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Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

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Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#661

Post by dh2022 »

lazide wrote: post #596
542354234235 wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia has had to sell oil at a steep discount, which has cut into their revenue significantly. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been frozen/seized that can't be used to fund the war effort. Modern war is not just "beans and bullets”, and Russia pays upwards of 10 times the price for key components it needs for missiles, aviation, UAVs, tanks, artillery, air defense, etc. as well as quality manufacturing equipmen…

I’m not saying the sanctions haven’t hurt, rather that when the war was at its decisive point (the first few days) they did not exist/were immaterial. Now they’re just doing more damage in an already damaging (and unwinnable) situation.

The biggest sanctions were adopted after the war started (and then the West kept piling up new sanctions every few months).

Are you suggesting the West should have put these harsh sanctions before the war? My recollection of Dec 2021 and Jan/Feb 2022 were that the West was trying to avoid inciting the crazy Russian dictator: Biden had two tele conferences with Putin in December, there were three meetings in Jan (OSCE - Russia, NATO - Russia, Lavrov - Blinken)

And I do not think the situation is unwinnable for the West (it is probably unwinnable for Ukraine as it will not be able to get its territory back). Russia is getting weaker with every man it loses, every tank is destroyed, every young man/woman who decides to leave. I would be surprised if Western Europe will want to do business with Russia for a generation - which basically makes Russia China's vassal for the same period of time.

Russia will be in bad shape for decades. The West will be just fine.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#662

Post by kennywinker »

gethly wrote: post #520
kennywinker wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny because i would write off any company doing business with russia. Every action is “political” because we exist in a context.

That is perfectly fine. You are the customer and you can choose whom you will give your business to. My point is that companies should not be doing it because they instantly cut their potential customer base by half with every single act of activism they do. They should be focusing on business and nothing else. Politics, activism, whatever you want to call it, should be solely in the hands of the individual, not the…

> they instantly cut their potential customer base by half with every single act of activism

Not really? The implication is that every choice has a 50/50 split of support. That couldn’t be farther from the truth.

> should be solely in the hands of the individual, not the corporations

The businesses in the article are doing what they did because of legal sanctions on iran. Not because they are making political choices about who to do business with.

But your description of what companies should be doing is describing unfettered psychopathic capitalism. Companies that will break every code of morality or decency as long as it’s technically legal. Chromium in the water? Go for it. Even legality is just a speed bumb. If you can get away with it? If you can bribe your way out of it? Why not do it!

I don’t want to live in that world. Unfortunately that’s pretty much the world we live in already and it shows.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#663

Post by kennywinker »

eunos wrote: post #196
kennywinker wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, we should just do business as usual with countries committing war crimes or genocide? Aggressors in war, users of chemical weapons on their own people? I’m aware there are consequences to sanctions, and the way they are implemented is often half-assed or hypocritical (e.g. the way that russian oil still flows) but to drop all sanctions… Is that not like saying boycotts hurt employees who had nothing to do with th…

Or moving towards a multipolar equilibrium so that a pole can't unilaterally decide about those.

What does that mean? Like in a practical sense - russia declares war on ukraine… next step is? Move towards a multipolar equilibrium? How? How long does that take.

Yes ideally we’d live in a world where this bullshit doesn’t happen. But it does happen, so our choices are to respond with the tools we have NOW or not respond at all.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#664

Post by miningape »

figmert wrote: post #652
miningape wrote: post #644

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Is the US government is so much more stable than Iran's? The US has been directly or indirectly involved in all conflict in the middle east in the past few decades, and the instability in the region is due to the US's failed foreign policy. Maybe the US should stop pretending they know what they're doing. The US can't keep domestic terrorism at bay, why are they trying in a foreign setting?

Yeah, I’ll take my chances with the global hegemon that has reigned over a historically unprecedented global peace. (Although I'd prefer we all did like South Africa and decomission our arsenals)

And yeah, the US should get out of the Middle East - we need to stop pretending is that sharia-law is compatible with western liberal democracies*.

