Well, Russia recently invaded a European country, assassinated several people in the U.K., got caught using spies to infiltrate U.S. political parties, hacked the emails of a U.S. presidential candidate while meeting secretly with her opponent (who may or may not be massively in the Russian government’s debt), and resumed air attack drills on NATO countries. So, a lot of English-speaking people see Russia as the “bad guy” right now.
> So, a lot of English-speaking people see Russia as the “bad guy” right now.
So a lot of English-speaking people are falling for mass media lies. And frankly it's getting ridiculous now days. It seems that whatever US media starts pushing out ( and it's usually w/o proof ) people will just eat it up.
"The referendum was regarded as illegitimate by most members of the European Union, the United States and Canada mainly due to Russian intervention.[13] Thirteen members of the United Nations Security Council voted in favor of a resolution declaring the referendum invalid, but Russia vetoed it and China abstained.[14][15] A United Nations General Assembly resolution was later adopted, by a vote of 100 in favor vs. 11 against with 58 abstentions, which declared the referendum invalid and affirmed Ukraine's territorial integrity."
"In February 2014, Russia made several military incursions into Ukrainian territory. After Euromaidan protests and the fall of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, Russian soldiers without insignias took control of strategic positions and infrastructure within the Ukrainian territory of Crimea. Russia then annexed Crimea after an unlawful referendum in which Crimeans voted to join the Russian Federation, according to Russian official results.[12][68][69][70][71] In April, demonstrations by pro-Russian groups in the Donbass area of Ukraine escalated into an armed conflict between the Ukrainian government and the Russia-backed separatist forces of the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics. In August, Russian military vehicles crossed the border in several locations of Donetsk Oblast.[31][72][73][74][75] The incursion by the Russian military was seen as responsible for the defeat of Ukrainian forces in early September."
And here is my point exactly. How is this an invasion. And if this intervention is an invasion, why are not "interventions" in Syria for example called invasions also.
The language used in media is often like the newspeak from 1984.
Well what do you call it when each side reports extremely biased opinions that further only their cause and portrays the other side as the criminals?
We can call it also misinformation, fake news, ignorance or whatever. Does it really matter what is the exact word I used, given that it is occurring on a mass scale ?
I'd stopped consuming so much cable news, it can rot your brain. And why did you edit out "China's human rights may be even worse" from your comment? That's certainly something that is up for debate.
"English-speaking people"? What's that?
Russia does bad things. China does bad things. The EU does bad things. We do bad things. What's strange is the sudden hysteria and relentless propaganda directed towards china and russia in particular. It's not like Russia and China were saints before.
>And why did you edit out "China's human rights may be even worse" from your comment? That's certainly something that is up for debate.
That comment didn’t seem relevant in hindsight. The article is only about Russia. Discussion of China’s human rights record would not be on-topic commentary.
We in Europe have a very personal stake in this. The chance of China ever invading us is minuscule bordering to none, the same can't be said for Russia.
They've already done it in the past numerous times - I know damn well since I come from former Czechoslovakia. I have no kind word for a russians due to this, my parents and their whole generation have pretty horrible stories to tell and effects of their meddling and bloody direct invasion in 1968 are still felt these days. And they've done it recently (and still doing it while LOLing like nothing is happening) with Ukraine.
You don't need to consume cable news at all, I've stopped some 15 years ago. This is plain old history.
> They've already done it in the past numerous times - I know damn well since I come from former Czechoslovakia.
Czechoslovakia was a part of the Soviet Bloc, wasn't it? During the time of Cold War? With Soviet Union being, in effect the ruling center of the bloc and considering the rest of the Soviet countries its sphere of influence? I mean, it doesn't justify what Soviet Union did then, but what happened to Czechoslovakia couldn't have happened to France, or Sweden, or the UK.
Things are completely different now. Yes, even now, with the militaristic rhetoric on both sides rising to the Cold War-era level. There is no Soviet bloc. Russia is reduced in its ambitions to the level of a minor regional power.
As for Ukraine, it has the misfortune of sharing a border and a lot of common history with Russia; so much so that Russia still considers it its sphere of interest. With Western Europe things are completely different. Russia may have squabbles with Ukraine or perhaps even with Baltic states (unlikely, because they are members of NATO), but to conclude from that that other European countries are under the risk of Russian invasion is to misrepresent reality, I believe.
Sovereign nation under Soviet influence is how we, in the West, understand Soviet bloc. Completely standalone except for the Brezhnev Soviet invasion after the Prague Spring, when Dubcek tried to liberalise and remove some of the Soviet yoke.
Czechoslovakia, Romania and Poland were all Soviet Bloc - from a Western Europe understanding - not part of the USSR, but certainly subject to their regimen and control. Like being required to sell goods at below market to USSR.
Oh, it certainly wasn't part of the Soviet Union, if that's what you are referring to, but wasn't it part of some political configuration that made it possible for the Soviet Union to treat it as a satellite state and as a battleground of communist ideology against western democracy? Wikipedia, in the article on Soviet-Czechoslovakian relations[0], states that: "After February 1948 Czechoslovakia was firmly set into the Soviet sphere of influence."
