President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes that Ukraine and its allies are very close to the moment when Russia can be forced to end or at least halt the war, but this would require the United States to impose tough sanctions on Russia.
Zelensky is a bit like a CEO presenting his companyās prospects. He was talking like this two years ago, too.
I personally think heās not wrong. Just - until Kremlin gangās members and their families are being caught and jailed\deported all over the globe, or at least in NATO countries, this is all bullshit. Well, maybe after failing in Ukraine theyāll attack some smaller and weaker country, just to show themselves they can defeat someone. And maybe theyāll try again.
In any case - yes, that leadership keeps Russia weak, inefficient, dependent, but as everyone can see, itās also capable of destruction on scale too big to allow. So maybe some optimism should be applied and the goal be for Russiaās regime to change and for it to have a democracy that may make its potential useful for everyone around. The ākeeping it weakā approach, after all, has already led to Putin.
Most of all the Russians simply canāt stomach a reality where theyāre not a feared global superpower, to such a degree that theyād rather shoot themselves in the foot and be a shithole rather than just a regular better functioning nation
In some ways, yes. American soft power and trust in the country just got fully tanked, but I see it as unrealistic that the country wonāt still be a superpower trying to insert itself into everythingā¦ it just wonāt have a lot of allies.
But then again they control all of social media (minus Tiktok) so Iāll bet theyāll sway some assbrains around the world anyway, like with the election in Poland.
The tech and military industries in USA are too powerful that itāll lose all of its relevance. Of course, the people will live increasingly worse lives - I just hope itāll at least hit Republicans the worst
In some ways, yes. American soft power and trust in the country just got fully tanked, but I see it as unrealistic that the country wonāt still be a superpower trying to insert itself into everythingā¦ it just wonāt have a lot of allies. But then again they control all of social media (minus Tiktok) so Iāll bet theyāll sway some assbrains around the world anyway, like with the election in Poland.
The tech and military industries in USA are too powerful that itāll lose all of its relevance. Of course, the people will live increasingly worse lives - I just hope itāll at least hit Republicans the worst
Kinda sounds like you are already in denial about it yet you say it hasnāt happened yet :P
Iām from one of the countries that the US has consistently threatened and badmouthed. Conceptually, the US is dead to me. I have no doubt that the people - and even our governments - no longer view the US as allies. But the country is too rich and powerful not to be an important factor globally no matter how many bridges they burn during this authoritarian and regarded spell
The ākeeping it weakā approach, after all, has already led to Putin.
No one kept Russia weak when Soviet Union collapsed. Yeltsin brought a lot of democractic traits into Russia and it was heavily leaning towards west on multiple areas. Should they kept going on that direction theyād be a global superpower on pretty much all fronts by now, surpassing US and even China.
But they had also pretty big internal problems and a ton of people who desired old soviet times and whatever, so we ended up with what we have today. Wikipedia has way more info and links to study it further.
Yeltsin brought a lot of democractic traits into Russia
No. The democratic mechanisms started working a bit earlier than the USSR stopped existing.
People like Sakharov, Galina Starovoitova, have your heard of such names?
The democratic reforms happened before USSRās collapse.
Yeltsin used that to come to power in 1991, and then kicked the ladder in 1993, and in 1999 named Putin as the next president on television. Oh, of course Putin āwonā an election after that.
And that process was actively supported by western governments, especially in 1996, with the justification that an honest democracy in Russia will lead to scary-scary communists coming back to power.
Should they kept going on that direction theyād be a global superpower on pretty much all fronts by now, surpassing US and even China.
Yeltsin was a dying alcoholic living uncritically and without shame by the motto āto my friends everything, to everyone else the lawā. They have kept going on that exact direction. Thatās the bloody point.
Yeltsin usurped power in 1993. If that didnāt happen and the conflict between Yeltsin and the parliament was resolved peacefully and legally (by having snap parliament and presidential elections simultaneously, so - replacing both sides of the conflict, in other words, Yeltsin would have to back the democratic claims with the democratic action of leaving the post ; that was the constitutional courtās decision), then maybe. But instead Yeltsin used tanks to resolve the dispute.
Anyway, no, even if 1993 conflict would end differently, I think surpassing Germany is possible.
Soviet Union was an interesting part of the planet, the older generation from there can āknowā and teach you all the right things, but not live by them. Talk about bravery and honor, and very correctly, but act dishonorably and be completely blind to that, talk about science and logic and critical mind and very correctly, but go to fortunetellers and believe in energies. Talk about principle, but not follow it. Never use the āthought experimentā tool freely. And so on.
They needed lots of time to fix that - through pain. Itās not been 40 years yet, if we take biblical timespans. Maybe in year 2031 Russia will finally be ready.
But they had also pretty big internal problems and a ton of people who desired old soviet times and whatever, so we ended up with what we have today. Wikipedia has way more info and links to study it further.
In 1991 nobody desired āold timesā back. People saw how it all was degrading until falling apart. Donāt you give me Wikipedia links, lol. Something should have happened for a lot of people to wish a ārestorationā, donāt you think so? Like what Iāve described. And that ārestorationā was provided by the same people, Yeltsinās people, with the figure of Putin and his image of a āformer Soviet intelligence operativeā.
How would Russia have surpassed the US and China? What did they have that would have contributed to that superiority? I realize that is a massive question, but to a a casual observer, that seems curious.
