Philosophy Hour: Russian Exceptionalism vs. American Exceptionalism

Where do they come from?

For a long time, I’ve been thinking about a palpable psychological “ground level” difference between the cultures of my two homelands—the Russian and the American cultures.

First of all, the two have lots of features in common. For example, both cultures feature “ambitious geopolitical thinking in mere peasants,” which is seemingly different from the collective mindset of the people coming from less “influential” countries. What I mean by that is people on the ground bond emotionally to the foreign policies of their empire and discuss geopolitics amongst each other as if their “good” leaders love them. (It is kind of like when two sincere peasants, having studied the latest issue of “Pravda” after a hard day, argue with each other with passion about the geopolitical benefits or disadvantages of “our” invasion, which is not really an invasion because it’s a fair invasion, etc.—and I am not even talking specifically about anything current, I am talking about the mindset and the gap bet…