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“My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

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Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#251

Post by jhbadger »

paulintrognon wrote: post #22
kragen wrote: post #6

During the Cold War, the primary thing that distinguished the US side from the USSR side was that, while speech by USSR people and people sympathetic to the USSR (like, say, CPUSA) was published in the US, publishing speech sympathetic to the US in the USSR would get you arrested. It seems like the US has become what the USSR was: companies who publish speech from people in Iran or Crimea are now violating the law by…

I don't think Noam Chomsky has ever been sympathetic to the USSR, he just said that the US was not much better than USSR. For example in that speach he clearly states that USSR was a a flawed totalitarian system from the start https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06-XcAiswY4 (he has in fact also stated many times that his political views were indeed censored in the US)

When Western intellectuals like Chomsky say they have been "censored", they mean that that their publishing house asked them to leave out or add stuff because they felt that such changes would help the book sell better, as their goal was to make money off authors they published. That's quite a bit different from the threats of jail time that Eastern Bloc intellectuals faced.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#252

Post by orf »

lazyjones wrote: post #244
n4r9 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By "EC" I'm guessing you mean European Commission? This is appointed by the European Council and requires approval from the European Parliament. If the make-up of the Commission is a point of serious public interest then the public can democratically enforce their interest via their choice of heads of states and MEPs. More concerning is the inability of the European Parliament to repeal legislation, but things are gr…

> This is appointed by the European Council and requires approval from the European Parliament. And now let's look at the past 3 presidents: always the same routine, the EP gets presented with 1 candidate and can say yes... or yes. Awesome democracy.

Just because you don't understand it, or have been misinformed, doesn't make it a terrible system.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#253

Post by zzzcpan »

egorfine wrote: post #221
shitgoose wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The Ukraine" referred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in the Soviet Union. no disrespect, but there is this coming from?!

Ukrainian society is ill and this is one of the recent inflammations that hurts. Being unable to fix roads or economy, they have directed their frustration towards symbolic things, fighting everyone who calls Kiev "Kiev" instead of "Kyiv", renaming streets, etc. Now they have decided that "the Ukraine" is somehow referencing Ukraine as a territory and not a state. God knows where any of this comes from, but any "patr…

> fighting everyone who calls Kiev "Kiev" instead of "Kyiv", renaming streets, etc.

It's an organized effort, part of government propaganda, not an ill society. Society is so healthy, that it didn't trust the government at all and voted all those people out. Really, it doesn't get healthier than that.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#254

Post by gdy »

dogma1138 wrote: post #35
avocado4 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do they sanction Crimea (victim) instead of Russia?

Because Crimea is a defacto Russian state now and for the most part a large portion of the population and the current government is participating in it. The sanctions are for the most part per the request of the Ukrainian government. If Catalonia becomes a separatist state tomorrow and Spain and its allies sanction it everyone in it will be under sanctions regardless of who or what they support. This is what happens…

"The idea behind the sanctions is in the end to make the life of the populous sufficiently difficult so they will rebel."

Isn't it evil?

I mean, if you don't believe the results of referendum and subsequent Gallop's poll, than sanctions are intentionally hurting people who are victims of Russian occupation. And if you do believe that overwhelming majority of Crimean people support reunification with Russia, the sanctions punish Crimeans for exercising their right of self-determination and reek of double standards. I don't remember any sanctions on Chechen republic after it separated from Russia, for example.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#255

Post by DanBC »

wahern wrote: post #245
komali2 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you say you could publish pro-soviet material in the USA during the cold war? My understanding is that this is not true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism > In 1952, the Supreme Court upheld a lower-court decision in Adler v. Board of Education of New York, thus approving a law that allowed state loyalty review boards to fire teachers deemed "subversive". It had certainly cooled down from outright McCa…

The government has more leeway when acting as an employer.

McCarthyism affect wide ranges of industry, including the entertainment industry.

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

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#256

Post by orf »

lazyjones wrote: post #228
dragonwriter wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Democracy doesn't require a lot of parties, it requires that the people actually have the power to elect someone in charge. No, this problem has been studied and democracy (that is, rule by the people) empirically requires an electoral system that had the capacity to support multiple competitive parties; to the extent systems artificially limit the option space they produce results that are not representative of th…

> No, this problem has been studied and democracy (that is, rule by the people) empirically requires an electoral system that had the capacity to support multiple competitive parties First democracy: ca. 500 BC First political parties: ca. 1800 AD We could discuss in detail whether the EU system or the US system enforces more artificial limits, in the end the EC remains much less democratic due to its relative power…

I'm not sure how you can say with a straight face that political parties only came into existance in the 1800's.