Heys Boris āBomb the parlimentā Yeltsin super democratic. as we all know Democracy is when you disreguard a vote, then when the parliment makes you mad you bomb it into submission, all brought to you by pizza hut
I think thatās more up to the Russian people than anyone in the west. Russians like strong men, itās a weakness in their society. Everyone outside Russia wanted it to continue to be a democracy, Russia even had a brief association with NATO while it was. But Yeltsin drank too much (alcoholism being another weakness in Russian society) and that allowed a guy like Putin to make himself a Czar.
Russians like strong men, itās a weakness in their society.
No, itās not any more a Russian weakness than an American one, even less than a Japanese or a Chinese one.
Especially unwise to judge Russians by American stereotypes of Russians.
Everyone outside Russia wanted it to continue to be a democracy
Howās that compatible with supporting Yeltsin in his 1993 coup and in stealing 1996 elections?
Russia even had a brief association with NATO while it was.
No it didnāt. Yeltsin wanted that, yes, and Putin wanted that too. Both wanted to be a big, scary country accepted to NATO and with NATO weaponry. Like Turkey, but with nukes. What both didnāt want is dropping the bullshit about spheres of influence and being an equal of the USA, apparently got told by NATO that beggars are not choosers. Also wanting an association with NATO has plainly nothing to do with being a democracy or not.
But Yeltsin drank too much (alcoholism being another weakness in Russian society) and that allowed a guy like Putin to make himself a Czar.
I think you skipped the part where I was educating you that Yeltsin made himself Czar in 1993 and just passed it on to Putin.
I donāt really care that it breaks your narrative. Putin is a natural continuation of the western-supported and consulted regime in Russia installed in 1993. That Yeltsin presented himself as some liberator and Putin presented himself as ex Soviet intelligence are campaign pictures that mean nothing. All the trusted people around Putin are the same that Yeltsin had even before 1991. Including Putin himself.
Alcoholism is not a bigger weakness in the Russian society than in British ones or in Sweden or in Finland.
Russians keep gravitating towards authoritarians over and over again. Canāt think of any other country that reverted back to it multiple times in a century. Weak people want strong man leaders, just how it is.
Iād hoped Russians could grow a spine and get rid of Putin, but theyāll probably go on riding his dick for the rest of his life. Closest they got to ending that cunt was Prigozhin attempting a coup in a drunken rage, but he sobered up and chickened out before it was done. Just how shit goes in Russia, always on a spectrum between drunkenness and authoritarian dick riding.
Closest they got to ending that cunt was Prigozhin attempting a coup in a drunken rage, but he sobered up and chickened out before it was done.
No. Prigozhin was a spoiler. A demining attempt, because Putin probably got afraid enough of a coup in the military and decided to use Prigozhin to try and detect people in the high command whoād assist Prigozhin or react favorably, or at least not do enough to impede.
Russians keep gravitating towards authoritarians over and over again. Canāt think of any other country that reverted back to it multiple times in a century. Weak people want strong man leaders, just how it is.
Russia has special services. They work all the time, work very well, and āentrapmentā is not a problem for them, similar to āfruit of a poisoned treeā. When you detect people likely to wish for a change early enough and neutralize them, either by silently jailing or intimidating or disrupting them, the society is much more amorphous.
Itās not about gravitating anywhere, wishes or sympathies.
You sound like youāre doing Warhammer 40K roleplay. It also involves pretending to be loyal to a fucked up empire. Itās more believable than the fantasy world youāre describing.
No, itās not any more a Russian weakness than an American one, even less than a Japanese or a Chinese one.
Russians donāt have the āfuck the fedsā grassroots rebelliousness of Americans, they donāt have a honour/respectability culture like the Japanese not to mention that Russians have basically no civil society while Japan (as a stem family culture) has a very strong one, and unlike the Chinese Russians are fatalist AF, donāt really have expectations about things becoming better for them. If the CCP had started this shit they wouldāve lost the mandate of heaven quite a while ago.
But I agree, itās not so much a strong man fetish. Itās an acceptance of might makes right combined with social acceptance of tyrannical behaviour on the individual level and, consequently, high distrust among individuals stopping the formation of a civil society.
Russian society hasnāt fundamentally changed since the days of the Tsars, theyāve gone through various paint-coats while sticking to the same overarching organisational structure: Central power delegates exploitation of people, the environment etc to viceroys in exchange for loyalty, meanwhile acquisition of new colonial subjects is ongoing as, being built on terror, the imperial core can never feel safe and needs to bash something to distract itself from its vulnerability.
Russians donāt have the āfuck the fedsā grassroots rebelliousness of Americans, they donāt have a honour/respectability culture like the Japanese not to mention that Russians have basically no civil society while Japan (as a stem family culture) has a very strong one, and unlike the Chinese Russians are fatalist AF, donāt really have expectations about things becoming better for them. If the CCP had started this shit they wouldāve lost the mandate of heaven quite a while ago.
All wrong.
Thereās just one thing that Russians really lack - understanding of the importance of truth. It would seem the Orwellian amorphousness of mind is a legacy Russians have carried from the USSR, except one can see signs of it all over the Russian literature school course. Russians really love āgrey moralityā, ambiguity and nihilism.
For an American or a German it takes belief in a propaganda device to follow it. For a Russian - just acceptance that itās likelier to be better in some way.
Itās an acceptance of might makes right combined with social acceptance of tyrannical behaviour on the individual level and, consequently, high distrust among individuals stopping the formation of a civil society.
No. Just the belief that thereās some deeper grey wisdom, a secret, and youād be an idiot to just give yourself to some specific idea.
A whole country of cynics thinking they know better. Thus extremely skeptical about any initiative.
