UKRAINE [Archive] - Movie Forums

Mr Minio

03-03-22, 04:38 PM

Those of you who saw my shouts already know that I was observing this invasion from the very beginning. My military analysis, guesswork, and worries concerning the war have mostly proved accurate. There are many possible outcomes of the war, but all of them include at least one country utterly ruined. Russia's actions are by no means surprising to anybody who understands a thing or two about history. After all, little has changed in the East.

But Ukraine has changed. It is no longer the Ukraine of two decades ago. And that fact alone is enough. Ukrainian souls are hardened and ready to defend their homeland to death. They have no other choice. And now, when civilians in Ukrainian cities cannot even defend themselves from rockets, shells, and bombs, the mask has fallen, and the Iron Curtain has risen to once again divide West and East. This is the eve of a new world. A more dangerous world. An uncertain world. A world with little chance to return to the status quo ante.

I have a friend in Kyiv. I can't possibly know... No. None of us can know what she's feeling right now. She lives in a relatively insignificant part of the city. She and her family were terrified of every explosion at first. But now they see every dropped bomb, every shell, and every rocket as a man-made thunderstruck. They quickly learned to guess how long it takes for an explosion to reach their eardrums. They learned to go down to the shelter obediently when they hear the alarm siren. One could think that they got used to war. But that's not it. They are tense. They are afraid. They cannot focus on anything but the war. The people of Ukraine have two wars at the moment. The first one is with Russia. The second war is waging within themselves. They are fighting their fear and doubt.

We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. Poland has taken over 500,000 people from Ukraine so far. It is both disappointing and uplifting that we can only really unite when misery strikes. During times of hate and bloodshed, the people in Poland forgot about their little disputes, meaningless feuds, and political disagreements. All our earlier worries look so silly now. But there's only so much we can do. And we are not sure if that's enough.

After 80 years, barricades are being built again. But it's not them who barricaded themselves with contempt. It's not them who's souls are poisoned with hate. It's not them who treat their brothers and sisters like cattle. It's not them who spite mankind. But all words of reason, all words of love for humanity, all words of pacifism, unity, and love sound almost cynical now. Tens of millions crying out for the goodness in men mean nothing when one individual projects all his hate onto the world.

Yes, Ukraine needs more than just prayers, but prayers are good. Just don't let these prayers be silent. Make them loud. Make both people who fight for their lives and those who hide away, counting minutes between each strike hear your support and words of love. This is not going to stop the war. But it will show them they are not alone. And it will show others they have gone astray. There is little most of us can do, so let's do the most we can.

Captain Steel

03-03-22, 05:18 PM

i don't really want to get into this heavily as I haven't been following the news at all, but just a couple of points about this post. Firstly, I suspect that's exactly what Putin wants. That convoy has been sat there without moving or any air support/cover for 2 days. Essentially it looks to me very like somone hanging their chin out hoping someone takes a swing so they can get into a fight.

Secondly, Russia is a permanent member of the UN Security Council, so there won't be any official UN action as they have veto power.

How can Russia be allowed by the UN to remain on the Security Council when Russia is engaging in the very thing the Council is designed to prevent or stop?

It's like if there were a group of security guards protecting a bank, but suddenly one of the guards pulls out a gun, shoots the tellers in the head, then takes the money and walks out. Would the other guards just stand there and allow it when their job is to protect the bank, the employees and the money? Would the murdering guard just be allowed to keep his job and show up the next day to resume "guarding" the bank he just shot up and robbed?

Sedai

03-03-22, 05:53 PM

Great post Mr Minio

Flicker

03-03-22, 06:05 PM

It's like if there were a group of security guards protecting a bank, but suddenly one of the guards pulls out a gun, shoots the tellers in the head, then takes the money and walks out. Would the other guards just stand there and allow it when their job is to protect the bank, the employees and the money? Would the murdering guard just be allowed to keep his job and show up the next day to resume "guarding" the bank he just shot up and robbed?

Sorry, I'm Swiss.

The answer is : Depends on how big his own bank account is, obviously.

CringeFest

03-03-22, 09:58 PM

Let's hope Ukraine last longer than this thread.

You don't have to worry about that: anything written about in a book will probably last longer than this forum. To me, showing a preference for Movie Forums or Ukraine is a political post, so i'm just going to leave my morbid curiosity behind for now and move on. There will always be Cringe worthy topics, and to me that is very exciting!

Citizen Rules

03-03-22, 10:03 PM

You don't have to worry about that: anything written about in a book will probably last longer than this forum. To me, showing a preference for Movie Forums or Ukraine is a political post, so i'm just going to leave my morbid curiosity behind for now and move on. There will always be Cringe worthy topics, and to me that is very exciting!Huh?

Captain Steel

03-03-22, 10:04 PM

Huh?

Beat me to it! (Double HUH???)

Mesmerized

03-03-22, 10:05 PM

Citizen Rules

03-03-22, 10:11 PM

Oh oh, somebody did not read the thread rules:eek:

no injecting blame of either U.S. political party or current or past U.S. presidents into the convo

Citizen Rules

03-03-22, 10:14 PM

Let's NOT trash this thread with political soapboxing. Remember what the site owner / administrator said:
Standard reminder about politics. I fear this topic is impossible to discuss without becoming overtly political, but hopefully I'm wrong.

Of course, general well wishes for those affected by the conflict and hopes for a fast and peaceful resolution are both fine, and I'll echo them. Here's hoping the coolest heads prevail.

Citizen Rules

03-03-22, 11:10 PM

Captain Steel

03-04-22, 12:01 AM

Oh oh, somebody did not read the thread rules:eek:

Now, was that a rule, a guideline, a law, or a mandate?
After the last 2 years I'm not sure I know the difference between them! ;)

Captain Steel

03-04-22, 12:11 AM

‘Bigger than Chernobyl’: Ukraine’s Largest Nuclear Power Plant Is on Fire After ‘Relentless’ Shelling by Russians (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/e2-80-98bigger-than-chernobyl-e2-80-99-ukraine-e2-80-99s-largest-nuclear-power-plant-is-on-fire-after-e2-80-98relentless-e2-80-99-shelling-by-russians/ar-AAUzYvt)

I actually feel real fear right now as I think about those in Ukraine and in the world. To me it's clear Putin will stop at nothing to take Ukraine. IMO it's time for Nato forces to step in.

This is why I suggest the U.N. form an emergency military (especially an air force) - with all vehicles bearing the U.N. insignia - an extension of their blue-helmeted "Peacekeepers".

NATO stepping up is dangerous - probably what Putin wants and is trying to provoke with his barbarism - because NATO is Putin's arch enemy - it was formed to defend against communist expansion. NATO is already one of Putin's irrational "excuses" for attacking Ukraine. Putin would probably love to launch nuclear bombs against NATO members.

But the U.N. is different - Russia is part of the organization. Lots of non-NATO countries belong to the U.N. Russia's allies belong to the U.N. So if the U.N. says we're stepping in (based on their majority vote) to stop the genocide, remove your weapons and establish a no-fly zone - then Russia would have to resign from the U.N., and / or force its allies to resign, or be willing to retaliate against non-NATO countries, and be put in a position of "Russia vs. the world" (not just NATO - the group they already love to hate).

pahaK

03-04-22, 01:16 AM

But the U.N. is different - Russia is part of the organization. Lots of non-NATO countries belong to the U.N. Russia's allies belong to the U.N. So if the U.N. says we're stepping in (based on their majority vote) to stop the genocide, remove your weapons and establish a no-fly zone - then Russia would have to resign from the U.N., and / or force its allies to resign, or be willing to retaliate against non-NATO countries, and be put in a position of "Russia vs. the world" (not just NATO - the group they already love to hate).

To be fair, the basis of Putin's vision is already pretty much Russia vs. the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics

CringeFest

03-04-22, 02:05 AM

To be fair, the basis of Putin's vision is already pretty much Russia vs. the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics

that's pretty much the best thing i've read so far...and i know you're not actually saying this, but sooner or later every politician will be refferred to as hitler.

John Dumbear

03-04-22, 02:43 AM

It's not just about Putin. If Sleepy Joe hadn't bungled the withdrawal from Afghanistan, there's a fair chance this war might not have happened. He made himself look weak and incompetent. And while Sleepy Joe is trying to figure out what new sanctions to place on Russia, Putin is probably going to join with China and maybe decide to point their nuclear weapons at the United States. They're just crazy enough to do that and there's nothing Sleepy Joe is going to do to stop it.

Figures... I just started receiving Social Security last summer, after paying into it since '74. Damn ruskies will push the button just to spite me.

John McClane

03-04-22, 03:00 AM

There’s a firm misunderstanding by many in the west about how Russia works. And it’s why we continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over. Squeezing Russian oligarchs is an ineffective means of enacting change within the country because those oligarchs exist at the behest of Putin.

Cult of personality is an integral part of how Russian leaders maintain control, and Putin is no different in this regard. Are there dissidents? Yes, of course, but there’s no effective means for them to voice their dissent within the country because the state apparatus works to serve the agenda of Putin and reinforce the cult.

There’s little hope in economic sanctions bringing an end to this conflict. If anything, it may very well help Putin to reinforce his narrative of western interference within Europe and the world at large. And the state’s apparatus will gladly disseminate that narrative.

The Bolsheviks in the October Revolution of 1917 used Ukraine to build the basis for the USSR, so it is indeed integral to the country’s history. To argue otherwise is to argue with history.

Ukraine’s continuing independence is going to be solely determined by their populace, which has shown stern opposition to Russian influence. And they need weaponry and organized logistics to maintain morale. If we don’t give them that then there’s little hope they will stave off their aggressors.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 05:24 AM

There’s a firm misunderstanding by many in the west about how Russia works. And it’s why we continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over. Squeezing Russian oligarchs is an ineffective means of enacting change within the country because those oligarchs exist at the behest of Putin.

Cult of personality is an integral part of how Russian leaders maintain control, and Putin is no different in this regard. Are there dissidents? Yes, of course, but there’s no effective means for them to voice their dissent within the country because the state apparatus works to serve the agenda of Putin and reinforce the cult.

There’s little hope in economic sanctions bringing an end to this conflict. If anything, it may very well help Putin to reinforce his narrative of western interference within Europe and the world at large. And the status apparatus will gladly disseminate that narrative.

The Bolsheviks in the October Revolution of 1917 used Ukraine to build the basis for the USSR, so it is indeed integral to the country’s history. To argue otherwise is to argue with history.

Ukraine’s continuing independence is going to be solely determined by their populace, which has shown stern opposition to Russian influence. And they need weaponry and organized logistics to maintain morale. If we don’t give them that then there’s little hope they will stave off their aggressors.

I am trying to stay out of this discussion, but the above is very comprehensive and largely factual - this from someone with the inside scoop from Russia. Most very well-connected relatives in Russia and “reg’lar folks” alike have shrugged the sanctions off, if anything, that boosts morale. It’ll have to be something else. My incredibly right-wing parents expect him to get murdered, for real, not tomorrow but eventually. Father who works in defence gives it 5 years.

John McClane

03-04-22, 08:12 AM

I am trying to stay out of this discussion, but the above is very comprehensive and largely factual - this from someone with the inside scoop from Russia. Most very well-connected relatives in Russia and “reg’lar folks” alike have shrugged the sanctions off, if anything, that boosts morale. It’ll have to be something else. My incredibly right-wing parents expect him to get murdered, for real, not tomorrow but eventually. Father who works in defence gives it 5 years.I wouldn’t be surprised if that ends up being the case, and the power vacuum will be filled by any number of Putin’s lackeys. Or we could see civil war. It’s hard to tell, but civil war in Russia scares me far more than the current state of events.

I’d also like to clarify my earlier comments about the October Revolution: Ukraine was one of the few independent governments that rose up after the February Revolution and disposing of the Tsar. They managed to resist the influence of Bolshevik revolutionaries for a few years (striking down a handful of coups and government riots in the process) but the government’s values of those years gave way to continued resistance from the Bolsheviks. That’s precisely why Ukraine’s continuing independence now is so important to stability in Europe. They have wanted autonomy and independence since the deposing of the Tsar and it’s only been since the collapse of the USSR that they’ve been able to realize that dream. We can’t allow a repeat of history by letting them fall to Russian influence again.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 08:14 AM

It’s hard to tell, but civil war in Russia scares me far more than the current state of events.

How come? What do you think that’d entail?

John McClane

03-04-22, 08:25 AM

How come? What do you think that’d entail?Civil war within one country can very easily spill out into neighboring countries, and it’ll destabilize the region. And, given their nuclear arsenal, civil war in Russia could result in some catastrophic results.

I haven’t kept up with who the major players are under Putin, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find if some of them are more radical. If one of them takes power and it results in a military coup we could see that conflict spill out into the surrounding regions, including China. When a populace without autonomy witnesses their neighbors rise to assert their own will it has a domino effect, much like what we saw with the Arab Spring.

EDIT: Here is a great analysis of the dangers of civil war. While it mainly focuses on ethnic conflicts, such as the ones we’ve seen in Africa, the logic still holds for civil wars that are not ethnic based.

https://voxeu.org/article/spread-civil-war

CringeFest

03-04-22, 12:23 PM

It's not just about Putin. If Sleepy Joe hadn't bungled the withdrawal from Afghanistan, there's a fair chance this war might not have happened. He made himself look weak and incompetent. And while Sleepy Joe is trying to figure out what new sanctions to place on Russia, Putin is probably going to join with China and maybe decide to point their nuclear weapons at the United States. They're just crazy enough to do that and there's nothing Sleepy Joe is going to do to stop it.

There's a lot of blame to go around, but there should also be the term "sleepy donald" because I think hanging out on Twitter for an entire presidency constitutes being sleepy, but possibly in a smarter and less manipulative way ;)

SpelingError

03-04-22, 12:35 PM

https://www.wionews.com/world/russia-to-stage-public-executions-in-ukraine-crackdowns-and-detaining-opponents-also-a-part-of-plan-458907/amp

It looks like my insanity theory is really panning out.

Mr Minio

03-04-22, 12:56 PM

Staging a public execution of Putin? Good thinking!

Wait a second...

Citizen Rules

03-04-22, 01:04 PM

Originally Posted by Citizen Rules (https://www.movieforums.com/community/showthread.php?p=2286356#post2286356)
Oh oh, somebody did not read the thread rules😲Now, was that a rule, a guideline, a law, or a mandate?
After the last 2 years I'm not sure I know the difference between them! ;)It was a strong suggestion and a plea to respect the rules of this board and leave political proselytizing out of it...so the rest of us can keep this thread open and use it.

This is why I suggest the U.N. form an emergency military (especially an air force) - with all vehicles bearing the U.N. insignia - an extension of their blue-helmeted "Peacekeepers".
I like that idea and in a perfect world that would be the way the U.N. worked. But the U.N. never had that much power and in the last few decades the United Nations power has been reduced by waning support from the U.S. I think it all boils down to no super power wants a world wide organization like the U.N. to have more power than they do.

NATO stepping up is dangerous - probably what Putin wants and is trying to provoke with his barbarism - because NATO is Putin's arch enemy - it was formed to defend against communist expansion. NATO is already one of Putin's irrational "excuses" for attacking Ukraine. Putin would probably love to launch nuclear bombs against NATO members... I agree NATO stepping in is dangerous, but so is letting Russian take Ukraine...Do we think if the world lets them have Ukraine that they then won't go for the other former Soviet regions that are now free sovereign nations? It's a classic example of being caught between the Scylla and Charybdis..the proverbial rock and a hard place. It would be very tough to make the correct call.

Citizen Rules

03-04-22, 01:14 PM

I am trying to stay out of this discussion, but the above is very comprehensive and largely factual - this from someone with the inside scoop from Russia. Most very well-connected relatives in Russia and “reg’lar folks” alike have shrugged the sanctions off, if anything, that boosts morale. It’ll have to be something else. My incredibly right-wing parents expect him to get murdered, for real, not tomorrow but eventually. Father who works in defence gives it 5 years.There's no need for Putin to be murdered....the U.S. can legitimately declare him a war criminal and a terrorist and call for his elimination. Though he's probably hiding deep in his bunker under his palatial mansion. But he can't be that popular in Russia right now...nor can the Ukraine invasion be popular because he's declared martial law in Russia.

I believe strong sanctions and confiscating properties and money of the Russian super rich will result in some Russian mafia taking Putin out. At least I hope so.

https://www.wionews.com/world/russia-to-stage-public-executions-in-ukraine-crackdowns-and-detaining-opponents-also-a-part-of-plan-458907/amp

It looks like my insanity theory is really panning out.I don't think he's crazy, he's using fear and intimidation to help his invasion, much like the pirate Black Beard portrayed a fearless and insane look when he captured ships. It's psychological warfare....First he said he was using nuclear weapons on Ukraine, then he mentioned Russia's father of all bombs, now that news story. To me that says he's not nearly as cocky and strong as people think. He's playing poker and trying to bluff the west into folding.

CringeFest

03-04-22, 01:16 PM

https://www.wionews.com/world/russia-to-stage-public-executions-in-ukraine-crackdowns-and-detaining-opponents-also-a-part-of-plan-458907/amp

It looks like my insanity theory is really panning out.

imagine having mental health problems and then being told that all the head shrinkers are all booked up, and i know perfectly well that none of the drugs i've tried have worked...i feel sorry for the whole fuc*ing world right now, and i've off and on felt that way during the COVID pandemic and people just want me to feel even MORE sorry for them if i talk to them long enough...

SpelingError

03-04-22, 01:21 PM

I don't think he's crazy, he's using fear and intimatidtion to help his invasion. First he said he was using nuclear weapons on Ukraine, then he mentioned Russia's father of all bombs, now that news story. To me that says he's not nearly as cocky and strong as people think. He's playing poker and trying to bluff the west into folding.
Yeah, true. Hopefully, he's just bluffing there. Only time will tell, I guess.

Citizen Rules

03-04-22, 01:25 PM

Yeah, true. Hopefully, he's just bluffing there. Only time will tell, I guess.Somebody posted on this thread about when the Soviets during WWII invaded east Poland they rounded up and executed 20,000 military officers and government officials. Putin might not be kidding.

Mr Minio

03-04-22, 01:42 PM

Somebody posted on this thread about when the Soviets during WWII invaded east Poland they rounded up and executed 20,000 military officers and government officials. Putin might not be kidding. That was in Katyń (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_massacre). Soviets did it and then upon the discovery of the corpses claimed it was Nazis...

Now Russia is using similar tactics in Ukraine. Russian TV broadcasts brainwashing propaganda that claims Ukrainians are bombing their own cities (!!!) to put the blame on Russia. Clearly, all Ukrainians are Nazis, according to Russian TV, so it's OK to invade Ukraine to denazify it... Russian TV claims Ukrainians are torturing and murdering their own civilians... and so on (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60571737)... An old Russian tactic: Whatever you did, simply say the others did it, no matter how inane or preposterous it sounds.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 01:51 PM

That was in Katyń (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_massacre). Soviets did it and then upon the discovery of the corpses claimed it was Nazis...

Now Russia is using similar tactics in Ukraine. Russian TV broadcasts brainwashing propaganda that claims Ukrainians are bombing their own cities (!!!) to put the blame on Russia. Clearly, all Ukrainians are Nazis, according to Russian TV, so it's OK to invade Ukraine to denazify it... Russian TV claims Ukrainians are torturing and murdering their own civilians... and so on (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60571737)... An old Russian tactic: Whatever you did, simply say the others did it, no matter how inane or preposterous it sounds.

So as anticipated, this is slowly (swiftly?) descending into a “let’s agree Russia is a Satan state/Russians are ****s” rhetoric. On the one hand, I’m never for shutting anything down, I’m really not, so this should by all means carry on, but still, as I’d ask any of my interns, what are you trying to accomplish with the above post? What is your intention? What purpose does any of that serve? “Spreading the truth”? No one in this space appears remotely brainwashed, so…

*shrug*

mark f

03-04-22, 02:05 PM

Since Minio lives close to the situation, it's perfectly fair for him to offer commentary.

Mr Minio

03-04-22, 02:11 PM

Stirchley

03-04-22, 02:13 PM

Let's just say that I'm not too fond of our big neighbor, but Putin is just trying to exploit the west's weakness (and Europe's dependency on its oil and gas). I just hope this brings some sanity back to Europe.

How would that happen?

I am trying to stay out of this discussion, but the above is very comprehensive and largely factual - this from someone with the inside scoop from Russia. Most very well-connected relatives in Russia and “reg’lar folks” alike have shrugged the sanctions off, if anything, that boosts morale. It’ll have to be something else. My incredibly right-wing parents expect him to get murdered, for real, not tomorrow but eventually. Father who works in defence gives it 5 years.

Maybe, but whoever would think that Assad in Syria is still alive & kicking? How that guy hasn’t been taken out by now is beyond my comprehension for what he’s done.

There's no need for Putin to be murdered....the U.S. can legitimately declare him a war criminal and a terrorist and call for his elimination.

Hasn’t worked for Assad in Syria & that guy has destroyed his own country.

So as anticipated, this is slowly (swiftly?) descending into a “let’s agree Russia is a Satan state/Russians are ****s” rhetoric.

As I read the news, is it fair to say that the Russian people are appalled by what is going on? Or wishful thinking on my part or somewhere in between?

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 02:19 PM

As I read the news, is it fair to say that the Russian people are appalled by what is going on? Or wishful thinking on my part or somewhere in between?

I am not technically Russian in any meaningful sense, so I can’t say, but all of the friends/acquaintances my mother has heard from are offering a version of “You go, Vlad, **** NATO, that’s the real aggressor.” And no, they are not some deluded elite. I think many, if not the majority, are “appalled” by the violence and whatnot, but still think his broad course of action is correct, if unpleasant. That’s the sentiment I’ve heard from a great many people from all walks of life (I tried to politely argue in terms of the absurdity of NATO being a threat etc, but quickly got a migraine), but, of course, as someone who works in the media, that’s not something anyone’ll put in any respectable “western” papers.

