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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31743 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 2, 2023

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A recent event that I’m sure fully counts as culture war is the official removal in Odessa of the monument to the city’s founders, mainly Catherine the Great. The justification, which is rather easy to predict, is that Catherine was a perpetrator of Moskal imperialism who repressed Ukrainian patriots (supposedly they already existed back then), committed cultural genocide and erased Ukrainian nationhood (which obviously we’re also supposed to believe existed back then). There isn’t much to comment on this, I think (though I’ll again point out that Odessa would never have existed in the first place without Catherine), but an educated redditor was eager to point out* the curious fact that the removed monument is actually a replica erected in 2007, largely as a response to the events of the so-called Orange Revolution, as the original was removed (and supposedly destroyed) by the Soviets in 1920. So yes, it was originally removed as an imperialist relic, by powers that the Ukrainian authorities claim later perpetrated genocide specifically against Ukrainians because they were Ukrainians i.e. it was an incident between opposing factions of Ukraine deniers. This is where we’re at, which actually doesn’t surprise me that much because I believe we’ve been in a clown world for a long time.

*https://old.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/zyccgk/catherine_the_great_statue_taken_down_in_odesa/

I am mildly interested in how the quest for Ukrainian nation building will develop my lifetime. Right now they manage to co-opt two very opposing sets of political and philosophical schools, largely due to wartime mobilisation censorship and patriotism. On the one hand the Ukrainian identity is being based on 19th/early 20th century style blood and soil rhetoric. The defenders of white Christian (even pagan) Europe against eastern orc hordes. Unspoiled real Slavs against the crypto-Tatar Muscovites. Real European Christians unlike those Eastern Orthodox peasants. On the other hand their only hope for national survival in this day and age is to tightly integrate with the “GAE”. So the Ukrainian army puts up EU flags in newly reconquered territories. Their parliament is busy rushing through gay agenda bills. Their politicians are making deals with Blackrock and learning the ropes of the WEF circuit.

But when the war ends these two stories cannot coexist for long. You cannot arm neo-nazi battalions while going through the EU integration process. You cannot outright ban one of the largest churches as well as the linguistic communities in your country and try to enter the Schengen area. It’s not for nothing that half the EU funded ads targeted to my demographic on social media has some visible minorities (ie blacks) posing as proud Europeans. The nationalist Ukrainian state, if it ever stops being such a poor corrupt shithole and enters the EU, will have to cope with millions of African/South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants as well as the European Court of Human Rights rulings which will not tolerate the blood and soil rhetoric in practice. It’s ridiculous contradictions all over and makes me profoundly sad that so many young brave people are dying for a political project doomed to fail if it ever succeeds.

Something has to give in at some point. I don’t know what but I am not very hopeful about the results.

I am mildly interested in how the quest for Ukrainian nation building will develop my lifetime.

I agree that Ukraine founding fathers and founding myths are lame.

Imagine alternate timeline where CIA during Cold War chose different group of hopeless exiles, timeline where today's Hero of Ukraine(TM) is not this cringe nerd, but this majestic based Chad.

Everything else is the same, but the flags, symbols and songs so much more kino.

But it does not matter at all.

Every nation had to be built sometimes, mostly ad hoc out of very unsavory and contradictory material that just happened to be there at this time and place. Ukraine is no different.

If you are nationalist who sees mankind turned into unified faceless shapeless blob as the worst nightmare, if you see diversity of nations as good thing, you should celebrate, you should be thankful you can see birth of new nation.

Right now they manage to co-opt two very opposing sets of political and philosophical schools, largely due to wartime mobilisation censorship and patriotism. On the one hand the Ukrainian identity is being based on 19th/early 20th century style blood and soil rhetoric. The defenders of white Christian (even pagan) Europe against eastern orc hordes. Unspoiled real Slavs against the crypto-Tatar Muscovites. Real European Christians unlike those Eastern Orthodox peasants. On the other hand their only hope for national survival in this day and age is to tightly integrate with the “GAE”. So the Ukrainian army puts up EU flags in newly reconquered territories. Their parliament is busy rushing through gay agenda bills. Their politicians are making deals with Blackrock and learning the ropes of the WEF circuit.

Nothing contradictory about these positions, they can be resolved easily.

"Ukraine is Europe! What is Europe? Europe is, and always had been, land of free market and LGBTQ+ rights, as opposed to communist homophobic and transphobic orc hordes from the East!"

The more Russia celebrates their past, the more Russia bases its identity against LGBTQ+, the more natural this reaction is.

But when the war ends these two stories cannot coexist for long.

Yes they can.

You cannot outright ban one of the largest churches as well as the linguistic communities in your country and try to enter the Schengen area.

Yes you can.

The nationalist Ukrainian state, if it ever stops being such a poor corrupt shithole

If.

and enters the EU

Millions of Ukrainians already entered EU on their own, and millions more would follow.

will have to cope with millions of African/South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants as well as the European Court of Human Rights rulings which will not tolerate the blood and soil rhetoric in practice.

Ukraine is already part of Council of Europe, people already complained to ECHR about blatant sexist discrimination and breach of European Convention on Human Rights in today's Ukraine where men, only men, are banned from entering the country and subjected to draft due to their gender identity alone.

ECHR reply.

Compared to this, overlooking some edgy flags and symbols is nothing.

Color me shocked that nobody selected a peasant Anarchist who was easily duped by Bolshevik salami tactics to be the symbol of united Ukrainian nationhood. Instead they had to chose the cringe nerd for the sole but very obvious reason because they knew they could always portray him to the normies as a victim of Nazi repression, because "he was in a concentration camp". (In reality, he was under the equivalent of house arrest under comfortable conditions, because he had qualms about one aspect of the proposed National Socialist European New Order, namely that it didn't include an autonomous Ukrainian state.)

Europe is, and always had been, land of free market and LGBTQ+ rights

sure...lol. We'll see how much of a good political sell this will turn out to be. I suggest you don't hold your breath.

Color me shocked that nobody selected a peasant Anarchist who was easily duped by Bolshevik salami tactics to be the symbol of united Ukrainian nationhood. Instead they had to chose the cringe nerd for the sole but very obvious reason because they knew they could always portray him to the normies as a victim of Nazi repression, because "he was in a concentration camp". (In reality, he was under the equivalent of house arrest under comfortable conditions, because he had qualms about one aspect of the proposed National Socialist European New Order, namely that it didn't include an autonomous Ukrainian state.)

People who were on the German side in the second late unpleasantness are still considered sus (even if they eventually got on their wrong side) , and Bandera is, to use modern woke term, problematic figure, especially in Poland.

In addition of being much more charismatic, Hollywood blockbuster worthy figure, Makhno would not have any of this baggage. (well, the Mennonites might object)

Bandera was picked as Hero(TM) and Founding Father(TM) of Ukraine not only because CIA chose to support OUN, but also because Soviet propaganda made him into Big Bad and gave him in this way great name recognition. Not because of anything he personally did.

In contrast, Soviet propaganda was nearly silent about Anarchists - all Civil War books and movies portrayed it as exclusive struggle of Reds and Whites, with Blacks shown only as ocassional perpetually drunk comic relief guys (and Greens absent completely).

sure...lol. We'll see how much of a good political sell this will turn out to be. I suggest you don't hold your breath.

It worked excellently so far. Look outside of your bubble - general public in Western world loves capitalism and loves LGBTQ+.

You know what Ukrainian nationalists mean when they speak of "Europe", don't you?

You know what Ukrainian nationalists mean when they speak of "Europe", don't you?

What they want Europe to mean does not matter, what Europe really means does matter.

Look at Ukraininan laws that are actually passing now - these are not laws about defending "Aryan race purity", these are laws about deregulation, privatization, restricting labor rights and protecting LGBTQ+ rights.

Good response overall. You are probably right.

not this cringe nerd, but this majestic based Chad.

Man early 20th century was wild. Imagine a 1.65 man being such a chad today.

There are a lot of models among nearby countries, but populist right with a spark of social democratic welfare policies seems to work well in ex-Eastern Bloc democracies. If Ukraine joins the EU, I see them as bolstering the Vysehrad Tendency: in favour of the EU, but also strong on sovereignty issues, especially regarding borders.