But that might not be wrong course of action too, Westerners donāt seem to comprehend that todayās Russia is not USSR, and that solving the problem of making Russians, say, rebel en masse is not going to achieve much. That rebellion will be predicted, easily disrupted and the people involved will regret they were born. Itās probably perpetually happening - new and new people whoād eventually have done something finding yet another FSB trap and going to a secret jail silently before they would do anything.
Russian society hasnāt fundamentally changed since the days of the Tsars
It has and to the worse. Except, of course, back then the majority consisted of illiterate peasants.
Central power delegates exploitation of people, the environment etc to viceroys in exchange for loyalty, meanwhile acquisition of new colonial subjects is ongoing as, being built on terror, the imperial core can never feel safe and needs to bash something to distract itself from its vulnerability.
No. Thatās not how central power functioned back then, and what happens now is a mafia group gratuitously using its vast human resources to just have fun. Their fun in this case is conquering Ukraine to feel themselves more powerful. Only it doesnāt quite work out, but I think the feeling of being able to mobilize people and send them to the grinder is good enough.
Thereās just one thing that Russians really lack - understanding of the importance of truth.
Now that is a universal human trait.
For an American or a German it takes belief in a propaganda device to follow it. For a Russian - just acceptance that itās likelier to be better in some way.
Americans donāt believe in, whatnot, manifest destiny, their exceptionalism, they live it. Germans certainly donāt believe in classism, yet weāre living it. Generally speaking: The stuff that people are actually following is not found on the propaganda level, but on a level below that, on a cultural carrier wave so to speak. Why propagandise something that people are doing, anyway? Doesnāt make sense.
No. Just the belief that thereās some deeper grey wisdom, a secret, and youād be an idiot to just give yourself to some specific idea.
Thatās just bug-standard metamodernism collapsed into fascism, that is, regressed into modernism. Just to explains terms: Modernism is the age of grand ideas, āone true path to absolve humankindā, while postmodernism is the āyo all that stuff is BS anyway we donāt know shitā. You see those forces oscillating throughout history, metamodernism means their co-existence.
That belief might very well what people are telling themselves, but itās a shallow analysis. The ādeeper grey wisdomā (interesting that you used āgreyā btw, āit must be ancientā ā why?) is Snokhachestvo, and not the practice itself but the cultural attitudes that enable(d) it. Russia made some progress overcoming that shit, e.g. normalising nuclear families instead of communal ones (the one crucial achievement of the USSR), but the underlying cultural beliefs stay uninterrogated, able to perpetuate themselves. Thus men do to their sons what their fathers did to them, think thatās what being a man is all about, and if you donāt use whatever power and might you have to be cruel, youāre obviously gay. Like Europe.
That is what I meant with āa belief in might makes rightā.
A whole country of cynics thinking they know better.
Germany has 80 million national football team trainers. There seems to be a pattern here: Declaring universal human traits as specifically Russian. Those traits are true, no doubt, but theyāre not unique.
Thatās not how central power functioned back then, and what happens now is a mafia group gratuitously using its vast human resources to just have fun.
It didnāt? The Tsar and the viceroys, plundering the country and living the good life. The General Secretariat or even Secretary and the Nomenklatura, plundering the country and living the good life. āEveryone is equal, but some are more equal than othersā. In either case, highly authoritarian societies, with varying levels of totalitarianism. Such a setup requires cruelty and ruthlessness, and thereās no shortage of either because, according to Russian culture throughout the ages, good fathers make sure that their sons are strong men by raping the sonās wife. Metaphorically speaking, at least: The āsonsā might be subordinate soldiers, and the āwifeā their pay checks and materiel. In the position of son, youāre just expected to take it, otherwise youāre weak, and the āfatherā will make sure thatās an even worse fate. The Siloviki do indeed want to free Ukrainians ā so they bomb cities. Free them from their āEuropean gaynessā, that is. Such is the perversity of the Russian psyche.
Or, differently put: You sure youāre looking at the water youāre swimming in? Iām not Russian, I only lived there, and I was able to see the water. Swimming feels quite a bit different in Russia than it does virtually everywhere else.
Snokhachestvo and the cultural approaches similar to it are prevalent in those people who are Russiaās elite now, but generally seem very rare as far as I can see.
And that stuff about Europe and homosexuality seems for me a kind of āthe hungry doesnāt understand the fullā, more of jokes and separation than of really thinking thatās true. Itās just that there are people outside the prison and inside it, and those inside canāt afford to behave freely. Itās almost envy, except without even negative feelings. More like alienation - āthey live so much easier that for them homosexuality is a real concernā.
Also thereās the criminal culture homosexuality, as a marker of status in the criminal hierarchy, which is demonstrably non-consensual, and one can see a psychological parallel between living freely in general inside a prison and being gay in a place where people get raped. A nonsensically careless behavior, something like that. And being nonsensically careless is weak.
The Tsar and the viceroys, plundering the country and living the good life.
They followed their own laws. If a law was too cumbersome to make, they didnāt. It was an absolute monarchy, but if you compare todayās Russiaās judicial system to the imperial one - the latter seems very humane. By stats, by procedures, by stories of people who witnessed it.
and thereās no shortage of either because, according to Russian culture throughout the ages, good fathers make sure that their sons are strong men by raping the sonās wife
The kind of peasant communes and huge families where such things happened wasnāt actually natural. It was becoming the more common, the more people were becoming personal serfs. That is, there was that transition during Catherine where state serfs (which in practice meant almost a free man) were given to nobles en masse, she considered that a better arrangement. Sort of a privatization.
