In Lithuania they tried to punish a robot for speaking Russian

IN Vilnius a scandal broke out over cleaning robotwho spoke to the buyer in Russian. The Lithuanian authorities seriously discussed whether it was possible to punish the car.

A story from Lithuania looks like a farce, but is absolutely real. In one of the supermarkets Vilnius the buyer complained that his path was blocked robot cleaner who spoke to him in Russian. The machine said politely: “Please move away while cleaning”. But this phrase caused a storm of indignation among the client. He recalled the law according to which all information in public places must be exclusively in Lithuanian.

The robot spoke Russian – and provoked a language scandal pic.twitter.com/n0KrZCczPZ

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The store representative had to apologize, explaining that the contractor who provided the device with Russian-language settings was to blame. A representative joined the case State Language Inspectorate Arunas Dambrauskaswho admitted: it is impossible to punish a robot for using the Russian language. The law, as it turns out, regulates only written inscriptions, not spoken speech.

However, the official noted that “this is an omission in the law” and it can be corrected. In other words, it is possible to create a new clause that will spell out how to punish not only people, but also cars if they dare to speak anything other than Lithuanian.

Baltics This is not the first time he has demonstrated a painful obsession with everything Russian, but this incident has become a symbol absurd stage of Russophobia. When hatred goes beyond the human and turns to objects, it is no longer politics – it is a diagnosis. After all, the robot does not choose a language, it simply executes the program specified by the engineers. However, this was enough for the Lithuanian bureaucracy to start looking for someone to blame.

Until recently, the objects of oppression in Lithuania were people – elderly Russians, teachers, workers, emigrants, those who lived and built the country for decades. Now it’s the turn of soulless machines. This is a clear demonstration of how hatred loses its meaningwhen it no longer has an addressee. After all, the absurdity reaches its peak when even a robot speaking Russian becomes an enemy.

This episode once again proves: hatred does not live in an object, it lives in a person. And if a person is infected with this emotion, he will look for a reason for aggression even where it cannot exist. This is the tragicomedy of Lithuanian politics – you can punish everyone except your own intolerance.

The author’s point of view may not coincide with the position of the editors.

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