Prototypal modern, organized political parties started to emerge in the 1700's. Do you think before then that everyone was an independent and had no common goals? Political factions predate even the first demcracy. There where a number of competing, and from many accounts solid, factions in both the greek and roman governing systems, which where for all intents and purposes a party.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#257

Post by gdy »

riku_iki wrote: post #124
coliveira wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If, as you say, people want to be part of Russia, what is the difference? Do they need to be punished for wanting to be part of another country?

Russia would severely punish people who wants to be part of other country (not Russia). It is in both countries (Ukraine and Russia) constitution, that it is against the law to separate territory without country-wide voting.

Serbian constitution didn't allow unilateral secession of Kosovo either. Where are the sanctions against Kosovo then?

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#258

Post by zzzcpan »

dogma1138 wrote: post #35
avocado4 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do they sanction Crimea (victim) instead of Russia?

Because Crimea is a defacto Russian state now and for the most part a large portion of the population and the current government is participating in it. The sanctions are for the most part per the request of the Ukrainian government. If Catalonia becomes a separatist state tomorrow and Spain and its allies sanction it everyone in it will be under sanctions regardless of who or what they support. This is what happens…

> The sanctions are for the most part per the request of the Ukrainian government.

Sanctions were pushed by the US for the most part.

> The idea behind the sanctions is in the end to make the life of the populous sufficiently difficult so they will rebel.

The idea is to flex power for the enemy government and other countries, nobody cares about the people. People are definitely not going to be happy about the west after that and even less likely to participate in organized rebellion against the government, as all sides are bad now.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#259

Post by gdy »

lacampbell wrote: post #125
my_first_acct wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your numbers are probably correct. I don't happen to know another number: how many people in Chechnya would rather be independent than part of Russia. But it doesn't matter; the Russian government is very selective about how it applies the "right to self-determination". The Russian government is likewise selective in its interpretation of the Budapest agreement (1994) [1], in which Russia guaranteed Ukraine's…

But it doesn't matter; the Russian government is very selective about how it applies the "right to self-determination". That's the crux of the issue I think. To be consistent you would surely have to support both Chechnya and Crimea having the right to self-determination - or neither having the right to self-determination. EDIT: So let me ask you - do you support both, or neither?

To be consistent you would surely have to condemn the US and EU for not imposing sanctions on the Chechnya.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#260

Post by otalp »

jhbadger wrote: post #251
paulintrognon wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think Noam Chomsky has ever been sympathetic to the USSR, he just said that the US was not much better than USSR. For example in that speach he clearly states that USSR was a a flawed totalitarian system from the start https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06-XcAiswY4 (he has in fact also stated many times that his political views were indeed censored in the US)

When Western intellectuals like Chomsky say they have been "censored", they mean that that their publishing house asked them to leave out or add stuff because they felt that such changes would help the book sell better, as their goal was to make money off authors they published. That's quite a bit different from the threats of jail time that Eastern Bloc intellectuals faced.

Not many people know of the worst cases. Take the case of Chomsky's "Counter-Revolutionary Violence", which caused angry executives to literally shut down the publisher[1]:

"Sarnoff(chief of book operation, Warner communications) complained that too many of Warner Modular's(small publishing company under Warner communications) works were written by left-wing writers. McCaleb replied that conservative writers were also represented, and that Warner Modular had planned to publish works by Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek.

Sarnoff then canceled the ads for CRV, ordered the destruction of the first printing of CRV, as well as the Warner Modular catalog that listed them, and announced that he would not release one copy of CRV to anybody. When McCaleb replied that such an outrageous move would shatter Warner Modular's staff and shock the publishing world, Sarnoff replied that he did not "give a damn what I, my staff, the authors, or the academic community thought and ended by saying that we should destroy the entire inventory of CRV".

Warner Publishing decided to shut down Warner Modular before CRV could be published. The print run was not initially destroyed because of contractual obligations, but the book was passed on to MSS Information Corporation for promotion and distribution after Warner Publishing shut down Warner Modular. However, MSS engaged in no promotion, as it was not a commercial publishing company and had no distribution facilities. Only 500 copies of the 20,000-copy printing survived. Radical America obtained and distributed some copies, because its staff already knew of CRV's existence.[6] According to Chomsky, the rest were "pulped," not burned. Despite its suppression in the United States, it was translated into several European languages, had two printings in France by the time that The Washington Connection was printed, and CRV's suppression became a "minor cause celebre" in France."

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-Revolutionary_Violence...

Not to mention that Chomsky was on the verge of being put in prison for protesting Vietnam, while journalists and activists who have either gone to prison or forced to accept terrible plea deals thrown upon them for minor offences. Barrett Brown and Aaron Swartz comes to mind.

The FBI assassination of Black Panther leaders being another.

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