That seems more likely than the National Liberalism of the Baltic States: fierce patriotism + liberalism. Some of the most fanatically anti-Russian and anti-communist people I know are very woke Balts, with militantly centrist liberal views on economic issues. Some of them are currently volunteering in Ukraine. Even though this is arguably the more natural way to reconcile the parts of Ukrainian nationalism that you mention.

I see them as bolstering the Vysehrad Tendency: in favour of the EU, but also strong on sovereignty issues, especially regarding borders

I strongly doubt this. Given how extraordinarily they will be indebted to the US and EU at the end of the war, I don’t think Ukraine will be at any position to have a political spine against the EU institutions. Something like Romania is much more likely. Very corrupt country going totally under the radar in the EU institutions since they vote with German line on every issue.

But of course no EU entrant country, not even Bulgaria, was as demographically, politically, economically fucked up as Ukraine. It’s also quite a large and populous country in comparison so I have doubts if the EU can spare funds necessary for its development even if they wanted. So this whole saga might also develop into a strange farce by time.

The EU line is not set in stone but is affected by what the political lines of the member states are. For a long time now smarter right-wingers and nationalists within EU have aimed at taking over EU instead of demolishing it, and if EU would eventually be joined by a strongly nationalist Ukraine (and it's quite likely strongly nationalist parties will be considerably stronger in Ukraine after this conflict, unless it gets totally defeated), it might very well bolster the efforts of such a tendency to make their line the mainstream line.

For a long time now smarter right-wingers and nationalists within EU have aimed at taking over EU instead of demolishing it

Who are these people and what have they achieved so far in your opinion?

Ukraine has also some resources, including not yet exploited gas fields.

Aren’t we supposed to be having an energy transition soon that will make not yet exploited gas fields obsolete?

If UE would continue pulling hard toward unstable sources like wind and solar that will make gas peakers (and pumped hydropower and other now theoretical grid-scale batteries) more needed, not less.

(or you can just redefine gas as green and renewable and go on if you really need this)

I agree with a lot of what you say, but I think it's hard to speculate what Ukraine will be like by the time they become full EU members or if that will even be possible, considering the possibility that Russia might still hold a lot of Ukraine after a peace deal. A situation like Georgia can't be ruled out.

The Ukrainians don't seem to have a lack of spine, and the Vysehrad Group have shown how the EU is pretty toothless against an awkward squad.

and the Vysehrad Group have shown how the EU is pretty toothless against an awkward squad.

I think this was due to EU institutions designed for horse trading between a handful of Western European countries (ie France and Germany basically) being unable to cope with the amount of veto power each member has when the number of members is almost 30. Currently that’s being fixed with Poland and Hungary acting as the comic book villains against whom we should empower our sensible heroic Eurocrat overlords. If Ukraine ever enters the EU (probably as part of a larger expansion including countries like Moldova, Serbia etc) this will imo be part of a larger deal to seriously empower the Center against member states. Or maybe this doesn’t happen at all and newly anointed eu members Ukraine and Georgia just become another set of US satellites in Brussels. Who knows

I hope they don't end up like Pakistan, where your entire identity and history is tied up in hating the country where it all comes from.

Without Islam, Pakistanis are just Indians, and that reality is indigestible to them. So instead of making peace with our shared history, they are on a quest to be an Islamic nation like no other. Sadly for them, there is no such thing as a culturally Muslim country. At that point, you're just copying Arab traditions, while the Arabs themselves see you as an impure/inferior race. The people are confused, because at an organic level, their traditions are very much Indian.

Indonesia effortlessly balances its Hindu cultural roots with Islam and Malaysia faces more friction, but still does a better job than Pakistan. You simply cannot build a stable country that is expected to hate its own cultural roots. In the subcontinent - Bangladeshis don't have this issue, because they have a real cultural sub-identity : Bengali. Pakistan can't adopt a similarly dominant local sub-identity for 2 reasons. First, Punjabi would be the most common sub-identity, but Sikhs have wholesale monopoly on that identity. Pakistani Islam can't make peace with a Sikh influenced co-identity. Second, Pakistan is multicultural, and separatist movements are rooted in resentment towards Punjabi dominance. Making that explicit will only give power to Balochi & Pashtun terrorists.

I can see some similar parallels here. From Hatred towards the mother-state, lack of a unifying identity that is separate from the mother-state and fostering snakes in their own backyard. (Islamists, Neo-nazis). Both of them are only important to NATO because they balance out hostile (to NATO) powers in the region. And the second you take the current military aid, their complete economic bankruptcy becomes hard to look away from.

Similarly, if you take away the history, then the mother-state is your most natural trading partner and prospective ally. Living with historic resentment actively makes life harder for your country.

I have more sympathy towards Ukraine because unlike Pakistan, their problems aren't of their own creation. But in 2022, Pakistan is the poster child of 'failed state'. I sure hope that Ukraine can avoid the same predicament.

I really like this framing, but the more I thought about it the less sure I became that it's likely. I'm hugely ignorant in the complexities of both societies, but it seems like Ukraine will have many advantages that Pakistan never had, or had working against it. Things like general level of tech and industry, access to wealth, landmass and sea access, education levels, etc. I'm really not sure about the religious thing. It seems a lot more 'hot' between Muslims and Hindus than it does between Eastern and Western Christians.

I would also predict that the most likely end to this war is a settlement where a big chunk of Ukriane ends up in Russia...likely, the 'more' culturally Russian bits they already have. This will act as a bit of a pressure valve for the two main factions presented in your argument.

I'm skeptical but interested.

It doesn’t fit their general image as a country but Pakistan has quite a lot of sea access by the way.

You know, this parallel never occurred to me, to be honest, but this write-up makes it completely clear. Thumbs up.

All excellent points. Thanks for the write up. I think people from countries undergoing recent nation building processes have a more instinctive understanding of the addictive emotional appeal as well as the absurdity and fragility of the whole thing compared to the Anglos on this platform.

Have you read Naipaul’s Among the Believers?

Similarly, if you take away the history, then the mother-state is your most natural trading partner and prospective ally. Living with historic resentment actively makes life harder for your country.

Good point, often very much overlooked. Soviet industries were designed for interdependence at a gigantic continental scale. Putting (economically) arbitrary borders in the different parts of these supply chains have been absolutely disastrous for everyone involved except the people looting and selling out the factories. Sealing shut the Belarus and Russian borders will destroy any remnants of Ukrainian industry and even if they manage to integrate into European scale supply chains this will be a very painful very long term project.

It's not too unusual for countries to define themselves as "not X and not Y". A famous statement of Finnish nationalism is "Swedes we are not, Russians we shall not be, thus let us be Finns".

Ukrainians define themselves in this way against Russia, of course, but have historically also done it against the idea that they're just "Ruthenians of the Polish nation" or whatever (after all, Poles are what Bandera and the gang fought against). Of course, in recent years, the definition-against-Polishness part has been quite muted.

"Svenskar äro vi inte längre, ryssar vilja vi inte bli, låt oss alltså bli finnar." We are no longer swedes, we don't want to be Russian, thus let us be finns.

Huh? The Finnish people have a peculiar ethnic origin and also a language that make them markedly distinct from both Slavic and Scandinavian peoples. Ukraine is in a different situation.

I will never get over the actual name Pakistan building off an acronym for the regional ethnic groups/regional areas. It would be like a US ethnic minority secession country calling itself Bipocia or the Pacific Northwest seceding as Pwnia.

I will never get over the actual name Pakistan building off an acronym for the regional ethnic groups/regional areas.

Not only this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan#Name_of_Pakistan

He added that "Pakistan is both a Persian and Hindi word... It means the land of the Paks, the spiritually pure and clean."[35] Etymologists note that پاک pāk, is 'pure' in Persian and Pashto[36] and the Persian suffix ـستان -stan means 'land' or 'place of'.[37][38][39][40]

...

It would be like a US ethnic minority secession country calling itself Bipocia or the Pacific Northwest seceding as Pwnia.

First name sounds good and is well pronounceable, and this is what matters.

Second name needs one more vowel.

Pownia? No, no one wants to be associated with losers who got captured.

Pawnia is it.

Pawnians arise! Fly your flag high and proud! Glory to the great Pawnia!

Pwnia

Pwnia, land of the Gamers and Haxors, est. 1337.

I can see some similar parallels here. From Hatred towards the mother-state, lack of a unifying identity that is separate from the mother-state and fostering snakes in their own backyard.

Pakistan, Ukraine, Ireland... anyone else?