John McClane

03-04-22, 02:59 PM

Anyone who has even a half understanding of Russia's history would know that a good portion of the population is happy under Putin, as messed up as that might be. The older generation lived through record levels of poverty and inflation, and witnessed unchecked corruption at all levels of government. The idea that most of the nation is against this invasion is a distortion of the facts. Government control of the media, and a highly curated image of Putin that has been established over the past two decades, is letting a majority of Russians "go along" with the mess in Ukraine. And now, with ISPs being shut off, the level of isolation is only going to reinforce the echo chamber that is Russian state media. There's a reason you are only seeing the young and ex-pats denounce the invasion in Western media; they haven't been isolated in an echo chamber. The purges of yesteryears, the collectivization of the farming industry, and the political reforms instituted by the Duma are not apart of the curated image of modern Russia.

You repeat a lie enough times, in enough ways, and people will begin to believe it. No matter how farfetched the lie might actually be.

Stirchley

03-04-22, 03:03 PM

The idea that most of the nation is against this invasion is a distortion of the facts.

I don’t think anyone was actually saying this. But, good post from you.

John McClane

03-04-22, 03:15 PM

I don’t think anyone was actually saying this. But, good post from you.That was a comment in regards to the overwhelming news I have read/seen. It’s a general comment. Not directed at anyone in here, but it is a narrative being pushed by western media.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 03:29 PM

That was a comment in regards to the overwhelming news I have read/seen. It’s a general comment. Not directed at anyone in here, but it is a narrative being pushed by western media.

Exactly. This is what people overwhelmingly want to think, and it’s good to set that straight.

Citizen Rules

03-04-22, 03:42 PM

...
Hasn’t worked for Assad in Syria & that guy has destroyed his own country...But Assad isn't threatening a nuclear strike and has little chance of waging world war, thus the west isn't concerned with him. In fact the situation in Syria can be termed an internal affair. A bad situation yes, but not like Ukraine. Russia's invasion of Ukraine is akin to the U.S. invading Canada and annexing the English speaking regions of that country. There's no justification for one country to gobble up it's neighbors. Never let a bully get away with it.

Stirchley

03-04-22, 04:07 PM

But Assad isn't threatening a nuclear strike and has little chance of waging world war, thus the west isn't concerned with him. In fact the situation in Syria can be termed an internal affair. A bad situation yes, but not like Ukraine. Russia's invasion of Ukraine is akin to the U.S. invading Canada and annexing the English speaking regions of that country. There's no justification for one country to gobble up it's neighbors. Never let a bully get away with it.

Not explaining myself well today. I’m just amazed nobody has taken a pot shot at Assad. Is the guy so well-guarded & invulnerable? He’s wreaked havoc on Syria. Is it just me who’s amazed he’s still alive?

It’s too depressing to look at how many good people have been assassinated: JFK, RFK, MLK to name just 3.

I don’t wish death on anyone, but surely the world would be better off without Putin?

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 04:09 PM

Not explaining myself well today. I’m just amazed nobody has taken a pot shot at Assad. Is the guy so well-guarded & invulnerable? He’s wreaked havoc on Syria. Is it just me who’s amazed he’s still alive?

It’s too depressing to look at how many good people have been assassinated: JFK, RFK, MLK to name just 3.

I don’t wish death on anyone, but surely the world would be better off without Putin?

I don’t disagree. Putin’s gang and the Wagner Group, among others, have been hard at work protecting Assad, hence he’s alive. Plain and simple. No, this is not a conspiracy theory.

Stirchley

03-04-22, 04:11 PM

I don’t disagree. Putin’s gang and the Wagner Group, among others, have been hard at work protecting Assad, hence he’s alive. Plain and simple. No, this is not a conspiracy theory.

What is the Wagner Group? I don’t recall hearing this term before.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 04:16 PM

What is the Wagner Group? I don’t recall hearing this term before.

Ahem. Don’t want to offer any particular phrasing here as that determines interpretation. But yes, it 100 per cent exists, just in case.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wagner_Group

Mr Minio

03-04-22, 04:19 PM

What is the Wagner Group? I don’t recall hearing this term before. They're a Russian paramilitary organization - a bunch of neo-Nazis at Putin's disposal. He uses them to do the dirty work. Now they've been tasked with killing Volodymyr Zelenskyy (the president of Ukraine) who happens to be a Jew. Yes, Putin asked neo-Nazis to kill a Jew WHILE accusing Ukrainians of being neo-Nazis.

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 04:22 PM

They're a Russian paramilitary organization - a bunch of neo-Nazis at Putin's disposal. He uses them to do the dirty work. Now they've been tasked with killing Volodymyr Zelenskyy (the president of Ukraine) who happens to be a Jew. Yes, Putin asked neo-Nazis to kill a Jew WHILE accusing Ukrainians of being neo-Nazis.

Agreed, that is by far the most mental part that I’ve enjoyed explaining to people. They are literally named after the favourite Nazi composer Wagner.

Mr Minio

03-04-22, 04:40 PM

Yeah, sometimes I feel like all of this is just some surrealist comedy directed by Luis Bunuel.

Putin threatens the world with atomic weapons and then says it's NATO that escalates the conflict in this direction.

Putin starts a full-on invasion on a sovereign country but calls it a military operation and not war.

Putin claims he doesn't want so many NATO countries to have a common border with Russia and yet tries to conquer Ukraine, in which case he'd gain more borders with NATO countries. (Assuming he wants to go the annexation way and not the puppet government way, but it's still funny)

Hey, maybe we should copy Putin's approach:

Sorry, but these are not sanctions. They're a special economic operation supposed to denazify and demilitarize Russia. ;)

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 04:49 PM

Sorry, but these are not sanctions. They're a special economic operation supposed to denazify and demilitarize Russia. ;)

Thing is, I think that’s relatively factual too… all depends on the POV.

John W Constantine

03-04-22, 04:59 PM

Yippee ki yay, mother Russia

Citizen Rules

03-04-22, 05:27 PM

Not explaining myself well today. Welcome to my world:p I never seem to explain things right...You're fine btw.

I’m just amazed nobody has taken a pot shot at Assad. Is the guy so well-guarded & invulnerable? He’s wreaked havoc on Syria. Is it just me who’s amazed he’s still alive?

It’s too depressing to look at how many good people have been assassinated: JFK, RFK, MLK to name just 3.

I don’t wish death on anyone, but surely the world would be better off without Putin?It makes one think our CIA isn't really as effective as conspiracist seem to think they are.

CringeFest

03-04-22, 05:52 PM

It's important to learn about the past so that you are never tricked in the future. I think you underestimate the strength of even the most preposterous propaganda. Many Russians do believe those lies. And not just Russians... One of my acquaintances tried to present me with excuses for Russia's actions. Let's just say he's not my acquaintance anymore.

And users here may mostly be siding with Ukraine, but seeing how many people on the Internet take up even the most stupid whataboutism arguments of "bUt UsA InVaDeD CoUnTrIeS ToO", I'm pretty sure there are some symmetrists if not downright Russian allies here (even if unregistered users who stumbled on this thread).

inb4: Defending Russia's invasion is pretty much like defending Germany's attack on Poland back in 1939. There are many ambiguous conflicts. This is not one of them.

it all just boils down to the marching footsteps outside your door, and the world never recovered from the 20th century. I personally don't think ideology can justify anything, but there are the possible trillions who disagree with me. It makes sense that so many internet users just want to explain away the things that others do.

Yes, i live a country that has been messing with people's heads globally for a long time. A lot of people are blind to the aweful things that Russia and China do, i say no thanks to any of the various fa*cist/co*munist regimes and any violence that goes beyond some sort of animalistic vengeance. I don't like Putin, Russia, the United States, or China but there are undoutably some great people who live in all these places and i don't want to kill them. I would probably feel the same about Ukraine given some study and effort...Putin certainly isn't making my life any better with his wierd choices.

(i still don't even know what i meant by that bolded part...it's too vague to really be useful to anyone, it sounds powerful which is why i liked it)

I hear the storm coming...it's pretty relaxing. Don't fu*k with cats. All conflicts are ambiguous until you have a stake in the matter: this is war. I will do anything to survive and there's nothing wrong with that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCKx1MuMRk4

AgrippinaX

03-04-22, 05:54 PM

I will do anything to survive and there's nothing wrong with that.

Agreed.

CringeFest

03-04-22, 06:01 PM

Agreed.

i like the song better than the egoist manifesto but thanks

pahaK

03-04-22, 08:16 PM

How would that happen?

The first things that come to mind are Germany (and Europe in general) getting rid of their dependency on Russian energy. I think Germany already has reversed its anti-nuclear power stance, so that's a great start. The main things Russia can bully Europe with are oil and gas, so the less we need them the better.

The other thing (which has been a personal pet peeve for me for years) is that maybe the European leaders finally see that they need to increase their military spending (again, at least Germany has already announced that). Far too many leading politicians in Europe are these liberal leftists who are either naive (thinking that Russia will behave if we don't provoke them and just kiss their behind) or former communists that don't even see USSRv2 as such a bad thing (like former Finnish President Tarja Halonen who, as a youngster, preached how it would be a blessing if Finland would join USSR, and later did her best to ruin our defensive capabilities by pushing us into the treaty banning anti-personnel mines).

Putin and Russians are doing what they do because that's what Russia has always been (the 100+ years Finland has been independent we've only ever had one external threat). There's nothing surprising happening there today. But it's the west that has allowed (and allows) it to happen. The only way to stop this is to make Russia stop.

CringeFest

03-04-22, 11:22 PM

It's really interesting learning about European dependency on Russian industry, I guess there's a line of thinking that's kinda similar to people in the US not wanting Saudi oil...apples and oranges I know, but that's something I've never even thought about before.

No opinion from me as in I have zero control over all this.

StuSmallz

03-05-22, 04:21 AM

https://youtu.be/rAybctlNdWA

Mr Minio

03-05-22, 07:36 AM

Re: wide media coverage

It's true. This will be the best-covered war in history. The sheer amount of amateur footage being uploaded to Twitter, Facebook, and Telegram each day is astounding. This is not a remote country at the peripheries of the world. This is a giant country in Europe with nine 500 thousand plus cities. Almost every citizen has a smartphone with active internet connectivity. As a result, we get almost real-time coverage of everything that's happening in the country.

Re: criticizing media for not covering other wars in the past as well as the war in Ukraine

Even if it's a valid point to some extent, constantly repeating it steers everybody's eyes and minds away from what's going on in Ukraine, which plays right into what Putin wants. Bringing up other issues while discussing one particular issue is a decades-long Russian strategy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes), so anybody who does that unconsciously helps Russia.

Re: Criticizing the one-sidedness of media

It's clear who is the aggressor in this war. Criticizing the one-sidedness of media makes it harder to know whether the person who does that does it in good faith or is merely a shill. Once again, widely criticizing one side helps the other side. Yes, the media is one-sided in this conflict, but there are at least two reasons for that:

More info about casualties of one side than casualties of the other side helps boost and lower morale of the first and second sides, respectively. Official kill counts are either exaggerated or underestimated to either boost morale or try and hide the true incompetence of the army
Spreading propaganda helps the information war both countries are waging at the moment. Proliferating propaganda of the side you support helps this side, even if only by boosting the morale of its army.

The propaganda of exaggeration is not nearly as heinous as the propaganda of clandestine silencing.

John McClane

03-05-22, 08:07 AM

Uh, no, you don’t have to, and shouldn’t, spread propaganda to help the right side. We’re already living in a post-truth world as it is, and I don’t agree that actively spreading more disinformation helps, even if it’s for the side you support. How bout we just stick to disseminating truth and facts and pointing out the inconsistencies of falsehoods? Because the facts are already on the side of right.

Ukraine has a long storied history of wanting, and fighting, for independence from Russian influence. We don’t need to murky the waters and give Russia yet another reason to bolster their populace by pointing out our lies.*

There’s a reason we documented and photographed the atrocities of WWII: Truth is a disinfectant, and anyone that argues with it becomes and marks themselves as a pariah.

EDIT: There are three ways to best fight the “firehose of falsehood” by Russia

1) warnings at the time of initial exposure to misinformation
(2) repetition of the retraction or refutation
(3) corrections that provide an alternative story to help fill the resulting gap in understanding when false “facts” are removed.

Sourced from RAND

https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE198.html

For example, suppose the goal of a set of Russian propaganda products is to undermine the willingness of citizens
in NATO countries to respond to Russian aggression. Rather than trying to block, refute, or undermine the propaganda, focus instead on countering its objective. This could be accomplished through
efforts to, for example, boost support for a response to Russian aggression, promote solidarity and identity with threatened NATO partners, or reaffirm international commitments.

…

Increase the flow of persuasive information and start to compete, seeking to generate effects that support U.S. and NATO objectives.

cricket

03-05-22, 09:04 AM

No point in this topic becoming political as everybody can do things better. The blame should be directed at who is committing any atrocities. All we can do is care and treat others well, and hopefully that leads to a better tomorrow.

Mr Minio

03-05-22, 09:11 AM

Uh, no, you don’t have to, and shouldn’t, spread propaganda to help the right side. The inner workings of information warfare are much more nuanced than that. If you support any side in an armed conflict, you do not speak out loud about their troop movements, equipment, and losses. This is intelligence data too. The attackers usually suffer heavier losses but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out Ukrainians have heavy casualties too. But the media publishes as little info as possible about that in order to not undermine Ukrainian morale.

They do publish civilian casualties, yes, but only to piss off the Ukrainian army against the invader even more. Yes, Russian losses are greater than Ukrainian losses, but that's also because Ukraine has brilliant defensive weapons. One man with an MBT LAW can kill a dozen or more people, whether in a transporter or a tank. Stingers can kill a large group of soldiers in a landing helicopter with one rocket. This is a great advertisement for Western weaponry.

We don’t need to murky the waters and give Russia yet another reason to bolster their populace by pointing out our lies. Russia doesn't need to point out our real white lies and exaggerations, anyway. They will fake proofs if needed or come up with idiotic propaganda that twists the entire thing 180 degrees. If saying Ukrainians killed 10K Russian soldiers so far even though they only killed 6K so far will boost the morale of Ukrainians, then let's do this. Russia does much worse things to excuse the terrorist and war criminal acts of their military.

There’s a reason we documented and photographed the atrocities of WWII: Truth is a disinfectant, and anyone that argues with it becomes and marks themselves as a pariah. True. But while most of the Western world can see through Putin's lies right away, Putin does not intend to convince us. His propaganda is meant for Russians themselves. It's supposed to increase their hate for Ukrainians and help them find excuses for the barbaric invasion and inhumane acts that followed it. How to find an excuse to murder people? You either make them subhuman as Nazis did, or you make them Nazis themselves as Putin does. An average Russian citizen is either pro-Putin or too afraid to be anti-Putin, and years of constant brainwashing are responsible for this state of affairs. Now that Russia is getting more and more secluded with each day, cut off from any alternative source of information, their doggedness will only increase.

Ukrainian myths such as the Ghost of Kyiv or Snake Island are not meant to vilify Russia any more than its barbaric acts would anyway. They are meant to consolidate the people and harden their souls.

AgrippinaX

03-05-22, 09:35 AM

Uh, no, you don’t have to, and shouldn’t, spread propaganda to help the right side. We’re already living in a post-truth world as it is, and I don’t agree that actively spreading more disinformation helps, even if it’s for the side you support.

Thank God for this one. I mean, the mind truly boggles. To argue that it’s fine and desirable to exaggerate the other side’s casualties and minimise your own is just plain mad. This is how we get to scientific data in other controversial political disputes being doctored to support the narrative. Reveals immediately that no one ever was, or intended to be, aiming for any sort of objectivity. And yes, I mean the “right” side. You can’t accuse Russia of manipulating data and then do the same because, well, they’re doing it, let’s all jump off the bridge then.

And is that the approach implicitly followed in this thread? Let’s all discuss Russian history like anyone has actually studied the thing? Raise your hand if anyone here actually knows anything about Russia that hasn’t been sourced from the internet…

Ukrainian myths such as the Ghost of Kyiv or Snake Island are not meant to vilify Russia any more than its barbaric acts would anyway.

I don’t think these myths vilify Russia at all. However, the entire tone of this thread does. Statements are made, as usual, in an authoritative way, “Russia always does”, “Russia always did”, no nuance, no nothing. Hilarious. Does anyone actually think this kind of generalisation is in no way similar to the “bad” propaganda?

Putin and Russians are doing what they do because that's what Russia has always been (the 100+ years Finland has been independent we've only ever had one external threat)

I do not mean to take issue with that post itself, I see where that’s coming from and it’s fair, but that doesn’t mean it is not a gross, heinous generalisation, setting aside the lumping of Russians and Putin together. What is it that Russia “always does”? Or “always been”?

John McClane

03-05-22, 09:41 AM

True. But while most of the Western world can see through Putin's lies right away, Putin does not intend to convince us. His propaganda is meant for Russians themselves.So basically what you’re saying is you want to spread misinformation that’s not even going to be seen by the people that need convincing? I hardly see how that helps. But eh, you do you.

I’m going to stick to pointing out the misinformation on both sides and let history speak for itself.

I’m just saying for someone who is so dead set against whataboutisms you seem to be whataboutisming an awful lot.

AgrippinaX

03-05-22, 09:47 AM

So basically what you’re saying is you want to spread misinformation that’s not even going to be seen by the people that need convincing? I hardly see how that helps. But eh, you do you.

I’m going to stick to pointing out the misinformation on both sides and let history speak for itself.

I’m just saying for someone who is so dead said against whataboutisms you seem to be whataboutisming an awful lot.

Yes, indeed.

John McClane

03-05-22, 10:04 AM

I also fail to see how a nation, who’s entire history has been predicated on fighting for independence for the last 100 years, needs their morale boosted. Those guys are more fired up than they’ve ever been. Western propaganda is not what they need. They need weapons; a lot more than we’ve already given them. They need food and water; a lot more than we’ve already given them. They need logistical training; a lot more than we’ve already given them. They do not need more misinformation. They are too busy fighting for their independence to be concerned with propaganda in their favor. They already know they are in the right because their history is written in facts and blood.

AgrippinaX

03-05-22, 10:12 AM

Those guys are more fired up than they’ve ever been. Western propaganda is not what they need... …They do not need more misinformation. They are too busy fighting for their independence to be concerned with propaganda in their favor.

Yup. On that note:

Elon Musk says Starlink won’t block Russian news sources ‘unless at gunpoint’

Elon Musk tweets he’s ‘sorry to be a free speech absolutist’

Thank you, Elon.

https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/elon-musk-starlink-russia-media-ukraine-b2029215.html

Mr Minio

03-05-22, 10:29 AM

Sure, it was all Hitler's fault. ;)

I'll abstain from posting in this thread for some time.

Flicker

03-05-22, 10:32 AM

It's absolutely true that the only (weak) advantage than any "good side" has in any context is truth. And that devaluing truth, for whatever reason, is always ultimately harmful to the "good side's" only anchor, its only compass, only recognizable trait. I'm always flaggerbasted when people can rely on misinformation, require it, yet continue picturing themselves as the good guys. It should be the alarm bell that makes you question your own side.

But that being said, manipulation and self-delusion is a complex topic, and drifting to exaggerations, half-truth or wishful thinking is easy to do for anyone, at various levels of complacency or self-awareness. And given that, there's a danger coming from the human mind's tendency to equalize quantities. Like, you learn there's 3% chances of A and 97% of B, your brain translates it as "there's a chance for A and a chance for B", which becomes more or less equal chances (in fact, it can even be reversed in some contexts, where your brain favors the underdog). You can see that process in discussions about climate change, covid vaccines, lotteries, migration, pseudo-sciences, etc. "Oh, see, two scientists out of thirty billions say that wearing a seatbelt under the full moon can induce cancer, so, it's still debated in the community, and if scientists disagree between each others then who's to say who's to say", "oh, see, petty crimes are mostly committed by poor ostracized people, and poor ostracized are often male members of a visible minority, therefore there's great chances for that male member of a visible minority to murder you in your sleep", "oh noes, this medicine has a 0,00004% rate of heavy side effects, are you trying to kill me", etc. And we're all victim of this bias depending on our weighted values, on what we consider acceptable or not (typically, I'm okay with taking a train to anywhere and I'm against nuclear plants - don't ask me to back this gut feeling with death statistics, I just forgive less a death by irradiation than a death by collision so it doesn't compute).

In this case here, the danger is that the (contextual) petty lies of the West/Ukraine get overblown in comparison with Russia's mass propaganda. It can be blown out of proportion through bad faith (Russian whataboutism) or through the mere effect of talking about it more (because Russian's is considered too obvious and goes without saying, or because ours is closer therefore easier to debunk, or because ours is our own responsibility and therefore requires our own vigilence all the more).

It's similar to socio-cultural self-criticism. As members of our own socioculture, we have a duty of being self-critical and make ourself progress towards more and more refined social justice, fairer inclusivity, more awareness of the symbolic violences and power differencials in our own blind spots. It's a never-ending quest for civilizational betterment, and it's a matter of perpetual tensions, self-accusation, reflexivity, and historiographical re-evaluations. It's good. But then, it's also used by less democratic societies to point our flaws. Which opens a door to two directions of whataboutism : "stop the self-hatred, those over there are worse anyway so we should feel satisfied with our to notch society" and "don't listen to their accusations, see how they admit that they're riddled with flaws anyway, they have no lesson to teach us". Transpose this to our media's relation to truth, and you see how our healthy self-criticism can be instrumented. It's like a debate between two politicians, where the clever, honest, hesitating one has lost in front of the gung-ho populist who never admits any doubt or any field of ignorance.

Ruthless rigor about truth is our most precious tool, and so is self-criticism. It just has to be kept in perspective. It doesn't mean any indulgence, it's way too precious and fragile for that (honesty is our only way out of human dilemmas and social conflicts). But we only have to be cautious, at a given time, not to let a twig's close up look equivalent to a distant trunk. Because false equivalences can have terrible consequences.

