I was going to write a long reply but the simple truth is you gave an opinion (essentially you echoed Macron re letting Putin save face because you're scared of his actions should he be further humiliated) but instead of engaging in debate around that opinion you then went off on a tangent calling people keyboard warriors etc. without backing up your opinion once. Adding whataboutism into the conversation is irrelevant specifically to your point that people were replying to and further derails the thread, hence why we got moved to this one.
Geopolitics
- Thread starter Mciahel Goodman
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What exactly is the discussion about? I don't think I've seen anyone outright claim that Ukraine should give Russia concessions to end the war.
The point though is that we must always look forward and prepare for the consequences of a long-term war in Ukraine. A war that could take years with all the negative externatilities.
I would hope that Western governments take that into account and monitor how the food crisis develops and take measures.
The point though is that we must always look forward and prepare for the consequences of a long-term war in Ukraine. A war that could take years with all the negative externatilities.
I would hope that Western governments take that into account and monitor how the food crisis develops and take measures.
I was hoping for a bit more details. As in which organisations to support for example? Would you expect humanitarian support, military one and if military than what kind?
It might be a me problem, but I personally just don't see it. The spiel about functioning, sovereign democracy might sound cringe'y, but it guarantees a clear organisation to deal with that has big incentive to limit war crimes, striking civilian targets and to not exacerbate humanitarian crisis as much as possible. In case of Palestine any equivalent organisations are much more problematic in those aspects and nature of the conflict makes collateral damage nearly impossible to avoid.
Obviously there are a lot more cynical reasons to ignore that crisis for westerners, but they're not the only meaningful differences here.
There was a "Putin is a cornered, mad dog and needs to be given a way out" which runs very close to that take, although I don't think it was specified what exactly that would mean.
Well, I think that was precisely what some demanded.
The Russian Rubel, never been better in the last 5 years. While the euro and the european currencies are crumbling.
Which is a product of Russian policy to artificially strengthen the Ruble. They’ve actually gone overboard on the strengthening and are now looking at ways to weaken it because it is hampering economic growth.
The Russian Rubel, never been better in the last 5 years. While the euro and the european currencies are crumbling.
It's being artificially inflated.
The Russian Rubel, never been better in the last 5 years. While the euro and the european currencies are crumbling.
Wrong.
Where do most people in dictatorships get their news?
I know local currency is only one indicator of state of health of the economy, but is an important one, while they can artificially inflate it, but they can not take it to these levels without background to support it. They have gold and assets to support their currency now, and for the people of Russia, all they know is that their currency has never been better which helps them with their trade.
Internet is still the number one source of news. Pick any Arabic country (most of them are not democracies)
https://www.scientificamerican.com/arabic/articles/news/the-internet-main-source-of-news-for-arabs/
The article is in arabic, but it states that about 78% of the people in arabic countries use the internet as the first source of news.
Putin gave a three hour press conference at the economic forum in Petersburg. the weird thing is that Putin's economic rhetoric is kind of what the Brexiteers aspire to. a genuine economic vision with trade deals as part of the BRI and EEU but also highlighting sovereignty. it's also similar in many ways to what the US have been talking about in terms of domestic production. the interviewer gave him some interesting questions on corruption inside Russia, the Chinese being ambivalent, and the impact of sanctions on russian supply chains. overall you get a sense that the russian state is locked into a five or ten year plan and that there isn't much scope for change whether Putin is in power or he leaves office. the basic takeway is that Putin doesn't seem concerned with the decoupling from western markets because his economic agenda is one which involves replacing the hightech components they used to source abroad with some form of Russian alternative, probably with massive Chinese investment.
You clearly know nothing or very little about the conflict. So it is better to not discuss something you have no knowledge of.
I always find it funny that people are using Houthis using kids as soliders as an reason of them deserving of having innocent civilians bombed and murdered, but at the same time people in the west were praising images of women and children being taught how to make Molotov cocktails to throw at Russian soldiers.
