There is something uniquely exhausting about watching the high-priests of failing empires bicker over branding. Sergei Lavrov, a man whose face looks like a topography map of the Cold War’s most disappointing moments, has decided to spend his precious remaining years as Russia’s Foreign Minister moonlighting as a pedantic linguist. During his recent annual press conference—a marathon of state-sponsored grievance and bureaucratic theater—Lavrov took aim at the United Kingdom, mocking it for being the only nation on the planet with the audacity to include the word 'Great' in its own name. It is a rare moment where a Russian official utters a kernel of truth, though it comes wrapped in enough layers of hypocrisy to choke a Siberian tiger.

Lavrov’s observation is, on a purely technical level, the kind of biting sarcasm one expects from a man who has spent decades inhaling the stale air of the Kremlin. He isn’t wrong. The 'Great' in Great Britain was originally a geographic distinction—used to differentiate the island from its smaller neighbor, Brittany—but over the centuries, it has mutated into a psychological crutch for a nation that hasn’t quite figured out what to do with itself since the invention of the jet engine. To Lavrov, and to much of the world that isn’t currently preoccupied with the price of scones, the moniker is a hilariously outdated relic. It is the geopolitical equivalent of a man in his late seventies insisting everyone still call him 'The Stallion' because of something he did in 1945.

However, the spectacle of a Russian Foreign Minister lecturing anyone on national humility is a masterclass in the absurd. Here is a man representing a government that views the collapse of the Soviet Union as the greatest catastrophe of the 20th century, currently engaged in a 'special operation' designed to reclaim a perceived imperial glory that is rapidly receding into the mists of history. Russia’s own brand of 'greatness' is currently being measured in kilometers of scorched earth and international sanctions, yet Lavrov finds the time to critique the UK’s naming conventions. It is a race to the bottom of the vanity pit, with two declining powers grabbing at each other's throats while the rest of the world wonders if either of them realizes they are both circling the drain.

On the other side of the pond, the United Kingdom sits in its damp, post-Brexit malaise, clutching its 'Great' like a faded security blanket. The British response to such taunts is usually a mixture of performative outrage and a quiet, desperate look at the GDP rankings. The irony is that Lavrov’s mockery hits home precisely because the UK is in the midst of a profound identity crisis. When you are no longer a global hegemon, the adjective starts to feel like a sarcastic comment from a waiter who hasn't been tipped. Lavrov knows this. He isn’t just making a point about linguistics; he is poking a bruise. He is reminding the British that their branding is doing a lot of heavy lifting for a nation that is currently a collection of three-letter acronyms in a trench coat, trying to remember where it left its dignity.

The annual press conference itself is a ritual of cynicism. Lavrov stands there, the human embodiment of a sigh, delivering these barbs with the bored detachment of a man who has seen every treaty broken and every promise ignored. He represents a regime that uses language as a weapon to obscure reality, yet here he is, pretending to be the arbiter of semantic accuracy. It is a delightful piece of theater for those who enjoy watching the world burn in slow motion. The Left will find reason to scoff at Lavrov’s authoritarianism, while the Right will bristle at the insult to the Crown, but both sides miss the deeper comedy: the sheer pointlessness of it all.

We are living in an era where diplomacy has been replaced by mid-tier stand-up comedy performed by men with nuclear codes. The UK's 'Greatness' and Russia’s 'Relevance' are both fictions maintained by aging bureaucrats who are terrified of a world that no longer needs them. Lavrov’s mockery of the British name is a distraction from the fact that both nations are increasingly becoming footnotes in a century that belongs to powers that don't need to put 'Great' in their titles because they have the manufacturing capacity and demographic growth to prove it. In the end, we are left with a leather-faced diplomat sneering at a damp island, and a damp island pretending it can’t hear him. It is a fitting end to a year of global stupidity, where the only thing truly 'Great' is the sheer scale of the collective delusion.