Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children | Hacker News Reader

Russia is persecuting dissenters by taking away their children

economist.com

227 pointsMoSattler355 comments

Just to note, same happens in Belarus. This is one of the reason we can't travel there to see our grand parents - risk of being put in to prison and kids taken away is just to high to accept.

Belarus is a Russian puppet-state under Lukashenko.

The authoritarianism in Belarus is entirely domestic in origin and predates the modern Russian one.

That's true but it still is a Russian puppet state at present.

It's fluid. In the way late period fascist Italy could be called puppet state of Nazi Germany perhaps. But Belarusian dictator has his own distinct agenda and pursues it despite very limited choices which "puppet state" kinda glosses over.

Somewhere I could read more about Lukashenko's agenda?

As a .by native I never needed to go through any definitive source. But you often encounter useful nuggets in e.g. ISW reports and general long reads on situation with the Russian invasion. Naturally troubles in Belarus now pale to the savagery committed in Ukraine daily so there hasn't been much in terms of focused studies.

But it's not like Lukashenka runs some policy think tank anyway. He mostly wings it, often demonstrating an uncanny political sense for a self projected image of a simpleton. Still he certainly blew it big time in 2022. After participating in a breezy (now forgotten) invasion in Kazakhstan he went all in with Putin's next adventure. Now his ambitions of great commander appear to be back on ice and the focus is on survival. And while his own people remain his #1 enemy he is awake to the threat of complete Russian take over as well.

I don't think Putin ever bothered to ask for his opinion. From my neck of the woods Belarus seems to have been pretty much under foreign occupation since 2020. AFAIK the Russian military has had almost total control over your military bases and airfields even before the war started. We (KZ) had enough sense to stay out from day one, but probably only were allowed to do so because we're so far away and have no borders with Ukraine.

It's a popular opinion certainly that I've heard many times. Russian official support was essential in convincing local LE to commit to the government and squash the protests. But when you look at the ratio of Russian forces to Belarusian within the country at the moment it's hardly an occupation.

The reason I'm uncomfortable with this narrative though is it denies Lukashenka's part in this. All Belarusians are aware of the sheer amount of glee, joy and pride in his addresses during the build up and the first day of the invasion. I am convinced he was a willing ally, seething to get even with the West and to show it to stubborn people home who's the great one.

What really got me is that he seems to genuinely believe that the protests are driven from the West rather than that the local populace is fed up with him and wants him gone. It is as if he can't believe the evidence right in front of him. Belarus could have been economically roughly where Poland or Lithuania are today. Such a pity.

Yep, no doubt he somehow believes the West "stole" "his" people. Poisoned the sheep so to say, who now have to be mercilessly culled.

And the country certainly could have been entirely another place. Yet he's ultimately our people's creation, who voted him in democratically 29 years ago on an authoritarian leaning, populist platform. Now we're paying for the ultimate sin of not giving a fuck.

Makes you wonder how Hungarians will look at their lives two decades from now.

> It is as if he can't believe the evidence right in front of him.

This is a strict requirement to become a dictator/authoritarian. It's a job only for the delusional and shameless.

Less of his full agenda, but here's an article I felt was helpful on the current state of Belarus: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/30/magazine/belarus-mural.ht...

It's quite simple, actually. His main aim now is to survive. He has everything at stake, including his son. So he will try to brutally stifle any kind of dissent.

On the other hand there is Putin whose army occupies his land, practically forever. They will make sure Belarus stays under Kremlin's influence. But for some strange reason he managed to refuse sending his own soldiers to Ukraine, so Putin's grip over him seems not that tight one would assume. Maybe Putin is afraid whoever comes after Lukashenko might be less easy to control so he agreed to keep him in power.

Sending his soldiers in was no doubt in the original plan. Some units were staged at the border along the Russian troops but he found sense to pull the plug on it once he've seen Russian forward units being decimated.

I think part of the reason is that these dictators are subconsciously quite sensitive to public opinion and yet another invasion may well have tipped the balance against both Lukashenko and Putin. Now they can pretend to be frenemies, but if Putin had invaded Belarus Lukashenko would have either had to react or he'd be deposed by the Russians anyway.

It's a strange situation and it is very unstable. But for the duration of the war in Ukraine, ironically Lukashenko's position is now probably more solid than it was before.

Kamil Galeev had quite an interesting take on it all. Eg. "after being elected he usurped power and built a dictatorship, aiming to create something like a hereditary quasi monarchy."

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1518240030967406593.html

Belarus and Russia entering into the Unity State sounds like a transfer of much of Belarus' decision making to Moscow.

The Union State was founded in 1997 and remained a joke ever since.

Just before the war started, they signed 28 programs, which, at least on paper, remove most of Luka's room to maneuver: https://www.rferl.org/a/putin-lukashenka-union-state/3154622...

Add that to other scores of identical programs they were signing every few years. Agreements make sense only between countries with the rule of law.

As Russian who left the country on February 25th 2022 I can strongly recommend following substack for those who curios about economical and political situation inside the country:

https://ironcurtain.substack.com/

Author is Sergey Aleksashenko who is economist and former government official. He now live in US and actively support Ukraine, but he have really neutral and realistic view on events.

The very first article I clicked is "analysis" of Levada polls. This is pure garbage. In the land where all sorts of police get involved over child's drawing the phone poll has value just above zero.

I am yet to see any former kremlin official which public activity could not be classified as whitewashing.

Wagner leader Prigozhin made a statement against this one as part of his internal politics war. So in case people are questioning whether this is just western propaganda, no, it appears to be the same story running around domestically, with many ultra nationalists supporting it.

source me plz

https://t.me/concordgroup_official/658

Covered by ISW: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offens...

> Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin seized on the recent story of the sentencing of a Tula Oblast father for his 12-year-old daughter’s antiwar drawing to promote the Wagner Group’s reputation and ameliorate his own personal image. Prigozhin’s press service posted a letter on March 28 signed by Prigozhin, Wagner commander Dmitry Utkin, and Wagner-affiliated director of the “Liga” veteran's organization Andrey Troshev addressed to Tula Oblast prosecutor Alexander Gritsaenko stating that the signatories consider Gritsaenko’s issuance of a two-year prison sentence to Aleksey Moskalev unfair.[7] Moskalev was charged with “discrediting the armed forces” after his 12-year-old daughter Masha drew an antiwar picture with a Ukrainian flag in her school art class in April 2022.[8] Masha was taken into state custody and now lives in a juvenile shelter, and Moskalev fled house arrest the night before his sentencing and was sentenced to two years in prison in absentia.[9] Prigozhin’s letter suggests that Tula Oblast check the legality of Gritsaenko’s sentencing and recommends that Wagner-affiliated lawyers participate in the case on Moskalev’s side, noting that it is tragic that both Masha and children of dead Wagner fighters end up in orphanages.[10] Prigozhin’s response to Moskalev’s sentencing is particularly ironic considering that Prigozhin was initially one of the biggest and loudest supporters of the law on punishing those who ”discredit” Russian forces.[11] It is therefore likely that Prigozhin seized on the discourse surrounding Moskalev to further his own reputation and advocate for the Wagner Group, especially by choosing to highlight the plight of orphans of Wagner fighters who die in Ukraine.[12] Prigozhin may seek to maintain his own domestic relevance by continuing to closely involve himself in such developing stories, especially by affiliating his newest campaign for relevance with Utkin and Troshev—two well-established and notorious Wagner-affiliated personalities. The letter attempts to portray Wagner's leadership as a united front against elements of the Russian bureaucracy.[13]

They've already yoinked hundreds of Ukraine children from families, so why not?

Embrace the fuckery and continue the war crimes on your own citizens.

It seems that support for Ukraine is one aspect that crosses demographics here in the UK, Left and Right, Young and Old, Leave and Remain, all fully oppose Russia and broadly support the efforts the UK and the west in general have done.

It seems to be that a significant number of people in America seem to support the Russian narrative.

Selling Russia as the city on a hill to much of American public both on the right and on the left was tremendously successful info op.

50 years ago the USSR had to get support from the left for ideological reasons, but now there is no limitation on who they support -- and they've been incredibly effective at influencing the US Right Wing. There was a time when the American left supported Moscow -- when they were the USSR, and represented a real communist alternative to a US government that still openly sanctioned segregation and union busting.

Now their leftwing roots are mostly tankies and they have no real presence in US politics. The 20-something 'woke' crowd ain't listening to talking points from Chomsky.

Meanwhile we have pictures of small redheaded Russian ladies talking to the NRA and making sure that the NRA gets money to give to... guess who? There are members of Congress who openly support Q-anon, which is almost certainly a foreign intelligence operation.

That’s what their media is telling them.

And is your media not telling you this?

Is there any entity that actually knows what's going on in the minds of those who aren't onboard with the default? Of course not, how could they? And yet, what do we read every day online?

The Guardian and the Sun don't tend to agree on very much but they both support the help the UK is giving to Ukraine.

I’m referring to US. The people you find sympathetic to Russia are the people whose media is telling them to be sympathetic to Russia. Russia is the real victim, etc.

You have the nostalgists on the left who remember Mother Russia as they imagined it. You have some on the right who favor Russia for some mix of liking the traditional values thing that Putin puts out, resenting implications that Trump was in his pocket, disliking the Ukraine for its connection with the first impeachment, and I don't know what all.

Ironically the false idea that Russia had so much control over US politics is itself pro-Russian propaganda that presents Russia as much more powerful than it actually is. The truth is Russia is a failing country with a crummy military whose main real power stems from being able to threaten the world with nuclear weapons. If not for that, the West probably would have sent troops to Ukraine in 2014 and the Russian invasion would have been quickly defeated.

The recent effect Russia had on US politics was an ability to tip a crucial few (relatively speaking) on the fence to either support Trump or sit out entirely in 2016. The existence of a significant Russian propaganda troll operation around that time is well-documented by independent sources.

This doesn't require a highly sophisticated operation, merely an understanding of some talking points that can plant doubt into the minds of Americans—things like "if Bernie loses the primary, we should vote Trump/sit out in the general", or, more insidiously, "voting is meaningless; the two parties are the same".

It's certainly true that it's dangerous to believe Russia has some kind of remote control that can make American politics do whatever they want, but it's also dangerous to believe that they have no effective propaganda arm.

Edit to add: To be clear, I'm not trying to claim that Russian propaganda was the deciding factor in the 2016 election—merely that it was a factor, and discounting it is unhelpful.

> some mix of liking the traditional values thing that Putin puts out,

But this is so false! Russia is the opposite of conservative values. With its rampant alcoholism, record number of orphans and kids raised by single parents, AIDS and so on - the only "conservative value"/s is the prosecution of gay people - but I believe conservative Americans left that ship decades ago. There is literally nothing in Putin's regime worth imitating.

Ever seen the belligerents list in the first Gulf War? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War

It was basically the entire world against Iraq. Even countries like Afghanistan and Sierra Leone contributed to the coalition forces against Iraq, because invading your neighbors to steal resources is frowned upon by essentially everyone.

The only reason this hasn't happened again with Russia is because Russia has nukes to threaten the world with, and cheap oil and gas to sell. And even then, mutually assured destruction greatly diminishes that nuclear threat.

We are talking about different things. The political/military support for the invasion in Irak from various governments was so limited, and also criticized domestically, that it became a meme ("You forgot Poland").

Now, as for the people themselves, there were huge protests against the war in Iraq in Europe and even greater against the war in Afghanistan, with literally millions marching in some European cities - it was clear to most people in the West how pointless it is.

You're talking the second Iraq war in 2003, not the response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990

The 1990 invasion was condemned by the US and Soviet Union

Exactly. They are not the same wars and there's very important differences between them.