Again, I am not arguing from any ethical perspective; I am not saying that the USSR had the right to do what it did; I am merely saying that a bit disingenuous to suggest that Western European countries, including modern-day Czech Republic or Poland, are under any risk of Russian invasion. Ukraine might be; but even that doesn't seem all that likely.
> I am merely saying that a bit disingenuous to suggest that...countries...are under any risk of Russian invasion. Ukraine might be; but even that doesn't seem all that likely.
The risk of Russia invading the Ukraine is 100%, because it already happened. The Russians even annexed part of it, to worldwide condemnation.
> The risk of Russia invading the Ukraine is 100%, because it already happened. The Russians even annexed part of it, to worldwide condemnation.
Oh, I meant in the future. The risk of lightning striking the same house, as it were. Admitting a historically conflicted piece of territory whose population at the time is reported to have been overwhelmingly pro-russian and to have felt slighted by the anti-russian revolutionary government, and which even went through the perfunctory motions of a referendum to add some semblance of legitimacy to the process, is a fairly confusing case, for which, of course, Russia has its own exculpatory narrative. I was thinking of something more clear-cut. A declaration of war, an open military confrontation, that sort of thing.
I think it's a fine thing to take responsibility for your government. But it's a bit much to blame people for the government doing bad things with "their" money. It's not their picture on the money. There's no unsubscribe option on a tax return form. You can't opt out, and even in our Western democracies representation is... poor, to say the least. The distinction between a government and its population is not meaningless.
I really have no idea what any of that has to do with anything said by either myself or user basestop, who you originally replied to. Or how you came to any conclusions about my mental state.
We vote. The only legal democratic tool to "do anything about it", isn't it? Only our vote is a minority one that doesn't count much.
And what the hell is "society", anyway? Given that, say, 70 percent of the population votes one way and 30 percent the other way, is there any fault with the 30 percent? Are they "society"?
And the US are the good guys, never played a role in foreign countries political systems, never spied on anyone, never started wars, killed civilians in countless countries, founded terrorists organisations, &c. ?
It's very easy to tell the bad guys to stop being bad, while doing the same things and pretending it's right. You don't even have to go back to MKULTRA or vietnam, it's happening right now.
But be careful, the mean russians have whales with light harnesses and the chinese have backdoors in all our technology. It's even sillier than most WW1/2 propaganda.
That the US does bad things does not invalidate the bad things China and Russia do. You sound like someone who gets a speeding ticket and answers "but everyone else is speeding too! Why do you punish me?!"
It's actually a better excuse for traffic violations than for international politics. What the rules of the road specifically don't matter all that much so long as everyone is behaving predictably so doing what everyone else does is generally the best option even if it's not the letter of the law.
I rarely see negative threads about the US on hackernews, but not a day goes by without the regular anti chinese/russian propaganda, especially concerning military and/or technology.
I see plenty... often times it's more corporate focused but frequently it's about how those corporations interact with the government/society in ways that implicate government/society as well.
Thanks for the chuckle, but shitting on the USA is one of our favorite passtimes on HN as Americans, so it kinda makes your "b-b-but what about the USA" here into a trite eye-roll.
It's like complaining HN never talks shit about Javascript in a submission that shits on PHP.
> True, but whataboutism like that only carries any weight at all because the US has been the most warlike nation since WWII.
Not really. Russia was de facto involved in many of those conflicts (e.g. supplying fighters and pilots to North Korea during the Korean war to fight the UN), and had many of its own (e.g. the invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia, to name a few).
I'm not defending Russia, or whataboutism. Is the international politics version of, 'yeah, but what are you'. All I am pointing out is that the US government would carry greater moral weight when lecturing others if it didn't keep invading places and propping up dictators. Also, the overall problems we are dealing with as humans are systemic and not specific to one country, so if trying to solve them, pointing fingers at others just does not really help. The current situation with Trump, for instance, is an interesting reflection of the installation of Yeltsin.
> All I am pointing out is that the US government would carry greater moral weight when lecturing others if it didn't keep invading places and propping up dictators.
I don't think that's actually true. If you're of the mind that you're going to find fault in the messenger to ignore/distract from the message, you're going to find some fault regardless of how well the messenger behaves (and the fault you choose does not have to be related to the topic at hand).
>If you're of the mind that you're going to find fault in the messenger to ignore/distract from the message, you're going to find some fault regardless of how well the messenger behaves
Yes, but the mud sticks a lot better if it is made of fresh shit. To only regard the people bickering is a mistake. Is the people watching you have to really consider.
> Yes, but the mud sticks a lot better if it is made of fresh shit.
Unfortunately, mud sticks well enough even if it isn't real, so I really don't think that's much of a concern.
>> All I am pointing out is that the US government would carry greater moral weight when lecturing others if it didn't keep invading places and propping up dictators.
Do you think anyone affected or with influence would give greater credence to US "lectures" if it had never invaded anyplace?
I think the USA had a ton of political goodwill after WWII that it has since then burned for money and now has very little left. The USA does have a lot of money and weapons, so people fear it politically, but it no longer commands much respect.
Meanwhile, Mexico (and other Central American countries) continue to have rampant violent gangs and political corruption, causing a constant of drugs, guns, and refugees. And undoubtedly has a greater aggregate impact on U.S. politics than a handful of Russian nationals.
Yet Mexico gets a fraction of the bad press as the Russian threat.
