distic
9mo ago
In practice, neutrality would have meant that Ukraine will always remain weaker than Russia and can be invaded at any time. Russia would just have to wait for a time where NATO is occupied somewhere else. Russia violated the Budapest memorandum and the Minsk agreement. How could Ukraine trust them to not invade them?
Moreover, the fact that Ukraine is or is not in NATO is not very relevant for the security of Russia. They are American nukes in the baltic countries, so the threat would not be any bigger. On the other side, Russia would still have nukes, so the invasion risks aren't any higher. So if Ukraine joining NATO does not change anything for Russia security, you have to find another reason why it matters to them. The only thing Russia can do if Ukraine is "neutral" but not if it is in NATO is invading them.
has destroyed the country
No, the invasion has.
has cost enormous sums of money
The invasion has. The US are not responsible for it.
has wasted American influence in Ukraine
Are you kidding? American influence is stronger than ever in Ukraine.
has pressured Russia into developing better drone technology
No, their invasion has pressured them to do so.
has finalized the alienation of Russia from the West
Once again, it's their choice to invade Ukraine that has alienated them. Even after 2014 the west was totally OK negotiating with Russia. Have you heard about Nord Stream 2?
has influenced Arab nations into cozying with Russia
They always did... They are not democratic countries, they have an interest in helping authoritarian regimes. It has not much to do with Ukraine.
and all we get in return is some dead Russians
And the reassurance that you won't abandon your allies, which was in doubt after the Afghanistan retreat.
distic
1yr ago
Racists are far-right, homophobes are far-right, and homophobia means not being enthusiastic about everything you are told to be enthusiastic about.
I'm sorry, where do you read this in the wikipedia article? Especially the part in bold?
distic
10mo ago
There is a problem with your claim. Game-theory was once the best argument in favor of individualism. Game theory predicted that communism would fail because of the incentives. If people had been ready to ignore their own interests for the greater good, then individualism would have had a harder time. And how do you justify the sacrifices for individualism, if you are individualistic? It seems to me it makes no sense.
I think it touches the core of the problem, the heart of the internal contradiction of the american patriotism (or any kind of disinterested attachment to individualism). On one side, there is the individualism that you have learnt to love, and on the other side the attachment that you feel for it; you feel it so strongly that you are ready to sacrifice yourself for it. The problem is that both are contradictory.
Game theory is individualistic (it assumes everyone follows his own interests), yet it predicts that individualism will sometime be sub-optimal. It's like saying that saving America requires more state intervention, but more state intervention will destroy what America stands for. If what I just said is true, then America (or the world individualist party if you prefer) is doomed.
distic
2mo ago
Your core point is not clear because it is an anti-analogy. Analogies are not helpful to begin with, but anti-analogies are even worse. It needs to be clarified, but let me help.
I agree that any citizen committed to democracy should make sure that the electoral process is fair. This means, above all, that the legal procedures in place have been respected, and also that nothing has occurred which cannot be codified but which seriously calls into question the sincerity of the ballot. I think you agree, but contradict me if you don't.
However, here's where it gets complicated: questioning the results (in bad faith) is also a way of trying to cheat. So a citizen committed to democracy should also view any accusations of fraud with circumspection.
He or she should therefore demand that anyone making such accusations provides, perhaps not evidence, but factual elements that lead him or her to believe that irregularities have been committed and that they are of such a nature as to call the results into question. Tell me where I'm wrong.
distic
7mo ago
Anarchism has never worked, what are you speaking about when you say "able to exist without a state to protect them"?
Anyway that is not really relevant. The fact is that companies get some advantages from modern states. They are more prosperous when the state protects them. So they have to accept the downsides that come with this prosperity.
distic
9mo ago
An angry Bob in middle America has no power to formulate plans for middle East invasions and then put them into action.
Democracy means that everyone is responsible for what happens. Especially everyone which was in favor of the choice that was made. Sure, a guy in middle America wouldn't have been able to change anything himself, but it would have made a huge difference if a lot of angry Bob in middle America had opposed the war, instead of being in favor of it. The jews weren't a majority of the Bush electorate, and it's pretty clear that the Bush electorate supported the war.
Many Americans wanted revenge for 9/11. The direction those emotions were guided in and the actions those emotions were used to justify were completely the work of neocons and zionists. To pretend those two movements are not extremely jewish goes beyond any reason.
