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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   23935 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 14, 2024

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Navlny never seemed to have any ideology and seemed like a perfect example of a CIA stooge. Usually when there is an opposition, there is a much clearer agenda. The actual opposition groups have more policy that they want to implement. Navalny had no real ideology, he was just generally anti regime while being the darling of the western media. Color revolution leaders seldom seem to have an actual agenda before they take power. They will at best be "pro freedom" or some other empty epithet in order to get broad support.

Sometimes people just get fed up. Maybe some minor flunky of the regime did something to him once, or failed to do something, or he just got sick at the way Russia was declining. Not everyone needs an ideology to justify their disaffection.

Navalny’s ideology was generic center-ground nationalism, but his main focus was opposition to the Putin regime, which seems reasonable. Any successful Russian opposition would have to appeal to a number of different ideological currents in any case.

Of course, Putin’s ideology is also similarly void and incoherent.

Funny how the western media loved a supposed nationalist. If Navalny's critique of Putin was that he wasn't nationalistic enough he would have gotten zero-support for Navalny. At best it would be like Ukrainian nationalism where they get to wave WWII paraphernalia while the government rams through neoliberal and culturally leftwing policies.

At best it would be like Ukrainian nationalism where they get to wave WWII paraphernalia while the government rams through neoliberal and culturally leftwing policies.

I'm fairly sure current Ukrainian nationalism revolves around the extremely hands-on theme of keeping their country from being occupied by a hostile other nation.

Navalny’s goal was to maintain the support of both westernized liberals and disaffected nationalists. His “politics”, such as they were, reflected that.

The issue is that would be like trying to maintain the support of Likud voters and Hamas.

It’s more like Bibi trying to maintain the support of a wide faction of secular nationalists, religious Zionists and Chareidim.

Being pro freedom in a dictatorship without much of a broader platform is fine with me. It's the most pressing issue, so it's the one to focus on.

To use a somewhat goofy example, if there's an asteroid heading for earth, and some politicians are in favor of the asteroid, it's fine to just be anti-asteroid and nothing else. Anything else would just be a distraction until the asteroid is done with.

I like your pragmatism. There is a related argument: once there is democracy, the opposition candidate policy doesn't matter much, because you can choose another one if you want to.

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