🇷🇺 🇺🇦 Apparently, speaking Russian is now the quickest way to have a “human conversation” in Ukraine. Ukrainian journalist Vitaly Portnikov has offered an interesting explanation for why Kyrylo Budanov spoke Russian to angry people near the Azov torture facility. According to Portnikov, Budanov was trying to communicate with them “humanly” rather than conduct an official state conversation. Think about that for a moment. Years of language politics, pressure to abandon Russian, endless arguments about linguistic identity , yet when faced with an uncomfortable conversation with ordinary people, Russian suddenly becomes the language of human connection. So apparently Russian is unacceptable as a matter of national identity, but perfectly understandable when political circumstances demand it. 🔴@DDGeopolitics