People were angry. They wanted a war. So they are not completely innocent. Moreover, the problem of the war in Irak was more the war than the fact that it happened in Irak. All the other possible targets of the "revenge" were even worse: Pakistan has nukes, Saudi Arabia has oil. Other countries had no responsibilities in 9/11. They could have argued for peace, but you know very well that it wouldn't have worked. Some people have tried (some of them jewish), but they have never been heard. So the neocons provided you with what you wanted: the best (or the least bad) target they could find. That was not the main problem. The problem was that an angry mob was asking for blood. Being dumb and emotional is no excuse.
distic
9mo ago
A random person has not much power. But if the media were all agreeing about war, it's not because they are jewish, but because there was no market fir opposing war. The media could have opposed the war as much as they could, people would have looked at other media. They had as much appetite for anti war media as a AOC supporter for looking Tucker Carlson show. So after that blaming the media and the establishment is ridiculous. Just like it would be ridiculous for Bush to blame it on the people.
distic
11mo ago
I mean, isn't it clear that mediocrity is at the origin of this activism? Havard can't afford to much mediocrity, at some point they have a reputation to hold. BAU, on the other hand...
distic
1yr ago
It's not that there are right wing discussions, it's that there are almost only unchallenged right wing posts in the CW thread. The CW thread used to be a place where the culture war takes place, it is now a place where you can comment about the culture war taking place somewhere else.
distic
1yr ago
Are you arguing that what he writes is false? For comparison, that is what is promised by the Culture War thread:
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time
Look at the discussions there are right now.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57553?context=8#context
Quality post, but not very culture war-y. Anyway, right now, no one really disagrees.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57543?context=8#context
A post criticizing a labour MP for his anti-incels politics (anti Labour so we might assume right wing). No one really disagrees.
Are The Global Elites Coordinating to Push LGBT Acceptance And Gender Theory? (https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57433?context=8#context )
Obviously right-wing, but there I have to admit there are some people arguing the other way. But the post was quite extreme by itself.
https://www.themotte.org/post/329/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/57424?context=8#context
A post about liberals using AI to push their views. Pretty right wing. Everyone agrees. More or less.
I stop there. I don't think the CW thread delivers on its promise to challenge your beliefs, especially if they are right wing or libertarians.
distic
1yr ago
What do you mean essentially the same? Obviously we learn that 2+2=4, do you think it means that it is the same as american culture? I doubt Americans spend as much time on grammar (and especially on french grammar) in the US. The language is not the same. It's not a detail: the book we read in class are not the same, they are from french literature. Do Americans ever read l'Avare, from Molière? Almost every french person has read it. Do most Americans ever hear about Racine and Corneille, about Flaubert and his master work, Madame Bovary? We learn at least two foreign languages, so that I can understand something like 50% of an article written in german, and like 95% of anything written in english (yet foreign language learning is not that good in France when compared to other european countries). Do Americans learn foreign languages? In history lessons, there is much emphasis on the french Revolution, but we almost never speak about the American revolution. Most french people do not even know there was an American revolution. Have Americans ever heard about Danton and Robespierre? About the differences between Jacobins and Girondins? There are also lessons on Napoleon, with much emphasis on his politics. Do Americans learn Napoleon's politics? So please tell me what is "essentially the same".
distic
1yr ago
Well, my personal problem with libertarian arguments is precisely that they are absolute and unbounded. I think it is actually a trade-off between freedoms. Most of the time freedom of speech must win but sometimes it is harmless if it does'nt.
distic
5mo ago
The original question was "why do neutral people not care?" not "is it good or bad". I think it is right to say that people do not care as it happens only to a small number of children, and also that it doesn't happen to children without their parent's consent. Which means that it may happen to children, but not to those of neutral people. That is why they don't care.
distic
6mo ago
Out of hate, perhaps? Or as a revenge? I'm pretty sure raping women is useless for the freedom of palestinians, it does not prevent hamas to do it. People do not always act in their best interests... if they did, there would be no suicide terror attack
distic
1yr ago
It means nothing because there is no control group. Replace "prayer" with a drug, and you get a shitty observational study that does not mean anything. I wouldn't take this drug.
distic
1yr ago
The problem with those claims is that they are non falsifiable. "Surface level" does not mean anything. I can prove that there is a huge difference and you can still claim it to be on surface level only. Actually your theory is really like marxism "anything non surface level can be explained by the class strugle". I am quite sure Marx would have loved your theory.