John McClane

03-05-22, 11:42 AM

Sure, it was all Hitler's fault. ;)
I fail to see how this is relevant. The only group pushing that narrative is Russian state media, and it isn’t even a primary reason for their invasion. It’s a one off in a long ending bombardment of misinformation.

Don’t bite the lure. Don’t entertain the falsehoods. Even jokingly, it serves to discredit the autonomy of Ukraine.

Flicker

03-05-22, 12:05 PM

INTERMISSION

85837

The reason of the strongest is always the best
We shall demonstrate it soon :

A lamb was quenching its thirst
In a stream of pure water
A wolf arrived, on an empty stomach
By hunger brought to the premises
« Who makes you so bold as to muddy my beverage
This animal said, full of rage
You will be punished for your temerity
- Sire, the lamb answers, may Your Majesty
Not get angry
But rather consider
That I'm quenching my thirst
More that twenty feel below Them
And that, by consequent, in no way
Can I muddy Their drink.
- You muddy it, repeated the cruel beast
And I know that you've spoken ill of me last year
- How could I if I wasn't born yet
The lamb retorted, I'm still suckling my mother
- If it's not you then it's your brother
- I don't have any - Then it's one of yours
For you hardly spare me, you, your shepherds and your dogs
I've been told so. I have to avenge myself. »
On this, to the deepest of the forest
The wolf takes it and eats it
Without any other form of trial.

- Jean de La Fontaine, 1668

Stirchley

03-07-22, 01:56 PM

85876
85877

These civilians are all dead. The only survivor is the small dog or cat in the carrier.

These photos just slayed me yesterday.

Stirchley

03-07-22, 01:59 PM

If anyone is looking at photos or footage, have you seen the beautiful white dog? Slightly larger than a lab, I would say. At first I thought he belonged to someone. Now I’m not so sure as I haven’t seen him on leash. He’s throughly enjoying himself running with the people & even wading through water.

Poor thing. Makes me so sad.

Mr Minio

03-07-22, 02:07 PM

Murdering people but leaving out dogs seems to be a thing with Russians.

There is footage of a father getting shot and the son recording him, taking cover. At the end of the video, the son seems to be shot too. A dog (presumably theirs) appears. Another video shows what happened next. The bodies of the father and the son lie in a ditch. The dog is still alive, sitting next to the bodies.

CringeFest

03-07-22, 02:18 PM

Captain Steel

03-07-22, 02:23 PM

Stirchley

03-07-22, 02:37 PM

Ukraine? What do I care? I have IBS and an endless list of things to do. If you disagree, then you are nothing but a thief.

If you don’t care, why do you keep posting in this thread?

Flicker

03-07-22, 03:19 PM

The best revenge is living well

85876

Sure they kept that in mind.

Yoda

03-07-22, 03:22 PM

Gonna close this thread until tomorrow.

Yoda

03-08-22, 02:34 PM

Okay, I'm reopening this thread, but in a very probationary sense, and with two notes:

First, please ensure that any disturbing photos are posted with spoiler tags. I would never allow someone to post gruesome injuries or pictures of dead bodies in most contexts. It's reasonable to bend or suspend that policy due to the real-world import of these events, but viewing them should still be something people get to choose to do, or not.

Second, please do not confuse the importance of the news with the importance of a thread about the news. This thread has no effect on the conflict, and whether it remains open or closed has no effect on your individual abilities to follow the news or express your opinion about it on a million other sites, most of which are more appropriate for that expression anyway.

Captain Steel

03-08-22, 03:46 PM

Opinion question: is Putin just pushing the envelope to see how far he can go and how much he can get away with while threatening the nuclear option (i.e. bluffing while he maneuvers) or is his threat real and can we or the world afford to call his bluff?

This seems to be the crux of most speculation and debate regarding the rest of the world coming to Ukraine's aid right now.

Flicker

03-08-22, 03:59 PM

Opinion question: is Putin just pushing the envelope to see how far he can go and how much he can get away with while threatening the nuclear option (i.e. bluffing while he maneuvers) or is his threat real and can we or the world afford to call his bluff?
He's demonstrated his willingness to crush innocent lives the most deliberately spectacular and damaging way (his intent is to traumatize Ukraine and the surrounding countries). And he knows his opponents would have qualms about it (if anything because their leaders require democratic support).

If anything he's the one wondering if they would retaliate to nuclear strikes or not.

Captain Steel

03-08-22, 04:35 PM

He's demonstrated his willingness to crush innocent lives the most deliberately spectacular and damaging way (his intent is to traumatize Ukraine and the surrounding countries). And he knows his opponents would have qualms about it (if anything because their leaders require democratic support).

If anything he's the one wondering if they would retaliate to nuclear strikes or not.

Well, that's the debate. It's virtually assured that if he launched a nuclear strike (at least against any NATO countries) he and his country would be obliterated in retaliation.

He and Russia overall is not really in any great immediate danger (outside of economic sanctions) by attacking Ukraine - apparently he can crush as many lives there as he wants without having to worry about his own life - the same could not be said if he launched a nuclear missile.

So, the question is: is he willing to risk his own destruction, or just bluffing to get as far as he can by holding the rest of the world hostage with a threat he's unwilling to carry out since carrying it out would mean forfeiting everything he has gained - including his country and his life?

Citizen Rules

03-08-22, 04:42 PM

Opinion question: is Putin just pushing the envelope to see how far he can go and how much he can get away with while threatening the nuclear option (i.e. bluffing while he maneuvers)

or is his threat real and can we or the world afford to call his bluff?...Can we afford not to call his bluff? In all seriousness if we belly under to him we'll teach Russia, China and N. Korea that fear and intimidation will let them get their way. That to me is the real risk.

Mr Minio

03-08-22, 04:46 PM

Opinion question: is Putin just pushing the envelope to see how far he can go and how much he can get away with while threatening the nuclear option (i.e. bluffing while he maneuvers) or is his threat real and can we or the world afford to call his bluff? Both. Putin's greatest weapon is fear. Putin and Russia, as a state, have been using fear in almost every element of their all-around actions in the past years. From threatening countries with nuclear missiles to trying to terrify Ukraine into submission at the very beginning of this year's war (needless to say, they failed) to using trolls from Olgino (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency) to spread pro-Russian and anti-Ukrainian fake news (e.g., spreading the news that Ukrainians in Poland are robbing stores and attacking Poles). If you instill fear and doubt in your adversary, it's much easier to control them. And it's easier to make them stop acting while you do whatever you want.

But Putin did lots of miscalculations in this war. First of all, Russia was prepared for a very short military operation. They quite literally expected Ukrainians to give up their country just like they did Crimea back in 2014. There are many factors in this, and to not get political, let's say there was still a lot of intimidation and wrong-doing on the Russian side during and before the annexation of Crimea anyway. But back to the point, Russian military strategy assumes that Russia has no business going into an offensive war if they do not have three times as many troops as their adversary. It is estimated that Russia gathered around 200,000 troops for this war. That's most likely less than Ukraine (no official data on that yet though), and not enough to take over a country that big, anyway. Unless... you actually expect the majority of the country to welcome you with flowers. Well, Ukrainians welcomed them with bullets instead, so there you have it. Another part of Russian military strategy is that in the first wave of the invasion you always send poorly-trained conscripts and obsolete military equipment to "feel" your enemy. After that, in the second wave, you send your 'real' powerful, trained, cutting-edge forces. Well, that's not what happened during this invasion. Some of the best and most modern stuff was thrown into Ukraine right away.

Why am I saying all this? Well, that's because Russia did a major f*ck up, and now they desperately try to save themselves. They try to pay Syrian War veterans to come and fight for Russia for some lousy 300$ a month. They transport some super-old tanks from Primorsky Krai (that's the other side of the country!). They come up or rather try to revive the old Soviet idea of penal battalions and whatnot. Putin done goofed and unless he's absolutely mad or a total idiot, he knows this (there's a whole different theory that his generals are afraid to tell him the truth so they sell him lies about Russia actually winning the war, etc.,). The issue with Putin knowing that he f*cked up is that he may have not much to lose. Some people in the Kremlin may want to overthrow him. If he gets desperate, there is no telling what he'd do. But... is that really true?

Putin's second-best weapon is the insanity bluff. The issue here is that it's very hard to tell a difference between a complete madman and an unrelenting butcher, and Putin can be either or even both. His strategy is to instill enough doubt and fear in both his allies and enemies so that they will not be willing to take the risk, whatever that risk is for each of these groups, respectively.

There was an alleged leak from the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Security_Service), in which the question of whether Putin would use a tactical nuclear missile was left as 'it's possible'. But this leak has never been confirmed (then again, why would Russia confirm their Security Service had a leak, LOL).

So yeah, there's no easy answer to your question. And this uncertainty is Putin's trump card.

So, the question is: is he willing to risk his own destruction? Nope. The question is are his subordinates willing to risk it? Nuclear weapons do not work the way you see them in films. Putin doesn't have a fancy suitcase with a red button hidden under his bed. Using nuclear missiles is a complicated process that goes through several people. Should just one of these people choose to object to the order, they could thwart the entire master plan. Putin can be as out of his mind as it gets and maybe he has nothing to lose, but his subordinates do have lots to lose. They have their families and whatnot, and even a slave has a breaking point at which they stop listening to their master and revolt.

Captain Steel

03-08-22, 05:13 PM

Can we afford not to call his bluff? In all seriousness if we belly under to him we'll teach Russia, China and N. Korea that fear and intimidation will let them get their way. That to me is the real risk.

Right - that's one argument. I call it the "bully" argument (as I heard one commentator say similar things): If you don't stand up to them now, then they will take their aggression to extremes, gaining confidence & power with each conquest - the only way to stop them is to "punch them in the nose" and, like most bullies, they'll back down once they realize someone as big as they are is not going to allow their bullying anymore.

However, I've heard other pundits argue that the U.S. & NATO cannot play Russian Roulette (literally) with the entire human species if Putin is mad enough to engage in nuclear war. In a card game maybe you can afford to lose a hand, but in this case, the stakes involved in calling a bluff are too high to even think about it.

As someone said in a movie once, "We're in this for the species, boys and girls."

Mr Minio

03-08-22, 05:35 PM

Right - that's one argument. I call it the "bully" argument (as I heard one commentator say similar things): If you don't stand up to them now, then they will take their aggression to extremes, gaining confidence & power with each conquest - the only way to stop them is to "punch them in the nose" and, like most bullies, they'll back down once they realize someone as big as they are is not going to allow their bullying anymore. The standing-up-to-a-bully argument loses a lot if not all of its strength with a country that has a nuclear arsenal. Look at the Bosnian War. Yep, the West helped, but that's because Serbia was fighting basically everybody around, AND they did not have nuclear weaponry. But Russia does. And that one detail makes it hard to help Ukraine in the most straightforward way possible. Well, basically what you said in the second part of your post.

But Ukraine used to have nuclear missiles! In 1991, Ukraine had the world's third-largest nuclear arsenal. Ukraine got rid of it in exchange for security guarantees included in the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances signed in 1994 by the United States, Russia, and Great Britain. Draw your own conclusions.

crumbsroom

03-08-22, 06:14 PM

My personal experience with the bully analogy is that whenever I stepped up to some kid on the playground or in the class room who was giving me a hard time, or one of my friends a hard time, in all but one instance I got the absolute snot kicked out of me. Sure, lots of bullies get away with their shit because they make threats and puff out their chest. But a lot of the time, they also have the muscle to back up what they are threatening.

Now, was that one instance of me bettering the bully a delicious delicious thing? Of course. But he was also a bully who was short, not very strong and was clearly all mouth. So basically the opposite of this situation where we can't be entirely sure exactly how much power Putin has behind his threats. Or how much he is willing to use. But it is certainly a lot more than the puny little skinhead who was giving me a hard time.

So, as popular as the story has become that all you need to do to best a bully is stand up to them and they will shrivel up like the true coward they are inside, the reality of this is it wasn't even true in the schoolyard. And so I'd hope we wouldn't extend this reasoning towards the possibility of a thermo-nuclear war.

John McClane

03-08-22, 07:05 PM

Unpopular opinion: Russia has more power than we give them credit. They have basically upended the entire world’s economy with their invasion. Arguably, even more so than COVID upended the world.*

Yes, Russia suffers a lot more than we do, but if you look at their history the country has a long never ending quagmire of painful suffering. Their populace is practically engrained with an immense capacity to endure pain, both spiritually and economically.

But just look at the results of this invasion: Americans are going to see record increasing prices across the board due to the funnel choke of an oil/coal/natural gas embargo, and Europe will see even greater price increases. Billion dollar companies have had to write off millions in assets to cut bait and run which, while a drop in the bucket, is still a painful blow to western interests.

So to answer Captain Steel’s question, I think Putin’s agenda is to see how long he can squeeze the world economy. He is quite possibly thinking that Americans, specifically, will crack under the weight of our economic increases and demand inaction of our leaders to soothe the pain on our wallets. I, for one, am in an entirely new precarious position going forward and financially unprepared for the hardships the world is about to face. Nonetheless, I will never give Russia the satisfaction of demanding inaction of my leaders and will continue to stand with Ukraine’s interests. No matter the effects it has on my life because it pales in comparison to those who are fighting for their very lives.

Mr Minio

03-09-22, 10:49 AM

Free Movie

Netflix has uploaded an Oscar-nominated documentary film Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom to their YouTube channel. You can watch it FOR FREE.

https://youtu.be/yzNxLzFfR5w

Recommended.

Sedai

03-09-22, 02:06 PM

Russia doubled its gas and oil production and also doubled its energy output by nuclear power plants, while Europe cut all of the same stuff.

Whoops!

AgrippinaX

03-09-22, 03:25 PM

Russia doubled its gas and oil production and also doubled its energy output by nuclear power plants, while Europe cut all of the same stuff.

Whoops!

Yes, because Europe is being all green and conscientious.

Flicker

03-09-22, 03:32 PM

AgrippinaX

03-09-22, 03:37 PM

Sanctions against Russia. Coca, Pepsi, MacDonald, Philip Morris are pulling out of the country. I don't know anymore if we're trying to punish Putin or bribe him. :|

"Oh shit why are their soldiers so much healthier than ours, all of a sudden ?"

I’m genuinely interested if any spin doctors will try to sell that side of things. “Right, we’re going back to salads and kefir.” :lol:

cricket

03-09-22, 07:50 PM

My company is suddenly selling a crazy amount of vodka from Ukraine. I teased my bosses that they were taking advantage of mass suffering, but every little bit helps.

Flicker

03-09-22, 09:18 PM

Captain Steel

03-09-22, 10:04 PM

I'm more ill at ease with the profit that the armament industry makes through the weapons that have to be sent to help Ukraine (and those, of course, that also get richer by the minute on Russia's side - I don't even exclude some little modern Zaharoffs rubbing their hands while playing both sides).

Speaking of which, I find the polish MIGs fiasco infuriating. The West is already providing weapons of all kinds, but planes are out of the question because they'd have to be flown over there instead of rolled ? Casus belli because they can't find cardboards and pink ribbons large enough to make it legit ? I know "diplomacy" is a war of bad faith, but the cause-and-effect here seems ridiculous. So much hinging on protocol.

Some speculation says we shouldn't worry about triggering Putin because we've already triggered him in dozens of ways, yet he hasn't responded to any other major powers.

As you point out - what's the big difference in supplying tanks or planes? And what are Putin's "red lines" that would cause him to go "nuclear"? Tanks he's okay with, but planes would mean Armageddon?

Some view these nebulous standards from Russia as game playing - and thus feel we should call Putin's bluff. Still, other's say the stakes are too high.

Mr Minio

03-10-22, 02:30 AM

Planes are primarily thought of as offensive weapons. Plus, they would have to take off from an airfield situated in another country, which means it would be easier to accuse the country the planes took off from for actually waging offensive war against Russia. It wouldn't matter the pilots were Ukrainian.

Stingers and other weapons for infantry are simply given to Ukraine. They are transported across the border but are picked up and used only on the Ukrainian side.

There's a significant difference.

It's hard to transport so many planes on land. It's easy to spot these planes, and Russians can simply bomb them. It wouldn't make sense to lose most of them before they even got used.

Flicker

03-10-22, 06:42 AM

There's a significant difference.
That's a bit where I disagree. It's an insignificant difference that is blown out of proportion because of a bad faithed troll armed with nukes who can play on words at will.

As far as I know, the West isn't providing tanks to Ukraine. If they did, would it be okay because they travel by road ? Would it require a change of drivers at the frontier ? The West is providing D-30s howitzers to Ukraine, is it okay because they are not self-propelled therefore transported-and-picked-up ? Would a self-propelled howitzer crossing the frontier be an act of war ? Because that would make it more "offensive" than machine guns, whereas it was less when it was towed ?

Wherever that line, it is absurd. There's certainly some available -and ridiculous- gymnastics to transfer planes while keeping within these lines (hey, make them take off on a border crossing point's highway, but make sure the wheel leaves the ground at the right spot because 2 centimetres too soon makes is a national assault), which, again, would be a puerile play on classifications and mental categories (it counts - no it doesn't - it does too), in order to satisfy a madman's arbitrary interpretations while still openly opposing him.

Really, this is all just embarrassing, hypocritical, absurdist and cowardly. And people die of these wordplays.

xSookieStackhouse

03-10-22, 07:11 AM

its soo upsetting :( i wish they would have peace

Mr Minio

03-10-22, 09:10 AM

That's a bit where I disagree. It's an insignificant difference that is blown out of proportion because of a bad faithed troll armed with nukes who can play on words at will. Well, if Poland allowed these jets to take off from Polish airfields, Russia would have a good reason to call Poland an aggressor and declare war on Poland. And NATO would have a good reason to not come to Poland's help and retreat all their troops stationing in Poland to Germany. NATO's Article 5 is a defensive pact, so if NATO agreed that Poland was an aggressor, Poland would be left alone to fight Russia along with Ukraine, which would inevitably lead to the country's destruction.

Poland had a different idea: Let's transport the MiG-29 jets to the American base in Germany, and swap them for F-16 while we're at it, ergo let the nuclear power America handle the matter. Russia would be much more afraid to declare war on the power that the US is. All of a sudden, however, Americans lost their enthusiasm and called this untenable.

The US and UK openly said it's OK for Poland to give Ukraine their jets, but they will be doing it at their own risk. Even if NATO would come to Poland's help in such a scenario, that would escalate the conflict and make NATO join the war, which they try to avoid like fire.

The biggest f*ck up here was that talks about handling over jets should have been clandestine. But somebody done goofed and now everybody knows about it, so my guess is NATO countries are now trying to create one big clusterf*ck ballyhoo around the entire matter to make people confused. Russia will get confused, too, and then other countries may use the turmoil to give some help to Ukraine (jets or other) under the hood.

AgrippinaX

03-10-22, 11:41 AM

Re: Criticizing the one-sidedness of media

It's clear who is the aggressor in this war. Criticizing the one-sidedness of media makes it harder to know whether the person who does that does it in good faith or is merely a shill. Once again, widely criticizing one side helps the other side. Yes, the media is one-sided in this conflict, but there are at least two reasons for that:

More info about casualties of one side than casualties of the other side helps boost and lower morale of the first and second sides, respectively. Official kill counts are either exaggerated or underestimated to either boost morale or try and hide the true incompetence of the army
Spreading propaganda helps the information war both countries are waging at the moment. Proliferating propaganda of the side you support helps this side, even if only by boosting the morale of its army.

The propaganda of exaggeration is not nearly as heinous as the propaganda of clandestine silencing.

Just read this:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/03/telegram-russian-war-dead-ukraine-pows/

There’s also this, can’t find a non-Apple News link just now: Ukraine’s treatment of prisoners of war raises questions

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/09/ukraine-russia-prisoners-pows/

The best thing being, this has apparently been the case for years (the below is from 2015):

https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/20/ukraine-russia-pow-video-war-crimes

The way I see it, there’s been a fair share of silencing, clandestine or not, of Ukrainians doing this/abusing human rights (yes, it’s less serious than murdering civilians, but still).

The one-sidedness of the media matters because during a war both sides will stoop as low as needed, and to exonerate one side but not the other will breed resentment and, more importantly, let third parties/outside actors eg China or whatnot draw their own conclusions on how “fair” and “balanced” and “objective” the so-called West is. This is less about the lynching of Black people point and more about the fact that Ukrainians (or probably any community in a war-like situation) have also been fighting dirty long before this.

The one-sidedness of the media that continues to emphasise Russian losses and minimise those of Ukraine, among other things, makes it appear as though Ukraine/its people are somehow objectively “better”/“more worthy” than the Russian side, and narratives such as below and many others the media is conveniently ignoring is hiding that fact from the less discerning consumer.

This is where the “lynching” argument obviously comes in, and I’m not saying that Ukraine abusing human rights excuses Russia’s doing so, but I do think it’s the media’s job to highlight all these instances equally and shed equal light on them, showing no preference. Seeing as, as it is, the western media much prefers spreading the images of Ukrainian ladies welcoming a Russian soldier with “bread and salt” and letting him call his mum, not so much this POW stuff.

So what was that about clandestine silencing?

Yoda

03-10-22, 11:54 AM

I'm closing this for a day again. EDIT: gonna reopen MondayTuesday.

Pretty sure the only way this thread is going to be able to stay open is if it's to discuss the general facts on the ground. If used to litigate media coverage there's almost no chance it's not going to devolve into something ugly.

Yoda

03-15-22, 10:31 AM

I'm re-opening this now.

I would very much like anyone thinking about participating to make sure they've read this post (https://www.movieforums.com/community/showthread.php?anchor=1&p=2287371#post2287371), however. Nothing we say here will change or even improve this event as it unfolds. We are following history together, not making it. So it is simply irrational to take any anger about it (however justified) and transfer it onto any exchange here. There are also, I will remind everyone, quite literally a million other places to talk about this, most of them more suited to the task.

I would very much like not to have to close this thread (permanently the next time, I expect), but I absolutely will if the discussion keeps veering into personally-directed anger, sarcasm, or even just branching off into meta commentary about media coverage.

