Or so they would have us believe.

In today’s YouTube video, Arend Feenstra bursts forth with patriotic fervor as he shares with us a family project that he has been waiting to complete since they first arrived at their new farm in Russia. He calls it a “patriotic symbol of who we identify as.”

While watching him — with the help of a few of his children — digging a hole, mixing and pouring concrete, and settling an anchor into the snow-dusted (but not yet frozen) ground, it is quite obvious that what they are doing is putting up a flagpole. But not just any old flagpole. Guessing Arend to be about six feet tall, I estimate the flagpole at 15 to 18 feet high. That flag should be visible all the way to Moscow!

And there it is:

As they work, Arend Feenstra tells us how — since he first saw the Russian flag in the government offices there — “it said freedom” to him. How “thrilled,” and “excited,” and “thankful” he is to be “allowed” to be there, in the land of “economic opportunity,” where they can live “as traditional Christian people, raise a family, and be happy.”

And I’m thinking . . .

But he doesn’t stop there. Beyond his paean to Mother Russia, he feels compelled, as always, to tear down Canada, the country that brought him a beautiful family, a prosperous farm, and the freedom to make his own choices for the first 40-plus years of his life. We hear how traditional Christian values are under attack in the West; and that — though Russia, like every country, has its problems — they are not “those” problems.

I guess it never occurred to them to move to, say, an Amish community in Pennsylvania, where at least English is spoken and you won’t be thrown into prison for criticizing the government in Washington. But the Feenstras made their choice, and now they are trying to convince us that they themselves are convinced it was the right choice.

*. *. *

Well, I’m sorry, Arend and Anneesa Feenstra — but you’ll never convince me that your decision was the best one for you or, more importantly, for your eight children. (And by the way, I hope the ninth child — the young man who stayed behind in Canada — is doing well.)

Because there are things about your adopted country that you apparently didn’t know, or chose to disbelieve, before settling there . . . things that you are undoubtedly learning little by little, now that it’s too late to change your minds.

Now that you are under his watchful eye:

This is not your benevolent father figure, a leader who has the best interests of his country and its people at heart. This is, in reality, a man who rules with an iron fist;

. . . who stands in front of the world and declares 2024 to be Russia’s “Year of the Family” . . . while at the same time telling its citizens to report their friends, family and neighbors to the authorities for daring to speak against government policy or the war in Ukraine;

. . . who, without cause or justification, wages all-out war against a sovereign nation while unabashedly lying to the world about his intentions . . . all because of his territorial ambitions in the rest of Eastern Europe;

. . . who, when the number of casualties from that war becomes unsustainable, replaces them with young men from other countries whose governments are as corrupt as his own;

. . . who targets and imprisons Americans and other foreigners on wholly specious grounds, to be held hostage for future trade . . . in the meantime subjecting them to the worst kinds of abuse and outright torture;

. . . who, when faced with an opponent who won’t be silenced, simply has that opponent murdered;

. . . and who stifles the media in his country in order to cover up the lies and the corruption and the killing.

*. *. *

This, then, is the leader of the country you have chosen to provide you with the opportunity for the decent, honest life you desire for your family. I wish I had been able to tell you all of this before you made your decision, but I didn’t know you then.

Knowing you now, I can only say,

I’m sorry.

Good luck to all of you . . .

Brendochka
11/16/24