It’s a liberal cesspool full of people who refuse to listen when you speak. I explained how the SMO in Russia was justified going all the way back to fucking WWII and Stepan Bandera to Russia not wanting Ukraine in NATO and some dickhead told me to “tOuCH gRaSS”. Didn’t even address any of my points, just that “dEnAziFIcaTioN iSnT a gOoD rEasOn, iT’s aS bAd aS wMDs”.

Fucking moron. I hate that fucking place so fucking much.

  • Shrike502@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 year ago

    Your mistake was trying to ask for a reasonable view of Russian government’s action. To the average redditoid, nothing Russia does is ever justified in any way. Fighting terrorists? “That’s just an excuse to persecute minorities and national liberation!” Fighting Nazis? “Akschually Russia is real Nazis!”

    Russian government been doing lot of aping from the west, and these types universally condemn it, without a hint of self reflection. If tomorrow Putin completely withdraws from Ukraine, dissolves the federation and puts pentagon in charge of the Russian military (cough south Korea), they’ll still find something to blame.

    • taiphlosion@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      That Russiagate op really got people believing Russia is the USSR again. Like literally for years it has continuously been demonized just for existing. I’m aware that it’s not a worker’s state and deserves criticism for its reactionary tendencies, but nuance isn’t something that seems to exist when talking about things like geopolitics, which isn’t a fucking Marvel movie.

      • redtea@lemmygrad.ml
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        You’re not allowed to separate the analytical process from picking a side. If your analysis doesn’t confirm that you should unequivocally support the ‘good guys’, you must’ve erred in your reasoning.

        Unfortunately this logic permeates every Western institution. Analysis is subjugated to liberalism. Coming to conclusions that do not support the status quo is dangerous shit. It puts your livelihood at serious risk.

        That, and the lack of any critical self reflection, never raising the question, ‘If my analysis keeps leading to conclusions that do not coincide with reality, is reality wrong or my thought process?’

        • taiphlosion@lemmygrad.mlOP
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          This.

          I’m not a citizen of the settler empire, I’m a subject. So to me the illusion was never strong enough for me to vehemently defend it. I never understood the Amerikan worship of itself because they claimed to be #1 and the best…but at what?

          I eventually came to realize I had no loyalty for this country that enslaved my people and took our land, and eventually arrived at being an ML when I realized my heroes, the BPP, were also MLs.

          I honestly feel like understanding historical materialism is what helped me understand geopolitics the most, but that requires a critical understanding of how things have gone in the past, without the filter of the West to dilute the information.

  • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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    Good on you. I left Reddit when they locked Genzedong and i never looked back. It is such a breath of fresh air to be free of that toxic cesspit. It’s not just the regular users who are awful, the mods are even worse, and the entire site is heavily controlled by three letter agency employes.

    As to their “argument” against the SMO, it is totally moronic. Denazification is the best conceivable reason for starting a military operation. No sane country should tolerate a militarized Nazi regime on their border.

    Also there’s the little detail that the “WMDs” were a lie while the Nazification of Ukraine was so obvious even the western media were writing about it, and they are still forced to address it because every time they take a photo of Kiev regime soldiers - surprise, suprise! - there is some swastika, iron cross or SS badge that the western media need to twist themselves into knots to handwave away or justify.

    And it’s not just the Nazi problem and the NATO issue, far too many people omit what is probably THE main reason for why Russia HAD to intervene when they did, namely the eight year long war waged by the Kiev Nazis on the people of the Donbass.

    However this, just like arguments about Nazis and NATO expansion, is pointless to bring up when talking to Redditors and will just fall on deaf ears because they do not view Russians and pro-Russian East Ukrainians as human, nor will they ever acknowledge that Russia has a right to have national security concerns and vital interests, let alone a right to act to address these when the West refuses to take them seriously.

    • albigu@lemmygrad.ml
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      Also there’s the little detail that the “WMDs” were a lie while the Nazification of Ukraine was so obvious even the western media were writing about it, and they are still forced to address it because every time they take a photo of Kiev regime soldiers - surprise, suprise! - there is some swastika, iron cross or SS badge that the western media need to twist themselves into knots to handwave away or justify.

      The gaslighting never ends. I have had people badgering me over this war and yet they couldn’t even cite the official Russian reasons for the war, despite being incredibly “savvy” on all “secret” objectives.

      Reddit has been only getting worse since 2015 when r/politics became the dominant force. I gave up after the admins literally did a coup on even slightly leftwing subs like r/presidentialracememes.

      • Water Bowl Slime@lemmygrad.ml
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        It’s seriously astounding how little needs to be done to propagate lies here. Like, people often fearmonger about government censorship and algorithmic suppression, and those things ARE problems don’t get me wrong, but people waaaaaaay overestimate how much it takes to dupe them.

