If you don't like it, get out!

The authorities reformulated the social contract

Do not like the laws adopted by the State Duma? Don't like the same faces on TV? Theft? Mercedes and beggars on dirty streets? Blocked websites and nauseating propaganda on state TV? Well, you know what to do. The people said so. If there is any doubt about this, you can conduct a simple experiment. It is enough to post this note on social networks and collect comments.

In Russia, a new social contract has taken shape between the elites and the people. It boils down to one thesis: “If you don’t like living in our beautiful great Russia, leave the country immediately!” A more vulgar version of the same appeal sounds like this: “If you don’t like it, get out!” Do not like the laws adopted by the State Duma? Don't like the same faces on TV? Theft? Mercedes and beggars on dirty streets? Blocked websites and nauseating propaganda on state TV? Well, you know what to do. The people said so. If there is any doubt about this, you can conduct a simple experiment. It is enough to post this note on social networks and collect comments.

Freedom to leave Russia is seen by both President Putin and the latest Twitter anonymous as a guarantee of prosperity and pluralism.

Everyone who criticizes Russia in any of its aspects hears daily this “if you don’t like it, get out!”. Here is the source of the legitimacy of power. She does not forbid you to pack your bags and move to Sheremetyevo, so what else do you want from her?

Psychology is quite Soviet. In the 1970s, the issue of leaving the country or the shameful expulsion of unwanted people was also actively discussed. Solzhenitsyn considered this problem fundamental and for many years fought for the right to leave his homeland. This, by the way, is one of the key differences between Alexander Isaevich and Varlam Shalamov. The latter cannot be imagined in the role of a person who collects travel documents, and in the role of an emigrant in general.

Known psychological mechanisms underlie our social contract. Why, it would seem, is it necessary to angrily demand the departure of people who criticize the bad life in Russia and want to live well here? But there is a certain acute feeling, in the philosophy of Nietzsche called ressentiment. But something else is more important: the current deal between the top and the bottom turns out to be a swindle.

With the current vector of the country's development, the departure of the “very smart” is beneficial for the elites. Notice how the brain drain issue has come to naught. In the 1990s, under the hated Gaidarochubais reformers, this leak was constantly talked about, tears were shed. Now people continue to leave, more than 1 million people have left in recent years, but the tears have dried. More in demand is the conversation about emigrants as about people who did not find themselves in Russia rising from their knees, were superfluous, perhaps they were hiding something ... and finally left. This is more of a celebration than a reason for sadness. In addition, as the author of an ultra-patriotic publication “about culture” recently wrote, our population has just replenished with 2 million first-class citizens.

In fact, one cannot say that people are just leaving Russia. Even before the reunification with the Crimea, many people liked it here, and they “fell” to us. The brightest groups of new pre-Crimean Russians are, of course, migrants from Central Asia and Berkut employees. Which, of course, gives some idea of ​​what kind of society we are building and what kind of people it needs in the first place. A sort of Stanford experiment on the scale of one-seventh of the land.

But for those who shout: "Vali!" from below - this slogan does not bring any benefit. Russia has low labor productivity and very low competition in all spheres, not only in politics. There are few good entrepreneurs, journalists, scientists, doctors in Russia. All this affects the standard of living of citizens. If people who can find work in the West or in China leave, we will definitely not get better. But how to explain this to fellow citizens? If you start a conversation on this topic, then suspicions will only strengthen. “We don’t need anyone”, “we didn’t go through such a thing.” These slogans are hermetic and, judging by the experience of history, it is possible to break through them only at the moment when dear leaders finally let us into the world.

Unfortunately, all this can be called provincial. Not in the sense of opposing Moscow and the rest of Russia, but, on the contrary, we have provinces everywhere, including the presidential administration.

Everywhere there is a firm conviction that the order inherent in the native village is the best. The world beyond is the source of evil.

Smart, pragmatic in these circumstances, of course, will follow the advice of the people. It is short-sighted to ignore such an insistent call to leave Russia. True cosmopolitans just shrug their shoulders. If I'm not welcome here, I'll make new friends. If they say that it is better for me to work in another country, I would probably agree. This impeccable logic, this new, simple and clear social contract, is completely prevented from being accepted except perhaps by the broken gait of the sick old man Shalamov, returning to his home along Vasilyevskaya Street.