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Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

economist.com

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Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#301

Post by jevgeni »

orbital-decay wrote: post #229
jevgeni wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First and foremost it was the russians who supported their government. russians were silent during Chechnya, during the Yukos case, after Putin's comments on Kursk widows, after killing of Politkovskaya, Nemtsov, and so on and so on. Look at any russian popular media in early 2000s and you will see a huge amount of really casual racism, with "Brat 2" being the pinnacle. Nobody spoke out against it. Just because they…

> russians were silent during Chechnya Let me tell you how it actually was, first-hand - because you clearly got zero idea and seem to propagate the "we've always been at war with Eastasia" thing. So our family used to live in a small city/town (~10k pop) - everybody knew each other, and all that. A 18yo guy from a nearby house got conscripted and subsequently killed in that war. The next day his mother killed hersel…

Cool. So what happened to Grozny?

I mean, Jesus Christ, 150-300k people died and you’re telling me that people were pissed for being drafted.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#302

Post by jevgeni »

5e92cb50239222b wrote: post #110
jevgeni wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First and foremost it was the russians who supported their government. russians were silent during Chechnya, during the Yukos case, after Putin's comments on Kursk widows, after killing of Politkovskaya, Nemtsov, and so on and so on. Look at any russian popular media in early 2000s and you will see a huge amount of really casual racism, with "Brat 2" being the pinnacle. Nobody spoke out against it. Just because they…

I am not going to engage with someone who is so bent on his hatred that he's is willing to subvert the rules of the English grammar to show it, but let it be noted that it has been impossible to protest in Russia since around 2004 or so. None of what you're describing stopped the West from pouring insane amounts of money into Putin's military and repression apparatus. Oh, the irony. My relatives over there had it rea…

Saying that someone is accountable for their own country is hatred. Cool.

There are roughly 140 million people in russia. Out of that 2.6 million are “siloviki”. The 2.6 million are not the main reason for the regime, it’s the remaining 137.4 mil.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#303

Post by alienicecream »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #291
alienicecream wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO Mearsheimer's take has more explanatory power than "Everyone able to make a rational decision can see Russia are are the sole cause of this war.".

Sure. The west forced Putin to invade a neighboring country.

Maybe not forced, but the west gave him a good reason to. The Mexico analogy is a good one, and the US has invaded other countries for less, so I'm not sure why that's such a controversial take.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#305

Post by actionfromafar »

NineStarPoint wrote: post #207
mfer wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Russians have never had any real individual rights. To take a step back and think about things (not that I'm suggesting what I think)... in most places for most of history it's been about the group. The collective. Being heavily individualized is a modern and western thing. So, why is one way right and another way wrong? Note, I do not agree with what's going on with Russia. I'm simply bringing up the higher level…

Russia isn’t a country that’s about the group either though, it’s just a strong oligarchy. And not even an oligarchy that has roots in group based thinking like China, it’s very much an oligarchy born out of western individualism instead. More generally, I’d say that group based thinking should not be enforced by the government. A society based around “the group is most important” can enforce itself just fine based o…

In Russia, the rulers see any ideology as dangerous. You have to prove you are loyal the the rulers, not some ideology.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#306

Post by orbital-decay »

jevgeni wrote: post #301
orbital-decay wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> russians were silent during Chechnya Let me tell you how it actually was, first-hand - because you clearly got zero idea and seem to propagate the "we've always been at war with Eastasia" thing. So our family used to live in a small city/town (~10k pop) - everybody knew each other, and all that. A 18yo guy from a nearby house got conscripted and subsequently killed in that war. The next day his mother killed hersel…

Cool. So what happened to Grozny? I mean, Jesus Christ, 150-300k people died and you’re telling me that people were pissed for being drafted.

I'm directly addressing the point that people were "silent". No they weren't silent, and framing it as being pissed for being drafted is bizarre to anyone who lived during that time. They were angry at Yeltsin for bringing the war in the first place, to use military force in both 1993 coup and Chechnya. Why the massively unpopular person (with 6%-something support before the campaign) remained in power instead of someone like Nemtsov (funny how you remember his murder but don't seem to remember what role he was in during 90s) is another question, the answer will be far too long.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#307

Post by sifar »

mfer wrote: post #150
scottLobster wrote: post #129

Russians have never had any real individual rights. Throughout their history the common people have just been resources enslaved to brutal overlords. The Soviets were perhaps somewhat softer overlords on average, but the principle remains. The state will dispose of disobedient people the same way it would dispose of rotten potatoes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8ZqBLcIvw0

> Russians have never had any real individual rights. To take a step back and think about things (not that I'm suggesting what I think)... in most places for most of history it's been about the group. The collective. Being heavily individualized is a modern and western thing. So, why is one way right and another way wrong? Note, I do not agree with what's going on with Russia. I'm simply bringing up the higher level…

This group-individual dichotomy has been the oldest source of conflict. As social construct, both the individual and the group cannot exists without each other. One can only be an individual when one can differentiate oneself from or within a group - otherwise there is no basis for comparison.

There is the tyranny of the group and the tyranny of the individual - we need to reject both.

On which way is right - I would say one should be able to choose the group and retreat from it if so desired.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#308

Post by jevgeni »

orbital-decay wrote: post #306
jevgeni wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cool. So what happened to Grozny? I mean, Jesus Christ, 150-300k people died and you’re telling me that people were pissed for being drafted.

I'm directly addressing the point that people were "silent". No they weren't silent, and framing it as being pissed for being drafted is bizarre to anyone who lived during that time. They were angry at Yeltsin for bringing the war in the first place, to use military force in both 1993 coup and Chechnya. Why the massively unpopular person (with 6%-something support before the campaign) remained in power instead of som…

All irrelevant for the end-result: hundreds of thousands people dead, cities destroyed, warcrimes committed. 3 million "siloviki" in a country of 140 million - with these proportions, it's the 137 mil who are guilty.

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#309

Post by 331c8c71 »

lolinder wrote: post #292
331c8c71 wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://memopzk.org/figurant/moskalyov-aleksej-vladimirovich... https://m.newstula.ru/fn_1307328.html The first one is from a widely known human rights advocacy group Memorial (which has tensions with the state). The second is a regional newspaper of sorts (hence state-controlled give or take).

The first source gives a passing nod to past convictions with no details at all. The second source is completely state propaganda, no give or take. It doesn't even try to hide it, it's blatantly biased and leans fully into the idea that the accused is a mole planted by Western powers to discredit the government. Neither is a great source for your claims, and the fact that you cite the second at all in this context ma…

I didn't say it was not propaganda, what I meant is that the degree of direct state control of regional press varies.

Lots of papers write exactly in the same style even if they are completely private and no one tells them to - but they know what could happen if they start to dissent or even deviate from the "party line".

Novaya corroborates one of the past convictions exactly

https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/03/03/papa-menia-chut-...

Re: Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

#310

Post by dd36 »

arethuza wrote: post #159
dd36 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s what their media is telling them.

The Guardian and the Sun don't tend to agree on very much but they both support the help the UK is giving to Ukraine.

I’m referring to US. The people you find sympathetic to Russia are the people whose media is telling them to be sympathetic to Russia. Russia is the real victim, etc.
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