I think the best way to look at it is to see their side. If your relatives are similar to mine, they don’t really care about Ukraine or Zelensky. Not even in a negative way. They just want simple solutions to their problems that are actually very complex.

You understand that having a fleet of Migs that depend on russian technicians is not a reasonable thing if the biggest warmonger in the neighborhood is russia itself. You understand that Slovakia can’t depend on russian gas or oil after russia proved many times, that they will not hesitate to use this dependency every opportunity they get. You understand that making concessions to russia for a promise of peace isn’t going to stop them, because we tried that many times before. You understand that none of these problems have simple solutions.

But many people choose to be ignorant and believe politicians that promise simple solutions. “We will stop supporting war, negotiate peace in Ukraine and buy cheap reliable russian energy again” It sounds good, it sounds easy. So they will believe any lie that supports this “solution”. Or pretend they believe it, because frankly in many cases I know they aren’t really that stupid to believe some of the lies. They just choose to be ignorant and don’t ask questions.

How can you depend on russian gas again if you saw them draining EU gas storage year before the invasion and after you saw them cheerfully proclaiming that your family will freeze to death? You can’t. But people choose to ignore reality, because they don’t like how it looks.

When you look at it this way, you understand that there’s no reason to discuss Ukraine with your family. Because it’s really not about Ukraine. It’s about how much they pay for their groceries. And it’s easier to believe that corrupt Zelensky is to be blamed for expensive bread rather than the fact that we trusted corrupt unstable country with our energy dependency and now have a lot of work, tears and blood ahead of us to dig ourselves from the hole we dug for decades.