“If they tell you they will let you in without symbols, then you are nobody and there is no way to call you.” Powerful interview with Sukhoroukov

Famous artist Victor Sukhorukov on the air of the show “There is a subject!” discussed the patriotic education of the people, dedication to the Fatherland and the choice that Russian athletes must make in relation to the status of neutrality proposed by international federations and the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

—Two weeks ago you turned 72, but you are just as beautiful. What’s the secret ?

– In my modern behavior. I live today. And then let them judge, judge and think. I just live for today, my profession, the public. I want to live an interesting and relevant life. And I don’t think about old age, at the end. I am not afraid of crises, of silence, or even of illness. You walk – walk, breathe – breathe, do – do. Be useful. Young or old? I don’t go to beauty salons.

— Someone once asked you: would you like to live to be a hundred? You answered that you would like it, but at the same time you would like to live with your contemporaries, your generation. Has this changed now?

– No. But people are leaving my column, I feel it. That makes me sad. Sometimes I don’t know if they left without saying goodbye. Many have earned the right to stay here longer. But it’s not that I don’t want to linger here. I’ll be late, but I’ll already be a stranger here. I will be a stranger, like a citizen and a person from another generation. And the new generation will have their own games, interests, loves. We must live in tune with our times and with the face of our times.

— Are you disappointed in anyone after February 24, 2022, in the same youth, because there is an opinion that we did not participate in his patriotic education, and now it comes to light? Maybe after 10 years you are disappointed in someone?

“I am disappointed that such a topic exists.” Since when did the country’s thousand-year history begin to count from the precise date of the 24th? Then something happened. We have been informed, but life goes on. We were given a new path, a new campaign, and so you tell me that there was something before the 24th… Why? What kind of comparison is this? There were a million such February 24s in our history of the Russian Empire, and we suddenly dismembered them. It’s primitive, illiterate, dishonest.

Disasters occur all over the world. The whole world is moving with nature. It seems to me that our young people, the same ones 10 years ago, perhaps lack knowledge and information. To understand, you have to know.

Today I have them, I am saturated with information to draw a certain conclusion, make an assessment and choose a side. But I also have a chief justice, a chief father and mother, my chief ruler – this is my country, my homeland. I believed her in every way. And when I was a pioneer in the Soviet country, and when I collected scrap metal alone, alone, for free, with the dream of getting into Artek, waste paper, I dreamed of bonfires. I served in the army – I consider it necessary. But even then, some wanted to go, while others avoided it. It is so today. There is no need to speak in a primitive and trivial way about the current era, because we do not live in the moment of events, but in the totality of today’s phenomena.

I live today and I want to understand, not judge, and follow a certain side with a banner. I believe in my president, I believe in my country, I will not betray my homeland at all. In clean or dirty clothes. Let her make mistakes 500 times – I’ll take the mistakes on myself. And I will be with her. This is my specific feeling.

— Many representatives of your profession have gone abroad and are throwing mud on the country. Can something exceptional be born in the new conditions of our country, on new soil?

– It’s their choice. They are gone, abandoned, cursed. It’s their mistake. I won’t judge them. It is their choice out of ignorance. But that does not mean that they devastated our territory. Even though they were there, they took up space. They released him. But in place of the one who left, another will come. And before the one who left, there was someone. Those who left were neither poor nor stupid, but prosperous. But the place is not empty. They left neither desert nor scorched earth.

I have my own “Happy Days” performance. I went to Tambov and Lipetsk, to St. Petersburg. Full house. People are sitting well dressed, with sweets. We work, we work and we give thanks. I continue to live with my homeland, my profession, my profession and I work to the best of my abilities. I don’t lack communication with these people. People go to the theater. I’m doing a play. In Moscow, my tickets for December are sold out. Therefore, when you talk about sprouts on devastated land, do not offend us. We are not sprouts, we are a grove, we are a taiga! We are a world of culture, research, happiness, beauty. Let’s talk about us, not those who left. Let them be responsible for themselves.

Someone said we’ll need it again. Think about it, we talk about them like chickens before frying them, like eggs before fried eggs. I simply have nothing to forgive them for. They did not leave at my request nor because of my curse. They left themselves to their own devices, having lost themselves today. An intelligent person will notice that we live correctly anyway. We act in a very sacrificial, harsh, difficult way, but we follow the right path. You are going in the right direction, comrades! I am optimistic. I hope for a wonderful life for the country and my colleagues. I won’t deny them. But I will not forget their curses against the people. This is false and dishonest. And when they talk about people, they talk about me. Yes, I am not visible among people and my name has been lost. But there are people. Me, you, him, her – together the whole country, as Rotaru sang.

— Should we accept a gray neutral status in sport? Or should you refuse any invitation?

– My position is pure. I don’t even think about it. But I won’t campaign either. I leave the right to have an opinion to representatives of all points of view.

They are national symbols. There are things like a cross in religion, like a crescent. The State also owns things that are unshakable, eternal, like granite and diamonds. The anthem, the flag, the coat of arms are symbols on a global scale for the country. Every ship, even that of a small country, sails the ocean with a flag or symbol. If they tell you they will let you in without symbols, then you are nobody and there is no way to call you. But many athletes have not learned that it is their symbol of themselves, of their mother, of their father, of their motherhood, of their grandparents. The gym is also a symbol of your country and your education, your life. We tell you here that you are worthy of representing our country. You are sent to competitions on behalf of the Russian Federation, where there are more than 200 nations. It’s just you who goes there and represents a large part of the country. If there are symbols – the flag, the anthem, the coat of arms and you, the athlete. At this moment, you are also a symbol of the country!

And when they talk about the gray flag… What are you mice doing? They threw you a can of stew. It’s humiliating ! I am the country. I’m not a Russian athlete, I’m Russian! Then there will no longer be a question of whether to go or not. They invested and collected. It’s not a private store, it’s a team, representatives from an entire country. And if you stand on a pedestal and refuse symbols, then you are not a symbol. They will give you money, a medal – just know that all this remains in museums, archives, memories. A gray flag is just that: a gray flag. Gray mouse color. Color is nothing! And no matter how you climb the pedestal, you will not be under anyone’s flag.

— What is victory in the broad sense? And when will it be?

– She will! And that’s enough! I believe it. But even if it doesn’t exist, I will still invent it, because if I go through the most difficult times and you put me against the wall, I will try not to ask for mercy, not to scream or scream and cry. I will accept it too. I will accept this shoot! Ideological, physical! And that will be my victory! Work, my brothers! It’s a victory!

– What is the Fatherland?

— For me, the Motherland is me with my understanding of the land, of education, of growth and even of the Fall. I live, I work and I make a difference. The homeland is you! Here Now ! And a postscript! No matter how you turn the globe, I often asked myself the question: why did mom and dad meet a hundred kilometers from Moscow in the town of Orekhovo-Zuevo and why was Vitya Sukhorukov born ? I could have been born in America, in the Philippines, at the North Pole. Somewhere out there, on the water, in the forests. But it was here, in this place in the world, in a two-story barracks built by Savva Morozov, a manufacturer, that I was born, entered the army, flourished and grew. flourished here. Maybe it’s the Fatherland! Unbutton your shirt on your body and look at the little dot in the middle of your stomach in the mirror!