I wonder where were those moralists when Putin's oligarchs were pouring billions of GBP stolen from Russian citizens into London property.

We should all keep in mind the old saying, "The first casualty of war is the truth." I am not saying that you are incorrect but that we should digest some stories with a bit of skepticism. Here is a counter report on that claim to consider. https://thegrayzone.com/2023/03/31/iccs-putin-arrest-state-d...

I read that article with an open mind, but ultimately do not trust it. Among other tells, the term "break-away republic" betrays his sympathies. I might summarize it as "Pro-Russian journalist visits Ukrainian children's camps and sees nothing wrong."

Half a million actually, and that was just the kids, and last august: https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/09/01/forcible-transfer-ukrain...

Russians have never had any real individual rights. Throughout their history the common people have just been resources enslaved to brutal overlords. The Soviets were perhaps somewhat softer overlords on average, but the principle remains.

The state will dispose of disobedient people the same way it would dispose of rotten potatoes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8ZqBLcIvw0

That's how majority of the world lives though.

Yeah, and I wouldn't want to live in the majority of the world. Judging by immigration patterns, most people who live in the majority of the world don't want to either. It's one reason Russia's having issues with the T-14 tank, not only are a lot of its parts imported from the West, but anyone in Russia smart enough to help build a tank has almost certainly left for the West where they can have a better standard of living.

Democracies have decisively defeated dictatorships and oligarchies at every turn for the last century, the fact that dictatorships remain as a lesser category of nation is proof only that human potential has yet to be fully realized.

People who actually develop tanks usually have restriction for going abroad for 5 or more years even after they leave they job because they know classified information. So I don't think that they left the country.

Perhaps for those who start the job. But if you're a Moscow State University engineering graduate, why would you even start when there are better available living situations? Sure maybe some stick around for familial/patriotic reasons, but most are going to leave for greener pastures.

>"Sure maybe some stick around for familial/patriotic reasons, but most are going to leave for greener pastures."

Problem is that "greener pastures" allow very limited level of immigration.

perhaps. but russians were always dicks to themselves first. however, ask the american natives and the blacks what they think about individual rights in the us

but then again, for sake of fairness, lest we forget that russia, as part of ussr, was a pioneer in workers, women and ethnic rights. so much so that during the 1920s if you were a trade unionist, a feminist or fighting for national liberation of your people you most certainly ran the risk of being labeled a russian agent.

A key difference being that American society has evolved over the last 200 years to largely outgrow the cultural elements that produced those abuses. We fought a very bloody civil war to get rid of slavery, and black people/women have had the right to vote for some time. We're also not massacring Native American villages anymore. Not saying the problems are 100% solved, but no one can argue it's night and day compared to 100 years ago.

Putin by contrast is a return to a 19th century Tsardom in everything but name.

> We fought a very bloody civil war to get rid of slavery, and black people/women have had the right to vote for some time

is that what gets taught in american schools these days? i wonder how the black and natives feel

> Putin by contrast is a return to a 19th century Tsardom in everything but name

what does tsardom mean? if anything putinism is a caricature of the russian government in Red Alert 2. by that i mean a mix of soviet and tsarist symbolism and orthodox church. its so bizzare

> wonder how the black and natives feel

That they’re better off than being slaves.

sorry to break it to you but black men and women are born free. its just that americans put them in chains. im sure that today they are grateful for being treated as 2nd class citizens

> today they are grateful for being treated as 2nd class citizens

That isn’t what you said. You pushed back on the notion that people fought and continue to fight for others’ rights in America in a way they don’t in modern Russia (or China). That isn’t true, and it isn’t true that America Blacks or women are worse off today than they were two hundred years ago, as OP argued when you pushed back. Perfect is the enemy of good; you’re arguing against American values on a thread about modern Russia.

i just love reminding americans that the high pedistal they immagine they sit on when they lecture everyone is actually just a kitsch pigsty

So long as you acknowledge that our current pigsty is much cleaner than Russia's. The best you can point to is genocides and atrocities we committed 170 years ago, whereas Russia is attempting to commit similar genocides as we speak. And it's not the first time the Russians have committed genocide against Ukrainians. I guess when your nation doesn't change that much in 100 years it's hard to understand that other nations do, so calling up crimes from generations ago makes sense. I bet you berate the modern Mongolians for the crimes of Genghis Khan, and modern Italians for the many massacres committed by the Romans.

>The best you can point to is genocides and atrocities we committed 170 years ago, whereas Russia is attempting to commit similar genocides as we speak

russia's war in ukraine: 25,000+ civilians killed

number of civilian victims in Vietnam killed by US armed forces: 100,000+

number of civilian victims killed due to US dropping two atomic bombs on Japan: 200,000+

number of civilian deaths due to war in iraq: 200,000+

need i point out more?

as i said, kitsch pigsty. understand the evils committed by your own government before you lecture others. after all you have more freedom than russian people, hence more personal responsibility too. if people do this across the world, world would be a much happier place

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b7/My...

> russia's war in ukraine: 25,000+ civilians killed

> number of civilian victims in Vietnam killed by US armed forces: 100,000+

You do know the US involvement in Vietnam lasted 20 years, and Russia is barely past the 1 year mark in Ukraine, right?

those are statistics for 12 years of civilian deaths by the us military directly. they are not all the civilian deaths that occured during the vietnam war

during the same period, for a time span of 3 years, the us bombed cambodia and killed over 200,000 civilians as a result

> And it's not the first time the Russians have committed genocide against Ukrainians

im curious, when do you think was the first one? i mean there was the period of famine while ukraine was part of the ussr, but if thats what you mean lets get few simple facts straight

1) ukraine was an equal republic of the ussr

2) russia was a seperate republic of the ussr. russia had no authority about what goes on in ukraine

3) ussr at that time had a supreme ruler who was of georgian ethnicity

so even if we agree that systematic genocide did happen, it is very hard to argue that russia had anything to do with it

curiously, every time a russian ruled ussr, ukraine was rather well off. for example, under lenin ussr promoted ukranianization [1], under khrushchev ukraine got gifted crimea, while the ussr got a ukranian as its supreme leader [2]

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korenizatsiia

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Brezhnev

If you are referencing Holodomor, then it was not targeted at Ukraine. Yes Ukraine was hit hard by it, having half of total death toll from communist-induced famine. But other half were also Russians and Kazakhs. Bolsheviks while not being shy about ethnic-based genocide didn't really care about ethnicity of victims at that case.

Better to be black in America than Russian in Russia. We got our problems over here, but at least we aren’t being conscripted and thrown into the meat grinder of a pointless war.

> being conscripted and thrown into the meat grinder

I will be labeled as a brainwashed ruskie and downvoted into oblivion if I point out that it isn't really true, right?

How come? Several of my friends' coworkers were conscripted and sent to the front (the friends themselves managed to leave the country the next day). I don't even need to believe what the newspapers are saying — it's straight from the horse's mouth.

The conscription has not reached Ukraine's levels yet, but only because 2024 is not far away, and Putin expects to get his 75% without too much trouble. After that, who knows.

i know plenty of ukranians that left ukraine in order to dodge conscription. although they hope russia looses they say they would not give their life for benefit of the corrupt elite. to me that is a smart decision. same for russians that leave russia in order to escape conscription. this war sucks as do all sides supporting it

russia is the only side supporting the war, russia can fuck off from Ukraine any time it wants and the war will be over immediately.

i don't think you speak for all ukranians though

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/4/21/whats-behind-pro-ru...

so you are saying that the so-called "separatists" form a different "side" from russia tho they both want the war to continue?

nothing "so-called" about them. by all definitions of the word, they are separatists, and ones who support russia's intervention. by their account, zelensky can end the war immediately by recognizing independence of donbas, or initiating a referendum

If the goal is to recognize Donbas then why the fuck were the tanks rolling towards Kyiv? Why was Odesa bombed? Why did the annexation involve two other regions?

Let alone that it is public knowledge that the "separatists" are and always have been under russian control. Little green men came from russia and made the war happen.

seperatists are eastern ukranians that dont want to be under central kiev government, run by ukranian nationalists with nazi sympathies. that they would rather see themselves as russian just goes to tell you how much of a failure the right wing policies of the ukranian government have been

Because the Ukraine signed the Minsk agreements in bad faith with no intention of implementing them.

"it is public knowledge"

I suggest you read Wikipedia about anti-Maidan unrest in the Eastern Ukraine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_pro-Russian_unrest_in_Ukr...

I suggest you read Budapest Memorandum [0]. After russia blatantly violated its commitments from there any pointing out to Minsk is just idiotic.

Any violation of Ukrainian internationally recognized borders has been highly illegal and no matter how much whitewashing you want to do you are shilling for genocide. Also you will remove any claim that it was putins war after Ukraine has won.

Pointing out random events 9 years ago somehow justifies mass murder of civilians now? Also you need to go that far back to find anything at all is quite telling.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum

its not that simple. ukranian nationalists overthrew an elected, internationally recognised government and as a consequence eastern ukranians revolted. its not very clear that budapest memorandum was violated at that point. no ammount of russia bashing can clarify that

"After the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, Canada,[25] France, Germany, Italy, Japan,[26] the UK,[27] and US[28][29] stated that Russian involvement was a breach of its Budapest Memorandum obligations to Ukraine and in violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Whats not clear about that?

for one, their authority and capacity to objectively judge. for two, their hypocricy

"Pointing out random events 9 years ago somehow justifies mass murder"

You are confused. You claimed that the sole reason of the war in 2014 was Russian meddling and I suggested you read how the events really unfolded. It's still not too late to do just that.

How cute that a russian justifying russian war of aggression and genocide is gaslighting others with statements like "You are confused".

but you are confused. ukranian nationalists broke international law first. not only that but one of the first things the nationalists did after illegaly overthrowing an elected government was tell russia they were not going to be paying any outstanding debts. their policies only brought about what the whole world knew was gonna happen. never mind the feigned shock in the media. even my grandmother on the other side of europe knew what was gonna happen. the us egged them on to piss russia off. the eu told them to stay put. the us told ukranian nationalists infamously to "fuck the eu". its all common knowledge

the people in the eu largely support ukraine because they dislike russia. but no one sees them as our freedom fighters. lol. everyone knows the us is behind it and when living standards accross europe deteriorate people will lose patience with both the ukraine and the us

You have drunk the Kremlin propaganda really hard to think like that.

You think in one thread that russia had the best revolution in the history and in an another you call Ukrainian revolution illegal.

Also even if you don’t like that another country shakes lose of autocrat cronies, how does any of that justify tanks and bombs and Bucha?

Your thinking is comparable to a common thug: you were speeding, therefore I can kill all your relatives, rape your wife and kids.

i think you are incapable of having a civilized conversation

read about the russian civil war for a historical lesson about what can happen when there is a revolution. not just the russian civil war, but the ukranian civil war that followed the bolshevik revolution, as well as the heroic ukranian figures like Nestor Makhno and other noble ukranians that faught for a free and independent ukraine. but for some reason the ukranian nationalists in charge today glorify the nazi Stepan Bandera and made themselves and ukraine a vassal of us imperial ambitions. this is not the ukraine i want to support

I don't see how giving a link to an article in the English language Wikipedia and suggesting you read it can be classified as gaslighting.

"russia can fuck off from Ukraine any time it wants and the war will be over immediately"

You mean leaving the people of the Crimea, DNR and LNR to the mercy of nationalistic Ukraine?

Saving the people of occupied territories from russian rape, murder, forceful deportation, looting of property, etc.

That's not how the life is in Crimea. Ukraine was 'saving' Crimeans by cutting water and electricity supply.

