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Comment by notdang | Hacker News Reader

Is being a separatist something bad?

For example imagine you are part of the USSR, but not Russia, instead you are in Latvia. Not wanting to be part of USSR, makes you are a separatist. Is there something bad in it?

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Not necessarily, but can be. What if instead of USSR, you substitute US or Sweden? What if you some (not all) of the Muslims in Sweden want a separate Muslim country from Sweden? Or some (not all) of the Mormons one day decide they want a separate mormon country away from United States?

You then vote or fight for your freedom. Nothing is bad about either.

Fair. How do you propose a vote looks like? Who gets to vote and who doesn’t?

Say a specific ethnicity is 2% of the population in Sweden and they want a separate country. How do you propose the vote goes through? Who gets a say in this?

That's too many questions in a completely made up scenario.

If you see a problem with the person, name it. But being a separatist is at most stupidity depending on circumstances. Can't jail for that.

That’s not a made up scenario. Sikhs are less than 2% of the population of India. And the Khalistani movement does not even represent majority of the Sikhs in India. And the movement has a notorious past of conducting violent activities that can be described with the T word.

So it’s not at most stupidity. The stakes are higher. And you can be jailed for being associated with that.

I’d welcome any debate and am open to changing my mind, but you’ll have to answer questions that do matter before you dismiss them.

There's nothing to argue about. The fact that "being associated with a movement" is a crime you can be jailed for just shows you live in a totalitarian country.

Every single movement has violent elements, that's not a sufficient ground to jail for participation.

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