A VICTORY IN ITSELF

It is pleasant when young people who did not live in the USSR, congratulate one another on Victory Day [9 May], bowing their heads before those who perished, honouring the veterans of the Great Patriotic War [World War II]. This means that the military merits of the soldiers and officers who fought against the Wehrmacht, the Third Reich and its ideology - fascism [Nazism] will be remembered for ever. Why is this memory such a precious one? It is not just the fact that those who remember today and pass on this memory to their children, which means to the next generations.

This will happen naturally and without force. It is most likely that the young people of today have passed this victory over fascism through themselves, not by means of an ideological machine operating in the USSR and controlling the minds of 1950s'. 1960s', 1970s', 1980s'and partly 1990s' children. For the latter the idealising of the victory during the Soviet years was something unshakeable - how could it be any other way? Today there is complete awareness that fascism is an evil.  And the understanding of that is acquiring increasing value in the present times, when the whole world is in a fever, when countries and states oppressed by geopolitical games are taking inappropriate decisions and nations and peoples are reinterpreting their ethnic essence, roused by political games.

Society has an information overload. The Internet is peppered with reports on events of various kinds, ranging from the low-key to the great, from the complex to the integral. In one and the same day today's young people can read who threw a new-born into the rubbish bin, which was certain death, and share the idea that a seriously ill person needs help. In one and the same day some young people may be glad about the deaths in Odessa [Ukraine] and the passing victory of some over others and to puzzle over the phrase "it is important not receive but to give away".

In one and the same day today's young people can be curious about a Conchita Wurst video clip on YouTube and then immediately see a tweet about what men are doing with men and women with women. And this is not about homophobia at all. This "taking sides" with regard to right and left, fascists and anti-fascists, democrats and liberals, supporters of federalism and "integral states", is creating a jumble in which it is difficult to pinpoint what is really important. What remains unsaid can never be overcome. And we think that it is more complicated for these young people than it is for us who have taken our lessons from the Soviet ABC.  It is more difficult to remain a human being and to understand the essence and depth of the victory over fascism. Today for young people it is more difficult not lose oneself and to sort the wheat from the chaff, more difficult to honour and respect someone, more complicated to identify oneself with one's own nation and be a patriot. There are far too many "pseudos".And today is it is doubly pleasant when young people exchange messages on social networks about the contribution that the Azerbaijani people made to that victory, the role that Baku oil played and the losses that our nation suffered in the Great Patriotic War. Young people are posting information about our heroes on their wall in the social networks and wishing each other enjoyable festivities on Victory Day, when Azerbaijan restores its own territorial integrity. The young people are wondering why Baku did not become a hero-city, although it deserved to be. 

In the Soviet years you could not disgrace the fair symbol of victory and speak the truth. Thus, the historical past, which is at times sufficiently distant, has become an instrument with which to manipulate society's awareness, and consequently a lever for controlling society. But war is war, and many impartial levers in that carnage were used on the part of the Soviet Union. Today it is not a problem to dig down into the historical truth. Today's young people are doing that. But they continue to perceive the value of the victory over fascism in a pure light, even when they know all these negative facts of history. I believe that even a small, but moral victory over oneself, the victory of the parents who had to bring up a child, the victory of family values, the victory over fascism within oneself. We give thanks to those who gave their lives for the victory and to those who remain human in this imperfect world. 

Long live Victory Day!