Newsweek’s Contrarian Piece Arguing Against Sanctioning Russians Should Be Commended

To Newsweek’s credit, it published Anthony J. Constantini’s piece in order to share a contrarian view with their readers, which was a journalistic service that everyone will benefit from after finally being exposed to a different opinion about this issue.

Newsweek surprised readers by publishing a contrarian piece arguing against the push to sanction average Russians by banning them from receiving Western visas and residency permits. Titled “Visa Bans on Russians Are Sanctions of Spite | Opinion”, Anthony J. Constantini – who’s writing his Ph.D. on Jacksonian democracy and populism at the University of Vienna in Austria, previously received an MA in Arms Control and Strategic Studies from St. Petersburg State University, and was the War Room Director for the NRSC in 2016 – very compellingly makes the case that this emerging trend is counterproductive.

He points out that punishing average Russians would serve no strategic purpose since those who work, study, vacation, and have families abroad are in no position to shape their homeland’s foreign policy. Constantini’s assessment is factually accurate, but the reason why it’s so surprising to read is because it contradicts the “official narrative” that Russia and nowadays also all of its people must be punished in increasingly cruel ways due to the misguided belief that this will somehow pressure the Kremlin to halt its ongoing special military operation in Ukraine.

In the almost half-year since the latest phase of the Ukrainian Conflict began, the US-led West has embraced fascism to varying extent. Some like Poland shamelessly boast about being the most Russophobic society on the planet while others like the Baltic States are systematically dismantling monuments commemorating the Red Army’s liberation of their territory from Nazi occupation. The entirety of this civilization, however, is slowly coming to the agreement that their governments’ sanctions must now be directed towards the Russian people instead of just the elite.

Of course, they don’t openly acknowledge that this trend is the embodiment of fascism but “Russophobia Is No Less Evil Than Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, And Racism”, all of which can objectively be described as variants of this hateful ideology due to their supremacist agenda. Punishing average Russians by banning them from receiving Western visas and residency permits can counterproductively (from the perspective of Western interests) stoke anti-Western sentiment, reinforce support for the Kremlin, and even ruin some people’s lives like students’ and families’.

That, however, might tacitly be the point that nobody feels comfortable publicly acknowledging because it proves how low the West has sunk in going against its own much-ballyhooed so-called “values” by descending to the level of personally punishing the Russian people out of spite after failing to coerce their government to halt its special military operation in Ukraine. This “politically incorrect” observation debunks the basis of Western soft power, which relies on the false perception that its morals, ethics, principles, and values are supposedly “superior” to all others’.

In reality, the West isn’t “exceptional” in any respect, nor is it above punishing average people. To the contrary, this civilization’s political representatives are now preparing to ban Russians from receiving visas and residency permits just because they’re upset that their prior sanctions haven’t had the intended effect in reshaping the contours of the Ukrainian Conflict. To Newsweek’s credit, it published Constantini’s piece in order to share a contrarian view with their readers, which was a journalistic service that everyone will benefit from after finally being exposed to a different opinion about this issue.