Qooper on 16/3/2024 at 21:01
Quote Posted by lowenz
In every sense of a word we want so stupidely desperately exorcice just because we can't accept the fact that someone else is ready to die and we are not able to leave our comfort zone as the deepest of the tombs.
About the "varangian" aspect (very nazi-nietzschian like argument) I was talking about and the West can't even imagine as a "real thing" nor understand the symbolism.
An argument is like a line-segment between two points A and B. Point B is what you're talking about explicitly, and point A is where you're coming from. I can see your point B, you have explained it kind of. You're saying the West cannot believe or refuses to believe what russia is, i.e. that russians are willing to die to expand their borders. But what is your point A? Are you saying that we need to do the same, that every nation should be willing to sacrifice their citizens to expand their borders? Or since war is normal, that we need to live only for war? I'd like to know more about how you think life should be in a world where war is normal. What are the goals of countries in that world, and what are the goals of ordinary citizens? What values would people hold, and what kinds of things would people work towards and think about?
Well, about your point B, the west is slowly coming to the realization that putin will not stop anywhere, and that force is the only option.
demagogue on 16/3/2024 at 21:21
I wouldn't say that war is natural & inevitable. I'd say politics is natural, and war is the outlet for it when the other outlets are foreclosed or the aggressors' believe they are. But I think there are certain neuro-divergent profiles that are vulnerable to political frenzy, megalomania, and an obsession and conviction with their own mythology, a certain part of the population that is going to always support them, and the barrier to work them up into a frenzy to go to war is rather low.
Building democratic and liberal institutions is the way to deal with the first issue.
As for the second issue, building up people's sense of civic duty I think might help. At least in the case of Russia, I've read a lot about the massive percent of the population that is outside politics.
lowenz on 16/3/2024 at 21:36
Quote Posted by Qooper
But what is your point A? Are you saying that we need to do the same, that every nation should be willing to sacrifice their citizens to expand their borders? Or since war is normal, that we need to live only for war? I'd like to know more about how you think life should be in a world where war is normal. What are the goals of countries in that world, and what are the goals of ordinary citizens? What values would people hold, and what kinds of things would people work towards and think about?
Point A: accept the war on our soil (like Ukraine did), just like we accepted COVID (and not acting like stupid negationists speaking of fairytale medicine and fairytale peace "without" a single dead just throwing more weapon systems in Ukraine to wash our "deeply democratic conscience").
This is the unspeakable taboo of Europe after the WW2 ("War can't be here, it's
impossible" - no, it's totally possible, stop dreaming)
Quote:
I've read a lot about the massive percent of the population that is outside politics.
When you bring people into politics there's no guarantee they will not go drunk into escatological nationalism ("We're the chosen ones to save this world following our believes with no compromises")
Qooper on 16/3/2024 at 22:08
Quote Posted by lowenz
Point A: accept the war on our soil (like Ukraine did), just like we accepted COVID (and not acting like stupid negationists speaking of fairytale medicine and fairytale peace "without" a single dead just throwing more weapon systems in Ukraine to wash our "deeply democratic conscience").
Oh,
that's what you meant :) You can be more direct next time, don't worry.
Anyways, of course we need to accept the risk that there might be war on our soil when we resist aggressors. Isn't that a given? The alternative is to give up resisting, which isn't much of an alternative. When you face a school bully, you need to be fearless despite the fact that he might try to hurt you. I think the term "accepting" here has a slightly wrong connotation to it, but yes, you need to accept that you might get hurt. What's even more important is that despite that possibility, you have the courage to face that bully without even a twitch of hesitation. You need to know that you're right to face that bully, because if you don't make your stand, he will come back emboldened.
