Food as foe

I did not expect the Kremlin to break the ancient, deep-rooted, almost archetypal taboo against the wasting of food. Or do they think that “Western” food is not real food?

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree Wednesday ordering the “destruction” of all food brought into the country against import bans on Western products.

The order goes into effect next Thursday:

Shipments of banned food are to be destroyed starting on Aug. 6…

The Russian word unichtozhenie is morphologically equivalent to annihilation (nichto = nihil), meaning “the turning (of something) into nothing.” The opposition-minded public would like to know the affiliation of the St. Petersburg producer of furnaces to be used for burning the sanctioned food. The lighter-minded note that there are better ways to annihilate food, say by eating it; jokes proliferate.

2 Comments

  1. As Russians watch food being incinerated in front of their eyes I hope they understand this is a punishment for the West and not for them. They shouldn’t complain, they are annihilating us! It’s only a matter of time!

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