As for DNR and LNR, it's as meaningful as saying that Russia is saving people in Ukraine from being burned alive by Ukrainian nationalists [0].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Odesa_clashes#Trade_Union...

You seem to conveniently omit the fact that the first victims in Odessa on 2 May were on the Maidan side, 2 activists, Andrei Biryukov and Igor Ivanov. And that victims of the burning themselves were armed with incendiary weapons: https://youtu.be/FWBGM9G4kF8

Classic victim blaming.

I'm Russian living in Russia and it is really true.

> Better to be black in America than Russian in Russia

you really think that russians are scared of police when they walk down the road? i mean im not surprised. this is a very common misconception about how societies in e. europe work

> but at least we aren’t being conscripted and thrown into the meat grinder of a pointless war

given how brave people seem to be online i dare say, "not yet"

> Russians have never had any real individual rights.

To take a step back and think about things (not that I'm suggesting what I think)... in most places for most of history it's been about the group. The collective. Being heavily individualized is a modern and western thing.

So, why is one way right and another way wrong?

Note, I do not agree with what's going on with Russia. I'm simply bringing up the higher level question that's often assumed but rarely looked at.

> So, why is one way right and another way wrong?

There are conventions. That countries agree to uphold. In this case not upholding them is the "wrong" way. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_on_the_Rights_of_th...

So side stepped the context of my question (group vs individual) and answered to the context of the parent.

I was specifically responding to your comment: there are plenty of charters and conventions and when they refer to human rights they refer to individuals not groups. Russia and others have agreed to (for example) the UN CRC meaning they can have any feelings when it comes to society vs individual but the rights of the child still remain.

I don't think respect for basic humans rights and heavy individualization are necessarily related. They should be discussed separately.

Russia isn’t a country that’s about the group either though, it’s just a strong oligarchy. And not even an oligarchy that has roots in group based thinking like China, it’s very much an oligarchy born out of western individualism instead.

More generally, I’d say that group based thinking should not be enforced by the government. A society based around “the group is most important” can enforce itself just fine based on societal norms and their consequences (who people are willing to interact with and hire for work). What a government stepping in and saying what sort of talk is acceptable does is freeze the society to what the government enforces. Instead people should be able to try and change society norms if they believe there’s a better way, rather than government forcing it to stagnate.

In Russia, the rulers see any ideology as dangerous. You have to prove you are loyal the the rulers, not some ideology.

One way produces far more wealth for more people than the other. Wealth isn't just luxuries, it's technology. It's health. It's more time to do more things more efficiently. It's evolving and generally improving the human condition, as opposed to stagnation. Obviously not everyone agrees with the direction of evolution or the various philosophies involved, but the system provides flexibility such that we aren't constantly genociding each other just to get our way, which used to be the norm. Of course at the end of the day none of us know the meaning of existence, but I think most can agree taht "reducing fruitless suffering" is a better place to start than most.

Obviously there's a balance to be struck. 100% individualism is just anarchy. But history has proven that allowing people an above-historical-average level of individual freedom leads to a more productive and secure society.

That said it's debatable whether strong-man dictatorships are "collectivist" at all. They're extremely individualist, but only for a select group of elite individuals. Otherwise they'd try and make decisions to benefit the group, and as Putin has shown in Ukraine, they often don't. Never mind the strategic decision to invade which might have had some initial merit, you would expect a truly collectivist nation to prioritize competence in its military. As it stands a full NATO conventional intervention could end the war in a month, the only thing keeping Russia intact is brutal suppression of internal dissent and a nuclear arsenal that, if it's been maintained as badly as its regular military, might very well explode in its silos on launch.

That doesn't sound like a very effective collective to me. Maybe it would have been effective 300 years ago because that level of organization is all most nations had, but that's the point. It's an obsolete model.

This group-individual dichotomy has been the oldest source of conflict. As social construct, both the individual and the group cannot exists without each other. One can only be an individual when one can differentiate oneself from or within a group - otherwise there is no basis for comparison.

There is the tyranny of the group and the tyranny of the individual - we need to reject both.

On which way is right - I would say one should be able to choose the group and retreat from it if so desired.

You'd have a point if the Russian elites were actually on the front lines and not partying in Dubai and India.

Putin's regime is not communism.

> The Soviets were perhaps somewhat softer overlords on average

Most Russians in the Tzarist Russian empire could go years or decades without being actively oppressed — people out in rural villages could at least survive through benign neglect.

There was no benign neglect in the soviet union. You were a gear in the system and if you failed to fill that part, you were liquidated or sent to a prison camp.

> There was no benign neglect in the soviet union. You were a gear in the system and if you failed to fill that part, you were liquidated or sent to a prison camp.

Like you would be sent to a prison camp in the 80s? Just stop...

Late soviet union was pure benign neglect.

>"if you failed to fill that part, you were liquidated or sent to a prison camp."

I grew up in USSR. If you take late 70s and 80s (do not know how it was before) you would have to very actively open your mouth and be a dissident if you wanted to end up in prison camp even though it did not guarantee it. I left in 91 so have no idea how it later progressed from nearly absolute freedom at that time to what Russia has now with this maniac in power.

> Russians have never had any real individual rights

Russians had a real thing going in the 19th century. Turgenev [0], for example, wrote contemporaneously around when the serfs were freed [1]. Their history went in the direction of a series strongmen, similar to China today, but there was a balancing point when it could have been different.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Sportsman%27s_Sketches

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fathers_and_Sons_(novel)

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_reform_of_1861

https://archive.ph/R5zp6

How depressing it must be to have lived through the collapse of the soviet union, realize the magnitude of lies, see the hope of a new Russia, and then have to go through this.

> realize the magnitude of lies

Most of those born in USSR did not go through that realization. I am from KZ and it's the same here, if a bit more toned down (at least you don't see open praise for Stalin, probably because we were one of the main destinations for many deportations initiated by him: I grew up among many ethnic Germans and Chechens and such). It's one of the main reasons for what's been happening since the beginning of 2022, IMHO.

To be honest, after the collapse I was to busy making ends meet. Later, surprisingly, the sad realization was the fact that the western propaganda was in no way better than the soviet - the soviet one was too straightforward and it was easy to spot what was omitted, what was exaggerated etc.

I considered myself old and cynical but the level of hypocrisy recently is astonishingly, absolutely mind blowing.

"How depressing it must be to have lived through the collapse of the soviet union"

Unless you were among millions who simply died in the 'democratic' 90s [0].

"Mortality increased substantially after the economic crisis in 1998, with life expectancy falling to 58.9 years among men and 71.8 years among women by 2001. Most of these fluctuations were due to changes in mortality from vascular disease and violent deaths (mainly suicides, homicides, unintentional poisoning, and traffic incidents) among young and middle aged adults. Trends were similar in all parts of Russia. An extra 2.5-3 million Russian adults died in middle age in the period 1992-2001 than would have been expected based on 1991 mortality."

And what was depressing was seeing the magnitude of Western lies and the disillusionment that followed.

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC259165/

They took my daughter to the orphanage luckily for two days because of this reason (I'm a single parent).

To an observer not closely following the extraordinary cycle of internal repressions taking place in Russia following its invasion of Ukraine - the news coming out of there, such as this one - may appear sensationalized. Surely this level of judicial evil is overstated!

It’s not.

The show trials over alleged enemies of the state reminiscent of Stalin are becoming routine. Regular people receiving sentences of 7 years in colonies for anti-war posts or statements - are common.

At the same time - convicted murderers are freed to volunteer to fight against Ukraine and are given state honors, with laws being written threatening severe punishment for reporting the details of their past.

Sources?

Is this question in good faith? Wagner recruiting from prisons have been widely reported.

Do you read Russian?

You can read the Moscow Times, an English language newspaper.

They relocated to Amsterdam iirc and is owned by Derk Sauer who was booted out of Russia. He also writes interesting opinion pieces in het Parool about the re Stalinisation of Russia. Fascinating stuff. Ofcourse I have no idea if the majority of Russians really care- Stalin was very popular.

> Regular people receiving sentences of 7 years in colonies for anti-war posts or statements

well apart from the from the article on which you are commenitng, you can read this https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/03/russia-studen...

> At the same time - convicted murderers are freed to volunteer to fight against Ukraine and are given state honors

e.g. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/26/world/europe/wagner-fight...

Legally there is no penalty for being against the war or against the government. Actually it is the opposite - calling for war or helping to start it might be illegal.

The law punishes for spreading falseful information or discrediting use of armed forces in interests of Russia. For example, for falsefully claiming that special military operation against West-supported neo-nazis preparing an attack against Russia is actually a war or that army allegedly attacks civilian buildings and infrastructure. For this you can get to jail. For the same reason, posting messages like 'no to war' online will get you in legal trouble (and replacing 'war' with asterisks won't help; there was someone who got a fine for holding a poster with asterisks only). Holding Ukranian flag obviously will get you in trouble too although I don't know how exactly this discredits armed forces.

Recently I read that a protester with a poster "arrest me if you are agaisnt the war" was arrested. Better not joke with police.

I assume many countries also have laws against spreading falseful information. And holding Russian flag in many countries might get you arrested as well.

Can provide a link to relevant legislation if needed.

> For example, for falsefully claiming that special military operation against West-supported neo-nazis preparing an attack against Russia is actually a war or that army allegedly attacks civilian buildings and infrastructure.

Spotted: A true patriot repeating all the talking points from his lying government.

I read it as being tongue in cheek.

> "Legally there is no penalty for being against the war or against the government"

> "there was someone who got a fine for holding a poster with asterisks only"

> "Holding Ukranian flag obviously will get you in trouble too"

I can't imagine how you reconcile these facts in your mind without thinking "ok, maybe Russia is authoritarian".

Unless that's sarcasm that went way over my head.

I don’t collect articles, but here’re some results of a google query for “russia sentences for opposing war”:

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-moscow-government-...

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ilya-yashin-valdimir-put...

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/dmitry-ivanov-sergei-sm...

Here’s one about Wagner:

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1741299/Russia-Wagner-G...

Again, all these are just top results of a google search.

I really wish this got more attention (but I guess Russian citizens receive zero sympathy these days, their political position notwithstanding). Maybe then we would see less of this tiresome bullshit from keyboard warriors from around the globe who blame ordinary citizens for being unwilling to throw themselves unarmed against a neo-Stalinist dictatorship that the West has supported for more than two decades.

The EU only banned sales of riot control gear and weaponry in October 2022! and they're still buying tons and tons of oil, gas, diamonds, and other natural resources that directly finance the war (taxes on natural resources go to the army pretty much right away, unlike taxes on sales and salaries that finance local projects like roads and schools). In fact, Russia made record profits last year.

I do not live in Russia, but I have enough experience living under a strongly authoritarian rule to know what it's like. Another favorite of the West in fact, that did terrible things to the people in January 2022, and no-one batted an eye.

>In fact, Russia made record profits last year.

There was a lag between the jumps in prices and the move towards other sources than Russia. Russia is going to have massive budget issues from this year onwards. Saying that Europe is still a massive buyer of Russia gas and oil is simply false.

Do you have a source? I found that after start of the war imports doubled from Russia for gas and news try to hide this elephant in the room. Same with swift, they said that Russia was disconnected but it was just a publicity stunt and I personally sent wire to Russia via swift in usd to test and it did work. Don’t know which sources to trust but seems like they all lie

A fairly clear graph over time is halfway down the page: https://www.bbc.com/news/58888451

Yes, gas imports increased after Russia invaded (but did not double) because countries were topping up storage before inevitable disruptions. And I remember them talking openly about it, not as an elephant in the room.

