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Comment by justsomehnguy | Hacker News Reader

> ones that didn't manage to leave after the collapse of the Soviet Union

> openly racist towards ethnic Tajiks

Makes me wonder, maybe something happened between ethnic Tajiks and ethnic Russians between Soviet Union collapse and the present.

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Most Russians hold racist views. It doesn't change if they are expats. As a result of the colonial conquests, Russia is a multiethnic state. But the minorities have never been fully accepted. The govt balances between suppressing the far right and managing it for its own purposes.

This wiki article has plenty of references, with many pointing to the racist actions by the senior officials https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_Russia

> Most Russians hold racist views

I understand that people are unhappy with Russia right now, but what a truly gross thing to say (and absolutely not true).

Very true when it comes to antisemitic views: only 1 in 10 Russians would be ok having a Jewish friend.

"In a Levada Center poll, for instance, 45 percent of Russians said they had a positive attitude toward Jews in 2021, up from 22 percent in 2010. Russians said Jews were the minority group they were most comfortable having close to them — but only 11 percent said they’re ready to have a Jewish friend, up from 3 percent in 2010."

https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-ukraine-war-f...

That simply doesn't pass the smell test. I think you would be very surprised if you actually talked to any real Russians.

Oh please, Levada? lol. I understand there's a big psyops push to dehumanize Russians right now, but they are people like the rest of us. Crazy, right?

No, russians are incredibly racists and openly hostile to central asia migrant laborers. Experienced it myself

Wait, are you agreeing that Russians aren't humans?

Hitler and Pol Pot were also humans, yet they did very bad things to other fellow humans.

Nobody is denying that ru are humans, we are simply acknowledging that someone did very bad things against principles of humanity, did it deliberately, at scale, and over a very long time period.

Consider yourself lucky for being from a country that never bombed anyone. Mine killed about 4 million (mostly women and children) in the ME over the last 30 years, and are still at it by helping their friends pound Palestine into smithereens :(

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians

its not only bombing, it is casual everyday racism towards others that is a problem.

same like zionist jews think of themselves as superior to palestinians, same russians think of themselves as superior to Ukrainians and other ex-soviet nations. BTW a lot of Israeli jews immigrated from Soviet Union and some could argue they could pick up this superiority complex from russians

Yes, you're a vanguard for moral authority while actively also making what-about-x excuses for Russia.

Which has openly broken any established rules of war along with raping & genital mutilation being an actively encouraged tactic.

> we are simply acknowledging

We?

Please, for your racist views speak for yourself, without 'royal we'.

Also people like you always conveniently omit anything what would show your people not as those saints as you try to portrait it.

I am aware that this is a bold claim and that it may be hard to believe. I also wish this weren't true. That's why I put a reference to support it. Check out the section on Public sentiments and politics. In particular, that 60% of population support the statement "Russia is for Russians" and what that phrase implies. If you are curious to learn more, check out studies and polls by any organization that you support - Amnesty International, Russian NGO's, universities, etc.

I am pretty sure in most european countries people would vote for the same answer

I'm from the US South and am well traveled in Europe and Russia, including minority Russian republics like Adygea. In my experience, Russians are way less racist than Americans and Western Europeans - I almost never heard a racist word from them (I understand the Russian language).

Please watch these:

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_xq7WcM_J0

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdtCCi249xE

Also, feel free to hit that translate button on videos like these, especially the top voted ones. The comment from Russians are generally very positive (even heartwarming) towards foreigners who are adequate, learn the language and follow the local laws.

It's really not gross if you can accept that the author of such a statement would likely also believe racist is not a term that is used not as a binary (as in - you are either racist or not racist) but that racism is something we are almost all guilty of to some degree or another and not something that means you're going to hell or are a horrible person. In the same way that we are all at times capable of being selfish, or at times capable of being ignorant, or weak to temptation.

Saying they are racist in that light is more like saying that relative to the average, they are a bit more racist than the best of us.

This blanked statement is false. I’m speechless somebody can make claims like this tbh.

Definitely not false. Actually quite well covered by journalists and scholars.

As an example: https://academic.oup.com/edinburgh-scholarship-online/book/2...

The article studies properties of a nationalist group, which is in extreme minority, especially after 2010s, and doesn’t make claims that ‘most Russians are nationalists’.

You have to lurk really hard to find a nationalist there unless you count people love Dostoyevsky into this group. There are also a lot of glass ceilings in place for ethnical Russians, and distribution in elite universities, politics, and business don’t represent the country average, which suggests there’s an intentional ’reverse racism’ in place towards majority. Moreover, the word ‘Russian’ is banned in media and is replaced by ‘citizen of Russia’.

Yeah yeah, it's also well covered by journalists how all Americans are racist.

OP visited about 15 years ago so if you are hinting at the more recent event, it doesn't sound relevant. And if it is not that, I'm not sure what you are hinting at.

> I'm not sure what you are hinting at.

Probably the various ethnic cleansings that happened in the *stans at the fall of the USSR, where most more western ethnicities (Russians, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Armenians, ...) were at best swiftly & firmly reconducted to the nearest airport, and at worst killed on the spot.

It's best understood against the backdrop of a very long series of colonial endeavours. The circassian genocide is well documented.

