Dignity Is Our Shield Against Fear. Speech by Rehina Kharchenko

Dignity within a community is about ‘we’ — about a shared, almost sacred sense that carries its own moral weight when people are united by a common history, experience or values. This ‘we’ is capable of pride and shame; it can stand up in defence of its principles and recover from humiliation — almost like a living organism. Within this ‘we’, the collective (the common good) should, at least in theory, always prevail over the personal (the individual). Such dignity can be seen: in a community that stands up for its people; in a nation that does not allow its culture and freedom to be diminished; in a volunteer community that upholds the standard of humanity even when the world begins to falter.

Collective dignity is like an inner backbone that belongs to no one individually yet holds everyone together. It is extremely difficult to forge — and just as difficult to break.

I have two open-ended questions:

• Should we risk our own safety to preserve our dignity?
• Have Ukrainians developed a new hierarchy of needs, in which physical safety and integrity are no longer the top priority?

I would like to answer them in the words of Vasyl Stus: ‘A nation that lacks dignity has no future’.

Before my eyes now is 10 December 2024. At 15:01, an Iskander missile struck a medical centre in Zaporizhzhia. Forty-six hours of search. Twelve people killed.

Dignity is not about lofty words, but about real people. It is about the women of Zaporizhzhia who, after a russian strike, found themselves trapped beneath the rubble of a medical centre [following the missile attack on Zaporizhzhia on 10 December 2024]. They spent seven hours in darkness, under concrete slabs, surrounded by dust, when every second could have been their last. They themselves called the emergency line ‘101’. They did not scream, did not break, did not lose hope. Instead, they told rescuers that there were wounded people nearby and asked them to save others first.

Dignity is about remaining human even beneath the rubble. It is not about pathos. It is about the choice to stay human when the world is literally collapsing around you.

A few days after that, I was due to speak at an event and talk about how we in Zaporizhzhia are developing accessibility. But before my eyes stood 10 December. And 6 December 2024, when people in their cars were burned alive because a missile struck an intersection at 18:37, during rush hour.

That day, I spoke not about accessibility, but about the fact that people must, first and foremost, be alive. Article 3 of the Constitution of Ukraine states that the human being, their life, honour and dignity are the highest social value. Until we ensure this, it is difficult to speak about accessibility. Yes, it matters — but staying alive matters more. Having a chance to wake up matters more. After my speech, several people came up to me and said: ‘Thank you. You told the truth. Even though we were not ready to hear it.’

Perhaps it was then that I first truly understood: dignity is also very hard. Because it begins where we choose the truth, even when that truth is uncomfortable.

Vasyl Sukhomlynskyi once said that dignity is the wisdom to keep oneself in check. And we are holding on. Each of us has wrapped ourselves in our own arms and is holding tight, not to lose our sanity during the war. When everything you loved, built and hoped for is being destroyed. All that remains is to keep yourself together. To believe in yourself. To trust yourself. To trust those close to you. And that trust, too, is dignity. The victory of humanity over fear and pain is the highest expression of strength of spirit that is possible.

Life offers no instructions on how to preserve one’s dignity when chaos surrounds us. Each of us develops our own formula: where we live, how we work, what prospects we have; whether we have a family, a home; whether we pay our taxes, support the front, save even one life; whether we endured when we wanted to fall, whether we fell, whether we rose again; whether we held on to our community, our municipality, our state — even when the collective ‘we’ was beginning to dissolve.

These criteria change. And very often, they fail.

That is why I am convinced of something else: dignity is not measured by achievements. It is defined by an inner belief in human worth — one’s own and that of others. Even in the darkest of times.

For me, dignity means being honest with oneself. It is the readiness to say what is unpopular. 

It is responsibility for one’s actions. It is the ability to remain useful even when the system is faltering. It is the commitment to safeguard the collective ‘we’ of one’s own community, because without our shared, state-centred community, there can be no expectation of rights being upheld, nor of the triumph of light.

And above all, human dignity does not end where fear begins.

Dignity does not allow fear to turn us into someone else. When there are chaos, danger and uncertainty all around, when a person confronts loss and pain, it is dignity that helps us remain human.

Every choice made with dignity is a step towards oneself and towards others. It is the choice to save those you can, even when you fear for your own life.

That is why dignity is not an abstract concept, but a concrete, everyday choice — often deeply uncomfortable and difficult, yet honest.

Every one of us encounters fear — at home, at work, in a city that lives just steps away from the frontline. That is why dignity is our shield against fear, an inner support that allows us to remain human despite everything and to safeguard our community, our shared ‘we’ of the Ukrainian nation within our own state.

So what, then, is dignity?

Dignity is what keeps a person upright, even when the world around them collapses horizontally.

It is an inner axis — invisible on an X-ray, yet clearly visible in one’s decisions.

It is the refusal to betray oneself — even when no one is watching.

It is the courage to speak the truth.

It is the determination not to lose one’s humanity in inhuman circumstances.

It is the memory of the value of every human life.

And it is the belief that our human worth is neither a bonus nor a reward. It is given to us from birth, and we are responsible for what we do with it.

Dignity is something that cannot be taken away — but it can be lost. And our task is not to lose it. Not now. Especially not now.