(of course “LNG” is doing a lot of work in that graph since it probably contains some Russian gas but the trend is clear)

Do you have a source for your “Russia disconnected from Swift” claim? I can find reports of individual banks being disconnected but don’t see any credible source for that.

If by "other sources" you mean Latvia, India, and the like, then sure. Maybe you would like to know who that oil and gas is really coming from (or maybe not if you want to sleep well at night — that what others have been doing).

I've read enough of this bullshit about Putin supposedly being out of rockets, Russian economy supposedly collapsing in a couple of weeks, etc, to not believe any word of it. And I really hoped it would happen quickly (dig into my comments if you don't believe me) because what he's been doing to Ukraine destroyed me emotionally — unlike most Westerners who didn't know what Ukraine was until very recently.

Russian state is under tremendous financial stress. If one were to listen to sources projecting an imminent collapse - they’d be disappointed, but still it is happening, albeit not as quickly as some have hoped.

The western countries despite their best intentions couldn’t move as quickly as some have hoped - whatever costs they impose on Russia are often a double-edged sword and risk harming their own economies.

Before one dismisses it as cynical - one must realize that to ensure long-term support for Ukraine - politicians have to be careful and court the public opinion in their own countries, and an economic burden will not help that cause.

But still - claims of some magical resilience of Russian state to the biggest collection of economic sanctions in history - is also a form of Russian propaganda. The extraordinary outflows of investment capital, flight of economically mobile population, import and export bans, loss of western gas and oil markets - is and will be more effective with every passing day.

The alternative to this gradual effect - is an overwhelming military defeat as the result of bold offensive action by NATO, but one can only guess how this would end. So we must wait.

On top of increased capacity from Algeria, Norway etc., a lot of it just comes from the US.

On the effects of Western sanctions and the like, Perun did a very complete sum-up three weeks ago : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmO1kfCr_II

First and foremost it was the russians who supported their government.

russians were silent during Chechnya, during the Yukos case, after Putin's comments on Kursk widows, after killing of Politkovskaya, Nemtsov, and so on and so on. Look at any russian popular media in early 2000s and you will see a huge amount of really casual racism, with "Brat 2" being the pinnacle. Nobody spoke out against it.

Just because they let it fester for so long that now they can't even protest is still on them.

I am not going to engage with someone who is so bent on his hatred that he's is willing to subvert the rules of the English grammar to show it, but let it be noted that it has been impossible to protest in Russia since around 2004 or so. None of what you're describing stopped the West from pouring insane amounts of money into Putin's military and repression apparatus. Oh, the irony. My relatives over there had it really difficult since the collapse of the USSR and life came out of pure survival mode closer to maybe 2010. I can't blame them for having other things on their mind, but I know you won't care.

Nobody is responsible for the state of Russia other than the Russians.

Since 2011 I would say. The first couple Bolotnaya protests (2011) were big and safe for the participants (i was there personally). That changed in 2012.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011%E2%80%932013_Russian_pr...

Saying that someone is accountable for their own country is hatred. Cool.

There are roughly 140 million people in russia. Out of that 2.6 million are “siloviki”. The 2.6 million are not the main reason for the regime, it’s the remaining 137.4 mil.

> russians were silent during Chechnya

Let me tell you how it actually was, first-hand - because you clearly got zero idea and seem to propagate the "we've always been at war with Eastasia" thing. So our family used to live in a small city/town (~10k pop) - everybody knew each other, and all that. A 18yo guy from a nearby house got conscripted and subsequently killed in that war. The next day his mother killed herself. Fast forward to 1996; Yeltsin (the autocrat who started that war) was running for his second term and organized a massive media campaign with rallies in every city and village. There was a pro-Yeltsin rally in our city as well, but the organizers had to literally run for their lives - everybody remembered that case. Two of them were hospitalized and taken into another city because even the medics refused them. Chechen war was everywhere, and Yeltsin had to promise to end it to even be taken seriously. Anybody who says otherwise got either no idea, no memory, or no honesty.

Cool. So what happened to Grozny?

I mean, Jesus Christ, 150-300k people died and you’re telling me that people were pissed for being drafted.

I'm directly addressing the point that people were "silent". No they weren't silent, and framing it as being pissed for being drafted is bizarre to anyone who lived during that time. They were angry at Yeltsin for bringing the war in the first place, to use military force in both 1993 coup and Chechnya. Why the massively unpopular person (with 6%-something support before the campaign) remained in power instead of someone like Nemtsov (funny how you remember his murder but don't seem to remember what role he was in during 90s) is another question, the answer will be far too long.

All irrelevant for the end-result: hundreds of thousands people dead, cities destroyed, warcrimes committed. 3 million "siloviki" in a country of 140 million - with these proportions, it's the 137 mil who are guilty.

Honestly, what I hear is moving the goalposts until "it's irrelevant whether you did anything, if you lost it's your damn fault lmao". Same with Belarus 2020. Well, if I'm hearing it right, then good luck with that brush. It might be understandable, but that doesn't make it excusable.

Honestly, this playing the victim is at best getting tiring. You've ignored my comment to hear it as moving the goal posts.

Again: only ca. 2% of the population are siloviki, who rely on the rest for support, for food, for logistics, for communication, IT support, etc., etc. If the protests fail, is because most of the 98% don't care, or snitch, or actively oppose the protest. That makes them culpable. A few complaining doesn't absolve the society.

You, on the other hand, dismissed my comment on how it was, made another unrelated claim, and now hearing that I'm playing the victim. (how on Earth?..) We can run in circles this way if you desire, but I don't want to.

It's only unlrelated if you don't care about the results. Which is the point I am making.

So you are fine with idea that if Ukraine loses war then it's okay to turn back no it at that very moment, call ukranians aggressors and punish them?

I just read your comment and it makes no sense.

EDIT: I think I understand now, but the amount of brainworms you have to have to equate a victim with someone silently supporting the aggressor is pretty big. russians are not the victims here.

Are belorussians victims or silent aggressors? And what about chechns? They are good example of nation that had 2 long wars with russian government for independence, in the end they lost and now region is considered ultraloyal to Putin. Ofc this loyalty hold mostly on Kadyrov and federals' brutality, but I suspect that you anyway won't call them victims.

Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle mérite.

> At the same time - convicted murderers are freed to volunteer to fight against Ukraine and are given state honors, with laws being written threatening severe punishment for reporting the details of their past.

I guess it's a return to the recent past centuries then, with how many "blue blood" noble families came into existence by the state giving land, honors and vote to the reckless cruel men who could more the easily kill (murder?) in the many wars, wars not often over morally sound motives themselves. I'm not criticizing your comment, just wondering out loud.

It will continue for as long as it will take the world to realise that problem with Russia, is Russia itself, and it needs to be comprehensively fixed.

Russia -> some people in Russia

I don't mean to be rude but certain aspects of Russian Culture make authoritarian rule inevitable. Some of has to do with Orthodox religious values and some of it has to do with perceived misrule of the country in times where things were more free.

some people in Russia -> many people in Russia

Very few people disagree with the current state of affairs, it's "1984" with people just believing in whatever is being told to them. I'm saying this cause I've some distant families there, it's absolutely surreal. Either way, if you don't fall in line, you better leave the country (try to), or at best remain very, very quiet and keep your thoughts for yourself.

Putin has had high approval ratings for years. Not only because they clamped down on any opposition, but also because Russians simply don't care.

This is not just a "Putin" problem.

> because Russians simply don’t care

First, this is anything but simple.

Second, many Russians do care, but it is rational to stay quiet.

Third, your comment is one starting point for discussion but certainly not the end. Some follow up questions:

A. What would it take for more Russians to band together to oust Putin? Russians know the brutality of oppression and the long arm of state surveillance.

B. I take your point that this is not just a Putin problem. What happens after?

- The oligarchs have strong incentives to carry on similarly. They get so rich that they can buy loyalty “down the chain”. It becomes an issue of self interest to be corrupt, because it gets you a better quality of life. Sadly, a country with a high quality of life would be less susceptible.

- There will be some kind of selection process post Putin. It is unclear who might have the cunning, blackmail ability, and control of the military and intelligence forces. These levers make popular unrest almost futile.

He notably took credit for ending the lawlessness of the 90s, which was really bad. Russia went through a couple of years of being an outright "failed state", with basically no police operating in much of the country, and rampant gang violence, extortion, and lots of people wondering how they were going to survive, let alone put food on the table.

Putin played the classic "tough on crime" authoritarian tack, except the crime wave was genuine, and huge. The routine street crime and killings were brought to a stop, and ... unfortunately he's been riding the popularity wave from that for at least 20 years. I mean — he didn't solve the high-level corruption of basically having a mafia class run things, which robs the average people of opportunity, but he did slam down on street crime, at least.

Credit for this is a bit misplaced, but it is a reason why he was unusually popular for quite a while.

That, and that he was able to slip into office as Yeltsin's chosen successor without acquiring the 'stink' of Yeltsin.

And potentially some domestic-terror false flag operations, who knows.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings

Russian imperial identity, panslavism and all that jazz

When apartheid South Africa was a pariah state the world held the voting population of South Africa accountable as a collective, rather than just pretending it was only the elite in government making all choices. Although the system was corrupt and hardly a full free and fair election even within the limited racial franchise the country was allowed, the white voting public and corporate and civil society elite had more power than they chose to exercise. They were generally comfortable enough with the status quo to avoid rocking the boat and had developed a national culture that justified the worst of apartheid and attacks on neighbouring countries. They had to be forced out of their comfort zone to address their role in perpetuating the system.

That became obvious when sanctions and disinvestments really bit in the late 1980s and pressure from within forced the government into reforms that ultimately ended apartheid and minority rule.

I see no reason why the same should not apply to Russia. Indeed, I think that's part of the hope by following the same sanctions plus disinvestment route.

By that logic Israel should have full sanctions applied to it based on their treatment of the Palestinians. Instead the west is supporting the continued operation of a full open air prison with which it is near impossible to escape and that people are born and die in. There is plenty of hypocrisy to go around in the West. There are no major reforms coming either. Instead the west is doubling down by imposing laws to even prevent the criticism of Israel by way of punishment.

[1]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-BDS_laws

This isn't a question about whether there's hypocrisy in global politics. Of course there is. You're arguing a separate point.

It's about whether populations in cases like this can be said to be accountable, and be treated that way, rather than pretending it's only the elite who are making all the decisions and hold bad views.

Israelis, for instance, are certainly collectively responsible for the actions of their government. It's not all just Netanyahu and a few others calling the shots.

Should the same apply to Western governments and their people? Should every American be held responsible for all the US war crimes and bombings in the Middle East, Africa etc? Or can that be filed under "whatabaoutism" and ignored?

Yes, and we do. People absolutely blame Western populations for the governments they choose to elect, and act accordingly. How is this surprising?

Should every American be held responsible for all the US war crimes and bombings

This is a straw man. Nobody said every single Russian, or American, or Brit should be held solely and individually responsible, but that the population collectively should be.

> Or can that be filed under "whatabaoutism" and ignored?

One does not imply the other. It can be "whataboutism" in that it doesn't respond to the Russian topic in this thread. And we needn't ignore it. Write an article about the misdeeds of the Western governments and we'll discuss them in that thread. But US war crimes and bombings don't excuse Russia's current invasion of Ukraine.

Is it not true though that we seem to get much more upset when Russia does things wrong then when we do things wrong?

Like, if we were to look at the body count of our respective militaries over the last 20 years the US military is clearly dominant in that regard, yet the outrage over Russia seems disproportional to the harm...is there not a lot of truth here that people seem less enthusiastic to discuss in the aggregate?

Nope.

The US invaded Afghanistan with pretty much full international support and the authorisation of a UNSC resolution.