Like people said when those images were going out for the first time, imagine if the same was shown for Palestinian kids and women. It would also be used as justification for the occupation and murdering of those kids.
Like people said when those images were going out for the first time, imagine if the same was shown for Palestinian kids and women. It would also be used as justification for the occupation and murdering of those kids.
Because my opinion was met with accusations of me being selfish and worried about gas prices instead of Ukraine or my lack of morals. That's how the topic got drifted.
Anyone who said no Putin is too dangerous we shouldnt let him save face etc I didn't accuse of anything. One or two folks started talking about how my opinion basically means I'm fine with Russia wrecking Ukraine which is nonesense so I pointed out similar situations
Well, according to everything that’s been reported on it in the last month, that’s exactly what they’ve done.
That’s not quite an answer to what I’ve asked. Russia, for example, has most of its population (60%+) accessing their news via TV.
Ok so to help things along, if you feel Putin needs a way out to save face what would that look like? Ukraine realistically isn’t just going to surrender, they aren’t going to cede territory (on the contrary they seem to believe they can actually retake Crimea long term) and are going to become more and more emboldened as time goes on.
Also, let’s say Ukraine resistance magically dissolves tomorrow. You really think Putin won’t actively try to economically punish countries who sanctioned Russia with the sole thing he can control which is energy?
The whole discussion was on "why the opinion in these developing countries are not on the western side?". The poster argued the source of news in developing countries is controlled by the state , i.e the TV. I gave an example of how Arab countries (all developing countries and mostly authoritarian countries) use the internet as their first source of news. So yes he is wrong. Russia was not the question here.
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I disagree with ceding of territories. Very least there can be an acceptance of crimea belonging to Russia and Ukraine retaining it's Donbas reagions which was the defacto state anyway pre invasion.
This gives something for Putin to go home with without truly changing anything. It ends the war for Ukraine and it helps give another chance for Europe to not make stupid mistakes on Russian reliance.
Putin will not and cannot punish anyone. Lessons were learned from this war and Putin reached his limits.
In time Putin is tried and/or disposed and the rest goes on
Well, going back to June 9th, the poster in question seems to be making a point about dictatorial governments. This is what I based my question on.
Russia is just as liable to be used as an example as say Saudi Arabia, if we’re comparing developing nations with authoritarian/dictatorial governments.
The optics differs very much on your race, and ethnicity, history, geolocation, ideology etc
We all could watch the same TV networks and thinks differently.
Why some do not side with the west? Well if your country is bombed and you lost your loved ones or your job due to it they'll see the news with a different optic. Regardless of who's producing it.
And the internet is not the be all and all, most of the mainstream outlets are sanitized and doctored to some degree. The cnn are hardly objective when it comes to Russia, yemen, Afghanistan, etc.
I'm not totally sure that they do to be honest and, even if they do, they think that should be parked aside for this current conflict.
The reality is that a lot of posters on here consider the Ukraine war to be almost unique in terms of modern conflicts. To some extent, if you're European I can get that but the reality is of course that it isn't even slightly unique to most people around the world. It doesn't mean that they necessarily support Russia but for them, this conflict isn't different from ant of the number of conflicts still ongoing now or any of the number of conflicts that the USA and western countries have waged on other countries within living memory. We're not talking about the distant past, we're talking about conflicts where we still have living stories from people.
Putin's Russia is imperial as well and I've already articulated my personal view that as much as I can criticise, if I had to live in a world with a hegemon, I would prefer to live in a world with the USA/west as hegemon as opposed to one with Russia/China. It rather misses the point though that people are not going to react the same way towards people who have (and still do) exploit them vs someone who could potentially exploit them. If someone beat me up in the street and still trips me up when I see them, I'm not going to react to them in the same way as someone who has tripped other people up in the past.
A lot of countries in the old Soviet or even non-aligned blocks look with fond memories back to the money the Soviet Union gave them, as well the free university education they provided some of their citizens too.