* This IMO is the socio-cultural reason for the Middle East's instability following the US’s interventions - and why similar interventions had more success elsewhere.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#665

Post by YC837264872364 »

miningape wrote: post #644
figmert wrote: post #593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every international body had checked, and confirmed that Iran had no intention of building nuclear weapons. Even to this day. Even after what Israel and US did. Netanyahu has been saying Iran in minutes away from building nuclear weapons since early 2010s. Never mind those facts. Let's say they are building weapons. What gives the US the right to build enough nuclear weapons that they could destroy the world multiple…

[flagged]

> So unstable, theocratic, dictatorships under sharia-law [1] should have access to nuclear weapons? Because it's "fair"?

Ironically, this statement could apply to Pakistan, which has had nuclear weapons since 1998 and yet has never used them. How strange! According to Western leadership, all Muslims are supposed to be barbarian religious fanatics who want a worldwide nuclear holocaust!

Iran having a nuclear weapon would make the Middle East and the world a much safer place - if Ukraine had not disposed of their nuclear weapons in the 1990s, there would be no war happening right now! Possession of nuclear weapons is the only way for a country to guarantee its own sovereignty, which is something America and its coalition do not want for Iran - they want a weak puppet like the Shah who will let Exxonmobil come in and take all their oil revenue for themselves.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#666

Post by kennywinker »

sorushn wrote: post #99
kennywinker wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, we should just do business as usual with countries committing war crimes or genocide? Aggressors in war, users of chemical weapons on their own people? I’m aware there are consequences to sanctions, and the way they are implemented is often half-assed or hypocritical (e.g. the way that russian oil still flows) but to drop all sanctions… Is that not like saying boycotts hurt employees who had nothing to do with th…

> So, we should just do business as usual with countries committing war crimes or genocide? Aggressors in war, users of chemical weapons on their own people? That's what the US has been doing since forever, even actively participating in the war crimes. If you think any of the stated reasons for the sanctions are real, I have a bridge to sell you.

> That's what the US has been doing since forever

And you think this is a good thing? Like we should be consistent and support all war crimes instead of just some of them?

Just because we do bad things, doesn’t make it right to do more bad things.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#667

Post by deanishe »

sporkxrocket wrote: post #540
username332211 wrote: post #504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

This is an ultra simplistic take. Iran does not like the role the US has in propping up Israel, entirely rational and understandable. Israel may not be recognized by our government as a "sworn enemy" but it's done infinitely more damage to the US and US citizens than Iran has. The only reason they're not sanctioned is because one of the ways Israel attacks the US is through bribery (AIPAC) and blackmail (Epstein).

> The only reason they're not sanctioned

Aren't a lot of your religious fundies Zionists because the believe Jesus isn't coming back unless there are Jews in the Levant?

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#669

Post by Der_Einzige »

N_Lens wrote: post #561
adastra22 wrote: post #20

OP, some context from the other side might be helpful. Yes, there are fines for American companies if they do business with Iranians. That's how sanctions work as I'm sure you're aware. But the story doesn't stop there. If an American finds out they are transacting with a sanctioned individual, or citizens of a sanctioned country like Iran or North Korea, the stakes go up: $1M USD fine and up to 20 years in federal p…

Just a casual “pound-me-in-the-ass prison” top comment on HN (no this type of prison isn’t civilized or the mark of a mature criminal justice system or society).

You have to figure out how to make Americans stop feeling schadenfreude. They love the idea that these thugs/criminals in prison are being subjected to such conditions. The cruelty is the point.

We simply love to inflict pain and suffering. This is why we circumcise, why we ear crop, tail dock, create animals, put people in solitary, etc.

Re: Delete FROM users WHERE location = 'Iran';

#670

Post by simianparrot »

somenameforme wrote: post #614
simianparrot wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would "for the fun of it" be a prerequisite for it to be bad..? If someone shouts "death to " from across the street, I take it _very_ seriously. I fully understand the history between Iran and the US, but you you can't have suicidal empathy with an enemy state that trains its people to want you dead.

If you visit Iran (or pretty much anywhere) as an American you'll have zero issues with the people. Here [1] is a thread of various people visiting Iran, and it's 100% typical. The average Iranian has no problems with an American than anybody else - they have a problem with the American government. And the two are obviously two extremely different things. The one piece of advice that shouldn't need to be said, but do…

And I wrote that the US is at war with an enemy _state_. The state represents its people, but it is not _all of_ the people. I always see people derailing these discussions in this manner when it's always patently obvious that we aren't conflating the two.
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