Russians show disdain for Ukrainians in many ways, including using offensive names. An example of this is the word “westerners”.

Russian propagandists and users of social networks call residents of the western regions of Ukraine this way. At the same time, they try to portray them as either too arrogant towards people from other regions, or worse than residents of other regions of Ukraine. Very often, propagandists point out that it is the “westerners” who go to Poland every day for purchases and are ready to hand over their country to the West, because they allegedly do not understand all the risks. Moreover, they claim that the “westerners” are the root of evil in Ukrainian society, because they allegedly dream of Bandera and spread their views throughout Ukraine. The Russian propaganda also explained that most people from the western part of Ukraine take advantage of the war and supposedly everyone flees to Poland in the status of refugees. It seems that they frightened the Poles with “Nazi slogans” and the like. By the way, we refuted such a case in our disinformation chronicle.

Using all this, Russia wants to reinforce inferior stereotypes about Ukrainians and split our people. Pro-Russian politicians also resorted to this, creating myths that “Donbas feeds the westerners”. All this helps Russia to extend its imperial ambitions to Ukraine. Like, Russians are better than Ukrainians, who cannot even live in harmony with each other. However, it is Russia that is trying to divide the Ukrainians in order to realize their harmful ideas.