Currently some clichés in everyday usage still convey a distorted or false meaning. Propastop, a Defence League unit highly regarded for competence in exposing Russian propaganda, has focussed on some that not only Western media, but we also overlook as misleading, even harmful for Estonia.
Probably the most crucial is the notion that “Estonia became independent in 1991”. It overlooks the fact that Western states did not recognize de jure the illegal Soviet annexation of Estonia. It denies the pre-war status of Estonia as a full-fledged member of the League of Nations. It doesn’t acknowledge the diplomatic recognition which Estonia received both after 1918 and 1991. It implies that only in 1991 did Estonians assert their determination to re-establish full sovereignty. It ignores the suppressed goal, the ages-old persistency of Estonians to be free. And it somewhat reinforces Putin’s claim that Czarist rule and Soviet occupation were historically normal and thus acceptable.