So, its all a very western centric viewpoint, as to how the world is and should react. Its all very patronising (those poor people in dictatorships. If only they properly understood, then they'd realise how they should think and think exactly like us on this conflict').
As for the other topic which has been ongoing for the past few days (the impact of the war on prices and the willingness of people to stomach it). Firstly, there are people around the world already feeling it. That of course is 100% Putin's fault. Secondly, it is disingenuous to suggest that for people in the West, it is only 'annoying' and not also potentially plunging people into poverty. At the moment, money is flowing from Europe and the USA. That's great. I think the point though, and I know this is anathema at the moment, is that at some point, especially for populations which look like they're about to enter into a recession soon, the political cost of unrestricted support will eventually become too high.
I hope that point comes after Ukraine is able to push Russia back to its original borders. But it may not. That is not some traitorous conversation to have. If the war rumbles on at a relative stalemate like this for years, peoples' willingness to help out may not be as great as it is now.
Almost every arabic country is authoritarian, they are based at the bottom of the democracy index. Check it yourself. That is why I used it as an example. The opinion of these people as the poster above mention is based on other factors.
I agree.
And I didn’t have an issue with that other than to point out (by citing Russia) that using only Arabic countries doesn’t present a full picture of the issue in question.
Well, I guess I just give posters on here a little more credit than you do.
Considering the majority of the responses on here about why India chose not to join in with western sanctions against Russia, or to how various countries have voted in UN votes on this war (amongst other things), then I think we very much do.
Okay, cool.
I used Arabic countries as an example because I know that the perception of the West in Arab countries are not based on what the state-controlled media feed them, but in fact more on what the people of these countries experienced with the West in the past 120 years. And that's why governments in these countries are not too fussed about how people get their news. Internet are not restricted except for view adult sites. In fact there are many Western media like CNN, BBC, France 24, dw and euronews all in Arabic that pumps their own agendas without any restriction. If you take Iraq as an extreme example, Saddam governed Iraq like a military camp, mostly everyone in the country knew how the reality outside Iraq is and it is not like what they have been fed by that state-controlled media. In his last two years he opened internet access and listening to news on the radio from international radio channels under all his governing years was very common and an easy way to get the news outside of the state media umbrella.
When it comes to news media they are not the same at all. Living in Saudi Arabia local tv might have some censorship but international media like CNN BBC and even fox news is all available. The internet is widespread.
Immigrant laborers listen to news from their home countries. Not everything that isn't a western democracy in the west is the same thing.
And, again, I don’t have a problem with that… there’s just more dictatorial countries than that. That’s the only point I made by bringing up Russia.
That was not my point whatsoever, but thanks.
I didn't see your post before I posted mine
but youre spot on. The irony is that folks in the west are the ones actually suffering from what they believe to be happening in Middle East. News outlets like Fox and CNN along with general misinformation makes one think it's all the same as china.
Having lived in the Middle East, all the major news outlets are not only available but regularly watched.
I think censorship comes into play with homosexuality and mature content etc but information is not controlled as such.
Of course local government press tried to hush what they can and all but that different.
Christ on a bike. Folks so knee jerk to claim “western ignorance” at every opportunity that they can’t read a simple statement of fact.
Honestly, wouldn't hurt to admit you're wrong sometimes. You were quoting Russian media stats only few posts ago then trying to form a link between Russia and Saudi.
There's nothing kneejerk about it. It's a common theme here to draw broad conclusions on governments that are not western democracies as if they are all the same. You can't just use China as an example of discussing Russia or Saudi Arabia to discussed the UAE. They're different ballgames and just very "middle eastern expert" on CNN vibes.
And again, you’ve completely missed the reason I did.
I cited Russia as a “ dictatorial country” where most of its people get news from TV in contrast to another one cited by a different poster that gets most of theirs from the internet. That’s literally it. All the rest of what you’ve said has been invented by your imagination.