The invasion of Iraq was far more murky, and nearly split the alliance between the US, UK, France, and Germany as a result. It also caused serious consequences to US power. But it wasn’t a reshaping of the world map, did not include annexation, and was rapidly regularised by UNSC resolutions because of the US’s commitment to allowing an independent government to be formed as well as elections it would not control.

Most importantly though, the US-led coalition had the faintest cover of legal plausible deniability in UNSC 1441, which could be read as having authorised force because of Iraq’s ongoing noncompliance. I disagree with that interpretation, but it has never been fully settled.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was explicitly an annexation by force, and lacked even the pretence of any attempted justification under international law. Putin has also in speeches strongly implied that Ukraine is merely the first in his ambitions, that Russia had a ‘right’ to all the former frontier countries of both the USSR and the Russian Empire.

Where the invasion of Iraq was a bending of international law and the post-WW2 consensus, Russia’s is a complete break of it, and a statement that sovereignty of smaller countries as protected by international law doesn’t matter at all. That’s why it’s treated differently.

> Nope.

Have you any proof or at least evidence to substantiate this?

> The US invaded Afghanistan with pretty much full international support and the authorisation of a UNSC resolution.

Stated support - whether that was with zero aversion is unknown.

Also: while this is related to the specific questions I've asked, it is not answering those questions.

The questions I am asking are regarding the relative harm committed by our respective militaries, and whether our reactions and discussions are proportional to that harm.

> The invasion of Iraq was far more murky, and nearly split the alliance between the US, UK, France, and Germany as a result. It also caused serious consequences to US power. But it wasn’t a reshaping of the world map, did not include annexation, and was rapidly regularised by UNSC resolutions because of the US’s commitment to allowing an independent government to be formed as well as elections it would not control.

All very interesting, and important, but does not address the questions.

>Most importantly though, the US-led coalition had the faintest cover of legal plausible deniability in UNSC 1441, which could be read as having authorised force because of Iraq’s ongoing noncompliance. I disagree with that interpretation, but it has never been fully settled.

This is a matter of opinion. For some people, how many human beings were killed is more important than whether such actions have legal cover.

Do you remember a few years back when we were in the middle of a pandemic, and people dying was a super duper big deal? Do you remmber popular slogans like "Every life matters"? Isn't it interesting how flexible and dynamic humans are on their "bedrock, unequivocal, non-negotiable, just plain common sense" ethical axioms? Isn't it interesting how logically inconsistent and hypocritical people are, and how many people may die unnecessarily due to these strange cultural norms, that are enforced daily right here in "rational" forums like this?

> Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was explicitly an annexation by force, and lacked even the pretence of any attempted justification under international law.

Isn't it interesting how we always talk about this war from the prospect of "justification", rather than causality....and if someone was to inject the notion of causality into the conversation, a probabilistically predictable series of memetic "rebuttals/debunkings" would be likely to manifest?

Isn't it also funny how "international law" (or anything, really) is so important, when it serves our interests.

>Putin has also in speeches strongly implied that Ukraine is merely the first in his ambitions, that Russia had a ‘right’ to all the former frontier countries of both the USSR and the Russian Empire.

Surely. "Implied" is a very interesting word from a neuroscience/psychology/cultural perspective, because the way it is used suggests that the speaker is the only one involved in the implementation of "implied", when in actual fact each listener also plays a crucially important role in the implementation.

> Where the invasion of Iraq was a bending of international law and the post-WW2 consensus, Russia’s is a complete break of it...

Can you write out some pseudocode for isCompleteBreak() so I can better understand your intended meaning?

> and a statement that sovereignty of smaller countries as protected by international law doesn’t matter at all.

Who has committed this crime more in the last 20 years - Russia, or the US?

INB4: "whataboutism".

> That’s why it’s treated differently.

It is "treated differently" by millions of people. You do not have access to why each person treats it differently, thus you have imagined a reason....and due to living in a fantasy world being a (sometimes, and sometimes not) culturally acceptable and often encouraged behavior, no one finds it strange in the slightest. But if we were to change this topic from war to something like compilers and you made stuff up like this, it would no longer be culturally acceptable, you would get shredded in the comments.

Isn't this an interesting world we live in....if one is able to sustain a state of curiosity in one's mind, that is....unfortunately, the mind often seems to have a mind of its own...one whose behavior is subject to decades of social conditioning.

Gosh, I hope all of this is within the Overton Window of "things that are relevant to curious hackers", because it would be a shame if someone was to violate the Overton Window of what portions of reality are acceptable for discussion here and some people experienced a little psychological discomfort.

tl;dr: I asked specific questions, you did not even try to answer those questions.

I'm pretty sure the problem is a circle of oligarchs, cronies, and ex-KGB turning the government into a sadistic mob state, and their citizens poor as hell.

This seems pretty similar to descriptions of Russia in 1918 as well. What's up with this place? Maybe it's the cultural influence of the Mongol invasion?

Yeah, I think the Mongols broke Russia to the yoke of Empire.

Can you say more?

Can you think of similar examples where history seems to go the other way?

On prominent ancient example that pops into my head right away is Mesopotamia. The Assyrians were famous for their brutality and their depiction of violence as political propaganda. They were despised for their viciousness.

It has been argued that the later Persians and Medes were able to rule with a softer touch because by that time the peoples of Mesopotamia had been "broken into the yoke" - e.g. their local decision making traditions forgotten, decentralized civic structures abandoned.

Except Russia happened 200 years or so later.

Sure.

Russia just popped into existence in 1547. It doesn't have anything to do with the peoples that lived in that region before that. Russia as a whole was brought to earth by aliens.

You see, Kievan Rus equals Russia is the thing I've heard only from Russian officials. After the Mongol invasion different parts had very different paths in history.

Yes, and the people in the domain of the Czardom of Russia never recovered. One could make a point that the independence of the Cossack tribes contributed its share to the "de-imperialization" of the Dniepr region. A benefit the peoples in the Duchy of Moscow and later the Czardom of Russia never had.

What kind of explanation are you seeking?

Are you looking for broad “reasons” why history has unfolded the way it did?

What if Russia’s history is not improbable? What if “Western” {democracy + variants of capitalism + colonialism + etc} is actually more of a surprise, probabilistically?

Have you read various commentaries that draw associations and even causal links between natural resources and history? For example, extractable resources tend to correspond with countries that get exploited, either by outsiders or (autocratic or oligarchic) insiders.

(Opinion: Even democratic capitalist countries don’t share a region’s internal wealth very fairly. But it seems that this approach is better than capture by inefficient and corrupt command-and-control forms of government.)

In any case, geopolitical history rarely offers sample sizes large enough to proffer convincing statistical analysis. At best, historians point out convincing theories and evidence of how they play out.

P.S. I use curlies and parens for this crowd because it reduces ambiguity. :)

> What kind of explanation are you seeking?

In this case, I am wondering if a culture other than the present would lead to different outcomes, and specifically wondering if there are significant after-effects of the long-ago Mongol domination. Of course it's near impossible to answer this with any scientific rigor, and I don't have much hope for it :)

It seems that the communist takeover in 1918 was not an obvious "done deal," and at several points things came very close to not happening that way (and going the way of the German social-democratic setup for example).

Ah. I’m not a dedicated Russian scholar, but the big themes to me seem to be:

- Relative cultural isolation of Russia, with the exception of the major cities nearer to Europe. I’d speculate this is partially due to few international trade routes.

- A brutally tough existence, largely due to the climate, economic systems, and over-investment in war.

- No transformational economic gains from territorial gains. The US Colonies, later states, had huge land and resources to colonize and plunder. This created new centers of power and upended Britain’s colonial grip.

- Systemic repression.

- Few alternative centers of power besides the state. Religion plays less of a role in Russian throughout history compared to the West, is this fair?

- High levels of distrust for decades if not centuries, leading to leaders capitalizing on fear.

- Low probability that an aspirational leader could shake the country free of its 20th century roots. No chance that an exiled leader could flee, build a reputation, and return later to transform the country.

I know relativity little about the Mongol influence. What suggests that it might be lasting and enduring?

P.S. This answer would probably be better, more comprehensive, and possibly confidently wrong if aided by a chatty AI.

I asked ChatGPT 4.0 this:

——-

Let’s talk about the history of Russia. What factors contribute to the county’s “capture” by oligarchs? Why can’t the people topple the autocrats and get something better?

Please respond to my thoughts below. Correct me as needed. Offer contrasting views as appropriate. Agree if I get it right.

{I pasted my comment from above.}

——-

ChatGPT 4.0 responded with:

——-

Your analysis of Russia's history and the factors contributing to its capture by oligarchs is generally on the right track. I will elaborate on some of your points and provide additional perspectives.

Relative cultural isolation: While Russia's geographical location might have limited its interaction with the West, Russia has had a long history of cultural exchange with its neighbors in Asia and Eastern Europe. However, the isolationist policies of certain historical periods, such as during the Soviet era, contributed to this sense of cultural isolation.

Brutally tough existence: The harsh climate and economic systems have indeed played a role in shaping Russia's history. The centralized nature of the Soviet economy and the heavy emphasis on industrialization and military power at the expense of consumer goods and social welfare further exacerbated these issues.

No transformational economic gains from territorial gains: While Russia may not have experienced the same economic benefits as the United States did from territorial expansion, it did gain access to valuable resources and extended its geopolitical influence throughout Eurasia.

Systemic repression: Autocratic rule and repression have been recurring themes in Russian history, with leaders like Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, Joseph Stalin, and Vladimir Putin consolidating power and suppressing dissent.

Few alternative centers of power: The Russian Orthodox Church has historically been an influential force in Russian society, but it has often been closely aligned with the state, which limited its potential as an alternative center of power. Furthermore, the state has generally suppressed or co-opted other potential sources of power, such as independent media and civil society organizations.

High levels of distrust: The long history of autocratic rule and government surveillance has contributed to a culture of distrust in Russia. This makes it difficult for democratic movements to gain traction and for people to openly challenge the ruling elite.

Low probability of aspirational leaders: The concentration of power and repression of opposition make it difficult for transformative leaders to emerge within Russia. Even if an exiled leader were to build a reputation abroad, they would likely face significant obstacles upon returning to Russia, including potential arrest or assassination.

Regarding the Mongol influence, the Mongol Empire ruled over Russia in the form of the Golden Horde from the mid-13th century to the late 15th century. While the Mongol rule was oppressive and destructive, it also had lasting effects on Russian society and governance. The Mongols introduced new administrative and taxation systems, and their rule contributed to the centralization of power in Moscow. The legacy of the Mongol rule may have also influenced the development of autocratic rule in Russia, as Russian leaders sought to emulate the highly centralized and powerful systems of their former conquerors.

——-

What other points would you add?

Also, contrast Russia with other countries in similar positions?

——-

In addition to the points previously mentioned, the following factors have also played a role in shaping Russia's political and social landscape:

Ethnic and linguistic diversity: Russia is a vast country that spans multiple time zones and is home to over 190 different ethnic groups. This diversity has sometimes fueled tensions and has presented challenges to the central government in terms of maintaining unity and control.

Historical external threats: Throughout its history, Russia has faced various external threats, including invasions by the Mongols, Napoleon, and Hitler. These events have contributed to a national narrative of vulnerability and a desire for strong, centralized leadership to protect the country.

The Soviet legacy: The Soviet Union's collapse in 1991 had a profound impact on Russia's political, economic, and social fabric. The transition from a centrally planned economy to a market-based system led to widespread economic hardship, inequality, and the rise of the oligarchs. Additionally, the disillusionment with the failures of the Soviet system may have contributed to the public's skepticism of democratic institutions and processes.

