Timothy Snyder: Always be kind

by Timothy Snyder, a distinguished American historian, an expert on Central and Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, and the Holocaust

Source: Snyder on Substack

I see the world as a parent. Before my children were born, I was judgmental. After fifteen years with kids, I look at dads and moms and think “Wow, they are doing a good job.”

I just had a moment like that in Ukraine, talking about drone warfare. I was in Kyiv, on St. Michael’s Square, recording a video about the work we have done these last three years to raise funds for drone defense, a system that is protecting Ukrainians right now. Passersby knew what I was talking about; the worst drone attack on Kyiv had taken place just a few days before.

To my left I sensed a presence. It was a family: mom and dad, boy of about six. When the filming was done, the mom came over to say a friendly word. As I smiled goodbye to the three of them, I saw the message on her son’s t-shirt:

Always be kind.

War and parenting are close. Children are killed and parents live on. Parents are killed and children live on.

In this war, some Ukrainian children live on in Russia: kidnapped and handed over to Russian families to be russified. Their re-education is a darkness of this war. Children in Russia are militarized from elementary school.

Three years ago I was talking to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelens’kyi, about freedom; he spoke of that subject in terms of parenting, recalling his own parents, referring elliptically to his children. Trying to find a way to express the abnormality of Russian military parades for small children, he said: “kids just want to go to McDonald’s!” The experienced dad was talking. And taking your kids for fast food is OK parenting. Though perhaps not as good as the t-shirt:

Always be kind.

It is hard to be a kid. And it is hard to be a parent. And covid made everything harder. And when I read the t-shirt and caught the boy’s eye I thought: yes, his whole life, assuming he has been here in Kyiv, has been covid and air raids. The full-scale Russian invasion began in February 2022, so for Ukrainian kids there was no gap between germs and bombs. Millions of Ukrainian boy and girls still have some or all of their school days on line, because the Russians fire rockets and drones at schools. It takes time to adapt basements and build new schools underground.

In Ukraine, and in other war zones, and amidst other catastrophes and difficulties, parents raise children, or mourn them. And what is to admire, or what I admire at least, is parenting that teaches children how to be with others, how to do things, and also how to imagine a world that is different than this one, that is better. It is a challenge, not an escape, to teach:

Always be kind.

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