        I mean, you can just search “Ukraine” on any search engine and filter out results from 2022 onwards to get articles that blatantly contradict what’s being published today. It doesn’t take an elaborate scheme to spread disinformation… It doesn’t even take consistency…

        • albigu@lemmygrad.ml
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          Fighting for “freedom of the press” has been a liberal capitalist fight since the beginnings of the printing press. They believe that just because their ideas are banned that they’ll cease to exist, probably because they require enforcement from the law and state in the first place. And yet they think themselves to be “following human nature.”

          Everyone knows very well why. Because the publication of a newspaper is a big and profitable capitalist undertaking in which the rich invest millions upon millions of rubles. “Freedom of the press” in bourgeois society means freedom for the rich systematically, unremittingly, daily, in millions of copies, to deceive, corrupt and fool the exploited and oppressed mass of the people, the poor.

          This is the simple, generally known, obvious truth which everyone sees and realises but which “almost everyone” “bashfully” passes over in silence, timidly evades.

          from our boy Lenin

  • andrewta@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Russia didn’t want Ukraine in NATO but invades Ukraine and effectively kicks the door open to basically force NATO to let Ukraine into NATO.

    Law of unintended consequences?

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        Once the war is over they will be. The invasion of Ukraine basically created a situation where NATO said enough is enough and has agreed that Ukraine can join. Had Russia not invaded this would most likely not have happened.

        • redtea@lemmygrad.ml
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          Were they not on the cusp of joining before Russia invaded? I thought that was one of the reasons for the invasion, to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO?

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            There has been talk for years. But it never went anywhere and was never going to. I don’t remember right off hand why ( I just woke up and my brain is still foggy) but I do know it was never going to happen. Putin just wanted more land and believed that since NATO was never going to vote to have Ukraine join, it was going to be a quick conflict and the thing would be over. He took Crimea and the world did nothing. If it worked once why wouldn’t it work again?

            Man was he wrong.

              • andrewta@lemmy.world
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                Because if Ukraine is part of NATO and Ukraine is being invaded then NATO basically has to directly join in the fight. Which means direct conflict between NATO and Russia. That is never a good idea.

                And there is no civil war. Well no more then there is in the US. There are certain groups in the US that want to break away. Obviously that won’t happen. They never gain any real traction.

                In Ukraine they wouldn’t have gained traction either , but Russia decided to back and also arm the separatists. That was done for the sole purpose of giving Russia an excuse to invade and annex Crimea.

                • redtea@lemmygrad.ml
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                  You’re missing some facts here. There was a civil war. 14,000 people killed. 30,000 injured. 1.3+million displaced. All reported by the UN.

                • CriticalResist8@lemmygrad.ml
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                  In Ukraine they wouldn’t have gained traction either , but Russia decided to back and also arm the separatists

                  So it’s okay for NATO to arm Ukraine, but it’s not okay for Russia to arm people who are being killed by their own government?

        • Red Wizard 🪄@lemmygrad.ml
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          Lol this isn’t a marvel movie kiddo and this war isn’t going to be “over” where the “good guys” win and the credits roll. It’s going to end the same way the Iraq war ended. 20 years of bloodshed, every Ukrainian killed, irreparably traumatized, or radicalized, with Azov insurgencies armed to the gills with NATO and US assets with a deep hatred of all three parties involved.

          It’s natural landscape raped for it’s resources, it’s “reconstruction” privatized by Global Financial Capital, it’s people’s “identity” will be nothing but a shallow husk of its former self.

          Don’t forget what Iraq looked like prior to the deathgrip of imperialism:

          In 20 years, the then 20 year olds born around the time of the war won’t even know why we were aiding them, or why we would bother to help a “dirty” “under developed” nation like Ukraine. Just be ready to show them photos of what it looked like before NATO and the US wrapped their filthy, oily hands around their throats and choked them blind.

      • hitwright@lemmy.world
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        Yes, but it brings the whole NATO to war by default. Since that is an escalation no one wants to play, so the Ukraine continues to suffer alone.

        • redtea@lemmygrad.ml
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          So if the war means Ukraine cannot practically join NATO, and if Russia is unlikely to leave Ukraine in a state where it could join NATO after the war, is it likely that invading Ukraine will lead to Ukraine joining NATO?

    • loathesome dongeater@lemmygrad.ml
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      to basically force NATO to let Ukraine into NATO

      If NATO is being forced to let in Ukraine, then why is Ukraine still not a part of NATO after all this time?

      If you said this about Sweden I could understand. But everything about Ukraine joining NATO has been speculative saber rattling. As I see it they will never allow Ukraine to join.