Quote:
This is the unspeakable taboo of Europe after the WW2 ("War can't be here, it's
impossible" - no, it's totally possible, stop dreaming)
It certainly isn't a taboo here in Finland. But you're right that in Europe as a whole there is a lot of such thinking. In 2022 I had a video call with a client company (they're located in another European country), and chatted informally with one of their employees afterwards. I asked him what he thought of putin's invasion of Ukraine, and he almost couldn't believe it. He said: "Who wages war in 2022?!", as if the higher the number of the year, the more war as a concept somehow goes away.
lowenz on 16/3/2024 at 22:50
If you prefer a more generalized version (like a more basic theorem of which the war aspect is a simple inference): after WW2 we've build a gigantic - universe-scale gigantic, all-embracing, all-encompassing, all-including - comfort-zone into our mind in which "violence at large scale isn't real because it isn't rational"
I can talk for hours about why and how this dreamy bubble came to be (it's a very complex nexus of legit aspirations and and not-so-legit manipulations like "the market needs peace and the market is the only real king"), but the problem is that comfort-zone is more than a dream, it's alianating us from reality and so making us very very weak (it's the real cause of the "degeneration" russian - and local - fascists love so much to speak about but totally can't understand in their warped mind and link to LGBT, conspiracies, etc. etc. etc. no, it's just our rationalism).
DuatDweller on 16/3/2024 at 23:50
"Pourquoi vous cherchez le mal".
Why do you seek evil.
Is a good question when you believe you're doing the right thing for the right motives.
War in the minds of the people believing is right to do so might embrace it without question "is for our country, our people, our lifestyle".
It happened before, and it will happen again, sooner or later.
WW2, started when everyone was thinking it was impossible to repeat the mistakes of 1914-1918 (who wanted more suffering right?).
And there was a pushing German economy exceeding the French one, rearming in secret.
Germany had 70 million of population and France 39.
(
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_France)
How much people do you need fighting when you can throw missiles / bombs remotely.
Fly drones. Hyper sonic missiles.
Nuclear bombs? Nah too close home, the fallout would end up too close to Russia.
Cipheron on 17/3/2024 at 05:02
More about cannon fodder tricked into fighting in Ukraine. This time it's Nepalese economic migrants:
(
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-17/nepalese-mercenaries-lured-to-russia-to-fight-in-ukraine/103580652)
Quote:
"But nobody came to rescue me," he said.
"My body was covered in blood. I was drinking my own blood. Because I hadn't even gotten to drink water."
He says he limped 4 kilometres to the nearest hospital in Russian-held territory, where he was given basic treatment.
Krishna survived but watched three friends die in front of him.
"Only the Nepalis are sent on the front line there. Only if the Nepalis are finished do the Russians move forward," he said bitterly.
Quote:
In Krishna's case, he said he was approached by a recruiter who promised him a job in Europe. But when he got to Moscow, he was told there was no work for him due to high snowfall during the northern hemisphere winter.
After three months, during which he became increasingly desperate, the recruiter suggested Krishna join the Russian military.
"We did realise we [made a] mistake. But the way we reached [Russia] and were tricked by the agent, we had no alternative," he said.
Starker on 17/3/2024 at 12:22
Welcome to Russian World, the election edition:
[video=youtube;AIFuZ2zxqjY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIFuZ2zxqjY[/video]
DuatDweller on 17/3/2024 at 17:59
Don't worry mister Putin I'll vote for you even if you're not in the election ballot in this country, I don't want to just .... vanish.
:p
lowenz on 17/3/2024 at 19:09
Putin is @90% of the preferences. 90
Why do you still believe in representative democracy if the electoral process is there to appoint a tsar waging an imperial war to reclaim territories (when you can just offer to Donbas(s) population a russian passport) because "varangian majesty" ? Can the entire Earth stop praising "democracy" after this or we must continue to tell fables about the representative principle / "power to the people" and similar vessels to possibly nightmarish situations where you can hijack every political institutional theory just playing the "godfather protector" and enable the killing of hundreds of thousands in that role?
Please, don't make the mistake to absolve the "people" (and I'm talking from a country where the Fascism born and grew with similar numbers and after Fascism Mafia/Ndrangheta/Camorra did the same silently but very efficiently). People is always complicit with the power when the power makes the people feel majestic (and this easely beats every freedom aspiration).
As we must accept war as a normal reality we must accept people love dictators and democratically that love remains the same or intensify.
Donetsk -> 95%
Lugansk -> 94%
Zaporizhzhia -> 93%
Kherson -> 88%
It's an incoronation by acclamation.