When comparing Russia to other countries in similar positions, we can look at:

China: Like Russia, China has a long history of autocratic rule and a highly centralized political system. Both countries have experienced periods of isolation from the West and have pursued aggressive foreign policies in response to perceived threats. However, China's economic transformation and integration into the global market have led to more prosperity and stability than Russia has experienced in recent decades.

Ukraine: As a former Soviet republic, Ukraine has faced similar challenges in transitioning to a market economy and building democratic institutions. Ukraine has also struggled with corruption and oligarchic control, but unlike Russia, it has experienced a series of popular uprisings (such as the Orange Revolution in 2004 and the Euromaidan protests in 2014) that have led to changes in government and ongoing efforts to reform its political system.

Turkey: Turkey is another example of a country with a history of autocratic rule and a strong centralized government. While Turkey has experienced periods of democratization and integration with the West, its current political climate under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has seen a return to more authoritarian practices, similar to those in Russia.

These comparisons show that while Russia shares some commonalities with other countries facing similar challenges, its unique historical context, geography, and cultural factors have shaped its distinct trajectory.

>Maybe it's the cultural influence of the Mongol invasion?

What exactly are you suggesting?

Little to do with culture, everything to do with infrastructure, geography and for the 20th century and onwards messy politics. Russias geography is... rather paradoxical.

It's a country with pretty much some of the biggest landmass on earth, but very few of that landmass has been exploitable for resources. For most of history this has largely been due to its climate being rather hostile to humans - Russias more navigable areas are up north, which isn't great if you want to use it for things like farmland and other basic needs. The southern part of the country is on the other hand rather mountainous, which is also hard to grow resources on.

All of that has resulted in a country where most people congregate in big cities and an infrastructure that outside of those cities is just... barely existent.

The result is that anyone wanting to lead Russia will invariably end up gravitating towards concentrated leadership; the individual cities where most Russian citizens live don't have the resources around them to entirely sustain themselves independently, so all of them need to stay together. Combine that with a poor infrastructure and anyone looking for a power grab in the capital has an easy opportunity to do so if a vacuum ever arises[0].

[0]: The tsar was basically a monarch, which historically has been in general how countries operate. Lenin was specifically send to Russia by the Germans to attempt and disrupt the Russian front during WW1 (and Stalin can be summarized as "Lenin but worse"). The between leaders after Stalin were trying to uphold the same beliefs as him. Putin's powergrab is the result of him taking advantage of the fact that Yeltsin screwed up the de-sovietization process and just dumped Russia into anarcho-capitalism overnight (there was basically no transition process between the Soviet model and neoliberalism, which resulted in anarcho-capitalism).

Sounds like racism but ok

The barrier to outsiders invading and fixing it is nuclear weapons. If the west's troops invaded Russian, it's quite possible Russia would launch nukes. Even without that, the West doesn't want to put boots on the ground in Russia, fearing it will end up like Vietnam, Afghanistan, etc.

The barrier to Russians forming a coup is state repression. The FSB is good at routing out any coup before it can get far. Unless the upper ranks of the military fear for their lives under Putin, their calculus is that they're better off with the status quo than a coup.

It only depends on political will. Airtight isolation will be enough to solve Russia, let's say. On the level that "whoever has any diplomatic or trade relationship with Russia or does not accept the same policy, can't trade with anyone in the West", this policy will take days to "infect" entire world. Not being able to trade they will quickly descend to starvation, rampant disease and death. Then we can take refugees.

Also, well, if we were serious about it, we could throw in enough resources to defeat them like we did it with Soviet Union. Except not recognise any successor states this time: everyone out, with hands up, and that's it.

Doesn't work with North Korea, Venezuela or lots of other dictatorships around the world.

Regime change is hard. Creating a functioning, not corrupt state in the aftermath is harder.

Regime change is hard because maintaining any coherent regime needs will and capacity of the people. In case of Russia of course, it will not be the case. This is why Russia needs to be eradicated, not fixed. Population removed and replanted in many countries, so kids put into foreign schools, so language goes extinct in the next generation and whole "Russianness" thing ceases to exist.

That's the new North Korea scenario.

Well, not really. China continues to trade with North Korea prolonging it existence. If no one traded with Russia, things will be very different there.

So you think some kind of final solution is necessary?

Any Russians on here to explain why dissenters wouldn’t work on leaving the country rather than token demonstrations like this?

The article says he was investigated only after his daughter drew a picture in class. So it probably wasn't particularly planned. And then he fled to Belarus once he got wind of the charges.

Is vehemently disowning the art piece not enough to avoid jail or is it to the point where they’re jailing people for any excuse at all?

What usually happens in cases like this, is you look closer, and it turns out there was a neighbor who had wanted to build a shed on the property line, and the guy told him off, and the neighbor happens to be a member of the CP...

The point is to spread fear of any action or even thought against the regime.

This is Russia. No reason is actually needed. They'll take care of making an excuse.

Last year I saw a video of a woman getting rounded up while she was being interviewed and expressing her belief in the authorities.

She was just standing with a camera team next to a demonstration. Wrong place at the wrong time I think.

Oh I think I saw the same clip… one of those street interviews and a woman walks up and starts going like “You won’t dare showing this but I tell you I and many others support our preside-“ and gets nabbed by Russian police.

>Is vehemently disowning the art piece not enough to avoid jail or is it to the point where they’re jailing people for any excuse at all?

RuZZians(= imperialists Russians that are Z patriots) say that he was not jailed because of the child drawing, the child drawing ONLY caused the police to bring him in, then they found some social media posts and that is the main excuse for his sentence, the Zeds see this as normal.

If you're trying to solidify a regime of judicial terror, I would expect these kinds of cases would be pure gold. The fact that something as benign as a child's drawing couldn't be explained away would amplify the fear and force people to be more aggressive about policing their own thoughts: if the police can find out about a random kid's drawing, they'll definitely discover anything you do that's more than that. Among other things, it gives the state's security forces (and at this point, you can stick the Russian judiciary in that category) the impression of greater power and reach, which also makes people more likely to denounce others.

During World War 2, public perception of the Gestapo always exceeded its actual effective capabilities (at least in terms of agents watching random people and informers at every table) which was a huge part of why people were so willing to inform. Nearly all of the postcards written by Otto and Elise Hampel[0] were turned into the Gestapo by the people who found them, for example. One would expect at least some of the people to toss them in the trash to avoid any risk of entanglement, unless they were more worried about getting caught not turning them in. Richard J. Evans briefly touches on the subject in his Third Reich in Power book:

> [...] What counted was not whether or not there really were informers everywhere, but the fact that people thought there were. The disillusioned writer and journalist Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen recorded his friends’ and his own hatred of Hitler in the privacy of his diary and wondered on 9 September 1937 if anyone outside Germany had ‘any idea of how completely without legal status we are, of what it is to be threatened with denunciation at any

What's really surreal is that even the Gestapo itself realized very early in the regime just how screwed-up the system, not that they ever tried to fix things:

> [...] So many denunciations were sent in to the Gestapo that even fanatical leading Nazis such as Reinhard Heydrich complained about them and the district Gestapo office in Saarbrücken itself registered its alarm at the ‘constant expansion of an appalling system of denunciation’. What dismayed them was in particular the fact that many denunciations appeared to be made from personal rather than ideological motives. [...]

Basically, build up enough fear and you'll influence the population to do police and surveil itself; possibly to a level that even the state itself thinks is excessive and problematic. Returning to the original subject, it's not unsurprising to see Russia to extend its crackdowns to even more absurd cases. The Nazis did the same thing as it became clear they were losing the war, with executions for treason skyrocketing for even the most mundane activities and jokes.

When things are going wrong, authoritarian regimes take it out on their citizens in the hopes that if they just use a strict enough hand against them, they'll somehow cause something to change. Russia isn't in anywhere near as dire straits as Nazi Germany was, obviously, but the same basic impulse is always there.

0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_and_Elise_Hampel

Leaving the country is not easy.. you just need one grandmother that needs care and you're stuck

Also, most european countries don't allow russian¹² refugees anymore, and traveling by plane into western countries is impossible for (non-oligarch-level-wealthy) russians.

¹ germany: https://www.proasyl.de/en/news/germany-federal-office-for-mi... ² finland: https://thebarentsobserver.com/ru/node/189

It's not impossible at all. Russians flying to Turkey for a vacation is still normal - yes, even ordinary middle class people. My friends living in EU are using this to meet with their family in safety.

I think you can easily fly to turkey and then anywhere else. Would not even be that expensive to get from istanbul to sofia..

With regards to visa some friends applied for student visa and that seems to work quite ok.

> Would not even be that expensive

Let me remind everyone reading this that a "typical" salary in Russia is 30-40k rubles per month. They don't publish the median, and the mean is absolutely useless. This will maybe buy you a one-way ticket to a neighboring country, but how are you going to survive afterwards?

Moscow - Astana flight with luggage is ~230 USD, railroad is even cheaper, that's about all the additional expenses. The visas are the main issue.

That's very inaccurate. The German case states that the possibility to be drafted alone doesn't constitute grounds for asylum, you need some form individual persecution (because of ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion etc) in Germany. "I got charged because my daughter drew a picture that called for peace" will be a very different case than "I'd rather not fight personally".

It's not new either, it has pretty much always been that way. A lot of German politicians are calling for exceptions for Russians (which would effectively end the practice for all countries) to weaken Russia's ability to draft more people.

Any sane person who isn't a brain-washed z-patriot has already left Russia or at least staying quiet.

At this point North Korea is a democracy compared to russia.

I recommend quitting theatrics. Yes Russia implementing absolutely awful laws. They do not yet send people to labor camps en masse and living standard is still much higher.

They have quite a way to go down to NK levels. I hope that fucker Putin and his cronies gets wiped out before it happens.

Also the West is not really looking forward to accept Russian refugees / dissenters. They do send them back.

Colonies in Russia are essentially labor camps. And mandatory work (e.g. making goods like uniform for army and police) is still an essential part of russian penitentiary system.

Well, that was the whole premise of the question though.

Of course there are many millions of Russians who oppose the war and who still stay in Russia. And some of them are not staying quiet.

Need to have something to go to.

The dissidents still stuck in Russia are for the most part people that would not be able to succeed at all in Europe. Big name scientists left during the 90s, people who succeeded economically started leaving post 2008(once Putin/bureaucrats started clamping down on free business) and the last of both groups got out once the conflict started.

I mean at this point in time most European/ex-USSR countries have put measures in place to prevent dissenters escaping there, so it also isn't easy even if you do have skills.

Leaving Russia is difficult and takes a lot of money and connections. Most people don't have that or have other reasons not to. It's "smart" to stay quiet and not put yourself in danger but people like Moskalyov are compelled to at least say something.

From your question I can guess you most likely live in a developed country with a great passport and/or have a career where you make great money enabling you to move country whenever you want.

But for everyone else, to leave their country and move somewhere else legally, you need a visa, and a lot of money, which not everyone in Russia has.

Most countries where Russians left en masses to due to lax visa requirements, pushed the rent prices there to 2x-4x till today. Not great for the locals and not great for the Russians also trying to move there. And most western counties aren't in a rush to issue visas to all Russians.

Unless you have relatives abroad to help you out, or a skilled lucrative profession enabling you to save money and get a visa, you're screwed.

And that's besides the whole ordeal of leaving vulnerable family members behind.

Here is one example, there are many others

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/18/biden-admini...

A lot of people are in lower income brackets and don't have the means nor understanding where and how to leave the country.

Another big factor is that many countries have essentially closed borders for Russian nationals - i.e. US is now deporting those who are fleeing - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/18/biden-admini...