I would argue (North) Macedonia. In opposition to Bulgaria rather than Greece.

To be fair Macedonia had always been a fairly distinct region with its own ethnic religious makeup. It’s also where half the ruling class of the early Turkish Republic came from coincidentally including Ataturk himself who is from Thessaloniki (a Jewish-Turkish-Bulgarian city of historical Macedonia until Greeks took over and ethnically cleansed everyone else).

It’s not super clear to me why the current version of Macedonia is so anti-Bulgaria.

The Bulgarian perspective is that North Macedonia to them is a lot like what Moldova is to Romania, that is that it's an identity constructed in the past by a bigger power to strengthen their hold of the region.

Moldovans in general seem somewhat agreeable or at worst ambivalent towards the claim that they are Romanians, but the people of North Macedonia seem very invested in their new national identity. They've engaged in some weird historical revisionism over the years, and the Bulgarians have viewed this as a kind of erasure of Bulgarian history.

England was supposed to be loving and caring mother of Ireland?

Obligatory Soviet joke is in order.

Teacher: Lil Peter, who are your parents?

Petya: Our great leader Stalin is my father, and our great Soviet country is my mother!

Teacher: You are smart boy. What you want to be when you grow up?

Petya: An orphan.

edit: link fixed

England was still the only nation willing to care about them i.e. she was willing to annex them, at least.

England was still the only nation willing to care about them i.e. she was willing to annex them, at least.

The Spanish are not amused with this answer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland%E2%80%93Spain_relations#Early_relations

In 1554-58 Philip Prince of Asturias was married to Mary I and was named as titular King of Ireland in the Papal Bull Ilius ad quem. As a result, during the first plantations of Ireland what is now County Offaly was shired as "King's County", and Philipstown (now Daingean) was named in his honour, the first Irish place named after someone from Spain. Soon after Mary's death he succeeded as Philip II of Spain.

In 1601, Spain supported Irish rebels fighting against England during the Nine Years War, and especially during the Siege of Kinsale. At the time, the Catholics of Ireland saw Spain as a potential liberator of their country from Protestant England and in 1595 Hugh O'Neill offered the crown of Ireland to Philip II of Spain. Philip refused the offer, having already been the titular King of Ireland.

England was supposed to be loving and caring mother of Ireland?

I think the mother nation here is intended in a different way. It’s clear both Ukraine and Pakistan used to be just some subregions of a greater civilisation with minor cultural differences. If early 20th century history worked out slightly differently the chances are they would never exist.

It’s clear both Ukraine and Pakistan used to be just some subregions of a greater civilisation with minor cultural differences.

Most of Ukraine was indeed a part of Poland/Lithuania for 300 years, and large parts were beyond that, as well. I'm sure that's not what is meant here, though, but it's still worth noting that the idea that Ukraine and Russia have been together forever and ever is rather tendentious - it requires an assumption that Kyivan Rus is in perfect equivalence to current Russia, for one, and the RSFSR/Ukraine relationship within Soviet Union has its own complications, as well.

Regarding Pakistan, I can't find it any longer, but I remember an interesting Quora post making the point that the territories currently forming Pakistan have actually spent surprisingly little time being a part of the same political unit as the (most of the) rest of India, and most of that time was during explicitly Muslim empires or other foreign rule - for instance, the British only managed to make headway in Pakistan starting from 1830s, and the British conquest of former Durrani territories in current Pakistan really only got going around some decades later.

Most of Ukraine was indeed a part of Poland/Lithuania for 300 years, and large parts were beyond that, as well.

I think there is a misunderstanding here. The expression "Ukraine" and "Ukrainian" has indeed been in use for hundreds of years in Russia, Poland and also Lithuania, but this is a geographic phrase applied to the same borderland or border/outer region located between the two powers and its inhabitants (this is what the word literally means).

I meant the current territory of Ukraine, here. The point being that the Ukrainian and Russian populations have lived in separate states for centuries before the formerly-Polish territories fell under the Russian Empire control.

Of course, other parts of Ukraine weren't controlled by Poland at any point, but most of those weren't controlled by Russia, either, during that period, but rather by the Golden Horde and the various other Khanates, and were then resettled - as far as I've understood - chiefly from Ukraine.

That’s true. A bit difficult for me to imagine how such a cultural divide is being bridged over by the current nationalist Ukraine. Turkey has its fair share of nation building monstrosities but at least virtually all of its peoples and territories had been the part of same empire since like forever.

The Republic Ireland as such has done markedly better than those two with independence.

How bad can a country located in Northern Europe and didn’t enter the WW2 do for itself in the 20th century realistically though?

See Ireland, Northern.

Also not as bad as Pakistan or Ukraine, but a lot worse than Ireland in terms of ethnic conflict.

Also, Spain, which stayed out of WW2, but nonetheless managed to have a civil war that was even nastier than Ireland's and a very long period of fascism/post-fascism (rather than just De Valera's long fantasy of a Celtic Catholic leprechaun kingdom.)

Isn’t their GDP per capita roughly equal to Wales? I don’t think they could keep up such alright economic standards with so much ethnic violence if they were located in any other part of the world

Fair point. I suppose that raises the further question, "What's wrong with Wales?", but we don't have all week.

More comments

will have to cope with millions of African/South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants

Ukraine will? What on Earth are you talking about?

Look up the demographics of any former Iron-Curtain country in the EU and see if you can find even one whose current population born in those region breaches a single percentage point.

This is entirely a choice of national governments, not the EU.

The nationalist Ukrainian state, if it ever stops being such a poor corrupt shithole and enters the EU, will have to cope with millions of African/South Asian/Middle Eastern immigrants

Are you taking my sentence out of context on purpose?

This is entirely a choice of national governments, not the EU.

No it’s the migrants’ choice. Entire Eastern Europe gives massive youth emigration to the west because wages are low and living standards are low. That’s also why foreigners don’t go there. It’s naive to think this won’t change fast if they manage to catch up economically.

No it’s the migrants’ choice.

No it's not. Migrants choose to go to countries (through the asylum route) where they're unlikely to be deported (government policy) and where they're allowed to get into a benefits program and/or the job market (also government policy). It is entirely a government's choice to receive them, and a choice that EU countries are in fact free to not make, i.e. Denmark ever since their Social Democrats took power.

Is Denmark the only example of this supposed policy power? Because their anti immigrant social democrats caused at best some levelling off of still very high immigration levels. IIRC around 50k new comers for a country of 5 million each year. Do the population replacement math over a couple decades and it’s hard to see how this is a good example of anything.

IIRC around 50k new comers

It's a good example because they're overwhelmingly not from those regions you thought Ukraine would have to cope with. Which is what I thought was your issue.

Much of this immigration is from other EU countries, which Denmark cannot prevent whilst in the EU (and, more specifically, the Schengen area).

Yes that’s exactly my point. Denmark doesn’t have that much of a choice. Most they can affect is to replace the Iraqis with Romanians in the short term. Slight improvement

Poland constructed border wall and illegally pushed back migrants.

Unlike with almost all other things EU was not really complaining (unless it is proceeding and someone plans to dump also this on Poland/PiS?).

They like handouts. Migrants can and do work in Czech Republic - I see plenty of them. There's such a dearth of workforce actual Mongolians are being brought in to work in slaughterhouses and logistics. There is still a labor shortage.

Meanwhile, almost every middle easterner relocated to Czech Republic hoofs it over the border to Germany. Where.. what % of 'migrants' are employed? A third.

But when the war ends these two stories cannot coexist for long. You cannot arm neo-nazi battalions while going through the EU integration process.

More canny observers of Ukrainian politics claim it's not so simple. You can be e.g. an anti-communist communist, or you can be a neonazi battalion whose main sponsor is a Jewish oligarch. It's a land of many possibilities! Besides, they'd be 'our' neonazis.

Maybe the first generation stays in place but the second generation gets citizenship and can go anywhere. It will probably be a while before they decide to go to Ukraine, but they definitely will in the end. Same thing happened in the US, the immigrants all arrive in the coastal cities but they don't all stay there.

You cannot outright ban one of the largest churches as well as the linguistic communities in your country and try to enter the Schengen area.

So I guess Latvia just risked getting thrown out? /s

https://www.agenzianova.com/en/news/Latvia-passes-a-law-in-parliament-to-ban-the-use-of-the-Russian-language/

Looks like they are being opportunistic and trying to get this through while the emotions are high. Curious to see what will end up happening.