In the position of son, youāre just expected to take it, otherwise youāre weak, and the āfatherā will make sure thatās an even worse fate.
Nah, not that. If we make this comparison, for them itās the fatherās right, and you are subordinate. Itās not about fear of punishment, itās about enduring for enduranceās sake. Almost morality.
The Siloviki do indeed want to free Ukrainians ā so they bomb cities.
No, they donāt. They want to kill and loot and subjugate.
People who you are maybe looking for here are not those who try to somehow explain the stateās justifications for this war. Itās those who think that this has to be finished anyway regardless of whether the war should have been started.
Free them from their āEuropean gaynessā, that is. Such is the perversity of the Russian psyche.
I havenāt met such real people. OK, to be honest, probably I didnāt realize but I have.
The point is - almost nobody really thinks that about gayness and what not, but everybody thinks itās smarter to play along, thatās what I meant by the amorphousness of mind of Russians.
Or, differently put: You sure youāre looking at the water youāre swimming in? Iām not Russian, I only lived there, and I was able to see the water. Swimming feels quite a bit different in Russia than it does virtually everywhere else.
It does, but itās more of a culture of virtuous suffering, like doing your work the hard way instead of loosening up a bit and doing it better, but with less āhonest laborā or something. And lies. The virtuous suffering thing is often stupid, but sometimes a strength. The lies however are usually stupid, yet Russians somehow always start with lies and then maybe work it up to saying the truth.
And that stuff about Europe and homosexuality seems for me a kind of āthe hungry doesnāt understand the fullā, more of jokes and separation than of really thinking thatās true.
Iām talking about an underlying psychosexual current. Of course people donāt believe in the literal truth of these kinds of things, itād be like believing that dreams are literally true. But thereās still a reason why youāre having these particular kinds of dreams, and not different ones.
They followed their own laws. If a law was too cumbersome to make, they didnāt. It was an absolute monarchy, but if you compare todayās Russiaās judicial system to the imperial one - the latter seems very humane.
Do you think itās even constitutional for Putin to deputise people with presidential powers? That any court would challenge him? Law in Russia was, and is, subordinate to the powers that be.
Nah, not that. If we make this comparison, for them itās the fatherās right, and you are subordinate. Itās not about fear of punishment, itās about enduring for enduranceās sake. Almost morality.
Thatās the attitude of those considered strong, yes. You either become them or you break and end up with a tattoo saying āslaveā on your forehead or something.
People who you are maybe looking for here are not those who try to somehow explain the stateās justifications for this war.
Iām not talking about the stateās justification, but about the justification of the cultural psyche. Russia, as a psyche, doesnāt want to see Ukrainians with forehead tattoos, it wants Ukraine to be part of it. Part of the same ethos, with maybe slightly different dances, clothing, and they can continue pronouncing things with h instead of g as long as they admit theyāre Russians, that they accept, as you put it above, the fatherās authority. And the only way that psyche knows how to convince the son of the fatherās authority is by cruelty.
The virtuous suffering thing is often stupid, but sometimes a strength.
Itās not. It destroys social cohesion, it breeds neurosis. With true courage, it doesnāt matter whether you live or die for the cause, as long as the cause is virtuous. This Russian strength, though, it only can ever make sense if youāre dying for it, living for it indeed is stupid, at the same time its strength in dying for it is not stronger than that of true courage. Itās precisely why Russians donāt know where the fuck that cart is racing. But go, it must. Why. Why not make camp and have a party.
The reason is simple: Without the people neurotic, distrustful, and accustomed to bowing to authority, the central authority would fall, because people would actually be able to organise bottom-up. The central authority knows that, and thus does nothing to combat it, the people, well, itās Russiaās only way to greatness, isnāt it? Any alternatives?
Which brings me to Navalnyās balls of steel, returning to Russia: Yes, thatās impressive. Thatās strong, āvirtuous sufferingā. But itās also accepting the status quo. You canāt be a revolutionary against a system by holding onto the ethos that fuels it.
But thereās still a reason why youāre having these particular kinds of dreams, and not different ones.
I dunno, if we are going to that level, then I see plenty people not from Russia in the interwebs having this. In case of MENA people - much stronger.
Itās a problem, but not such a deep one. Even among ex-military people from older generation.
Do you think itās even constitutional for Putin to deputise people with presidential powers? That any court would challenge him? Law in Russia was, and is, subordinate to the powers that be.
No, Putin has been logically fully described in the āDollsā show. He just wants to torture and kill people better than him, and the law heās interested in only as long as he can call whoever he wants destroyed āstate criminalsā.
Iām saying that the Russian empire was different, and even the USSR was different.
Thatās the attitude of those considered strong, yes. You either become them or you break and end up with a tattoo saying āslaveā on your forehead or something.
Yup, Iām saying itās not the only idea of morality in the whole of Russian society and not even the dominant one.
It definitely is the one emanating from the state.
Part of the same ethos, with maybe slightly different dances, clothing, and they can continue pronouncing things with h instead of g as long as they admit theyāre Russians, that they accept, as you put it above, the fatherās authority
In this case no, itās not the father. Itās the same master. Slaves replace their own dignity with their masterās importance.
So those really thinking Ukraine shouldnāt be independent are the people terribly irritated by Ukrainians not willing to have a master. If Ukrainians wanted to have a master, that master would have a lower status than their master, in their opinion, so it would all be fine - Ukraine is a separate country, but Ukrainians are in the same general status. Itās envy - why can they have this and we canāt. A typical village thing by the way.
