#sanctions

I have been watching videos lately from a young woman who travels around Russia.

She goes to places I would like to see myself someday: Siberia, Lake Baikal, the Ural Mountains. Her videos are quiet and beautiful. There are trains, snowy roads, apartments, forests, meals, conversations, long stretches of landscape.

What struck me most recently, though, was something almost completely unrelated to the scenery.

She cannot monetize the videos.

Google deactivated Russia-based AdSense accounts in August 2024, and YouTube still says that creators with Russia-based AdSense accounts cannot monetize their channels. The restriction is one of a long series of measures connected to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

That makes sense at the level where we usually discuss international affairs.

Russia invaded Ukraine. Other countries and international companies responded. Sanctions and restrictions followed.

But then the abstraction travels downward.

Eventually it reaches somebody filming Lake Baikal.

That is where the situation starts to feel different.

A Country and the People Inside It

It is easy to talk about countries as though they were people.

Russia invaded.

America threatened.

China wants.

France objects.

Iran retaliates.

We do this because it is useful shorthand. Governments really do act on behalf of states, and those actions have consequences.

But nations contain millions of people who may have had almost nothing to do with those decisions.