Mr Minio

03-15-22, 11:26 AM

I give this thread a week.

Anyway, the number of Ukrainian refugees in Poland is approaching 2 million. This means that Poland now hosts one of the biggest refugee populations in the world. We're getting overwhelmed. Of course, we are never going to turn people away. Polish families started accepting Ukrainians into their homes. But we cannot improvise anymore. We need to set up relocation centers. Other countries could help, too. Looks like nobody's prepared for that surge of migrants coming from war-torn Ukraine.

John McClane

03-15-22, 11:55 AM

Sedai

03-15-22, 12:02 PM

Out of all the news reports I've heard I have tried to distance myself emotionally because I am pretty emotional as it is, but I listened to a report on NPR this morning about a family that sent their daughter west because they didn't want her to be buried alive if the shelter got hit. That tore me up.

Yea, it's too much to take, really. I know it's crass on a certain level to just put my head in the sand, but I can only focus so much on current global events before it starts to wear me down, so I just turn it off and go about my day.

Mr Minio

03-15-22, 12:58 PM

before it starts to wear me down Understandable. Please take care of your mental health, give yourself a breath, take a break for a few days, if not a few weeks. Your happiness and well-being should come first. Even rescuers say that their safety comes first before they start saving others.

crumbsroom

03-15-22, 01:10 PM

Video of an astonishing band from Kyiv. It isn't filled with bombs and death to illustrate a point, but does more than enough to put a human face to the people and culture that is under attack.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsNKSbTNd5I

Mesmerized

03-15-22, 01:35 PM

The End Times are coming and this could be it. Or maybe not. One thing is certain is that it will happen eventually. It's just a matter of when.

For people of faith,

"Forgive your enemies. Through you and the blood of the martyrs will come the conversion of Russia. Repent and love one another. The times are coming which have been foretold as being those in the end times. See the desolation which surrounds the world, the sins, the sloth, the genocide. Pray for Russia. Oppression and wars continue to occupy the minds and hearts of many people. Russia, despite everything, continues to deny my Son. Russia rejects real life and continues to live in darkness. If there is not a return of Christianity to Russia, there will be a third world war and the whole world faces ruin."

- From a 1987 apparition of the Virgin Mary in Hrushiv, Ukraine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMi6iKhgdpI

Much prayer is needed.

Yoda

03-15-22, 01:58 PM

Understandable. Please take care of your mental health, give yourself a breath, take a break for a few days, if not a few weeks. Your happiness and well-being should come first. Even rescuers say that their safety comes first before they start saving others.
Really want to echo this.

I'll add to it, as well: a lot of people seem to feel an obligation to "keep up" with the news, as if it's some kind of ethical obligation. I don't think it is. Self-governing societies probably benefit from their citizens being moderately knowledgeable, but I think that relationship is tenuous and mixed, and I doubt compulsively doomscrolling things half a world away is at the optimal point in that curve.

I think it's particularly insidious because following these things closely (and arguing about them, which seems to correlate quite a bit) creates a false feeling of productivity, if not a false feeling of agency over a conflict we're pretty much just powerless observers of.

I think it's good for us as a community and good for us as individuals to maintain distance and perspective as to what our role our observation and discussion actually play here, and the degree to which our focus and intensity is sometimes just a form of coping.

Sedai

03-15-22, 02:06 PM

I think it's particularly insidious because following these things closely (and arguing about them, which seems to correlate quite a bit) creates a false feeling of productivity, if not a false feeling of agency over a conflict we're pretty much just powerless observers of.

Excellent point.

For the record, I am fine. :)

Obviously, with a toddler in the picture, I do feel the weight of these things more than I used to, but for now, we are just doing our thing, having fun with the wee lass!

Stay safe out there, everyone.

Corax

03-15-22, 02:10 PM

One development to pay attention to is that three leaders of three NATO countries are headed to Kyiv. (https://www.newsweek.com/nato-leaders-stray-russia-crosshairs-high-risk-kyiv-trip-poland-slovenia-czechia-1688075)

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, and Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa said they will meet with Zelensky (https://www.newsweek.com/zelensky-ukraine-russia-war-troops-appeal-direct-1687999) and his Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal in Kyiv on Tuesday

We're one stray bullet or bomb away from a Prime Minister of a NATO country being killed.

Citizen Rules

03-15-22, 02:21 PM

I don't watch the news. I don't have TV service and if I did it would just stress me. I do try and read a bit on the internet about the Ukraine war but finding current information with a search engine isn't always as easy and reliable as it should be...

So I have a question for anyone who has been keeping up on the latest developments: I'd like to know what the U.S. and the west is currently doing to help end the war in Ukraine? What actions are we taking right now and what is planned for the near future? I know about the economic sanctions and stinger missiles.

If you chose to answer please don't include opining. I just want to know what is currently being done and planned for the near future regarding the war in Ukraine. Thanks

Sedai

03-15-22, 03:12 PM

One development to pay attention to is that three leaders of three NATO countries are headed to Kyiv. (https://www.newsweek.com/nato-leaders-stray-russia-crosshairs-high-risk-kyiv-trip-poland-slovenia-czechia-1688075)

We're one stray bullet or bomb away from a Prime Minister of a NATO country being killed.

I wonder if it is subterfuge, while the leaders actually meet somewhere else...

Corax

03-15-22, 03:17 PM

I wonder if it is subterfuge, while the leaders actually meet somewhere else...

If they're in Ukraine and the Russians have no idea where they are, that's arguably even worse. We're still one stray bullet or bomb or missile from a NATO Prime Minister being killed. That would basically suck NATO in to Ukraine and we're off to the races. War for real, not by proxy.

Guaporense

03-15-22, 07:34 PM

If they're in Ukraine and the Russians have no idea where they are, that's arguably even worse. We're still one stray bullet or bomb or missile from a NATO Prime Minister being killed. That would basically suck NATO in to Ukraine and we're off to the races. War for real, not by proxy.

That sounds so much like the trigger for WW1: as back in 1914 it was the assassination of someone important triggered WW1.

I hope that NATO keeps their heads cool. Russia is determined to take Ukraine by force (the ressurrection of the Russian Empire is Putin's dream and his approval ratings have increased since he ordered the invasion), so the best I can hope for is that NATO stays in the sidelines and either the Russians give up after heroic Ukrainian resistance or that Ukraine surrender to Russia's demands.

Captain Steel

03-15-22, 09:32 PM

IMO, there seems to be only 2 solutions at this point:

1.) Just let Putin continue his massacre and take Ukraine at the cost of millions of lives - which seems to be the prevailing strategy by everyone except Ukraine itself, as sanctions amount to no more than a joke to Putin and measures of deterrence have already failed miserably.

2.) Or form a U.N. coalition to stop Russia with an armed force on the ground, in the sea and in the air... identified with no flag except the U.N. flag (or some sort of global coalition flag; doesn't necessarily have to be called the U.N. or associated with it - it could be an entirely new Allied force consisting of all the countries that voted to condemn Russia) - it would preferably have to be led by non-NATO countries, but would require the participation of all that voted to condemn Russia.

The message to Putin would have to be: stop now, or else take on 144 countries. i.e. You against the world.

Until the countries of the world are willing to come together and present a united front of absolute force, then the massacre will continue (or practically ensure nuclear Armageddon if NATO countries alone attack Russian forces to defend Ukraine).

There is no guarantee against nuclear war with any scenario, but action by NATO alone raises that risk, whereas a united world front might lower it because Putin would have to be willing and able to obliterate the entire world, not just his enemies in NATO.

Citizen Rules

03-15-22, 10:41 PM

The UN solution you mentioned would be nice, but won't happen. It's not even feasible with Russia on the security council and most UN nations not wanting to get involved in the conflict.

I predict Russia wins, they get Ukraine...Then China who's patiently watching this chess match and learning, will take Taiwan in a near bloodless military action, North Korea will become more belligerent. The world becomes more dangerous as bullies with nuclear arsenals learn they can get anything with the threat of nukes...and the U.S. will join Britain as a once powerful nation.

Corax

03-16-22, 12:08 AM

Mr Minio

03-16-22, 03:27 AM

Whoever wins this war, it's going to be a Pyrrhic victory.

Flicker

03-16-22, 08:15 AM

The way it's heading, it looks like a guy beating his ex-wife to a pulp until she promises she won't marry any other person. The onlookers try to protect her without offending the guy ("hey take this mouth guard i had in my pocket, need a plaster too or is it too soon ?") all while asking her to abide with the guy's demand ("anyway we wouldn't have married you, you know, come on, you can promise him, it's not such a big cost for not being killed").

There's progress in the negotiation towards a neutral status and the promise to never join NATO. Yay. Win-win. Russia doesn't conquer other countries, merely bombs them and slaughters them until they take the political decisions he prefers.

That said, I unfortunately disagree with Yoda's perspective. It's not actually an outside, unrelated thing. Everything is collective, everything is produced and enabled by cultural currents, by mankind, by people. It's what defines the thinkable and the do-able. Putin -or more exactly Putin's power- is sustained by the values he incarnates and their popular support, which nowadays goes through global validation. It's a slow process, it's a very high inertia process, it's a complex, chaotic process (like various streams of diverse colors and temperatures colliding in a fluid), but we're all its constituting molecules. We all exert pressures on ideas, closely, remotely, directly, indirectly, on a vast continuum.

And the admiration that Putin benefited from, worldwide, fed itself. His national support was also international, comforted by remote interactions, feedback, praises - heck, even the elections of leaders considering him a model. As for many things (such as global ecology), individual responsibilities are impalpable, too diffuse, but they are what, together, shape concrete realities on all scales. Dismissing the infinitesimal factors is like dismissing an individual vote in an election because it changes nothing by itself.

But it's convenient. For oneself (the freedom of not feeling co-responsible for the world) and for communities (let's not endanger our nice valued cohesion over such petty details). So of course, a forum's very existence depends on this perspective.

But it's a fallacy. One of the many fallacies that we're forced to sustain in order to function in everyday life. That forgiving veil covers a much uglier and awkward reality.

For Yoda's sake, let's keep playing pretend. But some of us do it knowingly.

Yoda

03-16-22, 11:40 AM

That said, I unfortunately disagree with Yoda's perspective. It's not actually an outside, unrelated thing. Everything is collective, everything is produced and enabled by cultural currents, by mankind, by people.
All of which is true, but none of which really disagrees with what I'm saying, and to be honest almost feels like a willful misunderstanding of it.

That "everything is produced and enabled by cultural currents" is technically true, but not a contradiction. Saying you can trace everything back to culture does not imply that you can trace everything back to our culture, let alone a particular sliver of it. And even if you could, it would still not follow that we have that influence now, at this point in the conflict, so at most the venting and arguing about the situation now could be said to maybe possibly indirectly contribute to some future conflict. So yes, it is clearly on the outside; the advocacy to freely argue about barn doors doesn't retrieve the last horse.

It's what defines the thinkable and the do-able. Putin -or more exactly Putin's power- is sustained by the values he incarnates and their popular support, which nowadays goes through global validation. It's a slow process, it's a very high inertia process, it's a complex, chaotic process (like various streams of diverse colors and temperatures colliding in a fluid), but we're all its constituting molecules. We all exert pressures on ideas, closely, remotely, directly, indirectly, on a vast continuum.
"Goes through global validation" sounds like rhetorical laundering, some process our opinions pass through that render them more meaningful. We're part of the globe, there is some global opinion which exerts some influence, ergo we influence the war, ergo why can't I lay into this stupid guy I hate on this movie forum.

Here's my question: what doesn't this apply to? If everything is downstream of culture, doesn't that mean every topic can be defended this way? Once we discard distinctions based on both size of influence and direct/indirect, I see no limiting principle. Why can't I say, using the same logic, that a bitter argument about Liz Phair's Exile in Guyville is part of achieving gender parity in the Middle East, and if someone won't let me they're not taking that issue seriously enough?

And the admiration that Putin benefited from, worldwide, fed itself. His national support was also international, comforted by remote interactions, feedback, praises - heck, even the elections of leaders considering him a model. As for many things (such as global ecology), individual responsibilities are impalpable, too diffuse, but they are what, together, shape concrete realities on all scales.
True, but individual responsibilities have chokepoints around things like elections, and between those chokepoints many of them are swamped.

Dismissing the infinitesimal factors is like dismissing an individual vote in an election because it changes nothing by itself.
This is exactly the analogy I was going to use, actually. But it's not like dismissing one vote, it's like dismissing the value of arguing about one vote, on the internet, after the polls have closed.

But it's convenient. For oneself (the freedom of not feeling co-responsible for the world) and for communities (let's not endanger our nice valued cohesion over such petty details). So of course, a forum's very existence depends on this perspective.
It also depends on the members not despising each other and carrying grudges from thread to thread.

If you think I have some delusion (or even eventual expectation of) "cohesion," then we're not on the same page at all. The people constantly bristling at the rules they don't like sees to that all by itself. Nor have I advocated people simply stop caring about the state of the world. In fact, I went out of my way to preemptively nod to some of the relationships you're talking about:

please do not confuse the importance of the news with the importance of a thread about the news. This thread has no effect on the conflict, and whether it remains open or closed has no effect on your individual abilities to follow the news or express your opinion about it on a million other sites, most of which are more appropriate for that expression anyway.

Self-governing societies probably benefit from their citizens being moderately knowledgeable, but I think that relationship is tenuous and mixed, and I doubt compulsively doomscrolling things half a world away is at the optimal point in that curve.

maintain distance and perspective as to what our role our observation and discussion actually play here

Nothing we say here will change or even improve this event as it unfolds. We are following history together, not making it.

Note the phrasing: no effect on "the conflict." "This event." Noting a relationship in self-governing societies even though it is "tenuous and mixed." Noting there is some optimal point in the curve (which, by itself, is obviously a rebuke of either extreme). Nothing here implies that culture has no relationship to world events, and for a very good reason: because I don't believe that.

But it's a fallacy. One of the many fallacies that we're forced to sustain in order to function in everyday life. That forgiving veil covers a much uglier and awkward reality.
The fallacy is that we would change that ugly and awkward reality if only we could confront it on your forum, etc. Let's forget the layers and filters between our trickles of culture and world events. Let's concede their importance totally: even then, there is still the assumption that arguing about something here will produce better "culture" in any particular instance. I'd have thought the last few years would have obliterated that notion. It certainly isn't something that can be assumed.

Or, put another way: have you ever decided a given argument was not worthwhile? If so, why, in light of all these downstream effects? Whatever your answer is, you'll probably find it similar to my answer as to why any particular thread should be closed. You'll probably find a subjective difference (or maybe one in degree), and not a total one.

Stirchley

03-16-22, 02:20 PM

...and the U.S. will join Britain as a once powerful nation.

Which country are you defining as “once powerful”? Better not be the UK. :mad:

Wyldesyde19

03-16-22, 02:27 PM

Which country are you defining as “once powerful”? Better not be the UK. :mad:
Haha. I think he means before the revolution.

Stirchley

03-16-22, 02:29 PM

Tragic how this woman was mortally wounded during the maternity hospital bombing. Her baby born dead & she later passed too.

86071

Stirchley

03-16-22, 02:30 PM

Haha. I think he means before the revolution.

The Industrial Revolution? :p

Citizen Rules

03-16-22, 04:45 PM

Which country are you defining as “once powerful”? Better not be the UK. :mad:Yes Britain. (Why the angry face?)

At one time the British empire spread across the globe. There was a slogan, 'The sun never set on the Union Jack'. But after WWII the world power Britain once was faded to second tier and that's where America is at too.

AgrippinaX

03-16-22, 04:53 PM

Which country are you defining as “once powerful”? Better not be the UK. :mad:

I agree, but this is a very common sentiment.

Yoda

03-16-22, 05:26 PM

I took the frownie face to be kind of in jest, FWIW.

ynwtf

03-16-22, 05:31 PM

I read that as fweh-ehw. On this, I think we can all agree and come together as One Forum, One Fweh-ehw. This might even be a line from The Princess Bride, prophesying our peace. I'm not sure though.

Corax

03-16-22, 05:41 PM

Tragic how this woman was mortally wounded during the maternity hospital bombing. Her baby born dead & she later passed too.

https://www.movieforums.com/community/attachment.php?attachmentid=86071

I wonder how many images citizens of other nations should have to contemplate at length because of their blasé, ignorant, or totally oblivious response to the foreign adventuring of their own governments. I wonder how many people hate me simply for being American and I wonder how much cause they have. Am I absolved because I am powerless to change the course of foreign policy? Is there blood on my hands because it was done in my name by my "representatives"? I have never protested a war, at least not with a sign on any street in any place that could have resulted in me being arrested. I have kept quiet and minded my own business, privately expressing with my friends. I have only railed righteously semi-anonymously on forums like this (how courageous?). How many were killed in America's adventures in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other nations in the global War on Terror? This source (https://www.ippnw.de/commonFiles/pdfs/Frieden/Body_Count_first_international_edition_2015_final.pdf)puts it at, at least, one million people. I can't wrap my head around that or maybe I just don't want to? At the very least, we have to start having the conversation (not here, but with family, friends, and colleagues) and we have to start making war a priority at the ballot box. For every picture like this that Russians should have to see coming out of Ukraine (and they should see them), there is another picture I should have to see.

Stirchley

03-16-22, 06:19 PM

Yes Britain. (Why the angry face?)

At one time the British empire spread across the globe. There was a slogan, 'The sun never set on the Union Jack'. But after WWII the world power Britain once was faded to second tier and that's where America is at too.

Winding you up. Changed it from a smiling face. :D

I took the frownie face to be kind of in jest, FWIW.

Totally. Winding up CR for his hurtful comments about the British Empire. “Second tier”? How dare he.

I agree, but this is a very common sentiment.

Just having a laugh with CR. :p

Stirchley

03-16-22, 06:20 PM

86076

I never saw a country at war that cared so much for its pets.

Citizen Rules

03-16-22, 06:25 PM

Winding you up. Changed it from a smiling face. :D

Totally. Winding up CR for his hurtful comments about the British Empire. “Second tier”? How dare he.

Just having a laugh with CR. :pGot it:)

Flicker

03-16-22, 10:07 PM

Saying you can trace everything back to culture does not imply that you can trace everything back to our culture, let alone a particular sliver of it. And even if you could, it would still not follow that we have that influence now, at this point in the conflict, so at most the venting and arguing about the situation now could be said to maybe possibly indirectly contribute to some future conflict.
Indeed, there is no causality between what we're typing here right now and what is happening now in Ukraine. In that sense, it has "no effect on the conflict". However :

1) Yes, I do relate remote world events to "our culture" in the sense that I relate them to the global cultural ecosystem as a whole, of which "our" (whose?) "culture" is a part. Pragmatically, a person can vote for Putin partly because "even the USA" elect Trump or because "even his US gamer community" praises Putin as the saviour-of-white-schlong. We're all each others peers, nowadays (to varying degrees : a very closed full dictatorship à la North Corea isn't affected by global discussions to the same degree as a free speech liberal democracy, and Russia is somewhere in-between). In fact, Trump's election did also bolster extreme-right votes in many unrelated countries. And cultural sociopolitical currents à la #metoo or #gamergate do affect public debates and cultural sensitivities throughout the world. Money wouldn't be invested in troll farms without these causalities.

2) So many things have long term effects, you could prevent any action by using its lack of immediate result to delegitimize it. "It's not our fault anymore" skips directly to "the consequences would be too far later". The choice of focusing on immediacy is, itself, a convenient way to escape the notion of interconnection and responsibility. Again, as I said, there are practical reasons to escape these notions (forum cohesion), but it's a little cheat. And it hides the fact that today's Putin has been (partly, indirectly) the consequence of decades of international praise, and that tomorrow's putinoïds are the consequences of the same values being still fetishized. For me, the shame of Ukraine's war is also carried by remote admirers of Putin and of what he represents, and so is the responsibility for future manifestations of (geo)political True Manhood™. And this doesn't leave my eyes when I look at people around me. But I know that they'd never feel shame for it. The 20th century was full of mutual admiration (and more than that : emulation !) between different autocrats promoting the same values, and the praised turned to hostility when the geopolitical ambitions started competing. "They're our broth... wait, down with these guys, we have nothing in common !".

Here's my question: what doesn't this apply to? If everything is downstream of culture, doesn't that mean every topic can be defended this way? Once we discard distinctions based on both size of influence and direct/indirect, I see no limiting principle. Why can I say, using the same logic, that a bitter argument about Liz Phair's Exile in Guyville is part of achieving gender parity in the Middle East?
In a way it does. Feminist movements in Middle East, even though their forms and priorities differ from western feminism, are not unrelated to the models displayed in Europe or the USA. As I said above, there are variations depending on the scales of public discourses and the permeability of a given culture (I wouldn't equal a confidential argument about Liz Phair to a broad public dispute on social networks, also different societies engage with global/foreign debates to varying degrees). But such debates shape dominant mainstream values, and dominant mainstream values color the world. They form consensuses that are referred to in various countries, through various forms of diffusionism. The world tends to frown, nowadays, on black slave trade or native american genocides, and that stems from individual actions, discussions, interrogations, debates, elections, jurisprudence, etc. And this, already way before the popularity of online international arguments. Ideas and worldviews travel.

There are few things that it wouldn't apply to. Abortion rights are currently the stake of geopolitical domino games, where the pieces get pushed by local public debates, and shifting senses of normalcy. What affects public worldviews affects policies, and in turn these affects other countries discourses (political discourses are full of "see what happens over there" and "but we would be the only ones to").

but individual responsibilities have chokepoints around things like elections, and between those chokepoints many of them are swamped.
Elections are the expression of public sentiments, and public sentiments are formed through ordinary interactions throughout the years. A racist being elected or not is less the effect of a vote being cast than the effect of years hearing from peers that racism is or isn't okay (and I mean racism as the content, not as the label). Votes used to give punctual visibility to dominant values, now these are permanently visible on the internet.

