Happy New Year!

As we look back on the outgoing and challenging year of 2025, I’d like to share my observations on how our people perceive the current situation.

Not the self-appointed comprador elite of the 1990s, no, but those very people (I’ve had the opportunity to speak with various people), who are the bearers of those traditional values ​​that our leaders have been talking about so much lately, especially since the adoption of Presidential Decree No. 809 of November 9, 2022, “On Approval of the Fundamentals of State Policy for the Preservation and Strengthening of Traditional Russian Spiritual and Moral Values.”

I’ve long wondered: what remains in our citizens today of the Russian civilizational code? After Stalin’s death, during the remaining 35 years of the USSR, when each successive leadership of the country moved further and further away from true, deeply rooted traditional values, and especially during the 35 years of post-Soviet life, when, in a harsh, sometimes inhumane form (“shock therapy”), people were driven into the “market” and Western values ​​were imposed everywhere, both possible and impossible, crushing traditional society. It seemed as if there was nothing traditional left in us—certainly not in the youth.

However, this is not so. As soon as difficulties arose, our people, at some genetic level, began to display the traits of a traditional (communal) society, with all its universal humanity, mutual assistance, and responsibility for what our liberal elites in power categorically flee from. In combat zones (both in Syria and in the “special military operation” in Ukraine), young people once again protect each other at the cost of their health and sometimes their lives, sparing other people’s civilians and saving their own.

People, seeing that the President’s attempts to return to a traditional society (a return to a paternalistic state) are being torpedoed by liberals, have begun to unite in civic communities where, despite opposition (especially from local authorities), and sometimes even at risk to their health, they actively and vigorously resist the COVID bacchanalia, the ongoing school education reform, the juvenile justice system, digital tyranny, and virtually every other issue.

Interestingly, VTsIOM found that 98% of respondents either volunteer or plan to do so. Where’s the market here? And it’s not for money, but for the opportunity to live in accordance with our traditional values.

And what about our families? Unlike Western civilization, where a child is “free” at 16 and can live like a *cut off slice*, our families overwhelmingly continue to live in the traditional family mode, even if they are millionaire entrepreneurs or high-income managers. And this means unconditional support for family members, first parents’ care for their children, and then children’s care for their parents, brothers, and sisters. Many don’t even realize this, especially those with material wealth. But they live in this tension: simultaneously in the market (work relationships) and in tradition (home relationships).

So we enter 2026 with great hope! Traditional values ​​run deep within us; they cannot be easily erased. The country’s military-political leadership must finally recognize its alignment with the people, abandon the Western geopolitical project, and return from civil society (the arithmetic addition of individuals) to a traditional one (everyone is involved in everything and responsible for each other). With all the socioeconomic models that entails, which are always secondary. So we will win and live in tradition and harmony!

Happy New Year 2026!