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Comment by nuccy | Hacker News Reader

[disclaimer: Ukrainian here]

> Older generation (who are pro-Russian) suggested being careful around young people as they may be hostile to Russians, even those who are running away from Putin

Of course, instead of even attempting to change your country, where there is no war on its territory, you flee. Why should they be kind to you?

> The disheartening thing is that even if you never supported Putin, other countries treat you as enemy.

Silence equals support. Молчание - знак согласия. (A popular russian saying).

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it doesn't sound like you enjoy fighting Russian military, why should I? As for silence, I've been helping Russian opposition financially for years (even when it became illegal, through different channels), talking to relatives and friends to make sure they know what's going on. At some point risks become too great. Imagine Maidan, but if Yanukovich won and had 8 years to surround himself with 100 times more military and propaganda. Call me a coward for wanting to have a normal life.

Sure, nothing personal, one leaves, a thousand of others will do the same with the same reasoning, then a million, ten millions... Who will stay? No idea, but Putin definitely will, putting in danger the whole world.

If ten millions of Russia's most educated and brightest leave the country, it will have an effect. Those tanks and airplanes are expensive and require lots of skill to build and maintain.

Rude and unnecessary. I’m not going to die fighting FOR my country so I’m sure as hell not going to die fighting against it.

Words are not as rude as bullets.

Fighting against Putin would probably be fighting FOR your country at that point :)

I'm not pretending I would be better than you and honestly I would certainly have fled too in similar situation. But at some point someone is going to have to do something about the Putin situation, and unfortunately at this point, only Russians can do something that have not a significant chance to end in nuclear apocalypse. Hopefully some brave people over there that remember how tyrans should be treated (but once again, I would never blame anyone for not endangering their families)

Maybe because I would rather live a normal life instead of sitting in jail for 15 years for mentioning that war is a war?

Normal life?

I'm sure I cannot possibly understand how you feel right now, but there is no right answer between staying and fleeing.

Personally, if I had a family to support I would get the hell out asap for sure. What I empathize with are the people, not the territory that they call home.

Leaving is an effective way of changing it.

On the contrary. Leaving results in cementing the status quo because the population that remains are blind Putin followers.

A ton of celebrities pledged to leave if Trump got elected.

Well he did.

Yet, almost nobody kept their oath.

And it's not like they stayed on and took up arms either.

And if you don't want people to leave, then that automatically means you are very pro-border, because if these economic migrants are to be denied, then all undocumented migrants everywhere should be denied, by virtue of being people who did not fight hard enough to improve their lot in their country of origin.

There’s always infighting though. A dictator always has to have some kind of internal enemy to blame.

If the anti-war population leaves, they’ll go after anyone who’s not actively supporting war. Until you reach full, North Korea-style indoctrination, at which point the brain drain is massive.

They’re going after neutrals now:

https://mobile.twitter.com/franakviacorka/status/15004118457...

"Silence equals support."

This 'translation' is either ignorance or deliberate malice to mislead people.

"Silence is a sign of consent" would be an accurate translation, and even then a saying is just a saying, it does not mean it always applies or that it is always true.

Yes, you are right. Noprovrast setting prevented me from fixing that while editing was still possible.

Do you prefer they stay, get conscripted and shoot you in the head?

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