France, and a lot of other european countries, resist the american version of capitalism in some ways, and imitate it in other ways. If I say that all modern science is french because it uses the metric system excepted on a surface level, it is a ridiculous claim yet you can hardly disprove it as I did never explain what a surface level is. The french unions, the number of companies where the gouvernement has stocks (eg car companies, the train transportation company SNCF 100% state owned...), and the relationship of the people with the government are examples of things that are very different between french capitalism and american capitalism.
And hiding insults behind loosely related theories won't prove your point.
You cannot deduce that people are not born equal from the fact their parents are not equal, it's a mistake. There is a missing argument here. Indeed, assume that A is 10 times richer than B, but A has 10 children and B only has 1. Then the children are born equal, aren't they?
And also, the richest are only rich because everyone else is somewhat rich. You can only sell iphones or cars to people that are somewhat rich. Even amazon needs people to have phones or computers. So it regulates itself a little bit. I suspect the richest become relatively richer because the population grows. If you take 0.1 cent by product sold, it helps that there are more people.
distic
11mo ago
Yes, erasing people from history is a typical communist move. That's why you shouldn't do it, even to communists.
distic
1yr ago
This helpful article from Wikipedia may explain it all to you, it certainly opened my eyes:
Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being radically conservative, ultra-nationalist, and authoritarian, as well as having nativist ideologies and tendencies.
Historically, "far-right politics" has been used to describe the experiences of fascism, Nazism, and Falangism. Contemporary definitions now include neo-fascism, neo-Nazism, the Third Position, the alt-right, racial supremacism, National Bolshevism and other ideologies or organizations that feature aspects of authoritarian, ultra-nationalist, chauvinist, xenophobic, theocratic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, and/or reactionary views.
If Sanderson believes his church's teachings, and his church teaches that gay acts are sinful, then his church is homophobic. And being homophobic means you are far-right, which means you're the same thing as a Nazi. Doesn't matter if he never personally burned a gay or trans person at the stake, until and unless he denounces Mormonism and acknowledges his guilt and accepts he was wrong all along, he's a Nazi. And you don't tolerate Nazis, now do you?
You are drawing so much conclusions from a factual wikipedia article.
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It is a fact that the nazis were homophobic. It is also a fact that the nazis were far right, and also a fact that homophobia is a view held by a lot of far-right people. Are you challenging any one of these facts? It does not mean that if you are homophobic you are far right or a nazi. You know, most people have two legs but birds aren't people. By the way, you should have noted the "and/or" in the list, which suggests that far right people hold several of those views, not just one.
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"Doesn't matter if he never personally burned a gay or trans person at the stake, [...] he's a Nazi." When you do this comment, it seems to me you are saying that anyone who did not personally burned anyone cannot be a Nazi. In this case, there have been very few nazis. Hitler, for example, did not burn anyone "personally", as far as I know. At the end, the holocaust was organized in such a way that almost no one had to kill anyone directly. Not every nazi is a war criminal. Most nazis were just people like you and me that lived their lives peacefully. They just happened to vote for some nazi guy once, and to help the regime once in a while.
There is always this stupid idea that if only we were a bit kinder with those leaders (be it Hitler, Putin or others), if we had made just one or two small concessions, there would have been no war. But this is a complete misunderstanding of the nature of their regime. Whatever you give them, they see as a sign of weakness, a proof that they can push harder. You negociated with me about Syria, so that I can do anything there? I will also take Ukraine. You give me Danzig? I will also take Alsace. It's a game where they can only win: either you give them what they want, and they are stronger and can push for more, or you don't, and they get a casus belli.
EDIT:
In the wake of the 9/11 Attacks, the Jewish Neocons stampeded America towards the disastrous Iraq War and the resulting destruction of the Middle East, with the talking heads on our television sets endlessly claiming that “Saddam Hussein is another Hitler.”
By the way, I remember quite precisely what happened, and the jews were not responsible of it. All of America wanted this war. The people who opposed it took a ton of shit. You probably wanted this war yourself. But I guess it is easier to blame the stupid choices you made on the jews.
But that is precisely why losers should be required to provide proofs when they contest an election! Otherwise no peace is possible because the losers will always contest the results because it will always be in their best interest.
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