There are also few people who do want to stay in Russia and try to fight Putin there (like Navalny or Yashin).

I suspect for many people the process is hard to say the least.

Where would you live? Where can you work? Will you even find a job if you legally can work? Will your rights be protected even there? What happens to family back home? Can you take enough money with?

Many people have left hastily but they seem to be people with means, or directly at risk (conscription), young men who can grit it out for a while somewhere else.

Most people don't have connections in other countries to run to.

Many of countries that are easy to get to easily extradite political activists and defectors back to Russia.

I'm an immigrant that legally migrated into Schengen from outside Schengen. I currently have a temporary residence permit. I don't come from a country basically at war with NATO, I have a job, I earn good money, I contribute to society, I follow the laws, and still this is the most difficult thing I have ever done in my whole life, and it is not particularly close. It is expensive, it is time consuming, it is life consuming, every single step in the process is a gamble that could end up ruining my whole life in addition to taking all savings I ever had.

I feel like every day is a struggle just to keep my head above water. Even after doing everything I need to get permanent residence, I still have to wait 16 months for approval, which is longer than my temporary residence permit, and they won't renew that.

Immigrating to a country is hard. I don't blame the country I'm moving into, I get it, they have laws, but damn do I wish it was just a little bit easier.

Given how hard this is, think about how hard it will be for someone from Russia. If you just had the faintest inkling of how difficult it is, you would understand how absurd your question is.

I wish I could have it as easy as just walking in and demanding things, too bad that will guarantee that I never get to permanently decouple myself from the shithole that I was born in. And to be quite fair, knowing what I know now, about how difficult it is, I am not sure if it is even worth it.

Well this explains the situation exactly. People are oppressed into being hopeless. How Russian that seems.

> People are oppressed into being hopeless.

The way I look at it is, life is just way harder for most people than it is for people lucky enough to be born in the west, and it is difficult for westerners to comprehend.

When you say oppressed, it implies an oppressor, in reality, to not have "oppression" takes centuries of bloodshed and tradition.

The reason the country I'm moving from is a shithole is because we have not paid the blood price to not be a shithole, like Europe has paid. And I don't want to be around to pay that blood price, I'm too much of a coward, and I can see it coming, it is palpable, you know it is a matter of years before there is civil war and blood in the streets, there is no other way, there is just so far to fall before life is worthless, and I can see things falling every day there. I know it is just a matter of time before my parents get murdered in a civil war, but I'm powerless to stop it, and they know it also, but they pretend it does not matter. So you just have to do everything you can to ignore it, and do your best to keep gambling, hoping you win the lottery out of the shithole.

And again, I'm not Russian, Russians have it 1000x times worse than me, I thank the god I don't believe in every day that I don't have it as hard as they do.

I am not trying to downplay your personal struggle. There’s more to discuss here than a few posts allow. What I will say is that it’s hard to empathize with complaints or totally absolve people of responsibility for their state of oppression when as you say they don't want to pay the price to liberate themselves. If you can live happily in an oppressive regime then good for you, seriously. But when you start getting oppressed, don’t come crying. And when your country starts committing war crimes, don’t be surprised if people criticize your inaction and apathy.

> And when your country starts committing war crimes, don’t be surprised if people criticize your inaction and apathy.

Who stopped selling weapons to Ukraine? Who lifted sanctions on Nordstream II? What NATO country were more favourable to Russia than US, and as a result, restructured their "green" energy policy to be a "little green men" energy policy where they completely tied their economy to fossil fuel supplied by Russia, while laughing like petulant schoolchildren when warned that this will have negative consequences?

Yeah, sure, the Russians are all cowards for not dying on mass in another revolution that is likely to go nowhere better than the last. I'm a coward for fleeing my shithole home country instead of staying there and killing my fellow citizens in a civil war that is inevitable.

But the blood of the Ukrainians are also on NATO's hands. It is especially on the hands of Germans, French, Americans and citizens. If they made better choices, Ukrainians would not have to die. But instead, NATO gave every signal to Russia that they will do nothing to stop its excursions into sovereign nations, while also making clear that want Ukraine in NATO, and that NATO is primarily an anti-Russian alliance that refuses to lift a single finger to keep Russia at bay.

Migrating to Schengen is indeed hard (bordering on imposing) to a lot of Russians, but that’s not the only nice place in the world.

For example India right now is quite accepting of Russian immigrants - the place is full of them. There are a lot of places that are still open, and would welcome experienced workers from Russia, granted it might not be as glamorous as EU, but I bet at this point a lot of Africa would look like an egalitarian paradise.

You are totally right that it is incredibly hard, but as a russian who had migrated to the EU I wouldn’t say it’s insurmountable - granted I did it way before the invasion, but still I never felt threatened - it was all time consuming, bureaucratic and slow, but I just had to follow the process.

Software devs seem to be in demand everywhere so plenty of peaceful and nice places for us lot to settle thankfully.

Software devs are in demand everywhere, and I know one who migrated to the same country I migrated to, from Russia, and I know that he is consumed with the threat of being deported back home, having to face being shot or shooting Ukrainians. I tell him I doubt it will happen, I want him to be able to somehow not be consumed with the prospect of going back to the shithole that is Russia, but I every time I console him, it is a lie, I lie to his face, because I can't even convince myself that I can somehow manage to stay here, but I lie because I know that being consumed with worry is like being in hell, and if I can somehow spare him that I will, even if it is a lie.

There may be other places, but it is not easy. Maybe India is an exception, maybe to India it is easy, but to the particular Schengen country I chose, it is anything but easy.

About 30% of Russians are against the war (20% don't know, 50% support the war). That's about 40 million people that would have to leave the country.

Only 30% of Russians have travel passports, and most of them used them to travel to Ukraine, Kazakhstan and other ex-Soviet countries to visit their relatives.

Those numbers are pulled right out of someone's ass. No-one really knows how many citizens are for and against the war (there were some hints that the Kremlin did several unofficial polls and really didn't like their results, but nothing supported by good evidence).

Also, you don't need a travel passport to visit relatives in ECU (which Kazakhstan is a member of), and it's pretty much impossible to visit Ukraine legally regardless of whether you have a passport or not.

I have a Russian passport and I've been to Kiev in December 2021. It was just a few months before war has started and talks about possible war was all around the news for months already.

Had no problem crossing Ukraine border control. Of course after war started it became impossible, but it was very much expected.

Because they are poor people not speaking any foreign languages (Russian language education system is intentionally terrible), with no marketable skills relevant outside of Russia. They are both victims of the system and it's products, unalienable from the system itself.

I’m not Russian but have some experience with moving around with a (once)weak passport: You can’t just go wherever you like.

You are not welcome and they won’t let you come if they suspect you might stay. Some conspire to send you to Rwanda, some beat you up on the border, others lock you up in concentration camps.

You are also the boogyman for about %20-%50 of the population of the country you go and about that many politicians promise to get rid of you if they get elected.

One day you are on the bus and feel tired, a seat frees up and you snap it. You look around and see hateful stares directed at you.

For many many years you can’t function like a normal person. You can’t have a normal job, you can’t start a business, you can’t rent, you can’t subscribe to utilities and you need to find people who will help you out with all this all the time.

Some places will be more helpful than others but will make you feel your boundaries all the time and they will get rid of you at your first mistake.

Also, remember how you are active citizen protesting against war in your own country? You can’t protest in your new country, you are expected to be cooperating %100 of the time with whatever the locals do. Moving to another country, means you completely give up your aspirations of influencing the society.

It's really sad what people like you have to overcome. Fortunately this is not the case for majority immigrants from Russia even though it's multinational country. Very few people in west would ever be able to tell if a person in front of them is from Russia, Ukraine or Belarus. In some countries locals can't even tell we're foreigners.

Problems of people who immigrating from Russia are mostly financial.

Hah yeah, until you open your mouth - then its usually _painfully_ obvious you’re from Russia. The accent is very distinctive and inescapable. I have the luck to have learned english when I was a kid, alongside another foreign language, so people place me as “broadly eastern european” rather than precisely Russian but almost all expats I encounter I can immediately tell they are from there.

While it's true this is simply incomparable with having different skin color and face. Also a lot of people who fled from Ukraine only speak Russian and have about the same accent in English. Of course they also sometimes get some hate even though they actually from Ukraine.

Talking of me personally I just happy to have somewhat different accent due to how many years I spend in SEA. My wife is half kurdish half russian so for her it's even harder to tell where is she from.

For once because no one welcome people with Russian passport regardless of fact that you're against the war. It's possible to get humanitarian visa to a few EU few countries, but it's very difficult unless you're already under criminal investigation.

Few countries where it easy to move is ex-USSR countries like Georgia, Armenia, Kazahstan, etc. Unfortunately in all of them except Georgia there is high risk of extradition. And there good chance Georgia can simply close border at any moment or refuse entry at random.

There are few other countries including Turkey, Montenegro, Serbia, but moving there is actually quite expensive. It's really only an option for IT people who work remotely and there good chance your residency permit won't be renewed at any moment. Finding offline job in those countries even harder and with inflated cost of rent such job will barely pay enough to survive.

I personally donated to Armed Forces of Ukraine and posted enough on social media to get myself in prison for next 10 years, but I not gonna to attract attention to myself just to to get a visa.

Sure (I am Russian, emigrated in 2005, never been in Russia since 2014). Here are some of the actual reasons:

1) Immigration is hard. Particularly when you are not from a well-developed country with a powerful passport. You will live on a borrowed time, where the host country will invent reasons to deport you (to Russia, of course, where you most probably will be jailed in no time). I live in Switzerland for 18 years, and still on a temporary residence permit, as the Swiss government invents more and more creative laws and rules to deny me a permanent residence, not to mention citizenship, which is a pipe dream at this point.

2) Leaving your parents and elder relatives might not be something many people are ready for. In Russia, there is a strong notion that children are supposed to support their parents in the old age.

3) One misadventure with the Russian law (and many people from Russian opposition have a lot of them for their protests), and you can’t go out. You will be stopped at the border. The ability to exit the country is a privilege in Russia; not yet at the level it used to be in the USSR, but a privilege nonetheless.

4) Some heroic people think that they have to stay and fight, instead of quitting. It might be near impossible, but they have a reason.

Etc, etc. Those who could move out are really lucky. I am lucky, too.

What happens if you marry a Swiss chick, will they give you citizenship or did they plug that hole as well?

> Swiss chick

You get you are talking about another person, right? Not some object to be used for selfish aims?

After five years (+2 years of the process itself), while constantly checking if your marriage is still alive and well (like, spying on you or asking your neighbors or even calling your kids at 7AM if you have any; and, of course, endless interviews for both you and your wife to exclude that your marriage is fictional).

I am already married, though.

"(to Russia, of course, where you most probably will be jailed in no time)"

Only if you publicly protest against the war.

"and you can’t go out"

Really? Lots of opposition figures emigrated from Russia since the war started.

They did, because either they didn’t have criminal charges against them yet, or were smuggled out of the country illegally.

If you have criminal charges against you in Russia, you can’t get out. And at this point you can be sentenced to 5 years for “discriminating the army” if you write publicly in a social network that you are against war or that there were war crimes. Many people who did are already in jail, others will be detained if they attempt border crossing.

You'd first get administrative charges and a fine. Sometimes you can even fight off the fine in the court -- I personally know someone who did.

After that you either shut up or leave the country, which of course is very bad.

They just reinstated крепостное право, now one can't leave the country if a military recruitment office (военкомат) sent a summon letter (even if you don't receive it. You have to check yourself manually on a special website beforehand). Along with other restrictions like ban on transactions involving real estate (land, apartments, houses) and such.

