Yeah, I have no idea who the guy is for a start and don't actually care. The video was the point in the context of the above discussion.
The point is not so much that Ukraine should not have agency, but that actions have consequences. In this case: if Ukraine decides to flirt with joining NATO, it will anger Russia to the point of an invasion. That doesn't mean Ukraine can't make this decision, but Mearsheimer would consider it a wrong one given the damage a Russian invasion would do, and something leaders in Ukraine and NATO should have steered Ukraine away from through clear and strong messaging to the Ukrainian population.
It depends a bit on the timing of the predictions, but apart from the Ukraine one, these were pretty obvious, no? I also don't know what Mearsheimer's success percentage is.
But that cuts both ways, as Mearsheimer employs a 'what if' as well when he says that (the threat of) NATO expansion caused the invasion of Ukraine - cause the implication is that there would have been no invasion without it. I don't think I agree with that.
The problem is that the concept of joining NATO to some extent becomes a proxy for 'turning west'. You're right that NATO continues to exist because of Russia; but if all those Warsaw Pact and USSR countries had not joined NATO but had still become a part of the EU, I think chances are that Russia under Putin would still have invaded Ukraine if it had started flirting with becoming an EU country as well.
If you hadn’t just parroted the out-of-context truncated smear of a Putin apologist, you might have actually shared the fuller clip of this broadcast that shows the presenter breaking down on air whilst reporting on the death of one his friends, immediately before commencing on this badly misjudged rant in an emotional state. You might have also shared the fact that the broadcaster also apologised for his diatribe when next on the air, reflecting that he fell short of both himself as a person and a journalist. You might have also shared that the director of the network too apologised.
Very well reasoned post and I agree with most of it (cutting both ways). It does begin to take on tautological resonances the more you think about it. I would say, to conclude the gist of what historiography has been provided by people in this thread, that you can blame Putin/Russia absolutely for the invasion and hold the opinion that spheres of influence played a part without that being a mutually excluding premise.
Maybe. I wasn't aware that there was a fuller clip. I wasn't vetting every single tweet that came up. I saw a video of a Ukrainian presenter with a picture of Eichmann seemingly no longer giving a feck if the world viewed Ukrainians as Nazis (something that is a minority problem, which I have always said in this thread) and thought that relevant to the idea of war being unpredictable (Dwayne's WWII rise of the blackshirts was the background, here). It wasn't intended to rile anyone up or paint a picture of all Ukrainians as Nazis or neo-Nazis (I've always said that it is clearly a minority problem, the Azov, and a problem which has to do with convenience insofar as Ukraine is fighting a civil war and now against an invasion and you won't turn down whatever fighters you think will help; the larger point being the scope of political reform of a marginal movement post-War). So I think this has been a genuine misunderstanding.
Fair enough. I am just highly sensitive to many of the bad faith actors on Twitter now, trying to push an angle with out of context content.
Yeah, that's fair enough. Thanks for adding the above context.
Yeah, I'm very much in favour of using multiple lenses through which to view almost any situation. I acknowledge that that might endlessly complicate things, and that it is useful to have models which necessarily through their very nature generalize (and thus simplify) things; but my instinctive reaction is always to shy away from them in favour of a more holistic picture. Until you bring in the wide picture or comparable situations and do need the generalization again - and now I'm fittingly even going in circles in my own post.
Bayesian, by chance?
My statement should have been more accurate. Nothing less than alignment with Russia by Ukraine could have prevented an invasion. Had they agreed to disarm or significantly weaken their armed forces, we'd likely have a Russian puppet in Kyiv right now.
The clip wasn't doctored (though as there's a fuller clip, you could argue it was selectively framed, which is a fair point, but obviously there's no good way to frame Eichmann in that context) and the original point still stands. The added context from TMDaines is helpful, though. As a good rule, if someone posts a tweet which is text, I usually try to check their background (of late), if I am only interested in sharing the media, whether photo or video, I don't care who shares the clip. You have to distinguish the person sharing from the fact shared (when they only exist as a conduit). And I wasn't arguing about the source (know nothing about and want to know nothing about), I was defending the content (which I still defend as legitimate but with the added info provided by TMDaines, which helps clarify one or two things).
https://www.australiannationalrevie...olution-doctrine-of-nazi-holocaust-organizer/
Do you apply this same rigor when commenting upon things you agree with? And do those people spend five years in Russia learning the language so you know there's no way they've misrepresented the content?
You are applying a "fake news" ideology to things that you don't agree with. Ironically, the original point was not this contentious. If you all apply this effort to every foreign language tweet posted, I'll revise my opinion.
Exactly. The original point I was making was also relegated within a minority context (the potential for minority extremists to gain legitimacy post-War). It had nothing to do with whether Putin's claim was legitimate (it wasn't and isn't, which I've stated relentlessly). And, if anyone is interested in reading the actual thread, you'll see I agreed that Putin is basically doing the opposite of what his propaganda states (potentially creating the conditions that do not now exist and didn't prior to invasion).
What was the crucial context that vitiates my use of the content within the original exchange?
Point me to one example where it's been this drawn out. Trump was president for years and Covid was a thing, so you must have found some actual conspiracy loons posting things that weren't true and applied this same level of critique.
Also, "propaganda" doesn't mean "not true" or imply that the person using it in other contexts agrees with the propagandist. Everything is propaganda and potentially serves a purpose distinct from the one you intend. There is also "black" propaganda and "white" propaganda (the Belgian atrocity stories, for example, with which this thread opened was "black" propaganda).
Indeed, and I have been critical with it (no misrepresentation nor claim beyond the intensely narrow spectrum within which I applied it). As for motive, yes, I do suspect this is probably personal. I'll leave it there.
This is literal "whataboutery", saying yes I did it but what about your own practices.
Fair - thanks for following it up. Thinking I should delete my original post...