If you think I have some delusion (or even eventual expectation of) "cohesion," then we're not on the same page at all.
You actually do have cohesion, and you have a requirement of cohesion. If the forum started bursting into full scale open hatred it simply wouldn't be a forum, it wouldn't be controllable at all. And the same goes with society : you wouldn't be able to go buy bread if you knew everyone's opinions and deeds and realized the continuity between their opinions and the actual practical real-life sufferings that result from them. These are realities we sweep under the carpet. We keep out of sight the death of homeless people, we hide asylum seekers in remote camps or drown them in the sea, we live off bombings and starvation, we deprive gender-atypical people from their own lives and identities, we scorch the Earth, and it's all remote abstractions and lolz down the chain of votes, policies and everyday attitudes. Bring up these ghosts, show who gloat or pride themselves for their own indifference, and you've got a society of cynical monsters you're supposed to be polite with, far from the screams, gurgles and suicides they cheer for. Civility becomes impossible, or even obscene. So we mask it all. We don't think of it. It's simply a necessity of life. We can't afford newton balls to bring back our consequences. And on internet forums, it means that those who are for or against bombs being dropped on a village have to get along in the name of their hobby, as this is more important to their lives than children being burned alive ("come on we won't ruin the friendly atmosphere over mere differences of opinion").

And frankly, your job is quite easy here, compared to places where discussions are about whether ukrainians deserve the bombs. There's actually a vague local consensus on this. My gripe is about more remote, abstract elements (the deniability of indirect responsibility/complicity about events - events which themselves are, at least, deplored and disowned).

So yes, in practice, there is a maintained cohesion on this forum. What would be profound antagonisms are actually vastly put aside, in this forum's day-to-day activities.

(Also, I don't really see people "bristle" at the rules. Not even me. I admit their necessity while feeling bitter about what it shows and hides about mankind.)

The fallacy is that we would change that ugly and awkward reality if only we could confront it on your forum, etc. Let's forget the layers and filters between our trickles of culture and world events. Let's concede their importance totally: even then, there is still the assumption that arguing about something here will produce better "culture" in any particular instance. I'd have thought the last few years would have obliterated that notion. It certainly isn't something that can be assumed.

Indeed, I doubt that a political flamewar would change anything. But not because of how remote (in time, scale, space) it is from the consequences : again, this is the voting fallacy but upstream. Sensitivities are shaped by everyday discussions and mirrored attitudes, by values circulations, by subcultural normativities - votes are just the end result of it. But it would be pointless because flamewars are sterile clashes of void rhetorical violence. It would bring the forum down without changing anyone's opinion (on the plus side, it would shatter an impression of tacit assent, on the minus side it would only polarize over-invested postures construed as core identities). In this zero-sum context, skipping the whole mess probably brings a same result at a reduced cost. And as I said, the shame that I'd consider legitimate from Putin fans (or ex-Putin fans), the reconsideration of values that should stem from it, would certainly never occur : there are too many cognitive devices shielding people from it.

But I disagree about the rationale for these rules. I disagree about this idea that words on a forum are disconnected from world events, and that places where a dominant consensus go one way or the other play no role. I think that a community being defined by one consensus (one way or the other) plays a role as a jigsaw piece in the vast mosaic of global public discussions. There is, currently, a dominant consensus in the western world about the illegitimacy of Putin's invasion. This has an impact very different from the one that the opposite consensus would have. It legitimizes and encourages ukrainian resistance ("the world is with us") and it opens a potential window of doubt for russians who access it ("woah, the world sees us as the baddies there"). Ukraine feeling let down by the world's consensus, warmongering Russians feeling vindicated by the whole planet, would shift political attitudes -slightly or dramatically- differently there and there. And this consensus is an ocean of droplet (with a dominant color). The same could go for many things that are unfortunately less consensual.

I'm not promoting this or that forum policy. I'm pointing at the fictions it preserves, and why it needs to preserve it. I think it has reasons to be, and I think it has also rationalization that go beyond these reasons. My point is simply to lift the carpet's corner, point at what we hide, and why we hide it, and drop it. We hide it because discussing our responsibilities would be too costly. But letting the question aside on these forums, considering it off topic", is different from claiming "hey, anyway nothing of it is related to anyone from us here, we're too far and too small". This is, itself, a specific stance, an opinion left above the carpet. It belongs either under it, or next to the opposite reminder : putinism has been legitimized, glorified and reinforced by western forumers for years, no matter their current stances on Ukraine.

(And while political, that's not even a left vs right thing. Putin has supported anti-establishment, divisive currents in many countries, some right-winged, others left-winged, inducing the same forgiveness or praise in return. What I don't forgive to trumpists, I don't forgive either to french politicians and militants who are supposed to represent my values. That's even more nauseating to me, and I really hope those get crushed in the next elections.)

Yoda, feel free to remove this post if you consider it leaves the "meta" level too often.

Wyldesyde19

03-16-22, 10:55 PM

Indeed, there is no causality between what we're typing here right now and what is happening now in Ukraine. In that sense, it has "no effect on the conflict". However :

1) Yes, I do relate remote world events to "our culture" in the sense that I relate them to the global cultural ecosystem as a whole, of which "our" (whose?) "culture" is a part. Pragmatically, a person can vote for Putin partly because "even the USA" elect Trump or because "even his US gamer community" praises Putin as the saviour-of-white-schlong. We're all each others peers, nowadays (to varying degrees : a very closed full dictatorship à la North Corea isn't affected by global discussions to the same degree as a free speech liberal democracy, and Russia is somewhere in-between). In fact, Trump's election did also bolster extreme-right votes in many unrelated countries. And cultural sociopolitical currents à la #metoo or #gamergate do affect public debates and cultural sensitivities throughout the world. Money wouldn't be invested in troll farms without these causalities.

2) So many things have long term effects, you could prevent any action by using its lack of immediate result to delegitimize it. "It's not our fault anymore" skips directly to "the consequences would be too far later". The choice of focusing on immediacy is, itself, a convenient way to escape the notion of interconnection and responsibility. Again, as I said, there are practical reasons to escape these notions (forum cohesion), but it's a little cheat. And it hides the fact that today's Putin has been (partly, indirectly) the consequence of decades of international praise, and that tomorrow's putinoïds are the consequences of the same values being still fetishized. For me, the shame of Ukraine's war is also carried by remote admirers of Putin and of what he represents, and so is the responsibility for future manifestations of (geo)political True Manhood™. And this doesn't leave my eyes when I look at people around me. But I know that they'd never feel shame for it. The 20th century was full of mutual admiration (and more than that : emulation !) between different autocrats promoting the same values, and the praised turned to hostility when the geopolitical ambitions started competing. "They're our broth... wait, down with these guys, we have nothing in common !".

In a way it does. Feminist movements in Middle East, even though their forms and priorities differ from western feminism, are not unrelated to the models displayed in Europe or the USA. As I said above, there are variations depending on the scales of public discourses and the permeability of a given culture (I wouldn't equal a confidential argument about Liz Phair to a broad public dispute on social networks, also different societies engage with global/foreign debates to varying degrees). But such debates shape dominant mainstream values, and dominant mainstream values color the world. They form consensuses that are referred to in various countries, through various forms of diffusionism. The world tends to frown, nowadays, on black slave trade or native american genocides, and that stems from individual actions, discussions, interrogations, debates, elections, jurisprudence, etc. And this, already way before the popularity of online international arguments. Ideas and worldviews travel.

There are few things that it wouldn't apply to. Abortion rights are currently the stake of geopolitical domino games, where the pieces get pushed by local public debates, and shifting senses of normalcy. What affects public worldviews affects policies, and in turn these affects other countries discourses (political discourses are full of "see what happens over there" and "but we would be the only ones to").

Elections are the expression of public sentiments, and public sentiments are formed through ordinary interactions throughout the years. A racist being elected or not is less the effect of a vote being cast than the effect of years hearing from peers that racism is or isn't okay (and I mean racism as the content, not as the label). Votes used to give punctual visibility to dominant values, now these are permanently visible on the internet.

You actually do have cohesion, and you have a requirement of cohesion. If the forum started bursting into full scale open hatred it simply wouldn't be a forum, it wouldn't be controllable at all. And the same goes with society : you wouldn't be able to go buy bread if you knew everyone's opinions and deeds and realized the continuity between their opinions and the actual practical real-life sufferings that result from them. These are realities we sweep under the carpet. We keep out of sight the death of homeless people, we hide asylum seekers in remote camps or drown them in the sea, we live off bombings and starvation, we deprive gender-atypical people from their own lives and identities, we scorch the Earth, and it's all remote abstractions and lolz down the chain of votes, policies and everyday attitudes. Bring up these ghosts, show who gloat or pride themselves for their own indifference, and you've got a society of cynical monsters you're supposed to be polite with, far from the screams, gurgles and suicides they cheer for. Civility becomes impossible, or even obscene. So we mask it all. We don't think of it. It's simply a necessity of life. We can't afford newton balls to bring back our consequences. And on internet forums, it means that those who are for or against bombs being dropped on a village have to get along in the name of their hobby, as this is more important to their lives than children being burned alive ("come on we won't ruin the friendly atmosphere over mere differences of opinion").

And frankly, your job is quite easy here, compared to places where discussions are about whether ukrainians deserve the bombs. There's actually a vague local consensus on this. My gripe is about more remote, abstract elements (the deniability of indirect responsibility/complicity about events - events which themselves are, at least, deplored and disowned).

So yes, in practice, there is a maintained cohesion on this forum. What would be profound antagonisms are actually vastly put aside, in this forum's day-to-day activities.

(Also, I don't really see people "bristle" at the rules. Not even me. I admit their necessity while feeling bitter about what it shows and hides about mankind.)

Indeed, I doubt that a political flamewar would change anything. But not because of how remote (in time, scale, space) it is from the consequences : again, this is the voting fallacy but upstream. Sensitivities are shaped by everyday discussions and mirrored attitudes, by values circulations, by subcultural normativities - votes are just the end result of it. But it would be pointless because flamewars are sterile clashes of void rhetorical violence. It would bring the forum down without changing anyone's opinion (on the plus side, it would shatter an impression of tacit assent, on the minus side it would only polarize over-invested postures construed as core identities). In this zero-sum context, skipping the whole mess probably brings a same result at a reduced cost. And as I said, the shame that I'd consider legitimate from Putin fans (or ex-Putin fans), the reconsideration of values that should stem from it, would certainly never occur : there are too many cognitive devices shielding people from it.

But I disagree about the rationale for these rules. I disagree about this idea that words on a forum are disconnected from world events, and that places where a dominant consensus go one way or the other play no role. I think that a community being defined by one consensus (one way or the other) plays a role as a jigsaw piece in the vast mosaic of global public discussions. There is, currently, a dominant consensus in the western world about the illegitimacy of Putin's invasion. This has an impact very different from the one that the opposite consensus would have. It legitimizes and encourages ukrainian resistance ("the world is with us") and it opens a potential window of doubt for russians who access it ("woah, the world sees us as the baddies there"). Ukraine feeling let down by the world's consensus, warmongering Russians feeling vindicated by the whole planet, would shift political attitudes -slightly or dramatically- differently there and there. And this consensus is an ocean of droplet (with a dominant color). The same could go for many things that are unfortunately less consensual.

I'm not promoting this or that forum policy. I'm pointing at the fictions it preserves, and why it needs to preserve it. I think it has reasons to be, and I think it has also rationalization that go beyond these reasons. My point is simply to lift the carpet's corner, point at what we hide, and why we hide it, and drop it. We hide it because discussing our responsibilities would be too costly. But letting the question aside on these forums, considering it off topic", is different from claiming "hey, anyway nothing of it is related to anyone from us here, we're too far and too small". This is, itself, a specific stance, an opinion left above the carpet. It belongs either under it, or next to the opposite reminder : putinism has been legitimized, glorified and reinforced by western forumers for years, no matter their current stances on Ukraine.

(And while political, that's not even a left vs right thing. Putin has supported anti-establishment, divisive currents in many countries, some right-winged, others left-winged, inducing the same forgiveness or praise in return. What I don't forgive to trumpists, I don't forgive either to french politicians and militants who are supposed to represent my values. That's even more nauseating to me, and I really hope those get crushed in the next elections.)

Yoda, feel free to remove this post if you consider it leaves the "meta" level too often.

A few assumptions made (never mind the rsther condescending lecture on apathy) in this post to go through one by one, but most of this just sounds like an excuse to virtue signaling for the sake of it. This comes off as one long lecture about why we should feel guilty for not discussing it in this forum (Nevermind the assumption it isn’t discussed at all outside of it by many here). It’s just an argument for an excuse to argue your viewpoints while simultaneously showing everyone how sympathetic you are. No offense intended.

This fiim site is better without the political discussion. Period. Far too often they ended in arguments and it wasn’t a fun time. It wasn’t an easy decision, and I I know for a fact he wrestled with it for months. That’s not hyperbole.

You can argue ad naseum all you want, but the end result is it’s not coming back. And it shouldn’t at this time. The rule is intended to make the site far more enjoyable for the whole of the membership, not for some individuals who can’t find another outlet for discussing such matters elsewhere.

Honestly, I don’t even know why it even needs to be repeated as often as it is just because you (and I’m sure maybe a few others) don’t agree with it.

Edir: rereading this it comes off far more aggressive then I intend it to be.

Citizen Rules

03-16-22, 11:22 PM

Wyldesyde19

03-16-22, 11:37 PM

Yeah, for the record, I have no real issue with Flicker wanting to discuss it with Yoda, but I don’t think this was the best thread for it. Maybe privately. I certainly don’t think it warrants that much more of a discussion once it’s been made clear, mind you and I certainly don’t think it warrants long paragraphs that only tangentially touch upon the topic at hand, but I do respect the guy for his intellect, after all.

Captain Steel

03-17-22, 12:21 AM

Winding you up. Changed it from a smiling face. :D

Totally. Winding up CR for his hurtful comments about the British Empire. “Second tier”? How dare he.

Just having a laugh with CR. :p

No taxation without representation! ;)

Captain Steel

03-17-22, 12:24 AM

@Flicker (http://www.movieforums.com/community/member.php?u=113233) you already had you say once and Yoda replied, do you need to keep going on? I guess you do. So THANKS Flicker because now the thread will be closed.

I hope not. While it's nearly impossible to discuss a war without politics... this war is bigger than politics. It may be the last war any of us will ever discuss.

John McClane

03-17-22, 01:33 AM

A few assumptions made (never mind the rsther condescending lecture on apathy) in this post to go through one by one, but most of this just sounds like an excuse to virtue signaling for the sake of it. This comes off as one long lecture about why we should feel guilty for not discussing it in this forum (Nevermind the assumption it isn’t discussed at all outside of it by many here). It’s just an argument for an excuse to argue your viewpoints while simultaneously showing everyone how sympathetic you are. No offense intended..Most of us here know a word salad when we see it, and I get why Yoda feels the need to to engage it; I honestly don’t know how he does it. The fact that he does engage it, and tacitly I might add, negates any of the claims being presented. At this point, I can’t help but think you are right that it is a ruse to openly address a distaste in the structure of discussion here. Not all salads are healthy ruffage.

Mr Minio

03-17-22, 05:41 AM

Survey says 86.6% of Russians support the armed invasion of Russia in other European countries.

https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%B43-7.jpg
https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%B44-5.jpg
https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%B45-5.jpg
https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%B46-6.jpg
https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%B47-5.jpg

75.5% of Russians approve the idea of a military invasion in the next country and believe that it should be Poland. According to respondents, this is a logical continuation of the so-called “military special operation of the Russian Federation”.

Only 25.5% of Russians strongly oppose the use of nuclear weapons. Among those surveyed, 40.3% consider a nuclear attack absolutely acceptable, and 34.3% will support such a decision to some extent by the Russian authorities.

Source (https://activegroup.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/RF-eng-1.pdf)

I leave you to draw your own conclusions.

mrblond

03-17-22, 06:52 AM

Watch_Tower

03-17-22, 12:45 PM

Citizen Rules

03-17-22, 01:18 PM

Augh, so many aggression and unknowledge. :facepalm: Please, stop this!

God, please save the innocent people!

People, don't turn into instruments in one more conflict between these four or five cartels that took the world by setting wars all around. The cartels that've traumatized and exploited people for more than a century now from LA to Baikal lake.Huh? Care to explain?

Just reading some of the comments on here and as a long time, if infrequent member, I hope the thread is not closed! Open discussion is needed but it must be well educated discussion, not merely spouting media propaganda.I agree, if the MoFos could restrain themselves from political posturing and parroting, then we could learn from each other. It's interesting to see how people view the threat of the Ukraine conflict and equally interesting to see what solutions they believe would help and which solutions they believe are dangerous.

Captain Steel

03-17-22, 02:47 PM

Where did this Russian propaganda about Nazism in the Ukraine come from?
(I mean, I know it comes from Putin, but where did he get the idea to use that as a rationale to attack a civilian populace?)

I never heard of it until after the attack began.

Sure, there are tiny groups of neo-Nazis in Europe and the U.S., but they are barely a relative blip on any country's radar.

It sounds like Putin is trying to capitalize on the whole "White Supremacist threat" thing that came from the current U.S. government early in 2021. That claim is an absolute myth - there are no white supremacist militias or neo-Nazi groups committing terrorist attacks in America. Rather, random & gang-related urban crime takes hundreds of lives everyday throughout U.S. cities which has nothing to do with any organized ethnic supremacist groups.

And I'm NOT trying to get political, but did Putin adopt this bizarre & outrageous propaganda from the U.S.'s woke movement that started this bizarre and outrageous narrative that white supremacists are the leading existential threat to humanity?

What is Putin basing this on? Is there some kind of major Nazi movement in Ukraine? Does Putin realize Zelensky is Jewish?

Mr Minio

03-17-22, 03:55 PM

Where did this Russian propaganda about Nazism in the Ukraine come from? OK, I'm going to try to be as impartial as possible when answering this, which is obviously not 100% possible.

Russia's main gripe with Nazism in Ukraine is twofold:

Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) which has a long history I'm not even going to attempt to summarize here. The main thing here is that during the Second World War, the guys from this ultranationalist formation did some unimaginable things like the Volhynia Massacre. This is all true and well-documented. However, Russia is often using the Volhynia Massacre as an excuse to explain more recent events or to evoke hatred for the Ukrainians among e.g., Polish people. It's as if France or the UK started spreading hate for Germany for what they did back in the 1940s. Needless to say, it was a long time ago and 99% of the people who are living now weren't even born back then. It's true that there have been some recent unfortunate decorations of veterans from UPA, and even calling some of them heroes, but this can be in no way an excuse for a military invasion of a country, no matter how you look at it.
Azov Battalion which is a contemporary Ukrainian neo-Nazi organization located in Mariupol. I'm far from sympathizing with these guys, but they're just a paramilitary militia of, depending on different sources, 900 to 2,500 people. That's super-small, and there's no doubt there are more neo-Nazis in Russia than that. Still, Russia has been using the Azov Battalion as an excuse for many provocations and attacks during the War in Donbas, most if not all of which proved false. There has even been a video of a group of alleged Azov guys crucifying and burning a Russian citizen. Several independent experts analyzed the video and all of them came up to the conclusion it was fake. I mean, I saw it. It does look staged. Why and what for? I'll leave that for you to figure out. So the question is: How a militia of 2,500 members justifies the violent subjugation of 44 million Ukrainians including the bombing of the entirety of 430K Mariupol?

(I mean, I know it comes from Putin, but where did he get the idea to use that as a rationale to attack a civilian populace?) This is a super-old propaganda strategy. One of Nazi Germany's inane excuses to attack Poland back in 1939 was that the Poles allegedly oppressed the German minority population. One of Russia's excuses for the War in Donbas was that, yes, you guessed it, Ukrainians oppressed the Russian minority in Eastern Ukraine. But now that Russia attacked the entirety of Ukraine, including places with a minuscule Russian populace, they had to come up with another excuse. And that was the fearsome "Nazis". During one of his speeches, Putin called Ukrainians Nazis and... junkies... So yes, there's that, too.

mrblond

03-18-22, 06:07 AM

Just reading some of the comments on here and as a long time, if infrequent member, I hope the thread is not closed! Open discussion is needed but it must be well educated discussion, not merely spouting media propaganda.

That's be good and that's what I meant though I doubt it is possible.
I hope there are people who want to learn some info from free sources.

mrblond

03-18-22, 06:09 AM

Huh? Care to explain?

Yes, I do care very much and I'd like to but I also afraid for my health.

Stirchley

03-18-22, 02:02 PM

No taxation without representation! ;)

And poop to you. :p

God, please save the innocent people!

I pray every evening that the Dear Lord will end this. It sickens me every day that it continues.

Look at this sad photo: children of medical workers in Mariupol waiting for their parents inside the hospital.

86117

Stirchley

03-18-22, 02:03 PM

I now know that Ukrainians love their pets & I now know that they are very respectful of old people. They seem to be very good people indeed.

86118

Two more photos of this poor old thing. I reckon she’s lived through at least 3 wars in her lifetime, including this one.

86168
86169

Stirchley

03-21-22, 01:29 PM

86170

A memorial of empty strollers of 109 children who have died.

86171

A very resourceful family who have camped in the underground subway. They even have a pram down there.

86172

Comforting their dachshund.

86173

Russia, don’t mess with this bad ass lieutenant!

KinkyFest

03-22-22, 10:56 PM

The best revenge is living well, and it really bothers me to see internet soapboxing in general because all you can do in the end is live your life in the best way possible.

Ukraine? What do I care? I have IBS and an endless list of things to do. If you disagree, then you are nothing but a thief.

I just want to apologize publicly for this post overrall...i was having some real crazy anxiety issues, and sometimes i get irritated when people get worked up about what's going on in the news. Of course i care: about people fighting in Ukraine, and even Putin. I was reading some stuff before this whole thing happened about how Putin lives his life...all i can say is, a lot of people want to kill him...doesn't sound like a great friend or dictator.

Stirchley

03-23-22, 01:34 PM

I just want to apologize publicly for this post overrall...i was having some real crazy anxiety issues, and sometimes i get irritated when people get worked up about what's going on in the news.

Why would that irritate you? Why did you change your user name here?

