It looks increasingly like the U.S. is more interested in undermining Russia’s power than in saving Ukrainian lives. The U.S. needs to help end the war, not escalate it into a disastrous global confrontation.

Mentally arranging the world into homogeneous “civilizations” makes us oblivious to the world’s complexity as well as to our shared humanity with those considered mysterious Others.

What is presented as a uniquely “Russian” type of warfare, with high civilian casualties, is not dissimilar from attacks by the U.S. and its allies. Let us examine the facts that challenge our narratives in addition to those that confirm them.

Acknowledging the horror of nuclear war does not mean we must be incapacitated by this knowledge. We are capable of preventing nuclear war.

The need to put extreme pressure on the Russian government over its crimes should not lead to the stigmatization and punishment of every person from Russia. Collectively blaming groups for the actions of their autocratic governments is wrong. Anti-war Russians are allies who should be embraced.

We should simultaneously condemn Putin’s criminal war of aggression and be careful not to slip into arrogant insanity ourselves. Wars bring out the worst in all sides, and creating a world without war will require the United States to be self-critical rather than self-righteous.

The arguments made against Russia are often weak or hypocritical, and U.S. commentators still subscribe to a “Russo-Orientalism” that views the country as a mysterious dangerous Other.

Membership in a nation is supposed to be a guarantee of equality and human rights. But, as two recent books attest, the concept of citizenship has been unequal from the start, and is increasingly decoupled these days from anything that even looks like safety, freedom, or fairness.