Latvia didn't grant automatically citizenship to Soviet immigrants who arrived during occupation. To get a Latvian passport they were required to pass a language and history test. But many immigrants decided to acquire Russian citizenship instead because the retirement age for Russian citizens was lower.

Now some of those people are in trouble because Latvia requires language test for permanent residents and if they fail to pass it, they can be deported to the country of their citizenship – Russia. In fact, it is very hard to learn a language once you have reached retirement age. But they made their choice where their loyalties are. Those who remain non-citizens of Latvia (a special status) are safe as they have practically the same rights as citizens and cannot be deported.

It is mostly about stopping providing public services in Russian. The main goal is to strengthen the use of Latvian language. The EU will not stop this as they leave linguistic matters to each member country to decide.

During the Soviet times everyone in Latvia had to speak Russian to effectively participate in the society. Now it is not the case and most young people don't speak Russian anymore. But the tradition to provide services in both Latvian and Russian limits their job opportunities, especially in the lowest paid jobs in customer service sector. The rule will simply make sure that there is no expectation that one can get public services in Russian. Most Russian speakers also speak Latvian to some degree, so it should not be a practical problem.

Russians demanding that they should be able to speak Russian everywhere and not required to learn a local language even if they become residents in Latvia, are arrogant and misguided.

I get what you’re saying about ethnonationalist/globalist tensions, but is it really as dramatic as you make it sound?

visible minorities posing as proud europeans

Uh huh. If your barometer for intolerable equity is ads with black people, maybe the EU isn’t for you. I don’t think thats a deal breaker for most people. If the EU can fold in Baltics and Balkans they can put up with Kislev.

If your barometer for intolerable equity is ads with black people, maybe the EU isn’t for you

In my mind I was thinking of the deluge of ads I kept seeing around the last EU Parliament election where a group of young fashionable Africans were waving EU flags and merrily going to vote. Quick googling says Africans make up around 2% of EU population, and that is mostly due to France. I don't know where you live, but I really don't see many black people around in daily life unless I go to certain neighborhoods. The casting was clearly motivated to give certain political vibes so I don't think it is strange to notice it when you are suddenly targeted with such ads.

Real European Christians unlike those Eastern Orthodox peasants.

Ukraine is majority Orthodox. The main internal religious conflict is between the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, long considered schismatic by other Orthodox churches but currently considered canonical by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and some other local Orthodox churches, and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate), which is - as the name say - still at least formally connected to the Moscow Patriarchate and considered the only canonical church in Ukraine by a number of other Orthodox churches and in the process of being banned (not a good move in my opinion).

Their parliament is busy rushing through gay agenda bills.

I'm not sure what this refers to. The Ukrainian parliament was given a petition on legalizing same-sex civil unions and Zelenskyy gave verbal support for studying the issue in August, but insofar as I've seen, this has not processed since and is still evidently considered somewhat uncertain. The war has almost certainly made Ukrainians more positive about LGBT+ affairs (unsurprising, considering how strongly Russia has counterposed itself against that issue), but it doesn't seem anything is, at least, being rushed through.

and in the process of being banned

I share a bit of your concern here with respect to freedom of religion, but it's worth noting the actions of the Russian Orthodox Church (statements by Kirill, most notably) are quite relevant to the current war. It's not really a comparable situation to, say, the Vatican in WWII.

actions of the Russian Orthodox Church (statements by Kirill, most notably) are quite relevant to the current war

How so?

There've been reports of Russia using the Orthodox Church as a network for its spies:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/31/world/europe/orthodox-church-ukraine-russia.html

https://orthodoxtimes.com/orthodox-church-of-russia-acquired-properties-in-norway-next-to-military-bases-in-recent-years/

And Russian Orthodox Church was basically taken over by state during USSR and even before it was strongly supporting Russian state.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow is also supporting Russian invasion

On 9 March 2022, after the liturgy, he declared that Russia has the right to use force against Ukraine to ensure Russia's security, that Ukrainians and Russians are one people, that Russia and Ukraine are one country, that the West incites Ukrainians to kill Russians in order to sow discord between Russians and Ukrainians and gives weapons to Ukrainians for this specific purpose, and therefore the West is an enemy of Russia and God.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarch_Kirill_of_Moscow#Support_for_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine,_2022

main internal religious conflict is between the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, long considered schismatic by other Orthodox churches but currently considered canonical by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and some other local Orthodox churches, and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate)

That is interesting to learn. I wasn't aware of the divided Orthodox churches, and mentally processed the news of the ban as a ban on the Orthodox Church as a whole.

The war has almost certainly made Ukrainians more positive about LGBT+ affairs

Is there some poll indicating this?

Ukraine is one of those countries where most Westerners interface with only a small educated liberal cohort so I suppose this skews understanding what is really happening on the ground vs what those people wish. For example from your post I am realizing that I drew the wrong conclusions about the legal enshrining of LGBTQ+ rights from browsing the English language Ukraine subreddit where any gesture in that direction is greatly amplified.

That is interesting to learn. I wasn't aware of the divided Orthodox churches, and mentally processed the news of the ban as a ban on the Orthodox Church as a whole.

The Orthodox church issue in Ukraine is really kind of infuriating in the way that it's a really thorny problem in the Orthodox world (and the Ukrainian church issues have been a minefield in online Orthodox discussions for a long time now), scarcely understood outside of the Orthodox circles at all, and most Orthodox sources one can find online are "Moscow partisans" (not necessarily members of Moscow Patriarchate affliated churches, but still holding their general perspective, ie. that UOC-MP is the only canonical church and OCU is schismatic and thus not really Orthodox, which allows for straightforward statements like "Zelenskyy is banning Orthodox church in Ukraine").

I can try to effortpost on this if someone is interested.

Sure go ahead!

Is there some poll indicating this?

Yes, here, for example.

Ukrainian identity is being based on 19th/early 20th century style blood and soil rhetoric

No. Though some splinters remain (some very obvious nazi groups), the model the diaspora coalesced on by the 50s, which became state policy 8 years ago, is a multi-ethnic national state. Rudnytsky, Hrushevsky, Lypynsky etc. are taught in school... Dontsov and his ilk have no cachet today. But yeah, sure, obsess about a few hundred (surviving) neonazis in Azov.

N.b. Kiev already had quite a lot of Afghan and Iraqi refugees. Already by 2017, most drivers couldn't speak Russian, Ukrainian or English.

Though some splinters remain (some very obvious nazi groups), the model the diaspora coalesced on by the 50s, which became state policy 8 years ago, is a multi-ethnic national state. Rudnytsky, Hrushevsky, Lypynsky etc. are taught in school

Would be happy to know more about the significance of these people and the meaning of "multi-ethnic" in your usage. Which multi ethnicities are we talking about exactly?

Primarily Russians, Poles, Jews, Tatars, Greeks, Romanians, Hungarians etc.

Historically, the key event which formed Ukraine was the Polish Lithuanian commonwealth forming in 1569 (from a centuries long personal union). Poland and Lithuania continued to have different legal codes etc. but this shifted the border of Poland East, making the modern day Lithuanian-Ukrainian border to the North and the Russian-Ukrainian border to the North East. (Eventually, Ukrainians and Belarusians would have different national geneses due to different cultural contexts after this point, namely the Lithuanians not being exposed to the following.) Note, Lithuania was primarily an Eastern Slav state, using a legal code written in Church Slavonic etc. but the upperclasses started Polonizing in the 1500s.

Now become Poland, the South East of the commonwealth was flooded by rich Poles (only Lithuanians could own land in Lithuania) and Jews. They brought Polish methods of farming over, namely serfdom (a different form existed further East) to sell grain westwards. Many Eastern Slavs followed suit, adopting Renaissance learning, Catholicism and the Polish language. Many others were able to stay free, but didn't enjoy rights. Poland was rather democratic at the time, with the nobility (making up 10-20% of the population) participating in representative democracy. Outside of the nobility, even the "registered cossacks" couldn't make full use of the courts etc. To the South were the Ottomans (the Crimean Khanate (a mongol successor state) shifted in and out of their sphere) who often launched slave raids on the coasts and southern steppe. In a war in 1648, discontent at getting enserfed, at not being able to use the courts etc. boiled over and the cossacks rebelled. Somewhat losing, they then signed a treaty with Russia, which didn't go well. A lot of interesting stuff happened (Polish nobility converted to Protestantism, then back to Catholicism, part of the Orthodox church went into communion with the Catholic church, Ukrainian churchmen brought scholarship to Moscow, Lazar Baranovych came up with the 3rd Rome story etc.) Then Russians came under Catharine, who settled the steppes and coasts, which were primarily empty (fear from slave raids) or inhabited by Turks (Tatars) so Russians came. Greeks had been living on the coasts the whole time under the Turks at this point (Athens got its wheat from Southern Ukraine).

