News from the world of the morally pure:

The Cardiff Philharmonic has cancelled an all-Tchaikovsky programme as ‘inappropriate at this time’.

The concert included his decidedly apolitical second symphony, known as the Little Russian.

The orchestra says: ‘: In light of the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine, Cardiff Philharmonic Orchestra, with the agreement of St David’s Hall, feel the previously advertised programme including the 1812 Overture to be inappropriate at this time. The orchestra hope you will continue to support them and enjoy the revised programme.’

This is unutterably stupid. At the start of the First World War, the Proms conductor Sir Henry Wood informed the British government that he would continue performing Wagner and other Germans. The same rule prevailed in the Hitler war.

Only the Nazis ever banned Tchaikovsky.

Welcome to Cardiff 2022.

As the Rt. Rev. Donald J. Trump hath said, “Everything woke turns to shit.” Even Welsh orchestras.

Here’s a trigger warning for you who go into anaphylactic shock when exposed to anything Russian: The Moscow Times is a good source to read about the Russian government’s persecution of Russians who publicly oppose Putin’s war. For example:

One of Russia’s oldest universities will expel at least 13 students who were detained at the anti-war protests that have erupted across the country in recent weeks, the Kommersant business daily reported Wednesday.

The prestigious St. Petersburg State University is reportedly expected to draft more expulsion orders for students after protests against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continued into this week.

“I won’t get your hopes up, these students are doomed,” Mikhail Mochalov, chairman of the university’s student council, was quoted as saying in a student chat room Sunday.

Mochalov said the university’s vice rector is allegedly citing an unknown Interior Ministry letter as an “indisputable basis” for the students’ expulsion.

Here’s another story about how Russians who signed a letter calling for peace being fired. 

It’s one thing for us to demand that ordinary Russians get out onto the street, or in some other way publicly protest their leader’s war. But we need to understand that this comes with a severe cost to them. More than ever we need to refuse anything that causes us to dehumanize Russian people. I understand that the Russian government’s propaganda machine has for years worked to dehumanize Ukrainians, to prepare Russians to accept this war. But now arts organizations are choosing to censor themselves in the cause of construing all things Russian as inhuman.

This is not only a total violation of liberal principles, but it is also morally crazy. I know the head of MI6 thinks that the most important moral difference between the West and Russia is that we embrace LGBT rights, but I prefer to think that it’s in that we value free expression and tolerance. I like to believe that we are not the kind of people who ban Tchaikovsky because he is Russian. During the intense struggle against apartheid in the 1980s, nobody banned South African writers or musicians. China’s monstrous treatment of Tibet and the Uyghur people of Xinjiang does not provoke us to ban Chinese art, film, or literature.

Why Russians? During the Cold War, when Russia was ruled by a Communist dictatorship, and the West and the Soviet Union were at each other’s throats with nuclear missiles, we believed that it was important to have artistic and cultural exchanges so we could experience each other’s humanity. What happened?

In fact, we are not the liberals we once were. Woke institutions and the woke people who run them politicize everything, like a totalitarian state. The orchestra has to silence Tchaikovsky to protest the war launched by the man who is firing and punishing Russians who open their mouths to criticize the war. Because see, we’re morally superior to them, or something.

Please, parents, don’t let your little children watch old Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons. They might be tainted by exposure to cartoon Russians, and lose their precious bodily fluids by peeing their pants in horror.

UPDATE: It has just come out that there is more complexity to the story than first reported. It still in no way justifies what the orchestra did, in my view — nuts to these “best of intentions” — but it’s not quite as bad as first reported:

I just followed this up with Cardiff Philharmonic Orchestra, who said the following:@MusicMagazine, any plans to update your story, and give it some much-needed context? https://t.co/V8j1bX5m8c pic.twitter.com/zntzlh7fDQ

— Hugh Morris (@hwfmorris) March 9, 2022

UPDATE.2: Good piece by Jacob Siegel at Tablet about the stupidity and immorality of trashing everything Russian. Excerpt:

In an atmosphere of intense anti-Russian sentiment, it becomes suspect merely to question these firings—let alone the utterly devastating impact of major financial institutions like PayPal, Mastercard, and Visa deciding that they will no longer do business with Russian cardholders. That decision affects any Russian who took out a credit card in their home country, including those who hate Putin, have protested against the war, or are now living abroad. Is collective financial punishment of this sort justified to end the Russian assault on Ukraine? Perhaps, if indeed it has that effect. But it will involve making normal, nonpolitical people suffer for the crimes of the government, and attempting to erase that suffering by dehumanizing those people is cruel and cowardly.

Read it all.