Медіа: Radio Nakypilo

Context

Since the beginning of the full-scale war, the number of veterans in Ukraine has been rapidly increasing. At the same time, public discourse about veterans’ experiences is often limited to two extremes: heroization or stigmatization. Veterans’ stories are frequently reduced to narratives of trauma, loss, or “otherness,” which complicates reintegration into civilian life, contributes to social isolation, and reinforces discriminatory perceptions.

In this context, media play a crucial role in shaping a responsible, unbiased, and humane understanding of veterans—as diverse individuals with their own histories, experiences, and potential for active participation in society.

What Was Done

The media platform Nakypilo created the podcast series Shoulder to Shoulder, centered on conversations with soldiers and veterans of Ukraine’s liberation war.

The podcasts address:

• returning from the front to civilian life, adaptation, and rehabilitation;
• mental health, bodily changes, inclusion, and the prevention of social isolation;
• veterans’ experiences in their own words, without imposed frameworks of heroization or pity.

One episode features Dmytro Kozatskyi (“Orest”), a veteran, public speaker, and project manager working on veterans’ engagement in the defense industry, highlighting veterans’ professional development and civic participation as well.

How It Was Implemented

The series is built around open, non-confrontational conversations in which participants speak in the first person, at their own pace and in their own language.

The editorial team deliberately chose:

• an audio format that creates a sense of a safe space for discussing difficult topics;
• a focus on personal experience without generalizations or stereotypes;
• an approach that allows discussion not only of traumatic events but also of recovery, new social roles, and participation in community life.

Natalia Nekypila, commissioning editor at Radio Nakypilo, explains that the newsroom approaches mental health, bodily changes, and vulnerable veterans’ experiences in line with the outlet’s editorial policy. The key principles include prioritizing human dignity over sensationalism, using non-stigmatizing language, and respecting the personal boundaries of guests. Veterans are never treated as “cases” or generalized figures; their own voices and their right to control their stories remain central.

According to her, the newsroom consciously avoids dramatization, excessive heroization, and pathologization of experience, does not pressure guests emotionally, and considers the psychological safety of the audience, especially when covering PTSD, loss, and adaptation to civilian life. This helps minimize the risk of retraumatization and triggering for listeners.

She also emphasizes the importance of contextualization: veterans’ personal experiences are presented within a broader wartime and social context, including access to rehabilitation, the role of communities, and state responsibility.

“This approach resonated with audiences: listeners and veterans noted the calm tone and the feeling of a safe space where difficult topics could be discussed without retraumatization. Critical feedback also occurred, and we took it into account. The local context of Kharkiv is fundamental for us: the city lives in close proximity to active hostilities, and this shapes the tone of our conversations—careful, restrained, and oriented toward supporting the community. The radio does not merely talk about veterans; it talks with them as members of a community for whom the experience of war is an everyday reality.” — Natalia Nekypila

Impact

The podcast series contributes to changing perceptions of veterans—from seeing them solely as carriers of traumatic experience to recognizing them as diverse and full participants in social life.

The materials:

• help dismantle stereotypes related to bodily changes, mental health, and expectations of the “perfect hero”;
• strengthen public discussion about equality, dignity, respect, and trust;
• provide an example of responsible journalism when working with vulnerable experiences in wartime and postwar contexts.

What Other Media Can Learn From This

• Build conversations with veterans on the basis of equality rather than treating them as a “special category.”
• Allow guests to speak in the first person and at their own pace, without emotional pressure or imposed narratives of heroism or suffering.
• Avoid generalizations and stigmatizing language that automatically links veteran status with mental illness, danger, or social isolation.
• Cover mental health responsibly, distinguishing personal experience from professional medical or psychological information.
• Use formats that reduce confrontation, such as podcasts and long-form conversations that allow careful listening and nuanced discussion.
• Show the diversity of veterans’ experiences, including women veterans, veterans with disabilities, and people of different ages and professions.
• Shift the focus from war as an event to life after war, including work, civic engagement, professional development, and everyday challenges.
• Coordinate sensitive topics with guests and respect their right to decline discussing certain experiences.
• Avoid exploiting visual or audio effects that intensify drama at the expense of human dignity.
• Reflect on the newsroom’s own role in shaping public perceptions of veterans and its responsibility to support inclusion rather than exclusion.

Context

Despite women’s active participation in the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other components of the security and defense sector, their military experiences remain insufficiently represented in the culture of memory. Traditional practices of war memorialization often reproduce masculine images of heroism shaped by the Soviet legacy, which leads to the symbolic exclusion of women soldiers from public commemorative space.

In the context of the full-scale war, the question of whom and how we remember becomes not only cultural but also political and value-based. The visibility of women defenders in memorial practices is an important condition for building an inclusive, fair, and contemporary culture of memory.

What Was Done

The media platform Nakypilo produced an episode of the podcast Memorialization of War dedicated to the presence of women soldiers in the culture of memory.

In conversation with Oksana Dovhopolova—co-founder and curator of the memory culture platform Past / Future / Art, Doctor of Philosophy, and professor at the Kyiv School of Economics—the episode:

• analyzed why women’s military experiences remain insufficiently visible in public space;
• examined the influence of Soviet militaristic traditions on contemporary commemorative practices;
• raised the question of rethinking approaches to memorialization through a gender lens.

How It Was Implemented

The podcast was designed as an expert analytical conversation focused on cultural and philosophical analysis.

The episode discussed:

• contemporary tools of war memorialization, including artistic projects, memory festivals, public campaigns, and local memorials;
• the ways cultural practices can both reproduce inequality and become instruments of change;
• the topic in cooperation with Divoche.Media, which expanded the audience and engaged listeners interested in gender issues and cultural processes.

The podcast format made it possible to explore the issue not through isolated cases but as a long-term social process requiring reflection and systemic solutions.

Impact

The episode contributed to a new understanding of commemorating women soldiers as full participants in the war rather than exceptions within a “male” narrative.

The material:

• strengthened public discussion about the need for change in the culture of memory;
• drew attention to symbolic inequality in memorial practices;
• generated active audience engagement on social media through comments, shares, and discussions.

What Other Media Can Learn From This

• Integrate a gender perspective into coverage of war, memory, and commemoration, rather than limiting attention to news reports about women’s participation in combat.
• Ask questions about visibility and exclusion, analyzing whose experiences are represented in memorial practices and whose are systematically ignored.
• Work with experts from humanities, cultural studies, and philosophy to provide deeper analysis of complex issues that extend beyond daily news logic.
• Use podcasts and long-form formats to discuss long-term social processes where context and reflection are more important than speed.
• Critically rethink the Soviet legacy in language, symbols, and memorial forms, proposing alternative and inclusive approaches.
• Collaborate with other media outlets and cultural platforms to broaden audiences and bring multiple perspectives into conversations about memory and war.