Like that anecdote about hell and a Jewish cauldron, guarded by three imps to throw those escaping back in and prevent them from helping others, a Ukrainian cauldron guarded by one imp to just throw those escaping back in, and a Russian cauldron unguarded.
Itās not. It destroys social cohesion, it breeds neurosis.
Yep, in this regard we agree. It also breeds idiocy and cowardice with all participants certain they are being wise and brave and sacrificing.
The reason is simple: Without the people neurotic, distrustful, and accustomed to bowing to authority, the central authority would fall, because people would actually be able to organise bottom-up. The central authority knows that, and thus does nothing to combat it, the people, well, itās Russiaās only way to greatness, isnāt it? Any alternatives?
Thatās where you are wrong.
As you might have guessed, one canāt punish FSB for entrapment, they are the ones doing the punishing. So thatās what they were doing since Soviet times. Everyone trying to āorganize bottom-upā will just be detected by FSB before being visible for anyone else.
They are proactive. They have their agents of various kinds in youth groups, in hobby groups, everywhere. They even provoke such āorganizingā.
They literally lure teens into āpoliticalā groups. Just for everyone with potential to be under control.
It would be problematic, say, in the US, if FBI tried to put someone in jail for being a member of a group the leader and half other members of which are state agents, and which approached that someone first. In Russia itās not. They are always fishing for people willing to do something.
Iāve literally heard of more cases where a (say, anarchist) group had such agents, but it all became known because of some other crime (a murder in that case), than in āextremistā sense. Meaning this happens very silently.
So, about distrust. Itās well-substantiated. Russians canāt organize in Russia and canāt, frankly, trust a Russian in such things.
Similar to Armenians TBH, it sometimes seems there are more agents of various intelligence services and oligarchs in Armenia and diaspora than people really interested in changing something.
Which brings me to Navalnyās balls of steel, returning to Russia: Yes, thatās impressive. Thatās strong, āvirtuous sufferingā. But itās also accepting the status quo. You canāt be a revolutionary against a system by holding onto the ethos that fuels it.
Absolutely! Thatās exactly what his action communicated.
I think he was trying to send a signal to that layer of deeply skeptical people that heās one of them and not of those like Sobchak and Nemtsov and similar. And he was successful, heās seen very differently from them.
Except see my previous part about special servicesā work. The real problem is not in nobody willing to organize. Without it, whether Navalny would do his sacrifice or not, Russiaās government would have changed around 2012.
Zelensky is a bit like a CEO presenting his companyās prospects. He was talking like this two years ago, too.
I personally think heās not wrong. Just - until Kremlin gangās members and their families are being caught and jailed\deported all over the globe, or at least in NATO countries, this is all bullshit. Well, maybe after failing in Ukraine theyāll attack some smaller and weaker country, just to show themselves they can defeat someone. And maybe theyāll try again.
In any case - yes, that leadership keeps Russia weak, inefficient, dependent, but as everyone can see, itās also capable of destruction on scale too big to allow. So maybe some optimism should be applied and the goal be for Russiaās regime to change and for it to have a democracy that may make its potential useful for everyone around. The ākeeping it weakā approach, after all, has already led to Putin.
Most of all the Russians simply canāt stomach a reality where theyāre not a feared global superpower, to such a degree that theyād rather shoot themselves in the foot and be a shithole rather than just a regular better functioning nation
Americans are going to have to make the same choice in the next few years. I hope they donāt make the same mistake.
In some ways, yes. American soft power and trust in the country just got fully tanked, but I see it as unrealistic that the country wonāt still be a superpower trying to insert itself into everythingā¦ it just wonāt have a lot of allies. But then again they control all of social media (minus Tiktok) so Iāll bet theyāll sway some assbrains around the world anyway, like with the election in Poland.
The tech and military industries in USA are too powerful that itāll lose all of its relevance. Of course, the people will live increasingly worse lives - I just hope itāll at least hit Republicans the worst
Kinda sounds like you are already in denial about it yet you say it hasnāt happened yet :P
Pre-emptive denial?
Iām from one of the countries that the US has consistently threatened and badmouthed. Conceptually, the US is dead to me. I have no doubt that the people - and even our governments - no longer view the US as allies. But the country is too rich and powerful not to be an important factor globally no matter how many bridges they burn during this authoritarian and regarded spell
No one kept Russia weak when Soviet Union collapsed. Yeltsin brought a lot of democractic traits into Russia and it was heavily leaning towards west on multiple areas. Should they kept going on that direction theyād be a global superpower on pretty much all fronts by now, surpassing US and even China.
But they had also pretty big internal problems and a ton of people who desired old soviet times and whatever, so we ended up with what we have today. Wikipedia has way more info and links to study it further.
No. The democratic mechanisms started working a bit earlier than the USSR stopped existing.
People like Sakharov, Galina Starovoitova, have your heard of such names?
The democratic reforms happened before USSRās collapse.
Yeltsin used that to come to power in 1991, and then kicked the ladder in 1993, and in 1999 named Putin as the next president on television. Oh, of course Putin āwonā an election after that.
And that process was actively supported by western governments, especially in 1996, with the justification that an honest democracy in Russia will lead to scary-scary communists coming back to power.
Yeltsin was a dying alcoholic living uncritically and without shame by the motto āto my friends everything, to everyone else the lawā. They have kept going on that exact direction. Thatās the bloody point.