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 01:50 PM

Why did you change your user name here?

to be honest i never liked the name that much since it relates to twitter...

Why would that irritate you?

Imagine everyone telling you that WW3 is just on the horizon, but then knowing that that's probably not the case. It was a reaction to the unfavorable responses i got in real life when i was telling people not to worry about it. It seems that everyone gets irritated when you worry and complain...i don't want to feel like i need to see this as important when there are military conflicts going on all the time that people just shrug off as being normal.

A lot of the reason that people are upset about this is they are worried about the escalation of the conflict, and while i understand this I think it's fine in any country not to have wars or try to find a solution to all the worlds conflicts. If it helps, this is actually WW3 already just because there are so many parties involved. What you do about it is entirely your choice.

AgrippinaX

03-23-22, 02:06 PM

Imagine everyone telling you that WW3 is just on the horizon, but then knowing that that's probably not the case….

…If it helps, this is actually WW3 already just because there are so many parties involved. What you do about it is entirely your choice.

Makes perfect sense to me. Much like how I feel. I was invited by my CEO to speak on a public affairs/stakeholders roundtable panel on the matter (due to my Russian heritage I surmise) yesterday and still haven’t responded as I anticipate something like this thread. Thanks, but no, thanks.

And yes, agreed re WWIII and the hypocrisy. Now imagine if I said something akin to this at the roundtable. Best decline.

Yoda

03-23-22, 02:09 PM

Sorry for the delay in response here. I'll be brief(ish):

1) Yes, I do relate remote world events to "our culture" in the sense that I relate them to the global cultural ecosystem as a whole, of which "our" (whose?) "culture" is a part.
I want to reiterate that I never suggested otherwise (and quoted myself to demonstrate this), and then made it explicit just in case:

Nothing here implies that culture has no relationship to world events, and for a very good reason: because I don't believe that.
It's a little perplexing, then, to get a second response making the exact same case as the first one. I do not need to be persuaded that all cultural expressions have some effect on world events, over a sufficient time frame. Our disagreement is subtler and more difficult: a question of degree and emphasis.

2) So many things have long term effects, you could prevent any action by using its lack of immediate result to delegitimize it. "It's not our fault anymore" skips directly to "the consequences would be too far later". The choice of focusing on immediacy is, itself, a convenient way to escape the notion of interconnection and responsibility.
Potentially, but not inherently or inevitably. I have to object to the phrasing I keep seeing here, where you seem to assume people will fall into every possible pitfall of a given position. In reality, it's possible to be thoughtful (or thoughtless) about almost any position, yours or mine.

You say "well, the consequences are later and indirect so our effect is minimal" gives us an excuse not to care, and that's fair enough. But exaggerating our impact can:

a) rationalize our tribalistic desire to yell at people a bunch, and
b) give us an excuse not to do harder, more direct things to help.

In other words, how many people are just angry, and pretending Internet arguments have a meaningful effect gives them license to indulge that anger, and even allow them to think they're being productive? And, deciding those arguments are productive, how many people let themselves off the hook for donating money or doing things in their immediate community, because their time on reddit and forums (things they're doing out of compulsion anyway) conveniently count as their "community service"? Not all, we'd agree. But not none, either. And one expects some people even explicitly reason backwards: "This has to be important because I sink so much time into it."

Elections are the expression of public sentiments, and public sentiments are formed through ordinary interactions throughout the years. A racist being elected or not is less the effect of a vote being cast than the effect of years hearing from peers that racism is or isn't okay (and I mean racism as the content, not as the label). Votes used to give punctual visibility to dominant values, now these are permanently visible on the internet.
Sure, but this really has nothing to do with the point I'm making: that between elections, many of the effects of culture are "saved up" until the next election. Not totally, of course: politicians respond to polling and political pressure even when they're not on the ballot, and there's lots of smaller elections between the larger ones. But it's not linear: if the "wrong guy" wins, all the cultural expression that responds to it has far less effect until the next election. And occasionally it will have none, IMO, particularly if that expression is mostly done for emotional catharsis. Which sure seems to be the case, more and more.

And on internet forums, it means that those who are for or against bombs being dropped on a village have to get along in the name of their hobby, as this is more important to their lives than children being burned alive ("come on we won't ruin the friendly atmosphere over mere differences of opinion").
Under this logic, I'm not sure we'd ever be allowed to talk about movies, since time is finite and every moment we spend discussing or appreciating art (or playing games, or chatting, or whatever) is necessarily a moment we're not spending talking about <insert harrowing world event or situation here>.

And frankly, your job is quite easy here, compared to places where discussions are about whether ukrainians deserve the bombs. There's actually a vague local consensus on this. My gripe is about more remote, abstract elements (the deniability of indirect responsibility/complicity about events - events which themselves are, at least, deplored and disowned).

So yes, in practice, there is a maintained cohesion on this forum. What would be profound antagonisms are actually vastly put aside, in this forum's day-to-day activities.

(Also, I don't really see people "bristle" at the rules. Not even me. I admit their necessity while feeling bitter about what it shows and hides about mankind.)
Okay, this is a good clarification. Your previous post made it sound as if you were talking about this forum and this ruleset, specifically. I see now you're talking about all forums, and even all polite society. Fair enough.

Indeed, I doubt that a political flamewar would change anything. But not because of how remote (in time, scale, space) it is from the consequences : again, this is the voting fallacy but upstream. Sensitivities are shaped by everyday discussions and mirrored attitudes, by values circulations, by subcultural normativities - votes are just the end result of it. But it would be pointless because flamewars are sterile clashes of void rhetorical violence. It would bring the forum down without changing anyone's opinion (on the plus side, it would shatter an impression of tacit assent, on the minus side it would only polarize over-invested postures construed as core identities). In this zero-sum context, skipping the whole mess probably brings a same result at a reduced cost.
Agreed, and this is what most of the rules in question are about. The moment we accept indirect and long-term effects into our decision making about Internet arguments, we must simultaneously accept the practical effect those arguments have on those spaces. Increasingly, the effect is to destroy the space, at which point you have neither the pleasant appreciation of whatever non-political topic it was discussing OR whatever benefits come from "having it out" over those political topics.

But I disagree about the rationale for these rules. I disagree about this idea that words on a forum are disconnected from world events
Again, that's not the argument. The argument is that their effect is muted, blunted, indirect, and hard to trace, and that any righteous anger about the event itself cannot be losslessly transferred to discussions about it.

Reiterating the above: if we're considering the long-term effects argument can have on culture, and culture on world events, we also have to consider the long-term effects of allowing all spaces to be politicized. It sure seems to me as if the net effect of this is polarization and tribalism, which seem to swamp (or at least call into question) the unquantifiable value that comes from confronting such-and-such or calling out so-and-so.

matt72582

03-23-22, 02:22 PM

Just reading some of the comments on here and as a long time, if infrequent member, I hope the thread is not closed! Open discussion is needed but it must be well educated discussion, not merely spouting media propaganda.

Ha... I wonder if people even know their sources. Whenever I'm having a discussion, lately, I'll stop and say, "Do you remember your source". Answer is always no.

I don't think banning RT and Sputnik is a good cost for democracy - I'd rather keep prices down, because there are plenty of people hurting here, and this was is between Ukraine and Russia, but of course, people are going to be used as pawns. Exploiting certain pictures, etc. I recommend citizen journalists who are on the ground.. But if you're going to watch agitprop from one side, try watching it from the other side, and other sources that are neutral - just as long as they are one of OUR neutrals :)

Every war is a stain on humanity; don't forget the others going on right now. Yemen has lost hundreds of thousands of children from malnutrition -- no easy death. A handful of others, and that's just my country. But I think it's time to blame ourselves, for the acquiescence. Too many people fearful of being socially ostracized, so they repeat the same poop I just heard on TV who have a commercial for weapons contractors. Great for business, but I don't think you can sustain an economy built on finding more efficient ways to kill each other off.

Usually during tumultuous times (Vietnam, for example), the culture steps up, and we at least got GREAT music and movies back then to help us deal with life's miseries.

Thanks to travel and message boards, I know people from both countries. I'll trust them over what's on TV. Hell, I think I'm the last person who actually has cable, while everyone I know got rid of it.

AgrippinaX

03-23-22, 02:38 PM

Ha... I wonder if people even know their sources. Whenever I'm having a discussion, lately, I'll stop and say, "Do you remember your source". Answer is always no.

I don't think banning RT and Sputnik is a good cost for democracy.

Exactly. As ever, agree with most of your points.

Yoda

03-23-22, 02:39 PM

Imagine everyone telling you that WW3 is just on the horizon, but then knowing that that's probably not the case.
Yeah, this is tricky. Obviously it's easy to sound dismissive, but on the other hand, I'm not sure anyone is served by exaggerating the import of any event. It's kind of like demanding the death penalty for a really heinous crime: it is very difficult to say "well, I wouldn't go that far" about something awful. Parsing awfulness doesn't feel good, and it's risky. You are always vulnerable to the righteous flank of anyone who decides to take the bad thing even more seriously.

But I take it as a fundamental aspect of human nature that we exaggerate the importance of whatever is happening right now. Hence every election over the last half-century being treated as pivotal, if not "the most important election of our lifetimes." So any time someone insists that something happening is truly exceptional, I have a reflexive skepticism of it, because I think we need to put our thumb on the scale against the thing that most people do most of the time. The same way we need to put our thumb on the scale against believing any fact which flatters our preexisting beliefs, for example.

That said, when someone wants to express nuance about an awful thing, they need to...actually be nuanced. It simply won't do to try to "counterweight" an overreaction with an underreaction. If someone says "omg this is WW3" we don't balance that take by saying "pfft, nothing's going to happen, there's no reason to care about this." Will someone react hysterically even if you're thoughtful and nuanced and say "this is serious but thankfully it's still not that likely it'll explode into another world war"? Yes. But we should do that thing, the hard thing, anyway, and just hope thoughtful people notice and appreciate it.

matt72582

03-23-22, 03:13 PM

Something I forgot to say earlier is how the minute you ban something, it only piques curiosity. I think bad ideas should die on their own, without a 3rd party mediator between audience and performer.

As bad as I think things will get (little at a time), I do not see a nuclear war, but we did a drop few on Japan, so it's not beyond the realm of possibility, and now almost a dozen countries have nukes. Russia has about 6,000. We have about 5,000. The average Russian man lives to 71, and Putin is almost 70, so he might think, last chance. Revenge. History. I've tried to watch as much video as I can of Putin (not someone narrating over it), to see his soul. He says the one thing he can't forgive is betrayal. I think he feels betrayed by most of the world, as well as Yeltsin, his predecessor for not getting anything in writing, but part of that anger then goes to The West, for being sly, and making sure they never got anything in writing about eastward expansion in NATO.

Here's Biden from 1997. Try reading/watching as much as you can. There's so much out there, it almost feels like cheating compared to the days where I'd have to visit the reference section (and couldn't take any documents home). I can read dozens of e-books, and using the CTRL-F (Search) tool, I can find exactly what I want, and see what was being said in the 10's, 00's, 90s, 80s, 70s, etc.. Don't let anyone tell you how you are supposed to feel, but try to be aware. Don't let anyone tell you what you see, but be open -- maybe there was something you didn't consider or see on first glance, and let's avoid being defensive, because this is how wars are started.

https://youtu.be/E3tdF2S04wg

Citizen Rules

03-23-22, 03:29 PM

t...Imagine everyone telling you that WW3 is just on the horizon, but then knowing that that's probably not the case. It was a reaction to the unfavorable responses i got in real life when i was telling people not to worry about it...WW3 may or may not happen at any time and at any given set of circumstances. One never knows what could trigger a series of events leading to nuclear war. May happen, may not, maybe now, maybe later or maybe never.

Probability is like rolling the dice and seeing what number comes up, only the probability dice has an infinite number of sides and anything can happen at any time, or won't happen. So I'm not worried.

matt72582

03-23-22, 03:44 PM

Dmitry Medvedev warns of nuclear dystopia due to United States
And he's supposed to be Putin's eventual replacement...
https://www.yahoo.com/news/putin-ally-says-united-states-075006672.html

As they say in diplomacy 100 - always talk.. Now, and not at the point of no return. Remember the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. People always talk about the system as if it weren't run by humans. Vasily Arkhipov probably saved the world. Every US President from HW Bush to Trump seemed to have tried to get along with Yeltsin and/or Putin and just because we're where we're at now, doesn't mean we should slam the door. The world powers are probably talking now... hopefully.

There's an interesting story of how Putin is talking with Biden (2011), and Putin takes his finger, and presses it against his skin right underneath his eye downward and says something to the effect of... even if we have the same skin color, we are not the same.

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 03:49 PM

WW3 may or may not happen at any time and at any given set of circumstances. One never knows what could trigger a series of events leading to nuclear war. May happen, may not, maybe now, maybe later or maybe never.

Probability is like rolling the dice and seeing what number comes up, only the probability dice has an infinite number of sides and anything can happen at any time, or won't happen. So I'm not worried.

You can have WW3 without the nukes, some folks on the internet have suggested that the Cold War never ended. That would be really horrible if Putin nuked ukraine, and would likely lead to an eventual displacement/domination of Russian people, and europe/asia would be left in a tremendously terrible state. Some people worry about immigrants now, but imagine if THAT were to happen.

Citizen Rules

03-23-22, 04:19 PM

You can have WW3 without the nukes, Yes, of course. Nukes just makes the covno funner:eek: or scarier:cool:

some folks on the internet have suggested that the Cold War never ended. Depends on how one slices that, but yeah I could see that statement as having truth to it. I've said as much myself recently, Soviet Communism or Putin dictatorship has there similarities, especially when we're talking about the Soviet Union under Stallions iron thumb.

That would be really horrible if Putin nuked ukraine, and would likely lead to an eventual displacement/domination of Russian people, and europe/asia would be left in a tremendously terrible state. Some people worry about immigrants now, but imagine if THAT were to happen.Horrible yes. I think Putin a former KGB man is using fear an intimation (nukes, super bomb, etc) as a way of keeping western nations from intervening too much...and apparently it's working as no nation has sent aircraft into Ukraine.

Mr Minio

03-23-22, 04:23 PM

Ha... I wonder if people even know their sources. Whenever I'm having a discussion, lately, I'll stop and say, "Do you remember your source". Answer is always no. If you're having a verbal conversation or chatting, then it's understandable people do not have the source readily available. On a forum, however, a source would always be nice to have. But then, there are sources and there are sources and there definitely is some level of veracity and credibility to each of them. Both an average Joe and a compulsive liar can tell a lie, but the chances the compulsive liar will tell yet another lie tomorrow are much higher, statistically.

I don't think banning RT and Sputnik is a good cost for democracy It really comes down to a conversation on censorship. Is it OK to proverbially shut the mouth of somebody you deem to be a liar and whose words are harmful? Or is "freedom of speech" more important than that? What is the limit of freedom of speech, and is there really any limit at all? Dunno if this is political or not, but I think that if there's a bunch of people doing direct or indirect harm to other people in your house, you have every right to expel them.

I'd rather keep prices down, because there are plenty of people hurting here, and this was is between Ukraine and Russia That's rather cryptic to me. Do you mind explaining what you meant by that?

But if you're going to watch agitprop from one side, try watching it from the other side It is always advisable to see the reasons of both parties. But this should never transform into the centrism of "truth is exactly in between". Because it rarely is.

Every war is a stain on humanity; don't forget the others going on right now. True, but wars in other parts of the world are not a reason to undervalue whatever is happening in Ukraine right now.

But I think it's time to blame ourselves, for the acquiescence. Too many people fearful of being socially ostracized Well said, but it's definitely not Americans who should blame themselves for their acquiescence.

Usually during tumultuous times (Vietnam, for example), the culture steps up, and we at least got GREAT music and movies back then to help us deal with life's miseries. No, usually tumultuous times mean a dramatic decline of culture. The US got great art and counterculture during the Vietnam War because the war wasn't happening in America. If it was, the US would get very little art being made at all. But this is not the only reason. Most of the time, great art is only being made AFTER tumultuous times are over. There is a painful drop in the quality of Japanese films made during the Second World War, but a spike after the war.

Thanks to travel and message boards, I know people from both countries. I'll trust them over what's on TV. There definitely is a difference between talking to a person whose city was bombed earlier today and another person who lives 3000 km from the place that was bombed. Not that the eye-witness knows everything, but they definitely know more than somebody across the ocean.

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 04:46 PM

Horrible yes. I think Putin a former KGB man is using fear an intimation (nukes, super bomb, etc) as a way of keeping western nations from intervening too much...and apparently it's working as no nation has sent aircraft into Ukraine.

i think it's an important point to make that so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.

I don't think i would like it if Putin shipped a nuke over to the US (the possiblility being ~0%), but yes that would add a crazy new dimension to my life! If he we're nihilistic enough to do that, where do you think he would attack? Maybe he would attack California, and institute Revolutionary Trump Training Camps :D That would add a whole new meaning to the hammer and sickle! Maybe they'll have nice drugs!

Stirchley

03-23-22, 05:54 PM

i think it's an important point to make that so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.

Tell that to the Iraqi people or to the Afghan people to name just 2 countries that have suffered through war since 1945.

Yoda

03-23-22, 05:58 PM

I'm pretty sure the occasional exception is accounted for in the phrase "so much of."

Captain Steel

03-23-22, 06:13 PM

As bad as I think things will get (little at a time), I do not see a nuclear war, but we did a drop few on Japan, so it's not beyond the realm of possibility, and now almost a dozen countries have nukes.

I'm a stickler for certain facts. (No offense intended) but we (the U.S.) dropped a couple (precisely, a total of 2) atomic bombs on Japan in 1945.

(Only because "a few" usually connotes at least 3, usually 4, or more.) ;)

I realize the vast majority know this, but you never know... we might have some young people reading whose history classes may have consisted only of how to judge others by their appearance.

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 06:38 PM

Tell that to the Iraqi people or to the Afghan people to name just 2 countries that have suffered through war since 1945.

You clearly didn't read the "so much" part...it's an intimidation game for power. You see this is why i get so peeved about talking about politics: you can have a full scale violent military attack that has the purpose of intimidation.

I'm not going to tell "that" to some victim of war crimes, you can do that yourself.

Citizen Rules

03-23-22, 06:58 PM

i think it's an important point to make that so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes. I agree. It's often about who blinks first or maybe which nation soils their pants first. That's why I don't think we should so weakness in the face of a bully. But the flip side is we shouldn't taut a bully. Glad I'm not the president, the world is probably glad I'm not either:cool:

Stirchley

03-23-22, 07:18 PM

I'm pretty sure the occasional exception is accounted for in the phrase "so much of."

I saw the “so much of”, but I strongly disagree with his statement that “so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.” I don’t agree with it at all: hence my post.

Yoda

03-23-22, 07:51 PM

I saw the “so much of”, but I strongly disagree with his statement that “so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.” I don’t agree with it at all: hence my post.
That's fine, but since anecdotal examples do not contradict his statement, it's not an expression of disagreement to mention them.

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 09:18 PM

I saw the “so much of”, but I strongly disagree with his statement that “so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.” I don’t agree with it at all: hence my post.

Wars consist of skirmishes, I don't see anything refutable about that...

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 10:09 PM

It appears putin has either already lost or risks the end of his reign...I tried to paste the link the link but it didn't work, using my phone.

Captain Steel

03-23-22, 11:29 PM

It appears putin has either already lost or risks the end of his reign...I tried to paste the link the link but it didn't work, using my phone.

Let's hope so!

StuSmallz

03-23-22, 11:33 PM

https://i.ibb.co/VNJjRnC/20220324-only-man-successfully-defeated-ru-in-winter.jpg (https://ibb.co/26WnxVM)

John McClane

03-23-22, 11:34 PM

Re nuclear weapons: it’s important to note that the nuclear weapons of today are vastly more destructive than the ones that were dropped in WW2. We are talking destruction on a scale that’s never been seen, and I pray we never see it.

KinkyFest

03-23-22, 11:44 PM

https://i.ibb.co/VNJjRnC/20220324-only-man-successfully-defeated-ru-in-winter.jpg (https://ibb.co/26WnxVM)

I just love this, thanks 😊 the article I wanted to post was separate, buy I was talking with someone about the interesting reversal the Russian winter scenario...

And yeah, let's hope the nuke doesn't get launched, very unlikely. And yeah it is possible that a nuclear launch technicians says "no", I was telling people this when they we're worried about Trump having chief of command status...funny how people on the internet hating me has turned me into an optimist!

Stirchley

03-25-22, 01:31 PM

Wars consist of skirmishes, I don't see anything refutable about that...

Skirmish in a military context means a brief period of fighting. The current relentless destruction of Ukraine unfortunately has not been brief.

Re nuclear weapons: it’s important to note that the nuclear weapons of today are vastly more destructive than the ones that were dropped in WW2. We are talking destruction on a scale that’s never been seen, and I pray we never see it.

We won’t see it because we’ll all be dead.

Stirchley

03-25-22, 06:22 PM

86279

Ukrainians are very brave people. I pray they will prevail in this war.

Granny, far right in the photo, is 102 & this is the third war she’s lived through. The soldier far right is her grandson.

I just can’t imagine living this way seeing one’s village, town or city destroyed.

Watch_Tower

03-30-22, 12:36 PM

i think it's an important point to make that so much of the military activity since WW2 has been saber rattling or skirmishes.

I think this is entirely false. Europe saw full scale war and genocide in eastern europe.

The European continent has also consistently been involved in full scale war, invasion and mass murder across Africa and Asia almost non stop. The US has just come out of its longest ever war, Iraq is ongoing, NATO has been used in Libya, Syria, Iraq to name a few.

Just because Ukraine has struck a chord and is reported on every minute of every day doesn't change the fact that war did not go away...and in fact, still hasn't arrived in western europe, countries where people are mad with propaganda at the moment,.

Stirchley

03-30-22, 01:32 PM

I think this is entirely false. Europe saw full scale war and genocide in eastern europe.

I agree.

Stirchley

03-30-22, 01:32 PM

No cat left behind.

