• PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca
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    5 months ago

    It’s hard to avoid a “no true scottsman” with the current state of bots and propaganda accounts.

    But as far as I can tell, there are hardly any lefties, or even tankies, who unironically support Russia or even a middle ground position. Despite their hate of the west, Russia is clearly the greatest evil here.

    Most of the middle ground positions I see come from fox news.

      • PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        Maybe. But previously when I engaged with people making this same claim, when they provided their evidence (a link to a hexbear post) and I actually spent the effort to verify it, it was trivially clear that their evidence was wrong, and when I showed that to them, they blew up and blocked me from the entire community (they were a mod).

        Since then I’ve been pretty skeptical of people making this claim.

    • PugJesus@kbin.socialOP
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      5 months ago

      But as far as I can tell, there are hardly any lefties, or even tankies, who unironically support Russia or even a middle ground position. Despite their hate of the west, Russia is clearly the greatest evil here.

      Unfortunately, I can attest to a great many tankies who unironically support Russia or a ‘middle ground’ position. I could post examples all day long and not run out. At least, not run out of examples. I’d run out of will to live pretty quickly.

  • Zuberi 👀@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    5 months ago

    The classic LW fed bot, PugJesus, ladies and gentlemen. Back at it with another fire meme that entirely misses the point.

    • mozz@mbin.grits.dev
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      5 months ago

      I’ve asked this a few different times, and if you’re willing to answer, you’d be the first. How many people died to these death squads, in what year(s)?

      I suspect a particular reason for the unwillingness to give a precise answer, but let’s see what you say.

      Edit: No answer. I am not surprised.

        • mozz@mbin.grits.dev
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          5 months ago

          Yes, I’ve seen people send me this type of thing before. You didn’t answer the question. How many, in what years? There’s a reason I am asking for specifics from you, so that then you’ll need to defend your own claim.

          • mathemachristian@lemm.ee
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            5 months ago

            Irrelevant question. The point is about whether there are right wing death squads terrorising the people in east ukraine. There are my sources proving they exist. If you want to make up some weird statistic so you can have measure of how bad these nazis are in order to be able to dismiss them then you’re looking for nazi apologia. In which case you can fuck off.

            • mozz@mbin.grits.dev
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              5 months ago

              The reason I’m asking is that, if it had actually happened, there would be a specific answer. That’s a hallmark of factual information; it might be true or false, but it’s specific and unchanging. You can compare it against other facts, and if it’s true, it lines up. For the most part all the different pieces fit together. Propaganda information changes wildly, or contradicts itself, and the conversation keeps coming back to emotional appeals or angry hostility, and away from simple factual questions.

              When I first started asking this question, I was genuinely taking it pretty seriously. It was part of an extensive conversation with some people where I was looking up UN death and incident figures, watching Youtube videos like the ones you sent me, asking questions about what was being presented or looking things up for myself. I actually spent a whole bunch of time on it. So the original reason I asked was that I wanted to see if it was true or false, and the best way I know to do that is to dig for a lot of details, then compare them against other stuff, make sure they’re at least internally consistent, etc.

              Every single conversation I’ve had about these supposed death squads went this way though.

              • Hey, how many people have died in Gaza during this war? “About 27,000 so far”
              • Hey, how many people died on Kristallnacht? “Early estimates were 91 on that particular night; modern estimates are in the range of hundreds”
              • Hey, how many people died to Ukrainian death squads in Donbas? “You fuck off watch this Youtube video dead children you’re obviously a Western idiot how dare you say there weren’t death squads fuck you fuck you fuck you Russia’s the best”
              • Hey, how many Japanese civilians died in Hiroshima? “Somewhere from 100,000 to 150,000”

              See if you can spot the outlier. Again, I was originally asking about it expecting a specific answer and some kind of elaboration so I could compare it against other stuff to start to piece together whether it’s true, but it was a little hard to ignore the pattern once it started happening.