Yeltsin usurped power in 1993. If that didnāt happen and the conflict between Yeltsin and the parliament was resolved peacefully and legally (by having snap parliament and presidential elections simultaneously, so - replacing both sides of the conflict, in other words, Yeltsin would have to back the democratic claims with the democratic action of leaving the post ; that was the constitutional courtās decision), then maybe. But instead Yeltsin used tanks to resolve the dispute.
Anyway, no, even if 1993 conflict would end differently, I think surpassing Germany is possible.
Soviet Union was an interesting part of the planet, the older generation from there can āknowā and teach you all the right things, but not live by them. Talk about bravery and honor, and very correctly, but act dishonorably and be completely blind to that, talk about science and logic and critical mind and very correctly, but go to fortunetellers and believe in energies. Talk about principle, but not follow it. Never use the āthought experimentā tool freely. And so on.
They needed lots of time to fix that - through pain. Itās not been 40 years yet, if we take biblical timespans. Maybe in year 2031 Russia will finally be ready.
In 1991 nobody desired āold timesā back. People saw how it all was degrading until falling apart. Donāt you give me Wikipedia links, lol. Something should have happened for a lot of people to wish a ārestorationā, donāt you think so? Like what Iāve described. And that ārestorationā was provided by the same people, Yeltsinās people, with the figure of Putin and his image of a āformer Soviet intelligence operativeā.
I appreciate this response. Itās informative, and I learned a lot. Thank you for taking the time to post.
How would Russia have surpassed the US and China? What did they have that would have contributed to that superiority? I realize that is a massive question, but to a a casual observer, that seems curious.
Heys Boris āBomb the parlimentā Yeltsin super democratic. as we all know Democracy is when you disreguard a vote, then when the parliment makes you mad you bomb it into submission, all brought to you by pizza hut
I think thatās more up to the Russian people than anyone in the west. Russians like strong men, itās a weakness in their society. Everyone outside Russia wanted it to continue to be a democracy, Russia even had a brief association with NATO while it was. But Yeltsin drank too much (alcoholism being another weakness in Russian society) and that allowed a guy like Putin to make himself a Czar.
No, itās not any more a Russian weakness than an American one, even less than a Japanese or a Chinese one.
Especially unwise to judge Russians by American stereotypes of Russians.
Howās that compatible with supporting Yeltsin in his 1993 coup and in stealing 1996 elections?
No it didnāt. Yeltsin wanted that, yes, and Putin wanted that too. Both wanted to be a big, scary country accepted to NATO and with NATO weaponry. Like Turkey, but with nukes. What both didnāt want is dropping the bullshit about spheres of influence and being an equal of the USA, apparently got told by NATO that beggars are not choosers. Also wanting an association with NATO has plainly nothing to do with being a democracy or not.
I think you skipped the part where I was educating you that Yeltsin made himself Czar in 1993 and just passed it on to Putin.
I donāt really care that it breaks your narrative. Putin is a natural continuation of the western-supported and consulted regime in Russia installed in 1993. That Yeltsin presented himself as some liberator and Putin presented himself as ex Soviet intelligence are campaign pictures that mean nothing. All the trusted people around Putin are the same that Yeltsin had even before 1991. Including Putin himself.
Alcoholism is not a bigger weakness in the Russian society than in British ones or in Sweden or in Finland.
Russians keep gravitating towards authoritarians over and over again. Canāt think of any other country that reverted back to it multiple times in a century. Weak people want strong man leaders, just how it is.
Iād hoped Russians could grow a spine and get rid of Putin, but theyāll probably go on riding his dick for the rest of his life. Closest they got to ending that cunt was Prigozhin attempting a coup in a drunken rage, but he sobered up and chickened out before it was done. Just how shit goes in Russia, always on a spectrum between drunkenness and authoritarian dick riding.
No. Prigozhin was a spoiler. A demining attempt, because Putin probably got afraid enough of a coup in the military and decided to use Prigozhin to try and detect people in the high command whoād assist Prigozhin or react favorably, or at least not do enough to impede.
Russia has special services. They work all the time, work very well, and āentrapmentā is not a problem for them, similar to āfruit of a poisoned treeā. When you detect people likely to wish for a change early enough and neutralize them, either by silently jailing or intimidating or disrupting them, the society is much more amorphous.
Itās not about gravitating anywhere, wishes or sympathies.
You sound like youāre doing Warhammer 40K roleplay. It also involves pretending to be loyal to a fucked up empire. Itās more believable than the fantasy world youāre describing.
It would seem that Iām arguing in the direction opposite of what youāre claiming, but I donāt care, I think Iāve met you before.
You are an idiot, go fuck yourself.
Gorbachev was the only rational guy they had during that period. He could have had a chance to do something if the West had supported him.
Russians donāt have the āfuck the fedsā grassroots rebelliousness of Americans, they donāt have a honour/respectability culture like the Japanese not to mention that Russians have basically no civil society while Japan (as a stem family culture) has a very strong one, and unlike the Chinese Russians are fatalist AF, donāt really have expectations about things becoming better for them. If the CCP had started this shit they wouldāve lost the mandate of heaven quite a while ago.
But I agree, itās not so much a strong man fetish. Itās an acceptance of might makes right combined with social acceptance of tyrannical behaviour on the individual level and, consequently, high distrust among individuals stopping the formation of a civil society.
Russian society hasnāt fundamentally changed since the days of the Tsars, theyāve gone through various paint-coats while sticking to the same overarching organisational structure: Central power delegates exploitation of people, the environment etc to viceroys in exchange for loyalty, meanwhile acquisition of new colonial subjects is ongoing as, being built on terror, the imperial core can never feel safe and needs to bash something to distract itself from its vulnerability.