86414

Stirchley

04-01-22, 07:09 PM

86484

No dogs left behind.

Mr Minio

04-02-22, 07:32 PM

More and more mass graves of Ukrainian civilians are being discovered. Wanted to add pictures but these might be too drastic even for the spoiler tag. Basically the old Soviet method of tying the hands behind the back and shooting the person in the head from behind.

Next to the bodies of Ukrainians, leaflets with instructions for digging and securing mass graves.

https://i.imgur.com/QfG2PnB.png
https://i.imgur.com/C3N84lM.png

This is a leaflet from the document ref. the standard of grave digging. It was adopted on February 1, 2022, for the Army of the Russian Federation.

But sure, go ahead and keep saying Russians are not as bad as Nazis and Putin is not as bad as Hitler. It's not Putin who's personally murdering thousands of innocent people.

I really don't know what's the solution to all this. My hatred for Russian bandits is growing day by day. It is hard to watch photos, films, and reports from cities reclaimed by Ukrainians. Due to the number of crimes, Russia should be excluded from the life of Western civilization for a very long time!

John McClane

04-04-22, 01:15 PM

The satellite pictures out of Bucha are disturbing enough.

Stirchley

04-04-22, 03:52 PM

The satellite pictures out of Bucha are disturbing enough.

Ugh. Madness.

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John McClane

04-04-22, 05:39 PM

Ugh. Madness. Yeah, I just read the news about a mayor, her husband, and son being executed for not going along with the Russian demands. It's pure madness. Unnecessary retaliatory killings of small town citizens because they were too weak to capture any major cities. Their actions are precisely what I'd expect to result from their weakness. They resort to killing civilians because they can't accomplish anything. It is from the standard Russian playbook we saw twice before in Chechnya.

Stirchley

04-04-22, 06:13 PM

Yeah, I just read the news about a mayor, her husband, and son being executed for not going along with the Russian demands. It's pure madness. Unnecessary retaliatory killings of small town citizens because they were too weak to capture any major cities. Their actions are precisely what I'd expect to result from their weakness. They resort to killing civilians because they can't accomplish anything. It is from the standard Russian playbook we saw twice before in Chechnya.

Yes, there’s a photo of them (alive) in the Times today.

But this has been every war on earth: scorched earth plus the murder of civilians. It’s nothing new & it didn’t begin with Russians (not that you said it did).

Mr Minio

04-05-22, 03:22 AM

But this has been every war on earth: scorched earth plus the murder of civilians. It’s nothing new & it didn’t begin with Russians I don't think it's really about how these crimes are unprecedented or incomparable in scope. War crimes like this have happened before, and some of them are still relatively recent. What's it really about is how in the 21st century, in Europe, after all these atrocities Ukraine suffered at the hands of both Nazis and Soviets, we see it again.

Because it is happening in the 21st century in Europe when and where we thought that we went ahead. We think about the conquest of space, making new life-changing inventions, and eliminating diseases, and Russia is still having fun moving the border posts.

Russia's art was often riddled with propaganda. But they have a lot of great art. And I love Russian art: film, literature, music. I sing Russian songs. I always could make a distinction between the country's culture and its politics. But this is getting harder and harder.

And now we have a war. And somehow the associations with the Third Reich come to mind. After all, Germany had a wonderful culture! Poets, composers, Nobel Prize winners ... And they destroyed their entire image as a civilized nation during the Second World War. And, unfortunately, in order to cure Germany of nationalism, it was necessary to unleash the final punishment on it, break its backbone, and only then, under supervision, allow the restoration of statehood. But comparisons to Germany are not really needed, as Russians were comparably evil during the Second World War. They were lucky to be on the side of the winners of World War II (they changed sides, though). Their animal behavior has never been judged like that of Nazi Germany. In an ideally moral world, both German and Russian regimes should collapse during or after the war. Unfortunately, in the case of Russia, this never happened, and today Ukraine has to deal with the consequences of this. Because the Russian World War II criminals were never punished, it allowed Russia to build the myth of "Great Russia". No big mental change took place, and animal behavior is still an acceptable norm. Already their actions in Chechnya and Georgia clearly indicated this.

There is a problem with the narrative that what's wrong is not Russia, it's individuals. But first, a particular culture has bred these people into the world, and a particular culture has taught them how to conduct themselves as human beings. Secondly, Russia has been in the same poor direction for decades, not because of any hostile actions by Western agents, but through its own choices. Germany could be in a similar situation, but somehow not only corrected its course but also made a remarkable change in the narrative of its country. Meanwhile, Russia has been standing in the same way since the Bolsheviks, and as soon as it lifts its head, the neighboring countries are filled with thousands of corpses.

Putin is a symptom of Russian society, not some individual operating in a vacuum. Many Russian apologists say that it's all only Putin's fault, but bringing the war in Ukraine down to "it's all Putin's fault" is a shameful oversimplification equal to "every Russian is evil". Putin, the war on Ukraine, and Russia's imperialist aspirations are supported by a big chunk of Russian society. People protest the war in thousands but not in millions. This is the result of years of propaganda, Russian national consciousness, and lack of education. Of course, none of this is axiomatic with "let's hate every Russian person now", but rather it is an indication that the issue lies much deeper than Putin. The world is all resentful now, but then the world will forget and begin absolving. And then another Putin will come. And another war.

During the first days of the war, I even had some compassion for Russian soldiers. But now any compassion is gone. All normal people have either deserted or were shot for insubordination. Whoever stayed was either a beast from the very beginning or became a beast very fast. When one looks at such bestiality, I really think that Ukrainian soldiers have great compassion for these bastards.

Stirchley

04-06-22, 01:16 PM

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This was a school.

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The power of a photo. After a month of hunger & thirst her small town has been liberated.

Stirchley

04-06-22, 01:18 PM

I haven’t seen anywhere online a shout-out to the Ukrainian firefighters. What a crap & highly dangerous job: putting out fires in destroyed buildings. So I’ll put a shout-out here.

Stirchley

04-06-22, 06:06 PM

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Citizen Rules

04-06-22, 07:35 PM

Captain Steel

04-06-22, 09:30 PM

Regarding the dead Ukrainian civilians who were recently found with their hands tied and then executed...I wondered why the Russians would leave the bodies in the open where they could easily be found thus proving that the Russian military is involved in executing civilians, which of course is a war crime.

I suppose some would argue it's a warning from the Russians to the Ukrainians as to what will happen to them if they don't surrender soon. That could be true.

But I think the executed civilians were left out in the open so the Russians could see how the USA, Nato and Europe would react. I believe it's a test to see just how far the west reluctance to get directly involved in the conflict goes...and to test how strong of a hand the Russians have.

I think the Russians (and the Chinese who are paying close attention to Ukraine) are learning the west is afraid of a major direct conflict. I think our weak response is causing the Ukrainians great harm and has made the world a more dangerous place. Like a festering wound left untreated the end result can be gangrene and amputation.

I'm not offering an answer - just something I heard on a late night radio show called The Other Side of Midnight (hosted by Frank Morano) last night regarding this specific issue - some guy was on as a guest (unfortunately I missed his name & credentials)...

He said there are these Nazi militia groups fighting on the side of Ukraine. (President Zelensky was quoted to have said when questioned about these groups in an interview with Brett Baer that "they are what they are" - and allegedly FOX cut that portion of the interview according to this guy on the radio).

Anyway, whoever this guy on the radio was theorized that these Ukrainian Nazi groups are executing Ukrainians who either side with Russia or simply want to surrender to Russia to stop the attacks. So basically he's saying the Ukrainians executed in the street were killed by other Ukrainians who belong to Nazi militias and left as an example to anyone that doesn't want to join the fight on the side of Ukraine.

I have no idea if any of that is true or what it's based on.

crumbsroom

04-06-22, 11:21 PM

I have no idea if any of that is true or what it's based on.

Are these the standards you need to be met before you start speculating about matters worthy of serious consideration?

Like, dude, at what point is something not worth repeating?

At what point is amplifying talking points that sound an awful lot like the rhetoric Putin used to invade a sovereign country, irresponsible?

Maybe these are things to consider when we are just 'asking questions'. A practice that has been both knowingly and unknowingly used to spread a lot of really bad, really harmful, really distracting news stories the last few years.

Captain Steel

04-06-22, 11:38 PM

Are these the standards you need to be met before you start speculating about matters worthy of serious consideration?

Like, dude, at what point is something not worth repeating?

At what point is amplifying talking points that sound an awful lot like the rhetoric Putin used to invade a sovereign country, irresponsible?

Maybe these are things to consider when we are just 'asking questions'. A practice that has been both knowingly and unknowingly used to spread a lot of really bad, really harmful, really distracting news stories the last few years.

I'm not speculating, just repeating something that was aired on a public national radio station. And it was one person's publicly aired opinion in answer to a question that was also just posed here - because no explanations for the atrocities make much sense.

The only reason I'm repeating it is the question was just posted today and I heard one person's explanation just last night.

A while back I asked a question about where was Putin getting his talk about Nazis in the Ukraine (that, for some insane reason, he's somehow using to justify bombing the civilians of a country that has attacked no one). Someone responded who has a lot more insight into that area of the world than I with a very in-depth & detailed answer - you may want to go back and look for that post.

As a general statement I will say it seems more than apparent there is absolutely no logical rationale for the extreme violence & unprovoked mass murder Putin has unleashed on the innocent civilians of a sovereign & peaceful country.

crumbsroom

04-07-22, 02:03 AM

I'm not speculating, just repeating something that was aired on a public national radio station.

Then permit me a few questions about what you repeated.

Was what he said based on anything to back it up? Had he actually conducted an investigation? Did he have sources handy? Interviews? Was he in correspondence with field reporters or official experts of any kind? What made him someone worth listening to? Worth taking seriously?

Or was it just a guy wondering aloud about some stuff he'd thought? Was he just asking questions? Cosplaying shit about a tragedy?

Because if it is the latter, I overheard some guy at a bar talking about how he was raising pet crabs in a locker at a Greyhound station. Hopefully he never gets any air time on a public national radio station, because then God knows what crazy, unbelievable things we'll learn about the Ukraine. What secrets they've been hiding in their bus locker.

mark f

04-07-22, 02:36 AM

Everybody please stop responding to Steel's wackadoodles.

Captain Steel

04-07-22, 02:47 AM

Then permit me a few questions about what you repeated.

Was what he said based on anything to back it up? Had he actually conducted an investigation? Did he have sources handy? Interviews? Was he in correspondence with field reporters or official experts of any kind? What made him someone worth listening to? Worth taking seriously?

Or was it just a guy wondering aloud about some stuff he'd thought? Was he just asking questions? Cosplaying shit about a tragedy?

Because if it is the latter, I overheard some guy at a bar talking about how he was raising pet crabs in a locker at a Greyhound station. Hopefully he never gets any air time on a public national radio station, because then God knows what crazy, unbelievable things we'll learn about the Ukraine. What secrets they've been hiding in their bus locker.

I don't know the answers to the questions. I turn the radio on while cleaning up the kitchen before bed and listen to whatever's on, then turn it off as soon as I'm done or when commercials come on.

As said, the only reason I repeated it was because a question about that specific news item was the latest post on this thread and the portion of the radio show I heard was also addressing that specific question.

All I know is the guy was a featured "guest" on that portion of the show as opposed to someone calling in to the show.

I did look up the info today on the Net about FOX cutting the portion of the Zelensky interview and found corroboration.

Captain Steel

04-07-22, 02:57 AM

Then permit me a few questions about what you repeated.

Was what he said based on anything to back it up? Had he actually conducted an investigation? Did he have sources handy? Interviews? Was he in correspondence with field reporters or official experts of any kind? What made him someone worth listening to? Worth taking seriously?

Or was it just a guy wondering aloud about some stuff he'd thought? Was he just asking questions? Cosplaying shit about a tragedy?

Because if it is the latter, I overheard some guy at a bar talking about how he was raising pet crabs in a locker at a Greyhound station. Hopefully he never gets any air time on a public national radio station, because then God knows what crazy, unbelievable things we'll learn about the Ukraine. What secrets they've been hiding in their bus locker.

Don't know if this helps, but I found a link to the show:
https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93YWJjcmFkaW8uY29tL3BvZGNhc3QvdGhlLW90aGVyLXNpZGUtb2YtbWlkbmlnaHQtd2l0aC1mcmFuay1tb3Jhbm8v ZmVlZC8_cG9zdF90eXBlPWVwaXNvZGU/episode/MTM4NjIxMTgtYjU5OC0xMWVjLWI1NDEtOTNlZjY0Y2I1OTg2?hl=en&ved=2ahUKEwi77vT0oIH3AhVtZN8KHQx4B_UQieUEegQIAhAF&ep=6

Based on this site's description it says a guy named Dan Kovalik (human rights activist & labor rights author) offers insights on Russia-Ukraine war. I never heard of him, nor know anything about him, but I'm assuming that's the guy since I found yesterday's show.

Looks like you can listen to the entire show (over 3 hours).

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 03:24 AM

I wondered why the Russians would leave the bodies in the open where they could easily be found Apart from checking how the West would react, here are other likely reasons:

They simply didn't bother cleaning up the corpses. The Russian army is disorganized, so once they more or less claim a piece of land, they move onto it like a swarm of locusts on a cornfield, and totally devastate it.
They wanted to intimidate other civilians and undermine Ukrainian morale. This is quite a popular strategy. You brutally murder some people to show the rest there is no point in resisting. Psychological warfare.
They didn't have trench-digging equipment at hand, so they couldn't hide the corpses fast and were too lazy to / had no orders to dig up mass graves using shovels.
They were angry they can't make any progress in conquering Kyiv so they took out their anger on civilians in small towns.

I have no idea if any of that is true or what it's based on. This is a dot-to-dot version of the Kremlin propaganda's excuse for murdering civilian men, women, and children. Sharing these insights perpetuates Russian propaganda. Whether you did it on purpose or not, doesn't matter. The damage is done. I, too, have some unconfirmed claims about Russians raping 40 children and pulling out their teeth, but I don't share this information since it has not been confirmed yet. Not that I would be surprised if it turned true. The point stands, though: Even if you ask in good faith, it's hard not to see it as harmful, as it helps spread propaganda. Now, other MoFos have to do hard work debunking at least some of these claims.

Someone responded who has a lot more insight into that area of the world than I with a very in-depth & detailed answer - you may want to go back and look for that post. It was me. But the main takeaway from my post should've been that UPA no longer exists and the Azov Batallion is some 2,500 people at best. Here's the main point I was making:
How a militia of 2,500 members justifies the violent subjugation of 44 million Ukrainians including the bombing of the entirety of 430K Mariupol?
And yet, simply by asking, you totally ignored that point.

As a general statement I will say it seems more than apparent there is absolutely no logical rationale Logical as in, justifiable? There is none. Logical as in, explainable? There is more than one.

Everybody please stop responding to Steel's wackadoodles. He already posted this, so we have to respond and correct the harmful insinuations he perpetuates. Ignoring his post without giving any criticism could be read as silent support for what he wrote.

mark f

04-07-22, 03:28 AM

After 12 pages and a month of it?

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 03:31 AM

After 12 pages of it? Fair point. His posts haven't been deleted, though, and are some of the newest posts in the thread. His posts can still be seen by people who know nothing or very little about the conflict, and without any reaction to them, they would seem of equal weight to other posts. His post should be deleted. Especially the one with the link.

AgrippinaX

04-07-22, 04:01 AM

Fair point. His posts haven't been deleted, though, and are some of the newest posts in the thread. His posts can still be seen by people who know nothing or very little about the conflict, and without any reaction to them, they would seem of equal weight to other posts. His post should be deleted. Especially the one with the link.

Wonderful; so you are explicitly promoting censorship. Just checking - wouldn’t be the first time.

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 04:55 AM

Wonderful; so you are explicitly promoting censorship. Just checking - wouldn’t be the first time. Yes, I'm explicitly against sharing inane fake excuses that help the aggressor's side justify their barbarous crimes.

AgrippinaX

04-07-22, 05:53 AM

Yes, I'm explicitly against sharing inane fake excuses that help the aggressor's side justify their barbarous crimes.

Fair enough, but you are deluded if you don’t think your entire spiel/tone of every single comment of yours isn’t ideologically coloured. Everything is ideologically coloured, yet with your absolutist assertions throughout the thread of what “Russians” do and think, “Russia is” and “Russia does”, I still haven’t seen any evidence of your credentials to make any such claims. No one could quite explain where such phenomenally absolutist statements originate, in an evidence-based way, at least.

Do you have a postgraduate degree in Russian history from a respectable international institution, did you do a secondment there? Or isn’t it that, oops, you just live roughly in the vicinity of Russia? That alone means that your perception of Russia is coloured by the post-Soviet dislike and resentment of the country which is so typical of ex-Soviet republics and surrounding areas.

Someone placing so much emphasis on the concept of “fake” would, one would think, attempt at least to adhere to an objective, unemotional perspective - not the case here though.

What with your suggestions of exaggerating the figures for Russian casualties and minimising those for Ukraine, and many other comments here, it is crystal-clear that you’re very much “pro sharing inane fake excuses” (sic) as long as that helps propagate the narrative you support (it really doesn’t matter what the narrative is). And that’s pathetic and a case of blinding hypocrisy at that.

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 07:12 AM

Oh come on, the entire world is shocked at the crimes of Russian soldiers in Ukraine, but you felt the need to be a contrarian.

Freedom of speech ends where hurting another person begins. We cannot show tolerance for intolerance. I know it's a clichéd comparison, but the pattern is the same as with Germans during the Second World War: Germans were taught that they were Übermensch, which meant every other "race" was inferior. Not just Jews, but also Slavs. Germans planned to totally wipe out Jews and greatly reduce the population of Poland to make it a nation of enslaved serfs.

Similarly, Russians have been taught that they are the greatest nation in the world and that everybody else is inferior and against them. Everybody is a Nazi or an American spy, according to Russian information sources. This is the actual line of propaganda in Комсомольская Правда and РИА Новости articles, among others. I'm not going to link to these articles so as to not spread bull propaganda. You don't speak Russian? Thankfully, some of these articles have been translated to English just to point out how delusional Russian state propaganda is. You can find them if you want to.

Fair enough, but you are deluded if you don’t think your entire spiel/tone of every single comment of yours isn’t ideologically coloured. Everything is ideologically coloured This is a rhetorical distraction often used by Russian trolls to take everybody's eyes from what really matters:

1. Russia attacked a sovereign country.
2. Russia is raping, torturing, and murdering civilians.

How do you ideologically color the tying a person's hands behind their back and shooting them in the head from behind? How do you ideologically color the torture of a person in the basement? How do you ideologically color the rape of women and children? None of these acts have anything to do with ideology. Unless your ideology allows these things.

In Russia, there is no talk about Russian crimes, which were aplenty in its long and turbulent history. State propaganda convinces people that it is not a war crime if you murder a "Nazi". Even a ten-year-old "Nazi". After all, to this day, Russia takes pride in winning over Nazism and ending the war. Of course, this is greatly exaggerated. Americans would've won anyway. It'd just take more time. And less suffering in Poland and Germany, as once the Germans ran away, Russians came in and murder started again, this time spiced with rape and stealing LITERALLY everything.

If you don't think Russians are brainwashed on average, just try telling one that the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were once friends and had signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact that described how Poland will be divided between these two countries. Tell them that the Soviet Union attacked Poland from the East on June the 17th 1939 only 16 days after Germany attacked from the West. If you tell them all that and they say "you are right" then you have been lucky. Because my experience is totally different.

I still haven’t seen any evidence of your credentials to make any such claims Just watch the pictures from the Bucha Massacre. I'm not going to post these disturbing pictures here. You can find them in many ways, e.g., by going to Twitter and typing "Bucha graves" in the search box.

Do you have a postgraduate degree in Russian history from a respectable international institution, did you do a secondment there? Do you? We can start exchanging ad hominem retorts if you want. But I don't think it would contribute to this thread as a whole. If anything, it'd only derail it and force Yoda to close it.

Or isn’t it that, oops, you just live roughly in the vicinity of Russia? That alone means that your perception of Russia is coloured by the post-Soviet dislike and resentment of the country which is so typical of ex-Soviet republics and surrounding areas. There is a reason for that. But I wouldn't call that resentment. It's a rational fear of Russia; that Russia will attack other countries, again with the excuse of denazification. And that they will somehow still try to pose as liberators.

We saw that happen in Poland during the Second World War, and unfortunately, little has changed. I heard many stories from my grandma and dozens of other people's grandmas. Russians would steal toilets and women's underwear, rape and torture women that were still children as well as older women, saw off their breasts, etc. They'd dig up raw potatoes from the fields. They'd steal everything they could and set fire to whatever was left. This is happening again, on a smaller scale, yes, but maybe only because this war is a smaller war, too.

When she was still alive, my grandma would tell me a lot of stories about the war. She said that when the Germans entered her village, they have killed a few people there, and they took a few to the Treblinka Extermination Camp, including her father. But she somehow spoke flatteringly about the Germans anyway. She said that she was sitting somewhere hidden in a ditch and a German saw her, walked over, looked, and walked on. And besides, the Germans gave chocolate to children, etc. Yes, she admitted Germans too murdered people and some of them were scary monsters, but the main difference was that Germans did everything in a very routine and orderly way. By the way, I'm not trying to perpetuate the "good Wehrmacht" myth because Wehrmacht committed a lot of war crimes, too. But Russians were feared more than Germans were. And that says a lot.

When the Russians came to my grandma's village, they started from digging up raw potatoes. The women started hiding because Russians had raped some women before. My grandmother's mother was caught by a Russian soldier with an ax in his hand who entered their house uninvited. The soldier grabbed her by the hair. She fell. Then, my grandma threw herself on her knees in front of him and begged him for mercy. Miraculously the Russian soldier left the house. But other women in the village weren't so lucky. They were raped, mutilated, or murdered. Some women had their breasts cut off with a saw or ax.