              • mathemachristian@lemm.ee
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                5 months ago

                If what had actually happened? Nazis in donbass? Why dont you interact with what I said. I dont know what youtube video you’re talking about. What I linked is a three part series going into extreme detail about nazism in ukraine from WWII on as well as UN reports about missing persons in the region. Unless you interact with what I actually said I see no reason to continue this “conversation”

                • mozz@mbin.grits.dev
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                  5 months ago

                  Obediently watching your videos while you absolutely refuse to answer simple questions about your position is not “interacting,” and I’m not interested in doing it.

                  I spent hours watching videos the last time I did this. If I decide I want to do it again, I’ll let you know. How many people died to these death squads in Donbas, in what year?

    • trafficnab@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      They always have an account on hexbear, every single time, they could at least use a different username

      • mathemachristian@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        You’ll note that this account is older. My hexbear account is an alt of this one, not the other way around.

  • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    I love when people claiming to be communists defend the hyper capitalist modern Russia. I have my criticisms of the ussr, but it’s dead and buried and Russia is as much the Russian Soviet as the Russian Soviet was Czarist Russia.

    • nova_ad_vitum@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      Tankies don’t have anyone they can root for that’s coherently communist or socialist anyways. China isn’t really, Russia is just an oligopoly with one guy on top for life (if you substitute land ownership with ownership of sectors of the economy then Russia looks a lot like a feudal monarchy).

      Their one immutable belief is the “US bad”. That’s it. That’s their speed of light. Everything else must twist to maintain that position. If Ukraine elected a pro-western leader, it MUST be a CIA coup. They couldn’t have possibly chosen that for themselves because “US bad”. If Russia starts an offensive war of conquest it can’t just be their fault, they must have been provoked.

      Before Russia invaded Ukraine they could pretend like only evil capitalist countries invade others. The invasion broke them since they have to someone maintain that position while also justifying the invasion , again, because US bad. This is really all they have now.

      • Filthmontane@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        So, here’s how US bad: the US for several years has been provoking Russia by inviting Ukraine into NATO with no actual intent on letting them in. We’ve used them to offload massive stockpiles of old military equipment and secured all rebuilding of Ukraine to US companies. As soon as the Ukrainians start advancing, the US begins to fail on its commitments.

        It’s possible to center ones ideals around the US being bad while also believing that Russia is bad.

        • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          Akshually, Ukrainians want to join the EU, not NATO. If you don’t believe me, look up the survey prior to 2014/2015 on how many want to join NATO and EU. You will find that majority of Ukrainians do not want to join the alliance but it’s completely opposite for the latter. The yearning by Ukrainians to join NATO changed overnight after the Russian annexation of Crimea. Gee, I wonder why?

          NATO=/= EU. They are two completely different things! That’s like Ireland being attacked by Russia for being in the EU even though majority of Irish abhor NATO! Equating the two organisations is part of Russian propaganda. Because for the Russians, a sovereign country not aligning to them economically is the same as opposing them militarily.

          It’s a blindspot among Westerners to refuse seeing the Russian mindset. They have their own worldview that is alien to the West and vice versa. The Russians have Eurasianist worldview where the center of the world and power is Asia; and their country carving a huge piece of that pie. Even oppositions of ruling government-- from communist to Putin era-- are hard-core nationalists as well from Alexander Solzhenytsin to Alexey Navalny. They are poster boy of Russian opposition from their respective time and yet believe Russia should also go its own way. They might be more liberal minded Russians, but they are nationalist first and foremost, and Eurasianists at that.

          So, with that in mind, for the Russians, Ukraine and Georgia joining the EU-- a socio-economic bloc-- is unacceptable and tantamount to joining NATO; even though the fucking majority of Ukrainians and Georgians do not want to join NATO until further Russian provocations, brought by Russian siege mentality, pushed those countries to crave to join NATO. If Putin does not want NATO expansion, he certainly pushed two more countries to join, namely Finland and Sweden. Even Alexey Navalny-- Putin’s main presidential opponent-- said of the current president as the worst in geopolitics for having just provoked more countries to join NATO if the intention is to prevent its expansion. Those who says otherwise and keep harping about West provoking Ukraine to join NATO is Russian propaganda, because from the latter’s pov, either Ukraine signs a deal with them economically, or it means opposing them existentially too. Because Russia wants to carve their own sphere of influence.