> circassian genocide

You are aware that Circassia is 3 countries and more than 4000km away from Tajikistan, right? And that the ethnicities involved in the Circassian genocides are wholly separated from Tajiks?

Yes, why? Would Tajikistan for some reason be the only adequate example of muscovite colonial history?

Circassian genocide was especially nasty, but ancient history (and somewhat inline with America's genocidal colonial conquests West). And not that it justifies the genocide, the Circassians were big slavers of Slavs (especially young girls). Also some of the biggest bastards on the Russian side were actually ethnic German.

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigory_Zass

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sea_slave_trade#Circassi...

The late eighteen hundreds is "ancient history"? That's antiquity to you?

I get the impression that this might come as a surprise to you: 'In the context of the Circassian slave trade, the term Circassians did not necessarily refer to ethnic Circassians, but was used as an umbrella term for a number of different ethnicities from the Caucasus region, such as Georgians, Adyge and Abkhazians, in the same fashion as the term "Abbyssinians" was used as a term also for African slaves who were not from Abyssinia.'

That Moscow is a european colonial project was kind of my point but obviously that flew at a level seemingly mesospheric to you.

I’m well aware of the Mountain of Tongues and Circassia, having traveled that region extensively (including Adygea) and read a number of history books about it.

My country (America) had their own colonial project around that same time period (and also conflated various native groups) - like, ever heard of Manifest Destiny?

The US is still a colonial project, Puerto Rico being the obvious example. It's irrelevant however.

You describe 1863 as ancient history, so I'm not keen on putting any trust into the words you're using or claims to being educated on the subject.

What's your nationality? Because it is absolutely relevant. If you don't employ some empathy and self-reflection of your own history when judging the historical actions of others, you literally get no say in the matter.

My ancestors were mainly sami and travelling peoples. The swedish crown more or less eradicated them.

Not sure why that would make me empathetic towards muscovite genocidaires.

Well that makes you related to my wife, who’s part Komi (her father’s first language). But even they're not butthurt about what the Russians did to them - it was a long time ago. And actually, the Soviets made an effort to preserve the language - she had to take classes in school and much of the local signage is in Komi. People there on the river will even greet you in Komi, still.

And btw, the fact that Circassia itself was the result of the westward expansion of a Persian speaking people who also subjected other cultures (not to mention were big slavers) just shows that you have literally no idea what you're talking about and grasping deep into history for reasons to be bigoted against Russians. Not to mention that the people running the Russian Empire at the time were actually Germans (who also considered themselves superior to Slavs), including many of the top commanding generals behind the genocide.

Downplaying one of modernity's most complete genocides with 'they were actually persians that sold some slaves' and 'actually some of the people in charge were western european' is frankly disgusting.

Moscow's reach for the Black Sea had nothing to do with anti-slavery idealism or whatever you're getting at, they wanted ports and trade and didn't consider muslims as human as christians. It also seems to me that you don't consider serfdom a form of slavery, only international slave trade, which isn't a position I share.

Do NOT put words into my mouth about what I consider slavery or not (or anything, unless I explicitly write it). Yeah, Slav serfdom was shitty as was Russian Imperialism. And American Imperialism, British Imperialism and so-on.

And I'm not downplaying anything (and sure, the Russian Empire made justifications for what it did), I'm pointing out that my God - that was two centuries ago. By your measure, every modern American and Spaniard is a genocidal maniac...

I didn't. Your reading comprehension in english might not be as good as you think.

Sure you are. You're bringing up excuses.

Antiquity ended at the dawn of medieval times. That's like half a millenium earlier than where you want to put it. 1863 is quite some distance into modernity, well into the age of the railroad.

I haven't made anything in this about individuals, rather centering it around Moscow, which has at times been sacked by mongols, crimean tatars and culturally dominated by Paris. But well yeah, the US is quite genocidal. So what? Do you consider it the golden standard of statecraft or something?

Colonialism does not justify genocide

do you have source for your claim ?

Russians are the ones who conducted actual genocides:

  1. Ukrainian holodomor - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
  2. Kazakhstan famine - h ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakh_famine_of_1930–1933
  3. Genocide of Central Asian people in 1916 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Asian_revolt_of_1916
  4. Chechen genocide over two centuries + 2 major wars - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chechen_genocide
  5. Transnistria (Moldovan-Russia war) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistria_War
  6. Russo-Georgian war - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War
  7. currently Russo-Ukrainian war

.. countless other russian made genocides I am tired of enumerating

Russia - is a failing imperial bloody state and Russians as a nation are bloody genocidal nation of maniacs.

Russia cannot exist in peaceful state, they always create and incite cnflicts and thrive on other peoples' misery and death

Russia has Cult of Death, they thrive, embrace, and preach for death

  https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3864092-russias-cult-of-death/
  https://maksymeristavi.substack.com/p/free-press-eristavi-russia-is-a-death
  https://wavellroom.com/2024/05/14/the-russian-army-death-cult/
  https://www.thebulwark.com/p/apathy-keeps-russias-death-cult-alive

Most likely the Tajikistani Civil War, 1992-1997.

There was this little thing here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1990_Dushanbe_riots

Russians were specifically targeted. A Russian TV reporter murdered on the street in broad daylight. A school bus evacuating families of Russian servicemen shot with an RPG. Churches destroyed and clergy killed.

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