Imagine how evil must've been the Russians who entered my grandma's village that she, whose father was taken to Treblinka by the Germans and died there, still thought that Russians were worse.

And I spoke to numerous people from all around Poland. Their grandparents had very similar stories to tell. Then, the Russians moved on to Germany and did similar, if not the same. They were fighting Nazis. By raping women and murdering children.

If accounts of survivors are not enough for you, you can look at the thing in a wider scope by googling "soviet war crimes" or something. And then googling "Bucha massacre" and reading what Russian troops are doing in Ukraine. The similarities are scary. The thing is, googling it may not be enough. You need to spend more time reading about all that.

What with your suggestions of exaggerating the figures for Russian casualties and minimising those for Ukraine

There are definitely wars where one side has a huge moral advantage over the other and the war in Ukraine is such a conflict. If you compare these two things:

Ukrainians might've overestimated Russian losses, delibaretly or not.
Russians attacked an independent country. They raped, tortured, and murdered civilians in Bucha, Irpin, and other cities (I fear to think what is happening in Donbas).

You will see how inane your allegations sound.

And that’s pathetic and a case of blinding hypocrisy at that. I don't mind you saying that. It's a very good example of how most Russians and pro-Russian people react when they see what Russian troops are doing in Ukraine. Denial is one of the most basic defense mechanisms. And that refers to every nation. The thing is, most intelligent people accept the truth sooner or later. It's the uneducated who keep being stuck in their ignorance.

Watch_Tower

04-07-22, 07:25 AM

Why would the Russian commit war crimes, in a situation where they are already winning with negotiations going their way and zero military involvement from NATO and the US, plus neutrality if not support from the likes of China and India?
Wouldn't leaving dead bodied lying around willy nilly lead to further sanctions, potential military involvement and potential loss of Asian allies/neutrality.

It's sounds about as logical as Assad winning in Syria, negotiating ceasefire from western bombings only to sabotage himself by supposedly using chemical weapons .Later reports proved the weapons never used or the evidence was extremely LIMITED.

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 07:40 AM

Why would the Russian commit war crimes, in a situation where they are already winning They are not winning. They are getting their ass kicked. They already retracted back to Donbas and hope to win the war with the least possible gains (Donbas + maybe a tip of Southern Ukraine). Spoiler: They will lose.

So yeah, they realized they cannot win there, cannot take Kyiv, so they got angry and did the only thing they had so far succeeded at: murdering even more civilians. This sounds like one of many plausible explanations to me.

Wouldn't leaving dead bodied lying around willy nilly lead to further sanctions, potential military involvement and potential loss of Asian allies/neutrality. Russia doesn't care. The national news is already saying that Russia is left alone in the fight against Nazis all around the world, or some other bull like that. The issue here is that sometimes we try to analyze these things from our democratic, Western, educated perspective. But Russia has a different way of looking at things. It's either win or destroy everything so that they do not win.

It's sounds about as logical as Assad winning in Syria, negotiating ceasefire from western bombings only to sabotage himself by supposedly using chemical weapons .Later reports proved the weapons never used or the evidence was extremely LIMITED. Okay, now you're literally denying Russian war crimes. Hmm.

pahaK

04-07-22, 07:48 AM

Or isn’t it that, oops, you just live roughly in the vicinity of Russia? That alone means that your perception of Russia is coloured by the post-Soviet dislike and resentment of the country which is so typical of ex-Soviet republics and surrounding areas.

So would you also dismiss a rape victim's allegations towards the rapist because she's too close to the rapist and her perception is colored by dislike and resentment so typical to rape victims? Just applying your logic here.

In my opinion, it's exactly these countries that used to be under Soviet oppression that has first-hand knowledge of how Russians work. Experience is a great teacher. But then again, my opinions don't matter either as Finland is also Russia's neighbor, right?

AgrippinaX

04-07-22, 08:37 AM

Oh come on, the entire world is shocked at the crimes of Russian soldiers in Ukraine, but you felt the need to be a contrarian.

I can understand a need to be a contrarian and believe it rhetorically useful in some cases, but here I see a thread which, if it wasn’t designed to turn into Russia-bashing, is now safely that. And this, as I think has been noted, doesn’t really help Ukraine or even affect Russia: it’s just that, a group of people bashing a country, its people and its cultural experiences while never having lived there or studied it. I keep checking in here from time to time to see if anything beyond that would materialise; and whilst I have no issue with the OP, it’s very interesting how the focus is shifting to horrible evil Russia from Ukraine.

Also most (if not all) soldiers in all of the world’s wars commit crimes. This is an unfortunate reality of warfare and what it does to the human psyche. I remember you didn’t react kindly to my posting about Russian soldiers being tortured by Ukrainians. Whoever is in the wrong, that’s still a war crime on my planet?

Freedom of speech ends where hurting another person begins. We cannot show tolerance for intolerance.

And there you are, my friend, in a rhetorical quagmire. The above is about as good a piece of evidence that “tolerance” is really a myth as any. As with the Will Smith/any recent free speech drama, you don’t know why “another person” might be hurt. For all I know, maybe the mysterious and nefarious “Russian trolls” are hurt by your random anti-Russian quips. That’s where your freedom of speech ends, I guess?

This is a rhetorical distraction often used by Russian trolls to take everybody's eyes from what really matters:

1. Russia attacked a sovereign country.
2. Russia is raping, torturing, and murdering civilians…

…If you don't think Russians are brainwashed on average, just try telling one that the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were once friends and had signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact that described how Poland will be divided between these two countries. Tell them that the Soviet Union attacked Poland from the East on June the 17th 1939 only 16 days after Germany attacked from the West. If you tell them all that and they say "you are right" then you have been lucky. Because my experience is totally different.

Of course Russians are totally and utterly brainwashed. And no, they are obviously not winning the war.

Do you? We can start exchanging ad hominem retorts if you want. But I don't think it would contribute to this thread as a whole. If anything, it'd only derail it and force Yoda to close it.

I have studied it, yes. At postgraduate level (not that I think that makes it objective). Not in Russia, obviously, so we get that out of the way. As for the latter, well, many a less incendiary thread have been closed for less. I’m never for shutting down discussion, but there’s no discussion here really.

There is you/some others spurting out truth claims about Russia because most people won’t contradict you/get involved. I mean, it might be easier to change the subject of the thread to “**** Russia!” and what more can be said?

We saw that happen in Poland during the Second World War, and unfortunately, little has changed. I heard many stories from my grandma and dozens of other people's grandmas. Russians would steal toilets and women's underwear, rape and torture women that were still children as well as older women, saw off their breasts, etc. They'd dig up raw potatoes from the fields. They'd steal everything they could and set fire to whatever was left. This is happening again, on a smaller scale, yes, but maybe only because this war is a smaller war, too.

Yes, okay, and every single nation on Earth engaged in a war has done the same thing. And please, by all means, call me “a Russian troll” (I never quite discovered what they are, but alas), but this isn’t a form of deflection, or whatever you call it, this is factually true. Every nation on Earth that’s been at war has committed war crimes. War is not ethical business. So for me to say to you that Russia in that way is in no way remarkable isn’t “trolling”.

When she was still alive, my grandma would tell me a lot of stories about the war. She said that when the Germans entered her village, they have killed a few people there, and they took a few to the Treblinka Extermination Camp, including her father. But she somehow spoke flatteringly about the Germans anyway. She said that she was sitting somewhere hidden in a ditch and a German saw her, walked over, looked, and walked on. And besides, the Germans gave chocolate to children, etc. Yes, she admitted Germans too murdered people and some of them were scary monsters, but the main difference was that Germans did everything in a very routine and orderly way.

My grandmother was Polish. She had to hide in a well during the war for weeks on end, no light, no water. Once she got out and until the day she died, she had a phobia of Germans, even when she lived in London and walked through Marylebone, she would flinch away from German speech. Your reference to your grandmother is a problem less because it’s ad hominem but mainly because it is inherently emotional and impossible to approach analytically.

Everyone’s personal experience shapes their perception and attitudes, and to use that in all seriousness to claim “Russians are evil”/“worse than Germans” is darkly comical. I have a Ukrainian housekeeper who once insulted me suggesting it’s high time I have kids as “time’s running out” (I was in my early twenties). I guess I should say all Ukrainians are tactless ****s who can’t mind their own business.

Imagine how evil must've been the Russians who entered my grandma's village that she, whose father was taken to Treblinka by the Germans and died there, still thought that Russians were worse.

“Evil” is not a word that can be quantified. There’s a whole discipline called “ponerology” that studies evil. “Evil” is a way of othering something. But anyway, the fact that you actually in all seriousness refer to Russians, or any nationality, as “evil” makes me feel very little hope about this exchange.

If accounts of survivors are not enough for you, you can look at the thing in a wider scope by googling "soviet war crimes" or something. And then googling "Bucha massacre" and reading what Russian troops are doing in Ukraine. The similarities are scary. The thing is, googling it may not be enough. You need to spend more time reading about all that.

You seem to be under the impression that I am denying Russian war crimes - no. Again, your broader point being what? “Russians are evil?” What are you, you personally, trying to achieve here? What is your objective? I sure as hell hope that isn’t regime change in Russia, as that means you really don’t even care about understanding the country you’re enjoying bashing so much. Seeing as Russians could never under the circumstances “take to the streets”, or whatever other idiotic term there is, and even so, given there is ample sociological research proving that “protest”/“taking to the streets” doesn’t work/accomplishes nothing (below):

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/04/why-street-protests-dont-work/360264/

There are definitely wars where one side has a huge moral advantage over the other and the war in Ukraine is such a conflict. If you compare these two things:

Ukrainians might've overestimated Russian losses, delibaretly or not.
Russians attacked an independent country. They raped, tortured, and murdered civilians in Bucha, Irpin, and other cities (I fear to think what is happening in Donbas).

You will see how inane your allegations sound.

I don't mind you saying that. It's a very good example of how most Russians and pro-Russian people react when they see what Russian troops are doing in Ukraine. Denial is one of the most basic defense mechanisms. And that refers to every nation. The thing is, most intelligent people accept the truth sooner or later. It's the uneducated who keep being stuck in their ignorance.

And again, I am in no way denying that Russians are murdering civilians/etc etc (although to me, honestly, as someone who partly works in public affairs/politics, it seems like a tiny drop in the ocean given what goes on in the world…. Oops, I guess I’m a Russian troll again). I actually tried to convert a denier last night and I agree, it’s tough. So yes, to get that out of the way, Russia is committing war crimes. I’m trying to grasp, I guess, what people expect “outrage” such as that in this thread to do about it. If anyone explains, in a neutral fashion, I’d be very interested.

What you don’t seem to be willing to grasp is that every nation on Earth that has been at war has committed war crimes of some sort. This isn’t anything special. We are paying attention to Ukraine because the victims are white, this isn’t because of anyone’s “trolling”, but because people tend to care more about those who look like them.

https://www.newswise.com/articles/new-research-finds-we-don-t-empathize-with-others-equally-but-we-believe-we-should

I mean, sure, Ukraine has “a huge moral advantage”, whatever that means, so do the Uyghurs in China and the Copts in Egypt. Did having a moral advantage ever help anyone? Even the Jews with a moral advantage during the Holocaust weren’t let into most countries until very late in the day.

What you also don’t seem to be willing to grasp is that online threads or even in-person church meets where people go round in a circle discussing how “evil” Russians are is just about the most counter-productive thing one could possibly come up with during an armed conflict. “Widespread condemnation” has never truly stopped anyone save for corporate entities like McDonald’s from doing anything. “Widespread condemnation” isn’t an action, it’s a non-event, it’s nothing.

Speaking of reading on Russian history or whatnot, do you know about the prophesy of Fátima and the consecration of Russia? Have a read about that. Russia has already been consecrated twice, so what, what has that done? Same here with the “widespread condemnation” and Russia-bashing threads.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consecration_of_Russia

This thread is by now nothing of use except random Russia-bashing. Y’all enjoy yourselves carrying on with that.

(I totally understand if I should be banned, whatever).

AgrippinaX

04-07-22, 08:47 AM

So would you also dismiss a rape victim's allegations towards the rapist because she's too close to the rapist and her perception is colored by dislike and resentment so typical to rape victims? Just applying your logic here.

I work in litigation and I’m not a fan of victim impact statements, I think they’re manipulative. Also I never said (this keeps coming up in so many discussions) that my thinking/any thinking is absolute and should be applied indiscriminately to different types of cases. But to attempt to answer your question, I don’t think a rape victim’s mother should give evidence in court to determine how long the rapist’ sentence should be, because yes, her response is rooted in feelings, not evidence or legal practice.

If the rape victim said, “I bet he’s never had consensual sex in his life and raped all his exes because he’s EVIL”, then yes, duh, I would strike that from the record. Equally, if we’re trying to examine the allegations to see whether or not it was consensual, then I would say we should try looking at some kind of video evidence, not just the victim’s words. We certainly can’t rely on the emotional response of the side that’s “morally in the right”. I’m sure you’ve seen 12 Angry Men (one of my favourite films). In short, in the film, the jury member who has the deciding vote wants subconsciously to convict a young boy because the juror himself has a poor relationship with his teenage son. And he admits his mistake in terms of his thinking being inappropriate in the court of law context. That explores exactly that type of conundrum and shows that personal involvement/emotional responses, even if uncontrollable, are detrimental to the legal process and its objectivity.

In my opinion, it's exactly these countries that used to be under Soviet oppression that has first-hand knowledge of how Russians work. Experience is a great teacher. But then again, my opinions don't matter either as Finland is also Russia's neighbor, right?

Sure they do. It’s just that they carry exactly as much weight as those of the so-called “Russian trolls”, seeing as they are equally ideologically coloured.

Mr Minio

04-07-22, 11:15 AM

it’s just that, a group of people bashing a country If a country invades another country and kills civilians, it deserves to be bashed.

it’s very interesting how the focus is shifting to horrible evil Russia from Ukraine. What do you mean by that? Could you rephrase?

Also most (if not all) soldiers in all of the world’s wars commit crimes. This is a cop-out. If you kill several people, you are then persecuted for your crime. And saying "But... but... Ed Gein killed many people, too!" won't help you a bit. The thing is, nobody will persecute Russian war criminals. If anything, they will get medals for fighting Ukrainian "Nazis".

And there you are, my friend, in a rhetorical quagmire. The above is about as good a piece of evidence that “tolerance” is really a myth as any. As with the Will Smith/any recent free speech drama, you don’t know why “another person” might be hurt. For all I know, maybe the mysterious and nefarious “Russian trolls” are hurt by your random anti-Russian quips. That’s where your freedom of speech ends, I guess? There is no need for sarcasm. From my experience, Russians always take it as a personal offense any time you say anything non-positive about Russia. You should not be hurt when somebody says your country did or is doing something wrong. This shows insecurity.

Besides, is asking to not tell outright lies about another nationality and not murdering them based on these lies too much?

And Russian trolls are by no means a mysterious group:

Russian web brigades (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_web_brigades)
Internet Research Agency (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency)

Of course Russians are totally and utterly brainwashed. And no, they are obviously not winning the war. This, here, is a prime example of Poe's law. I have no idea if you're saying this sarcastically or agreeing with me!

There is you/some others spurting out truth claims about Russia because most people won’t contradict you/get involved Most people won't contradict me because they agree with me. You are in the minority, I'm afraid.

I mean, it might be easier to change the subject of the thread to “**** Russia!” and what more can be said? I explicitly underlined how what I say is not meant to incite hate on all Russians. But an authoritarian state waging an inhumane war on another state and oppressing the few of its own people who stand up to the crimes deserves criticism.

Yes, okay, and every single nation on Earth engaged in a war has done the same thing Not to such extent, though. Not all of them, no. And you're still repeating the same old argument: "but others did that, too!". It just doesn't matter.

My grandmother was Polish. She had to hide in a well during the war for weeks on end, no light, no water. Once she got out and until the day she died, she had a phobia of Germans, even when she lived in London and walked through Marylebone, she would flinch away from German speech. Your reference to your grandmother is a problem less because it’s ad hominem but mainly because it is inherently emotional and impossible to approach analytically. My reference did not mean to say that Germans weren't evil. It was meant to say that Russians were comparably evil. But while today's Germany wears penitential attire and continues to apologize for Nazi crimes, Russia not only denies an apology but oftentimes outright denies that any crimes happened, to begin with.

Everyone’s personal experience shapes their perception and attitudes, and to use that in all seriousness to claim “Russians are evil”/“worse than Germans” is darkly comical I have already addressed this point before. But if you follow what you wrote ad verbatim, then you can never criticize anybody or anything because a collective experience is still built on a multitude of personal experiences. So you can use this pseudo-argument to actually say Ukraine has no right to criticize Russia because there was some ninety-year-old grandpa in a deep Siberian forest who has nothing to do with the war.

But your point is flawed, and the following example of using the same logic illustrates it very well:
1. Oskar Schindler saved many Jews!
2. Oskar Schindler was a member of the Nazi Party.
3. You have no right to criticize Nazis as a whole. Not every Nazi was evil!

l. I have a Ukrainian housekeeper who once insulted me suggesting it’s high time I have kids as “time’s running out” (I was in my early twenties). I guess I should say all Ukrainians are tactless ****s who can’t mind their own business. Am I to understand the Ukrainian housekeeper raped, tortured, and murdered you, and then there was a similar Ukrainian housekeeper in every xth house in London? This is a bad example. We are not talking about just one person who did wrong. We are talking about many people who did wrong and some people who didn't do wrong. The fact there are good, humane, and wonderful people in Russia is undeniable. Unfortunately, the fact Russians committed numerous crimes during both the Second World War as well as the War in Ukraine is also undeniable.

“Evil” is not a word that can be quantified. You absolutely can quantify evil. If you slap somebody's face, you hurt them, so that can be fairly seen as evil. But if you cut off somebody's hand and then use this hand to bash them to death, then that's evil so much greater than just slapping the person. But I admit that measuring evil gets harder the more evil is done by a particular individual or group. Is killing 500,000 people really that much worse than killing 499,999 people? Anyway, it's not really about how evil the Russians were during WW2. It's about the fact they were very evil, but they never apologized and the state never did anything to change the people's minds.

Anyway, your rhetorical games change nothing, really. Russians are committing evil war crimes in Ukraine at the moment. And these crimes remind me of crimes they committed in the past, including during the Second World War.

But anyway, the fact that you actually in all seriousness refer to Russians, or any nationality, as “evil” makes me feel very little hope about this exchange. But I didn't. Not in the quoted block of text, anyway. Your emphasis skipped an important part of the sentence. The full sentence with a correct emphasis is:

Imagine how evil must've been the Russians who entered my grandma's village that she, whose father was taken to Treblinka by the Germans and died there, still thought that Russians were worse.

You seem to be under the impression that I am denying Russian war crimes - no. Then why are you acting as if you were?

Again, your broader point being what? “Russians are evil?” What are you, you personally, trying to achieve here? What is your objective? I could ask you the exact same questions, but... My broader point is multifold. Education is one - Captain Spaulding asked a question, so I answered it. But above all, I'm a user on a forum I like, so I'm posting in a thread I'm interested in. Just like you.

Seeing as Russians could never under the circumstances “take to the streets”, or whatever other idiotic term there is, and even so, given there is ample sociological research proving that “protest”/“taking to the streets” doesn’t work/accomplishes nothing (below) At last we agree on something: There is no way Russians will take to the streets in a big number. Unless the flour to sawdust ratio in their bread approaches 50:50, that is. But your point that protests accomplish nothing is, oh irony, so wrong, that the very Ukrainian Revolution of Dignity (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_of_Dignity) proves you wrong.

Russia is committing war crimes. I’m trying to grasp, I guess, what people expect “outrage” such as that in this thread to do about it. If anyone explains, in a neutral fashion, I’d be very interested. I don't think anybody expects that writing about it on the forum is going to change anything except for maybe clarifying the situation for those who do not know anything about the war. But chiefly, writing about the war is just a way of coping with it. Sure, you can write about it somewhere else, but for many MoFos, Movie Forums is their go-to place on the internet, so it's only natural they'd write about it. Besides, the thread is open, so we write in it.

What you don’t seem to be willing to grasp is that every nation on Earth has committed war crimes of some sort. And what you don't seem to be willing to grasp is that it doesn't matter.

We are paying attention to Ukraine because the victims are white, this isn’t because of “trolling”, but because people tend to care more about those who look like them. We are paying attention to Ukraine because to some of us, it's closer. Besides, we usually see Europe as a civilized place, more so than Asia or Africa. I'm not saying this isn't wrong, but this is how it mostly is. There wasn't such a big war in Europe since the Bosnian War. The War in Donbas has been raging since 2014, but it was mostly ignored. For many of us, this is the first big war nearby.

I mean, sure, Ukraine has “a huge moral advantage”, whatever that means, so do the Uyghurs in China and the Copts in Egypt. Did having a moral advantage ever help anyone? Even the Jews with a moral advantage during the Holocaust weren’t let into most countries until very late in the day. I don't know what you are talking about or trying to achieve here. My quip about a huge moral advantage was a reply to your accusation that I don't see an issue with Ukrainians overestimating Russian losses. It was supposed to show that it's not really an immoral thing to do, all things considered. And yes, Ukraine's huge moral advantage actually gets them weapons and tanks from other countries. Because almost the entire world supports Ukraine. With the exception of pariahs and undemocratic countries like North Korea, China, Belarus, and Syria. Quite a company, eh? I'm not going to comment on the comparisons to Jews, but Poland alone has already taken 2.5 million Ukrainians since the beginning of the war.

What you also don’t seem to be willing to grasp is that online threads or even in-person church meets where people go round in a circle discussing how “evil” Russians are is just about the most counter-productive thing one could possibly come up with during an armed conflict. So is spreading Russian propaganda. What's more, the latter is harmful, too.

Speaking of reading on Russian history or whatnot, do you know about the prophesy of Fátima and the consecration of Russia? Have a read about that. Russia has already been consecrated twice, so what, what has that done? Same here with the “widespread condemnation” and Russia-bashing threads. I don't believe in prophecies and don't care to comment on that point.