          • Filthmontane@lemmy.world
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            5 months ago

            What the people say in polls is not important. The US has been threatening to let Ukraine into NATO for years, the leadership in Ukraine wanted to be in NATO (cuz leaders in countries often don’t follow what the people want) and Russia used the threat of an application to NATO along with other reasons to constitute invasion. Which, btw, Ukraine applied for NATO status in September of 2022, so your feelings are invalid.

            I’m well aware of how the Russian oligarch mindset is. But this is a war that both Russia and the US have wanted and instigated for a very very very long time. It’s also within the US’s best interest to keep this war going on as long as possible and turn it into the next Afghanistan if it yields enough profit. Not everything that paints the US as bad guys is Russian propaganda. Remember, US bad AND Russia bad.

            • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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              5 months ago

              What the people say in polls is not important. The US has been threatening to let Ukraine into NATO for years, the leadership in Ukraine wanted to be in NATO (cuz leaders in countries often don’t follow what the people want)

              Do you have a source?

              Why does public opinion not matter when the whole ordeal started when the Yanukovych reneged on the deal with the EU causing a revolution to overthrow him in 2014?

              Convenient line you have tried to take haven’t you?

              Which, btw, Ukraine applied for NATO status in September of 2022, so your feelings are invalid.

              Why would Ukraine not apply after being invaded since 2015 after Crimean annexation? If you are not wilfully ignoring what I said said, Ukraine did not want to join NATO until Russia invaded Crimea with insignia-less “green men”.

              And cut the crap with faux centrist bs about BoTh SiDeS BaD with respect to Ukraine. In spite of saying both sides are bad, it is very telling that much of your criticism seems to be more against Ukraine and West and almost zero criticism of what Russia did wrong. This is nothing but serving Russian propaganda.

              No one could ever produce substantial evidence of Americans or the West goading Ukraine to join them when asked for proof. Recently declassified conversation from the Blair era were well aware that Ukraine joining the EU might “provoke” the Russians and questioned whether or not Ukrainians are “European” enough to join the EU. The West also were friendly with Putin before, to which the Ukrainian government at the time thought the West had “too rosy view” of Putin. It is very telling after all that countries not in NATO somehow have separatist movements aligned with Russia, namely in Georgia, Transnistria and Ukraine. Meanwhile, NATO-member Baltic states with significant Russian population somehow aren’t clamouring for Russian influence. Not very telling at all!

              The blame is squarely on Kremlin with their own siege mentality and jingoism. If you actually know how Russian mindset works as you claim, you’d acknowledge that. There is no reason for Russia not to be friendly with the West while still pursuing their own geopolitical interests. France always go their own way despite being a NATO member. India plays both the West and Russia and China. Russia could do the same but instead, they’re stuck in the 19th century, dog eat dog, brute imperialist mindset and wants their way or no way at all.

                • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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                  5 months ago

                  India always has military exercises with NATO too. Does that mean they will join NATO? Conversely, India also conducts military exercises with China and Russia. Does that mean India and China and Russia are military allies?

                  Ireland also has relations with NATO, does that mean Ireland will join too? Should Russia invade Ireland if that happens?

                  Military exercises and talks do not always mean formal alliance. Sure, governments on many occasions do not follow the will of the people. But there are lines that they won’t cross if enough people do protests. It is political suicide in Ireland for any politicians to demand joining NATO. And as was the same case in Ukraine before until the Russian invasion.

                  That all being said, why is it Russia’s business whom Ukraine chooses to have close military relationship with? Since India have closer military relationship with Russia, with India being the biggest buyer of Russian arms and regular partner in joint exercises, would you say that the United States have the right to antagonise India because of this, in the same way that Ukraine has close military relationship with NATO?

                  The problem is that people think in the socially constructed current paradigm of nation state model and great power game. Why is it any business of the bigger neighbours what the small country choose to be friendly with? But I suppose no one really cares about small countries having innate sovereign right to exercise their agency. The concerns of a bigger power like Russia’s is always more important, am I right?