Many countries don't issue visas and residence permits to Russian due to sanctions, for example, it is difficult to get to EU. There are countries you can leave for, but there are no jobs or they are with low pay, Russian education certificates are not usable there. So you can escape, but how are you going to live there if you don't have money?

Of course if you are rich that is not a problem. For example, relatives of high-ranked officials are sometimes seen spending time in Europe, shopping or visiting resorts, financing the economy of NATO countries.

Ow wow, I expected this one would become like "FSB arrests children for blowing up buildings in Minecraft" as soon as the first details had started to surface, but never would have guessed it would hit HN.

PsyOps is strong, I see a few other people here bringing them up and getting mass downvoted.

This one is on Russia telegram groups too, I don't think it's false (the details aren't the same, but the story is basically 'parent indoctrinated children should be given back to Russia' if Google translate is right)

this is absolutely terrible. this is a sure way for russia to create a modern version of the stolen generation [1]

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations

Sure is terrible, just weird that russians themselves just take it and don't stand up.

um they did, in 1917, like no one else, ever. too bad the whole thing took a wrong turn a decade later

So they tried once a century ago, then gave up? How is this different from what I was asking? Nothing is done, violence is tolerated and glorified at home and exported to neighbors too.

There have been many internal reform attempts in Russia, almost universally the leaders of each have been assassinated or imprisoned. It’s a very dangerous place to protest, especially now that they’ve invaded Ukraine and legalized mobilization.

I have a suspicion that the siloviki insiders are okay with the system as is. Plenty of stealing to be done at all levels.

The others still take it without doing anything about it.

Good luck standing up against million of well armed, well paid and well trained national guards.

Iranian school girls do that.

Did they win?

They kept their dignity and earned mad respect from others. They may also win at some point.

> mad respect

I really hope that you are being ironic and this is a joke.

Why would you hope such a thing?

The Ukrainians sure as hell won their Euromaidan.

and lost a chunk of east ukraine

So you propose it's better to submit than fight for your freedom? That's your choice.

Let's see where Ukraine is in 5 years and where Russia will be.

Your mentality fits nicely in russian society.

And in case you didn't notice, eastern Ukraine and Crimea is still Ukraine. Soon free from russian invaders.

> Let's see where Ukraine is in 5 years and where Russia will be

given the disastrous policies of the ukranian government, in 5 years it would not surprise me if ukraine is divided between russia and poland. im sure the poles would love that too

> Your mentality fits nicely in russian society.

i think my mentality fits pretty nicely with that of southern Europe, where i live. i also happen to think that polish ukranian and russian mentality fit rather well together, especially the rampant xenophobia

> given the disastrous policies of the ukranian government

Do you point out the policy of not letting it's people genocided without a fight? Or do you mean something else? I don't this is even up for the government to decide, Ukrainians would fight no matter their governments policy.

> especially the rampant xenophobia

Please don't project your own mentality onto others.

> Ukrainians would fight no matter their governments policy

is that why they prevent all men from leaving their country?

> Please don't project your own mentality onto others

Mine? The founder of Azov, Andriy Biletsky declared in 2010 that the Ukrainian nation’s mission was to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade … against Semite-led Untermenschen [subhumans].” There are now streets in Ukraine that carry names of the Azov clowns, and Bilenski is frequently present in ceremonies. But hey, let's give them all weapons we have so that they can fight the Russians. What a marvelous idea ... not. But it is what it is, and Azov Regiment is going to be part of the planned counter-offensive this spring

The reality is, the United States supports Ukranians in much the same way it supported the Afghans during the 1980s. Groups like Azov and Right Sector are just the new Taliban. For Ukraninan people's sake lets hope Ukraine doesn't end up like Afghanistan

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/ukraine-has-nazi-probl...

* Just in case you think I was brainwashed by KGB

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/azov-swastika-flag-ukraine...

* Picture tells a thousand words

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FdhsPQEX0AALM9H?format=jpg&name=...

lol. thats all you have ?

> southern Europe, where i live

Let me guess... you're antivax?

nope. whats that have to do with southern europe

Ukranian protesters had support from half of parliament, several independent oligarchs and even some part of government. Also they had logistic support from political organizations and also international support.

In Russia opposition has no allies in establishment, there are no independent oligarchs in the country, political organizations are destroyed and any Russian national by default has zero sympathy from the West now (frankly speaking even if one had a substantial support, it would be damaging for his political reputation in the country). There are no public institutions left in Russia that opposition can rely on, every activist is essentially alone against government machine.

"Well armed and well trained"

Sure, we've seen plenty of those in Ukraine. Also "well intoxicated"

Really well armed and well trained elite police forces are not sent in Ukraine because they are needed in case of unrests. For battlefield there are poorly trained conscripts with rusty gear from 70s.

Dictators like Putin or Saddam save their best guard even in toughest moments of war, because they know that they can loose war but can still be in power if their guard can protect them from their political enemies.

Honestly, not too much people take it here as seriously as you guys somewhere over there.

Most just get skeptical of such stories the older they get, and this is unfortunately a consequence of personal empirical evidence. You expect the truth but instead get a story. As you grow older the story starts to feel rough, doesn't add up to experience and at some point turns into a complete Orwellian bullshit.

Stories get treated as tabloid bs used as propaganda, and quite often this is hardly too far from the truth.

I see that a fresh batch of copium has been distributed.

Nothing new. Family from Eastern Europe had to deal with this bs with communism. It was always the fear of neighbors “ratting you out” made everyone paranoid. You had to be on board or risked being “taken away.”

Indeed. The fear was sometimes voiced as being afraid of people 'taking names' with future consequences.

And it takes generations to forget. I spent only my infancy under communism, but through my parents this is ingrained in me. I am always very careful to voice my opinion and I care too much about what unknown ppl would think about me. Criminal regime

Not just “rattling out”, often you had a quota as well.

There are international organizations that try to protect children's rights. For example, Robert Kennedy, who might a presidential run as a democrat in the next election is involved in the Children's Health Defence

https://childrenshealthdefense.org/

Pro-russion forces will claim this report is mere propaganda - how to proof it's not?

The burden of proof is on the country that started an unprovoked, brutal war of aggression that has thrown away the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in just over a year and still insists on not referring to it as a war. If you don't want people to believe that your country is a brutal oppressive authoritarian regime, you start by not acting like one, not by crying foul when people tell stories about your brutal oppressive authoritarian habits.

They'd love nothing more than for you to believe there is no proof or evidence for anything -- no truth for you to discern. Just struggles in the will to power.

Russia is slipping into totalitarianism more and more very day. But this did not happen over night; Putin and his cronies have been working towards this goal for more than 15 years now and the attack on Ukraine simply gave them all the excuses they needed to clamp down on the last dissenters.

So painful

Russia never really got out of totalitarianism. They've had two brief windows where they looked like they might (post-revolution and post-collapse), but those were really just windows of pseudo-anarchy while the next totalitarian regime consolidated power.

I guess there's some truth to that. What's coming off now was just a pretense.

Same happens with Polish kids in Norway.

citation needed

I've heard of that and I tried to google it but it's nearly impossible to find anything on it on Google anymore. Something about Child Protection in Norway taking away children if the parent was fatigued etc.

The same is happening in Texas, where your kid can be taken away without trial if someone reports that they may be trans.

Not true yet but it is proposed.

It is a directive from the Governor that has already caused parents to be under investigation and some have already had to flee the state.

I don't think he's an immediate threat to society or his daughter and hence don't support the imprisonment.

The portrait painted by the Economist is, however, incomplete. I guess because the details are not pretty. Mr. Moskalyov was convicted three times before this trial (but haven't served any jail time):

- in 1984 for theft

- in 2004 for (illegal) imprisonment without kidnapping

- in 2008 for violating production/transport safety regulations

Apparently he's also not paying utilities/taxes and have no legal sources of income -- he's growing and selling exotic animals but that's off the books.

Feel sorry for the kid the most...

Do you really think it's important what he did 20 years ago?

Half of Russia population don't pay taxes and occasionally have no money to cover their utility bills. Most people outside of Moscow only earn $300-500 / month.

Also do you reallt think it's a good idea to pay taxes in Russia at this moment? All these taxes gonna be used to kill children in Ukraine.

> Do you really think it's important what he did 20 years ago

To the extent it might have influenced the ruling...

> Half of Russia population don't pay taxes and occasionally have no money to cover their utility bills. Most people outside of Moscow only earn $300-500 / month.

50% would be an overstatement. It's normally deducted directly by the employer regardless of the salary so you don't see that money to start with (and typically negotiate/agree on your net salary).

People who don't pay utilities eventually get disconnected from electricity/gas etc.

> It's normally deducted directly by the employer regardless of the salary

That's why paying cash "in envelope" is a common practice in SMB. "Grey salary" as it's called there: minimal wage level part is payed officially, rest is not.

> People who don't pay utilities eventually get disconnected from electricity/gas etc.

That's more of exception than a rule. Huge debts for utilities (for 1 year of consumption or even more) are quite common. As also practice of "shame lists" in apartment lobbies with apartment numbers and sums of debt.

First, what's your source for this claim? Russia's propaganda arm is massive and working 24/7, so you can't go spouting off claims like this without telling us where you're getting your information. We need to be able to vet your source.

Second, given that we're talking about Russia's justice system, I wouldn't really care if this were true! Being convicted of a crime in Russia isn't proof you did it—it's just proof you're not in the Kremlin's good graces.

https://memopzk.org/figurant/moskalyov-aleksej-vladimirovich...

https://m.newstula.ru/fn_1307328.html

The first one is from a widely known human rights advocacy group Memorial (which has tensions with the state). The second is a regional newspaper of sorts (hence state-controlled give or take).

The first source gives a passing nod to past convictions with no details at all.

The second source is completely state propaganda, no give or take. It doesn't even try to hide it, it's blatantly biased and leans fully into the idea that the accused is a mole planted by Western powers to discredit the government.

Neither is a great source for your claims, and the fact that you cite the second at all in this context makes your motives highly suspect.

English translation of the second source: https://newstula-ru.translate.goog/fn_1307328.html?_x_tr_sl=...

I didn't say it was not propaganda, what I meant is that the degree of direct state control of regional press varies.

Lots of papers write exactly in the same style even if they are completely private and no one tells them to - but they know what could happen if they start to dissent or even deviate from the "party line".

Novaya corroborates one of the past convictions exactly

https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/03/03/papa-menia-chut-...

You seem to have a lot of facts handy - do you also happen to have an english translation of the letter his daughter sent to him that you can post here? Just to balance out 20 years old mud.

That's quite an accurate tranlation: https://metro.co.uk/2023/03/30/russian-girls-letter-sent-to-...

Go on, tell me this doesn't have a nuclear weapon used to "salt" Ukraine crops when he's on his final deathbed.

There are no checks and balances, everyone is just going to do what they are told and that will be the end of that.

The surge in the price of all wheat products in the US is in part due to Ukraine crops being unavailable, they are important to the entire world.

Is a family in the US that publicly supports Al Qaeda or ISIS not being threatened with the same?

No, and even if they were, that wouldn't make taking people's children away from them as punishment for thought crimes a reasonable policy.

Fuck dude, Ukraine is not a terrorist organization, at least compared with Ruzzia where you had state people going around the world and assassinating civilians with various possions. Too bad West is too coward to name Putin, his pary and Ruzzia a terrorist state and apply the laws for Ruzzia as they are doing for other terrorist organizations.

I doubt this argument is made in good faith. Do you think it’s reasonable to equate Ukraine with ISIS or Al Qaeda and a child drawing a painting depicting a mother and a child with the text “stop war” as supporting ISIS or Al Qaeda?

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