In the 19th century, looking at all of this, inspired by the German national awakening which threw off Napoleon, the Hungarians, the Croats/Serbs etc. etc. further West in Europe, many theoreticians of Ukrainianhism appear. They worked to fight Polish landlords (for reasons). Whereas other nationalists came up with historic narratives, made notes of the nobility's roots etc. to justify their people, the Ukrainians didn't have these things. Others had ruled them for many centuries etc. But there were a lot of them, speaking the same language(ish). Wasn't that enough?

Well, to answer your question, finally: Hrushevsky tried the traditional method, writing massive tomes of past history describing the existence of the Ukrainians or their lands from time immemorial (until the 1660s). He tried to provide a legitimizing context, showing the people's engagement in politics, what they were doing etc. If Hungary had a king ruling by divine right, the crown's actions described the nation. But if Ukraine doesn't, you have to describe the people's actions, customs, social history etc.

Now that's all fun and good, but how is a state supposed to form? How are the peasants supposed to conduct trade, pay taxes etc. when the cities are primarily filled with others? Should Ukraine be the countryside while the cities are not Ukraine? Lypynsky answers: Hell, even our fairy tales have Tatars, we've had these others here for ages! They belong here. Indeed, he wanted the Polish and Russian nobility to stay and guard the Ukrainian people, he was a monarchist... If Polish nobility existed in Russia under the Tsar and Austrian Kaiser, why couldn't they under a Ukrainian Hetman? Hrushevsky adopts this. Of course, his past work included many "non-Ukrainians" and besides, what is a Ukrainian? An Orthodox Eastern Slav? How's that different from the historical Lithuanians or the Russians or? It's different because we have this land touched by so many foreigners. The Russians in the East lived centuries under the mongols, they had serfdom for much longer, they didn't have nobles with rights or property, but we got Western serfdom, we had scholars of Greek, thousand year old cathedrals, elections etc.! And from those in the North, they didn't suffer under the Polish landlords.

(A lot happens. Austria-Hungary fell (where Ukrainians throve and fought Poles), independent Poland gained control over millions, removing their rights (universal male suffrage in Austria-Hungary's lost), famines, wars, mass murder, communism, fascism (everyone but the Czechs were Authoritarian to fascist in the 1930s...) The same bad things happened in most of Eastern Europe, with huge ethnic cleansings, expulsions etc. resulting in today's rather unmixed states. Anyway...)

Rudnytsky continues this further. He studies in Poland, a multiethnic state desiring a Central European union of sorts (as a bulwark against Germany and Russian imperialism, some of the minorities called this Polish imperialism), then Nazi Germany (weird, eh? Still trying to understand these points visawise), but leaves to Prague (still during the war) fearing being caught as a Jew. He eventually finds himself in the US. There, he writes many articles for a dissident Polish publication in Paris: Kultura. These Poles get read a lot by Polish dissidents - and have specific policy pieces. One of which is accepting Vilnius and Lviv as Lithuania and Ukraine (and not Poland, saying no to territorial disputes). When socialism falls, their policy suggestions are implemented immediately in Poland. As are Rudnytsky's in Ukraine. Writing to the Ukrainians diaspora, he said Ukraine shall be a virile push into the future, not dwelling in the past. Instead of Lypynsky's loyalty to the Tsar, loyalty to the Ukrainian people! And everyone who's loyal to them is Ukrainian! (Who's American? The Americans! That guy waving the flag with a slight foreign accent who came last month, what about that guy [insert politics you don't like]? Still American, technically. Embracing it makes you one, being there also does etc.

(For whatever reason, many Ukrainians ended up in the Canadian plains. They were sort of an incubation chamber for Ukrainianism, in communion with ideas from Austria-Hungary and then the 20s USSR, but not being exposed to famine, war and genocide. Many were also in the North Eastern US. They would sort of move into Ukraine in the 90s, but their influence was spotty in a way I don't fully understand. In constant contact with other diasporas, they largely maintain a bit of Polish, Russian and Ukrainian, so you don't get too many ethnopurists.)

Now, Rudnytsky's family language was Polish, their mother's family language was Yiddish, Dontsov's brother was a Russian bolshevik. Lypynsky was a Pole. (Hrushevsky seems fully Ukrainian.) They all just embraced and made Ukrainianism. This was common in Hungarian, German, Czech, Finnish and Russian nationalisms too, where e.g. a Swedish speaking Ethnic Swede would compile the great epic of Finnish literature or German factory owners (like emigrated from Germany) would research the origins of Hungarian and make their kids Hungarian politicians. (Hungary's great project was to turn everyone they could into a Hungarian through forced schooling, much like Argentina in the late 19th century did with the Italian etc. immigrants.)

Contrary to this, in the interwar Poland great resentment appeared, where in some provinces in the 20s regular assassinations of government officials took place. (This stopped in the 30s after people saw what was going on in the USSR, so less rights in Poland than in the past under the Austrians was still better than... Yeah.) In this milieu you get guys like Dontsov. He quit socialism before it won out in Russia, and thought Hitler was the bomb. Obviously independent Ukraine failed after WWI because of the minorities. When the Nazis appeared, many of this ilk in Poland joined in the killing of Jews, and Poles. Similar happened in Lithuania. Much was less than ideological and just police continuing to police under the new leadership, just with different commands. (These guys also disliked the Czechs and wanted to incorporate Rusyns, who are sort of Eastern Slavs further West than Ukraine.)

So, did they just cleanly disappear, these guys who genocided 200,000 Poles for the Nazis? Oh no, their plans succeeded. They won. The USSR pushed Ukraine West, expelling a few million Poles, beyond their greatest dreams. (Ukrainians still in Poland were either sent to Ukraine, or sent to resettle the lands taken from Germany in 1945. Socialist Poland was fixated on the Polish ethnicity, declaring the country purely Polish in the 70s. Thus the Kultura Poles, opposing socialism, also opposing such mononationalisms. Socialist Romania and Bulgaria were also extremely nationalist, deporting a few million Germans, Bulgarians etc.) Some survived the war, floated around the diasporas etc. but all the far right parties in Ukraine get less than 1% of the vote now.

This is the Ukrainian narrative, generated from talking to Ukrainian friends, living there, reading 6 books, seeing some lectures. My personal thoughts are a bit different, mostly boiling down to: All Slavs (at least Eastern Slavs) should speak one language, all Romance speakers should also etc. (more cultural connections for better literature, maybe), but many states. 1000 Slavic states! (Many courts to patronize poets...) Nationalism distracts from poetry.

Socialist Romania and Bulgaria were also extremely nationalist, deporting a few million Germans, Bulgarians etc.)

Also quite a lot of Turks (ie just Muslims). Very significant parts of Western and Central Anatolia are full of ethnically cleansed people of Bulgaria.

Thanks for the great write up. Overall the story resonates with me quite a bit. It’s easy to come up with theories of multicultural nations prospering with complicated ethnic arrangements if you are from a wealthy family and lived under the stabilising hand of great Empires. But when the push comes to shove and millions of ordinary people find themselves with the ideological framework of nationalism, means and the opportunity to settle long standing grudges.. they are not so cosmopolitan minded.

Also what I am missing in your story is the affects of Bolshevik approach to the minority groups. I understand that generally they acted to keep national consciousness of minority groups alive through education policies, political groupings and redrawing of borders because they were trying to counteract Russian national consciousness as a threat to their rule. At least this is the impression I get from Russian nationalist sources.

Also missing is the elephant in the room, the Russians and their language. How does the fact that the current Ukraine state is clearly acting to suppress the use of their language and in general their identity, reconcile with your claim that it also accepts itself as a multi ethnic country? I can think of 3 types of successful multi ethnic countries:

  1. USA, Australia, UK etc. The main ethnicity has set up such a prospering country that the others integrate by themselves because it has clear massive advantages. Maybe some nudging is used but overall not much force.