All wrong.
Thereās just one thing that Russians really lack - understanding of the importance of truth. It would seem the Orwellian amorphousness of mind is a legacy Russians have carried from the USSR, except one can see signs of it all over the Russian literature school course. Russians really love āgrey moralityā, ambiguity and nihilism.
For an American or a German it takes belief in a propaganda device to follow it. For a Russian - just acceptance that itās likelier to be better in some way.
No. Just the belief that thereās some deeper grey wisdom, a secret, and youād be an idiot to just give yourself to some specific idea.
A whole country of cynics thinking they know better. Thus extremely skeptical about any initiative.
But that might not be wrong course of action too, Westerners donāt seem to comprehend that todayās Russia is not USSR, and that solving the problem of making Russians, say, rebel en masse is not going to achieve much. That rebellion will be predicted, easily disrupted and the people involved will regret they were born. Itās probably perpetually happening - new and new people whoād eventually have done something finding yet another FSB trap and going to a secret jail silently before they would do anything.
It has and to the worse. Except, of course, back then the majority consisted of illiterate peasants.
No. Thatās not how central power functioned back then, and what happens now is a mafia group gratuitously using its vast human resources to just have fun. Their fun in this case is conquering Ukraine to feel themselves more powerful. Only it doesnāt quite work out, but I think the feeling of being able to mobilize people and send them to the grinder is good enough.
Now that is a universal human trait.
Americans donāt believe in, whatnot, manifest destiny, their exceptionalism, they live it. Germans certainly donāt believe in classism, yet weāre living it. Generally speaking: The stuff that people are actually following is not found on the propaganda level, but on a level below that, on a cultural carrier wave so to speak. Why propagandise something that people are doing, anyway? Doesnāt make sense.
Thatās just bug-standard metamodernism collapsed into fascism, that is, regressed into modernism. Just to explains terms: Modernism is the age of grand ideas, āone true path to absolve humankindā, while postmodernism is the āyo all that stuff is BS anyway we donāt know shitā. You see those forces oscillating throughout history, metamodernism means their co-existence.
That belief might very well what people are telling themselves, but itās a shallow analysis. The ādeeper grey wisdomā (interesting that you used āgreyā btw, āit must be ancientā ā why?) is Snokhachestvo, and not the practice itself but the cultural attitudes that enable(d) it. Russia made some progress overcoming that shit, e.g. normalising nuclear families instead of communal ones (the one crucial achievement of the USSR), but the underlying cultural beliefs stay uninterrogated, able to perpetuate themselves. Thus men do to their sons what their fathers did to them, think thatās what being a man is all about, and if you donāt use whatever power and might you have to be cruel, youāre obviously gay. Like Europe.
That is what I meant with āa belief in might makes rightā.
Germany has 80 million national football team trainers. There seems to be a pattern here: Declaring universal human traits as specifically Russian. Those traits are true, no doubt, but theyāre not unique.
It didnāt? The Tsar and the viceroys, plundering the country and living the good life. The General Secretariat or even Secretary and the Nomenklatura, plundering the country and living the good life. āEveryone is equal, but some are more equal than othersā. In either case, highly authoritarian societies, with varying levels of totalitarianism. Such a setup requires cruelty and ruthlessness, and thereās no shortage of either because, according to Russian culture throughout the ages, good fathers make sure that their sons are strong men by raping the sonās wife. Metaphorically speaking, at least: The āsonsā might be subordinate soldiers, and the āwifeā their pay checks and materiel. In the position of son, youāre just expected to take it, otherwise youāre weak, and the āfatherā will make sure thatās an even worse fate. The Siloviki do indeed want to free Ukrainians ā so they bomb cities. Free them from their āEuropean gaynessā, that is. Such is the perversity of the Russian psyche.
Or, differently put: You sure youāre looking at the water youāre swimming in? Iām not Russian, I only lived there, and I was able to see the water. Swimming feels quite a bit different in Russia than it does virtually everywhere else.
Snokhachestvo and the cultural approaches similar to it are prevalent in those people who are Russiaās elite now, but generally seem very rare as far as I can see.
And that stuff about Europe and homosexuality seems for me a kind of āthe hungry doesnāt understand the fullā, more of jokes and separation than of really thinking thatās true. Itās just that there are people outside the prison and inside it, and those inside canāt afford to behave freely. Itās almost envy, except without even negative feelings. More like alienation - āthey live so much easier that for them homosexuality is a real concernā.
Also thereās the criminal culture homosexuality, as a marker of status in the criminal hierarchy, which is demonstrably non-consensual, and one can see a psychological parallel between living freely in general inside a prison and being gay in a place where people get raped. A nonsensically careless behavior, something like that. And being nonsensically careless is weak.
They followed their own laws. If a law was too cumbersome to make, they didnāt. It was an absolute monarchy, but if you compare todayās Russiaās judicial system to the imperial one - the latter seems very humane. By stats, by procedures, by stories of people who witnessed it.
The kind of peasant communes and huge families where such things happened wasnāt actually natural. It was becoming the more common, the more people were becoming personal serfs. That is, there was that transition during Catherine where state serfs (which in practice meant almost a free man) were given to nobles en masse, she considered that a better arrangement. Sort of a privatization.
Nah, not that. If we make this comparison, for them itās the fatherās right, and you are subordinate. Itās not about fear of punishment, itās about enduring for enduranceās sake. Almost morality.
No, they donāt. They want to kill and loot and subjugate.