      • andrewta@lemmy.world
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        The vote will happen once the war is over that has already been publicly stated. The only reason it won’t happen while the war is happening is it would create a situation that put NATO in direct conflict with Russia. Right now it’s just handing the arms to Ukraine.

        Had Russia not invaded this most likely wouldn’t have happened.

        • CriticalResist8@lemmygrad.ml
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          NATO has said 4 times Ukraine won’t get to join, and has been dismissive of any timeline, and you still believe them when they say “yeah it will totally happen after the war trust us guys just hold on and eventually it’ll happen pinky promise”

    • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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      Ukraine was already becoming a de facto member of NATO before Russia intervened. NATO infrastructure was being built on its territory, interoperability was being established, it was being armed and trained by NATO and NATO operatives were already embedded in their military and intelligence apparatus. The same is true for Sweden and Finland too hence why their formal joining makes little to no difference. Russia intervened to prevent a genocide in the Donbass and to reverse the NATOization - aka Nazification and militarization - of Ukraine.

      Ukraine is being treated as a de facto member of NATO as the entirety of NATO is bending over backwards to send them every scrap of military equipment they can scrounge up, to send them intelligence, to train them and help them plan military operations, and inject thousands of “trainers”, “mercenaries” and “volunteers” aka NATO soldiers in disguise into the battlefield. This is not much different than what NATO would do for an official member. They also would have tried to impose a no-fly zone if they thought they could do so without their air force being absolutely wrecked by Russia.

      At this point Russia has no incentive to end the conflict before Ukraine is either completely annexed so it can no longer be weaponized by NATO against Russia, or until it capitulates to all of Russia’s demands, which will include the removal of the Nazi regime in Kiev and the installation of a pro-Russian government that will enshrine Ukraine’s neutral and demilitarized status into permanent law/treaties. The notion that Russia should have just let the situation in Ukraine continue to fester and worsen because their intervention has pissed off NATO is infantile and naive to the highest possible degree.

      Russia already tried the diplomatic route from 2014 onwards with the Minsk agreements and that turned out to be a complete sham on the part of the West and Ukraine. If anything Russia should have intervened much earlier, ideally gone in right after the Maidan to restore order and the legitimate government of Ukraine, but hindsight is 20/20.

  • Porcupirate@lemmy.world
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    I agree that Reddit has more unknowing “Hwell Acktually” types than is good for anyone’s mental health. It doesn’t make discussion any better. But if you proclaim your hate and call people morons you might be part of the problem. If someone is wrong on the internet you could just be doing them a favour by acting like that.

    • taiphlosion@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      Ah yes it’s certainly my fault that when I tried to answer a question I was met with ignorant hostility because people wanna feel good about their positions as if it’s a fucking Harry Potter book.

      It wasn’t even an “Hwell acktually” moment, they just ignored everything I said.

      • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
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        Nothing more disheartening than when you outline your position and why you believe the things you do only for some lib to just accuse you of things you never said and just ignore everything you wrote. “Smug ignorance” might as well be the motto of reddit.

        • taiphlosion@lemmygrad.mlOP
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          What’s worse is that it was in a supposed “leftist” sub. What else am I to do when I lay out my positions in a succinct way, and it’s met with that kind of hostility?

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            Any actually leftist sub gets purged there, Americans think that “liberal” is a left wing perspective. Too many subs are just built around accommodating that instead of actually challenging that kind of toxic behaviour. Though the ones that don’t do just end up getting banned or quarantined, so it is probably a bit of selection bias.

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    Fascist <= Liberal => Communist

    In this current world, as the situation has become, every body is born almost fascist then some education turns them into liberals that are always susceptible to fascism again whenever the state want. When liberals start educating themselves more they start seeing the truth and lies and perils of current system. And when they are exposed to left they accept it as the only alternative.

    Those people (if they are not bots) that you are facing on reddit or any other plateform bashing communism are either paid trolls or fascists that must be laughing when called a liberal.

    I may be wrong but this take is from my experiences these days. You’re more then welcome to correct.

    • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
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      “Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds.”

      You have it a little backwards. Liberals are kind of the “default” in capitalist society. Fascism could almost be considered an extension of liberalism. It has the same economic values, and often the same political values, just more “mask off” about them. You’re right that a liberal who educates themselves ceases to be a liberal, but most people online are not secret fascists, or at least, not consciously so. Liberals just have a lot of overlap with fascists, that’s all.

      And while we joke about the paid trolls and three letter agents a lot, the truth is that there are plenty of people willing to do their dirty work for them for free. They don’t need to be paid, they do it of their own volition, because they see it as “saving democracy from the evil tankies.”