  2. Brazil and US with slaves and native peoples. Clear disregard for the minority culture and heavy oppression. Minority cultures aren’t strong enough to resist. This is what Turkey tried and failed with Kurds.

  3. India. Increasingly Western Europe. Some overarching culture is adopted as the dominant culture. Anglo culture in both cases. This smoothes the tensions between different groups.

The theoreticians you listed mostly clearly imagined something like the first model. All early nationalist theoreticians were very optimistic after all about how great their nation would turn out to be. But the resulting country is clearly rather shit and Russians aren’t integrating so voluntarily. Their framework doesn’t offer any real alternatives. Soviet Union tried to use the Russian culture as the overarching framework but that failed and now not an option. Ukrainian state has been trying the second option but it’s quite risky especially if the minority population has a gigantic mother country nearby who has geopolitical interests in invading you.

In the end maybe this war resolves the problem “organically”. People of Ukraine are being forced to choose a side and if UAF somehow doesn’t manage to re-conquer the annexed territories, it will have a much more ethnically pure albeit smaller country in the future with almost all citizens dedicated to the nationalist project.

tl;dr: Yes, Russia made everyone choose a side and the masses clearly chose Ukraine, including the vast majority of Russian(speaker)s. The war is daily souring impressions further, making people transition to Ukrainian more and more. Ethnic purity is literally irrelevant, buy in for the anti-Russia project counts. See many Russian dissidents who moved to Ukraine and became Ukrainian citizens in the past years.

Also quite a lot of Turks (ie just Muslims). Very significant parts of Western and Central Anatolia are full of ethnically cleansed people of Bulgaria.

Yes, very much so.

But the resulting country is clearly rather shit and Russians aren’t integrating so voluntarily.

Well, that's not true.

People of Ukraine are being forced to choose a side

They've clearly chosen one. The 20-30% of the Donbas still living there don't speak well for Russian rule. In the past, I was antimaidan (primarily for cultural reasons), I knew many who'd gladly have integrated into Russia in 2015 or so. [3] But time changes things.

Something like 10 million Russian speaking Ukrainians moved Westward as a result of the war, just further to the West or into the EU. I've seen a few online showing support for Russia, I know a few who used to live in Ukraine in the past or who went to the Donbas in 2014, but literally everyone else is strongly pro-Ukrainian. No one cares about "ethnically pure" because it's impossible. Everyone has Russian and Polish ancestors, generally grandparents. Many in government, in the military etc. continue to use Russian day to day (weird instances like the Mayor of Kharkov's fine aside).

I lived in Kharkov, Kiev and Odessa at different times, viewing them as nice Russian cities where I nearly never encountered Ukrainian. I was there not too long before the war too. Hell, just go to Ukrainian subreddits. Plenty of Russian is used. Plenty of Russians use it in Ukraine. Denying that's just a blatant lie [7], whether from ignorance or something else. Well, what is a "Russian"? That's the hard part... [4] You can change languages quickly. See Svyatoslav Vakarchuk (singer of a big rock band), Volodomir Rafayenko (a big novelist) or Zelensky [5] himself. They all primarily used Russian and were very popular in Russia. At different stages, they became unwelcome in Russia - not because of their Ukrainianness, but because they didn't support the Donbas or such. Volodomir for example quickly learned Ukrainian and started writing novels in it instead.

Kharkov and Odessa aren't suddenly speaking Ukrainian (although many people are changing their correspondence to Ukrainian - I've had some friends stop talking because they no longer feel comfortable speaking Russian, associating it with the people shelling them for months - and we share no other language. In the Summer this was higher [2] , but then people shifted back to Russian a bit.) This is what time changed. Russians in Ukraine saw life in the Donbas go from the wealthiest places in Ukraine to a mafiarun hellzone where bandits force people to sign property away at gunpoint, like a far worse version of the 90s. That's what "Russia" means now. Not culture, freedom of language, becoming another Chelyabinsk etc. but the destruction of everything built in the past decades. This is not Russian vs. Ukrainian but Russia vs. Ukraine, two East Slavic states speaking extremely similar languages. The difference is in government, economic outcomes.

------ random links etc -----

Note, no census since 2001. I believe Ukraine's population is quite low now, perhaps even under 30 million (the Donbas is certainly under 2 million): https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/ymryp5/credibledefense_daily_megathread_november_05_2022/iv97rtc/?context=999

[2] https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/zfy88s/credibledefense_daily_megathread_december_08_2022/izhip9q/?context=999

[3] https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/ze65px/credibledefense_daily_megathread_december_06_2022/iz7tc06/?context=999 and https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/u0g54m/ukraine_conflict_megathread_april_10_2022/i45tf36/?context=999

[4] censuses in the whole region are deceptive. E.g. the terms translated as "native language" don't refer to the language(s) you grow up speaking, but what you believe your ancestral language is. Many will declare their native language as something they don't speak, especially in Russia and Kazakhstan.

This may interest you: https://old.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/yom5fv/credibledefense_daily_megathread_november_07_2022/ivi3blh/?context=999

Also n.b. I'm pro-Crimea not being in Ukraine. E.g. https://old.reddit.com/comments/45tl6z/_/d00bq3i/?context=999

If you want, pm me and we can talk on telegram. Perhaps you can speak to many Russians in Ukraine/Russian Ukrainians or however to phrase it.

Note, I say Russian and Ukrainian are nearly identical, yet it's uncomfortable for me to try to understand Ukrainian or to Ukrainianize my speech. So the differences are there in practice but they feel small. Really it's a sign of weak friendship, eh?

[5] Zelensky being pro-Russian language: http://news.sevas.com/world/zelenskij_o_zaprete_vezda_rossijskih_artistov_v_ukrainu

Also note Zelensky's corruption shown in the Pandora papers.

[7] but there's a lot of uncomfortable space re: language laws. But every article about "Russian being banned" exaggerate much smaller steps.

Thanks for the sources will definitely check them. I am generally very skeptical of enthusiasm for post-maidan Ukraine. Economic indicators don’t show a developing country at all, their demographics are still collapsing at East Asian levels and my only personal experience with Ukraine in the last decade has been the white woman trade in Turkey shifting from Russian to Ukrainian sourced.

I have strong suspicions most of this enthusiasm comes from a small group of well connected well educated people who suddenly received a flush of western NGO money and political power. I am very familiar with the Turkish version of this class of people and I see everyday how their views of the country influence foreigners so much. Creates a strange echo chamber where an average German is getting reflected back the views their own government is paying those locals to hold. The difference is those people are constantly limited and hindered by the Turkish government while they have free rein in Ukraine.

I have no illusions about Russia’s power of winning hearts and minds either. Their economic recovery miracle failed to take off and now indefinitely cancelled. What sensible person would want to live there instead of the “West”? Especially if they don’t even have to leave home and the west comes to their country. Turkey was supposed to be “almost” entering the EU recently as well so I get that feeling of hope for a better future very well. It’s quite likely the Kremlin boomers finally realised that they are definitely going to lose all influence in Ukraine soon and got scared of what might come if Ukraine with a fully NATO trained army and very hostile population decided to solve the Crimea problem once and for all. Then they fucked even that up…

Me too. I've heard of multiethnic states and nation/ethnostates, but a "multi-ethnic national state" sounds like an odd concept.

At one time, the Baltic countries joined the EU and became part of the "GAE". And they have deprived a third of their population of the right to vote on the basis of ethnicity. So I don't think that Ukraine will have problems with neo-Nazis.

Migrants go to Germany, France, Sweden - rich socialist states. Even Poland has a negative emigration balance in the EU. Probably Ukraine will never have to deal with mass migration from Africa.

From a demographic point of view, it is much more interesting how a country with one of the lowest fertility in the world and a population of less than 40 million people will exist after at least 10 million people left it. (Most of which are women and most of them will not return). This will probably be the biggest gender imbalance in history. Will Ukraine declare itself the first incel state? Will it provoke insanely high levels of crime and suicide? It will be interesting to watch.

Never is a long time. What year do you think African migration to the EU will stop in?

UGCC becomes a more powerful faction- it was already on the demographic upswing, is mostly in the west(so relatively undamaged), and like most conservative catholic groups maintains an above replacement fertility rate.

And they have deprived a third of their population of the right to vote on the basis of ethnicity.

