lives mean nothing, they at least want to feel part of a great nation, of powerful, feared Russia – and that is enough to make them happy.