People who you are maybe looking for here are not those who try to somehow explain the stateās justifications for this war. Itās those who think that this has to be finished anyway regardless of whether the war should have been started.
I havenāt met such real people. OK, to be honest, probably I didnāt realize but I have.
The point is - almost nobody really thinks that about gayness and what not, but everybody thinks itās smarter to play along, thatās what I meant by the amorphousness of mind of Russians.
It does, but itās more of a culture of virtuous suffering, like doing your work the hard way instead of loosening up a bit and doing it better, but with less āhonest laborā or something. And lies. The virtuous suffering thing is often stupid, but sometimes a strength. The lies however are usually stupid, yet Russians somehow always start with lies and then maybe work it up to saying the truth.
Iām talking about an underlying psychosexual current. Of course people donāt believe in the literal truth of these kinds of things, itād be like believing that dreams are literally true. But thereās still a reason why youāre having these particular kinds of dreams, and not different ones.
Do you think itās even constitutional for Putin to deputise people with presidential powers? That any court would challenge him? Law in Russia was, and is, subordinate to the powers that be.
Thatās the attitude of those considered strong, yes. You either become them or you break and end up with a tattoo saying āslaveā on your forehead or something.
Iām not talking about the stateās justification, but about the justification of the cultural psyche. Russia, as a psyche, doesnāt want to see Ukrainians with forehead tattoos, it wants Ukraine to be part of it. Part of the same ethos, with maybe slightly different dances, clothing, and they can continue pronouncing things with h instead of g as long as they admit theyāre Russians, that they accept, as you put it above, the fatherās authority. And the only way that psyche knows how to convince the son of the fatherās authority is by cruelty.
Itās not. It destroys social cohesion, it breeds neurosis. With true courage, it doesnāt matter whether you live or die for the cause, as long as the cause is virtuous. This Russian strength, though, it only can ever make sense if youāre dying for it, living for it indeed is stupid, at the same time its strength in dying for it is not stronger than that of true courage. Itās precisely why Russians donāt know where the fuck that cart is racing. But go, it must. Why. Why not make camp and have a party.
The reason is simple: Without the people neurotic, distrustful, and accustomed to bowing to authority, the central authority would fall, because people would actually be able to organise bottom-up. The central authority knows that, and thus does nothing to combat it, the people, well, itās Russiaās only way to greatness, isnāt it? Any alternatives?
Which brings me to Navalnyās balls of steel, returning to Russia: Yes, thatās impressive. Thatās strong, āvirtuous sufferingā. But itās also accepting the status quo. You canāt be a revolutionary against a system by holding onto the ethos that fuels it.
I dunno, if we are going to that level, then I see plenty people not from Russia in the interwebs having this. In case of MENA people - much stronger.
Itās a problem, but not such a deep one. Even among ex-military people from older generation.
No, Putin has been logically fully described in the āDollsā show. He just wants to torture and kill people better than him, and the law heās interested in only as long as he can call whoever he wants destroyed āstate criminalsā.
Iām saying that the Russian empire was different, and even the USSR was different.
Yup, Iām saying itās not the only idea of morality in the whole of Russian society and not even the dominant one.
It definitely is the one emanating from the state.
In this case no, itās not the father. Itās the same master. Slaves replace their own dignity with their masterās importance.
So those really thinking Ukraine shouldnāt be independent are the people terribly irritated by Ukrainians not willing to have a master. If Ukrainians wanted to have a master, that master would have a lower status than their master, in their opinion, so it would all be fine - Ukraine is a separate country, but Ukrainians are in the same general status. Itās envy - why can they have this and we canāt. A typical village thing by the way.
Like that anecdote about hell and a Jewish cauldron, guarded by three imps to throw those escaping back in and prevent them from helping others, a Ukrainian cauldron guarded by one imp to just throw those escaping back in, and a Russian cauldron unguarded.
Yep, in this regard we agree. It also breeds idiocy and cowardice with all participants certain they are being wise and brave and sacrificing.
Thatās where you are wrong.
As you might have guessed, one canāt punish FSB for entrapment, they are the ones doing the punishing. So thatās what they were doing since Soviet times. Everyone trying to āorganize bottom-upā will just be detected by FSB before being visible for anyone else.
They are proactive. They have their agents of various kinds in youth groups, in hobby groups, everywhere. They even provoke such āorganizingā.
They literally lure teens into āpoliticalā groups. Just for everyone with potential to be under control.
It would be problematic, say, in the US, if FBI tried to put someone in jail for being a member of a group the leader and half other members of which are state agents, and which approached that someone first. In Russia itās not. They are always fishing for people willing to do something.
Iāve literally heard of more cases where a (say, anarchist) group had such agents, but it all became known because of some other crime (a murder in that case), than in āextremistā sense. Meaning this happens very silently.
So, about distrust. Itās well-substantiated. Russians canāt organize in Russia and canāt, frankly, trust a Russian in such things.
Similar to Armenians TBH, it sometimes seems there are more agents of various intelligence services and oligarchs in Armenia and diaspora than people really interested in changing something.
Absolutely! Thatās exactly what his action communicated.
I think he was trying to send a signal to that layer of deeply skeptical people that heās one of them and not of those like Sobchak and Nemtsov and similar. And he was successful, heās seen very differently from them.
Except see my previous part about special servicesā work. The real problem is not in nobody willing to organize. Without it, whether Navalny would do his sacrifice or not, Russiaās government would have changed around 2012.
This is some of the dumbest shit ive read on here. Shocked you arenāt from .world