None of the Baltic countries has "deprived a third of their population of the right to vote on the basis of ethnicity", this assuredly referring to stateless post-Soviet citizens in Estonia and Latvia (not Lithuania, incidentally). Currently ca 9-10 % of Latvian and 7-8 % of Estonian population has the non-citizen status; this was not based on ethnicity but on the basis of becoming resident in these countries during Soviet occupation times (in other words, people descending from Estonian or Latvian Russian minorities that had existed there before the Soviet occupation gained citizenship among the others). Of course the noncitizen numbers were larger in the past decades, but many of them have been naturalized since.

It was a decision clearly motivated by nationalism. If this did not embarrass the leaders of the EU, then the AZOV regiment will definitely not embarrass them.

That still definitely sounds to me like something the EU would never tolerate against any other ethnic group. You would likely get jail time in Germany for even championing stripping new comers of their citizenship.

Again, it wasn't done against one ethnic group. The group of stateless citizens included Ukrainians, Azeris etc. in addition to Russians.

Estonia and Latvia did this under rather special circumstances. In the Baltic countries, the historical view - with justification - is that the countries were illegally occupied in 1940-1991, with the legal state continuity instead being carried by the exile governments abroad. The fall of Soviet Union then meant the end of occupation; in this view, nobody was stripped of the Estonian/Latvian citizenship, since legally the newcomers had never even held it, as no citizenship application had been processed by a legitimate government in those countries.

Of course, this did lead to a fair mess regarding the status of the noncitizens and the fact that Lithuania solved this issue differently despite a similar history to other Baltic countries complicates things, but it's still important to remember what the legal justification for all of this is, insofar as Estonia and Latvia view the issue.

with the legal state continuity instead being carried by the exile

For multiple generations? That's just a ridiculous legal fiction. "Actually this group people born and raised in foreign countries who have never held any political power within you or your parent's lifetime was your true government all along. Oh, and they're now deciding who in the past few generations was a real citizen and who was not."

Well, let's say your country was occupied by some foreign country. The government flees into exile while the foreign country installs a puppet government which then okays an annexation to the said foreign land. Would you instantly consider the exile government to have lost legitimacy? During WW2 era this happened to many countries (the Dutch, say), and it's generally considered that the Dutch government didn't instantly lose its legitimacy when this happened.

Of course, if you believe that the exile government is legitimate, the question becomes when the loss of legitimacy would then happen. It's not like the exile governments consisted just of "people born and raised in foreign countries", the last exile PM and acting President of the Estonian exile government had been citizens of Estonia before the annexation.

That's just a ridiculous legal fiction.

All discussion of legality is a discussion of fiction, what's your point?

My point was clearly stated. Let's not do the thing where we pretend not to understand common and clear phrases.

More comments

Indeed, it sounds rather far-fetched and just done out of spite.

When Slovenia became independent it offered those of her residents that were citizens of other Yugoslav republics, mostly gasterbaiters who came to Socialist Republic of Slovenia during the time when it was under communist occupation, to apply for Slovene citizenship. Those that refused to do so, were treated as foreigners.

But unhappy that their hedging of support for Slovenia wasn't ignored, they ultimately appealed to the ECHR, which considered the newly independent state in the wrong, and "The Erased" to be correct.

Edit: While here Slovenia was condemned for its discrimination against non-Slovenes, the Foibe massacres and the forceful removal of Gottschee Germans, two much more violent affairs, went unpunished.

gasterbaiters

Gastarbeiter. Capitalized, e and a in their correct places, and it's already plural.

Oxford dictionary disagrees with you

I don’t think weird German grammar rules keep applying when English decides absorb a word

More comments

This sounds rather like an Isolated Demand for Leniency. Any government who really dislikes their previous government can declare the preceding regime illegitimate/illegal and then do whatever the hell they want with people who became resident in the intervening times? I think not. If the Trumpists came out with rock-solid evidence that the election really WAS stolen, tomorrow, and subsequently Trump'24 (or '23) nullifies all citizenships granted since Jan 2020, do you think the Blue Tribe is just going to sit there nodding "This is legit because it's what the Baltics did" as X million mostly-Mexican-"Americans" get repatriated to Guadalajara?

Because I think they'd raise merry hell.

"Disparate impact = discrimination" and all that.

Besides, where exactly is the evidence that the Baltic referenda in '45 on joining the USSR were rigged? If that's their basis for yelling "illegal government" then I think they need better evidence.

Besides, where exactly is the evidence that the Baltic referenda in '45 on joining the USSR were rigged?

Is there any indicator that they were unique in being not rigged?

From quick look 1940 vote (after Russia invaded central Europe together with Nazi Germany) was blatantly rigged ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Parliament - Lithuania supposedly had 99.2% communist vote with 95.5% turnout, Estonia 92.2% and 81.6%, Latvia 97.6% and 94.7% )

Referendum in Poland run by USSR at that time was clearly falsified.

Why on Earth you would assume that USSR run elections in conquered country were not blatantly rigged?

(I admit that I have not found sources how 1945 were run or even good mention of them, but if Russians have not falsified them - then I would be really surprised)

If that's their basis for yelling "illegal government" then I think they need better evidence.

Being invaded is quite good evidence.

Needing to falsify elections is also a good hint.

Repeated protests that in 1991 were not crushed even by running over protestors with tanks are also quite good evidence.

People declaring independence as soon as Russia lost its power and trying to get away from it is also a good hint.

Any government who really dislikes their previous government can declare the preceding regime illegitimate/illegal and then do whatever the hell they want with people who became resident in the intervening times?

If previous government was result as invasion by oppressive regime, blatantly oppressed people and independence had clear support - then surely you can do this.

I don't think any Baltic countries ran referendums of elections in 1945.

Looking at the election in Estonia in 1940, electing the parliament that rushed through the annexation:

Parliamentary elections were held in Estonia on 14 and 15 July 1940 alongside simultaneous elections in Latvia and Lithuania. The elections followed the Soviet occupation of the three countries. As was the case in Latvia and Lithuania, the elections in Estonia were blatantly rigged.[1][2] They were also unconstitutional, since only seats for the lower chamber of the Riigikogu, the Chamber of Deputies, were contested; the upper chamber, the National Council, had been dissolved and was never reconvened. According to August Rei, one of independent Estonia's last envoys to Moscow, under the Estonian constitution, the Chamber of Deputies had "no legislative power" apart from the National Council.[3]

The Estonian Working People's Union, a Communist front group, was the only party allowed to run and won all 80 seats, allegedly with 92.8% of the votes cast and the remaining 7.2% having been declared invalid. The newly elected "People's Riigikogu" declared the Estonian SSR on 21 July and requested admission to the Soviet Union the following day. The request was approved by the Soviet government on 6 August.[4]

The elections followed the Soviet occupation of Estonia in June. The Communist Party established the Estonian Working People's Union to run in the elections, whilst despite having only three days to organise, the opposition put forward 78 candidates in 66 of the 80 Riigikogu constituencies.[2] However, Prime Minister Johannes Vares was ordered by Soviet politician Andrei Zhdanov to remove opposition candidates from the ballot.[5] Opposition candidates were required to present a manifesto within a few hours, which most of them did.[2] However, almost all were subsequently removed by a mixture of threats, violence and invalidations.[2] Only one opposition candidate remained; Jüri Rajur-Liivak, who was later arrested along with the other removed candidates.[5]

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I really don't see how this legal justification is relevant here. The same justification could be used for some type of ethnic cleansing in about half the countries in existence, and everyone is well aware the Europeans wouldn't stand for it then.

The group of stateless citizens included Ukrainians, Azeris etc. in addition to Russians

Same thing. Stripping large groups of people of their citizenship does not become any more supportable because you are doing it to some adjacent groups as well.

Good point. You come across plenty of Baltic ethnic-Russian youth in Western Europe working or studying. I get the impression that these countries are using the Schengen escape route to run a slow and clean ethnic cleansing operation without facing any real resistance.

Most of which are women and most of them will not return

Probably everyone who stayed in Ukraine will have some close relatives in Europe at the end of the war. They will probably be able to use the family reunification route for easy emigration even if Europe doesn't allow direct mass migration.

And Europe might encourage this- after all, if you need mass migration to balance the books because your fertility rate’s been screwed for 50 years, and you’ve got a resurgent populist right to deal with, might as well get 90 IQ whites as the immigrants.

On the one hand the Ukrainian identity is being based on 19th/early 20th century style blood and soil rhetoric.

Look to Ireland for how the transition from ethnonationalism to nationalism-allegedly-but-also-globalism-and-multiculturalist-rhetoric works.

My view of it is that nationalism is still used to make demands against the current or former overlord as suits you (e.g. Scotland as well) while, at the same time, its concrete tenets get hollowed out by the adoption of the inimical ideology of the dominant states nations want to suck up to (e.g. the large settler state to the West whose companies find their way to Ireland)

And somehow this incoherence just...continues.

I agree that this is a relevant parallel, as I agree with the view that Irish identity, as opposed to Scottish or Welsh, is almost entirely oppositional in nature, and therefore unravels easily:

https://affirmativeright.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-baby-killing-vote-and-loss-of-irish.html

Scottish or Welsh, is almost entirely oppositional in nature, and therefore unravels easily

I don't know about the Welsh, but why do you think the Scottish nationalism today is stronger? To me it looks like it is today indistinguishable from some blend of pro-EU and anti-Tory sentiment. It doesn't have anything particularly Scottish about it at all.

Good explanation. Often it’s easy to forget most political movements originate from quite absurd and contradictory sentiments.

I agree with most of that, but with a few pedantic points:

the last time the Tories won in Scotland was 1951

Nearly. 1955 in seats, 1959 in the popular vote.

The referendum in 2014 was closer than expected and energized the SNP, while the Tory government nationally allowed them to find their place politically as a kind of nice, “European style” social Democratic Party that wasn’t as anti capitalist as Corbyn’s Labour but also much more progressive than the Tories. So they did very well in 2015, and have maintained that position since.

Ed Miliband was leader in 2015. Plausibly, the SNP did well in 2015 because they were seen as more left wing and anti-Tory than Labour.

I also think it helps to distinguish Scottish nationalism and the SNP. Scottish nationalists I know are often cultural nationalists, though not ethnonationalists: they love the trappings of Scottish language, music, customs, and so on, and want them to be preserved as much as possible, but they'll very happily accept an Englishman or a Zulu who comes to Scotland and tries to integrate into the local culture. On the other hand, the SNP has a significant contingent of voters who are left wing and not Scottish (10% of people in Scotland were born elsewhere in the UK and most of them are from England). These voters like the anti-Tory, anti-Brexit, and social democratic parts of the SNP programme, but any sort of thorough-going Scottish nationalism, even of a cultural sort, is likely to alienate them. I like to joke that Scotland, like Wales, has only elected Labour governments since devolution - just that more and more of Scottish Labour started wearing yellow rosettes in the mid-Noughties. So Scotland is a curious country with a lot of cultural nationalism, but no culturally nationalist party.

On the other hand, the SNP has a significant contingent of voters who are left wing and not Scottish

One might almost say that they are not true Scotsmen...

Yah isn’t one of the biggest ScotNat complaints is that they don’t get enough immigrants now that they’re out of the EU?

No?

What is this page referring to then?

https://www.snp.org/policies/pb-what-is-the-snp-s-policy-on-immigration/

Or this story?

https://www.npr.org/2020/01/14/796344881/the-scottish-national-party-is-espousing-a-multicultural-brand-of-nationalism

The SNP is a single-issue party insofar its voters vote for it as long as it promises independence. Mundane policy is an afterthought, and the SNP is fundamentally lazy about it: it just does whatever rightist Englishmen dislike. Certainly getting immigrants isn't 'one of their biggest complaints', and it definitely isn't the sorts of thing rando fractionist Scots would consider their biggest complaints, if you bothered asking them.

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Yeah I suppose that is the "best case" scenario, although I doubt your average Azov battalion is thrilled to die for that.

But there are some big deviations.

Ireland's former/current overlords are Anglo countries mired in versions of anti-colonial ideologies. So it is easy to make demands from them when you know how to push certain emotional narratives. Russia is unlikely to ever play along in that.

Also the world bank data shows that before the whole tax haven thing, Ireland was trailing the UK with around 65% of its GDP per capita. That is not a terribly poor country. The main period of their transition from nationalist/parochial to atomised West Europeans also lies during a period of still pretty high birthrates and global rapid economic development. Compare that with Ukraine.

In short I doubt that economically they could hope for anything better than what Bulgaria (or Romania tops) have achieved, even if they entered the EU in 2021, Europe had decades of strong economic growth and the war never happened.

Should also take into account that the next generation of Ukrainian nationalists are going to be very well armed, have enormous combat experience and corps d'esprit, and have massive expectations for the nationalist future in their mind after sacrificing so tremendously. I doubt that they will be so docile if they start smelling betrayal in the air. This video comes to mind: https://youtube.com/watch?v=rgkPpsyUFcM

Also the world bank data shows that before the whole tax haven thing, Ireland was trailing the UK with around 65% of its GDP per capita.

Small note here since I both work in finance and am Irish; this exagerrates the UK advantage since a large proportion British GDP also comes from financial/tex efficiency stuff. If you're going to strip out the Irish tech sector (which is both the largest employer and largest GDP contributing sector of the economy) on the basis that firms are only sited there for tax efficiency, then to do a fair comparison you'd need to strip out the UK financial sector too.

It's true that GDP isn't a good metric to examine Ireland; our central bank publishes a figure that tries to account for the distortionary effect of profit funnelling, and which puts us about on a par with France on a per capita basis. If we're talking salaries and cost of living, Irish salaries are higher than non-London UK ones, and slightly lower than London ones.

When I quoted 65%, I was looking at the 60s-70s parts of those charts. I presume neither country had such a magnitude of “fake” economy back then?

You're comparing Ireland with London though, instead of Ireland with the UK. For sure Ireland doesn't have a city to rival London; neither does any other EU country. Paris and Berlin are both a grade below it; the only Western city that genuinely rivals London is NYC. Losing the UK from the EU was whatever, but losing London was a real tragedy for us. No disagreement there.

If the comparison is nation to nation instead of nation to city though, our per capita results come out above the UK in a lot of meaningful metrics.

As for the breakdown of roles, yes, no disagreement: the "top of the pyramid" roles tend to be based in London as UK personal tax is lower (Irish tax on equities is fucking abysmal), pay for high-end roles is higher, and there are a lot more of them.

Some quibbles: quite a lot of sales roles are really based here. Speaking of Google for example, more than 50% of staff in Dublin would be in sales roles, albeit junior ones. A junior sales role at Google is still pretty good. Meta is similar, so is Salesforce, Microsoft et al.

And you'll be aware of course that, given the loyalist history of the institution, people who go to Trinity aren't really Irish. The most ambitious Irish grads go to the US, not the UK, because there are more hoops to jump through; just like the Canadians you meet in London being more impressive than those in Boston.

Pictured here, the somehow.

Ireland has benefited massively and materially from integration into the EU/Globohomo system. Ireland has gone from a place of poverty that threw off emigrants to the USA to a wealthy nation. If Ukraine can achieve half that advance after EU integration, the majority of Ukrainians won't be sitting around grumbling about Black people.

Hasn't Ireland benefited massively from having lower tax rates than most other EU countries and acting as some kind of tax haven?

Their 2018 law allowing abortion shows which kind of path they're engaged in after welcoming Google and Facebook headquarters in Dublin.

the majority of Ukrainians won't be sitting around grumbling about Black people.

Yes they can become massive movie stars instead!

We previously were kind of a tax haven, yes. That's no longer the case, and what keeps all the tech HQs here is a mixture of inertia, business-friendly climate, etc. These aren't letterbox offices: Google is the largest private employer in Dublin, tech is the largest sector of the Irish economy both in employment numbers and GDP contribution, most US tech companies you could think of (bar Amazon) have their European HQ here. When I worked in the sector it would often surpise visitors from the US that [company's] largest office and official HQ was in Dublin and not London or Paris.

If the boss doesn't come into the office, but instead works from his home, does that mean "the real office" is the boss's house?

Yep, higher-ups often choose to work from their home country. Check out average pay in the Paris office, or Zurich. Also both higher than Dublin. Doesn’t mean they are also headquarters.

Finally, I suspect that Dublin figure excludes equity, due to the ridiculous way it's taxed here.

An average of 140k euros is still a tremendously high salary isn’t it? That would be an extremely good software engineer salary in The Netherlands which is a very expensive country on its own.

Are they Google numbers or Alphabet numbers? DeepMind would drag the London average for Alphabet up quite a bit.

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