Ukraine (24 Viewers)

[mjcouvi]

Simple - Speak up against oppression and injustice - whereever you encounter it - at home, among friends or abroad. Try to help in whatever way you can, be it only by moral support or something more substantial.

Yeah, it can be hard to simply say what you think.

 

[mjcouvi]

Just in modern time, it's mostly Yemen. But if you go back further you could contribute unknown millions of dead people to US policy. It's ugly, sanctions starving people and not allowing them medicine, giving the sauds bombs, training, fuel, intelligence to kill people in Yemen. What's happened in Ukraine so far is nothing like how the US has pulverized the Middle East. Putin is bad, yeah, but recognize what the US government has done, or I find your feelings on Putin shallow.

 

[SoggyBottomBoy]

And our idiot President goes and says Putin CANNOT remain in power, only escalating the situation. I thought we wanted to end the conflict Biden, not threaten the crazy guy, which can only make matters worse.

Okay, that explains a lot. That's all I needed to hear. I'm bowing out of this and getting back to news from the war.

 

[HoustonSaint68]

I don't know how to understand Putin's atrocities without understanding my own governments atrocities first.

Your earnestness is generally appealing but it's these kinds of comments that make it so hard to take your "deep" thoughts seriously.

This is just a ridiculous statement. You're either making it in an attempt to 'virtue signal', or it really is true for you -- which suggests a complete inability to employ any kind of governor on your ego slavishly serving your id.

So, since I'm on the slippery slope of responding to the poster and not the post, I'll remove myself from further interaction on this point.

First, one suggestion: go and start a new (NON-PARTISAN) thread on the current (or historical) American atrocity of your choice. You can point out how we don't pay enough attention to it. Then, a goodly portion of the posters on this thread will likely respond with some form of "you're right, we really should do better as a country and I should think about that more". You'll be right if you choose wisely...and it will still have nothing to do with Ukraine and "understanding Putin's atrocities".

 

[DCSaints_Fan]

I don't buy that the security of the United States is served by VERY DIRECTLY helping Saudi Arabia conduct war upon Yemen. Just one example that makes me sick.

With respect to Saudi Arabi(i.e KSA) and Yemen, as often the case in the Middle East, there really aren't any good guys there.

The only reason the US continues to support the KSA despite an atrocious human rights record, is because historically speaking (as in since the 1970s-1980s), we needed to in order to secure oil supplies. On top of this they have had a reasonable policy towards Israel (though obviously don't like them). As it stands now, there are pretty much only two players in the Persian Gulf - KSA and Iran. Iran hates Israel and supports Hezbollah. The KSA isn't too fond of Israel either, but at least they don't fund terrorist attacks against them. At least not like Iran does. So we're picking the lesser of two evils. I suppose this leads to the question of why we must support Israel, which is a whole different topic.

International politics isn't really about exporting our values so much as it is about things like balance of power. If there was some country attacking Russia (like say, China), we would have certainly supported Russia despite them having a pretty oppressive government.

Theoretically the US could abandon all alliances, become part of something like the Non Aligned Movement, and let the world burn, because strictly speaking, there is no material interest in supporting some factions over the other presuming they are willing to trade with US. Some geopolitical analysts like Peter Zeihan thinks thats exactly what was going to happen, in the future, mostly for the reasons that the US has achieved energy independence and increasingly less reliant on overseas international trade. I'm not sure I buy into his predictions. Despite international trade being in the single digits portion of our GDP, its not zero, and simply giving that up is step backward and recession levels of economic growth. Also there are some very key goods we trade for which would constrain our economy quite a bit if they were not available.

Putin's ambitions are not so dissimilar to those of the people in the Pentagon and the people who you vote for. It's a mess. It really is not worth trying to rationalize from an American perspective. If you're interested in some modicum of what little truth you can find, look in places other than government sources.

The difference is that the USA doesn't use military force with the explicit objective of redrawing maps, displacing populations or destroying cultures, but mostly to depose what we perceive to be hostile governments (Afghanistan and Iraq), or governments that we believe are committing genocide (Serbia) Now some would say we recognized Kosovo, but that was two administrations removed from the military action and 10+ years after the fact. And the breakup of Yugoslavia was a hot mess in any case (On that note, Bosnia is primed to blow up again) Russia is claiming they want a do-over after explicitly recognizing Ukrainian independence and territorial integrity for 20+ years.

 

[efil4stnias]

Just in modern time, it's mostly Yemen. But if you go back further you could contribute unknown millions of dead people to US policy. It's ugly, sanctions starving people and not allowing them medicine, giving the sauds bombs, training, fuel, intelligence to kill people in Yemen. What's happened in Ukraine so far is nothing like how the US has pulverized the Middle East. Putin is bad, yeah, but recognize what the US government has done, or I find your feelings on Putin shallow.

So to offer another analogy, if a convicted murderer is about to jump into a lake to save a drowning victim, do you say "wait not him. He killed someone " and let the swimmer drown?

I think your fractured honestly and don't exactly know which way to go here. So I'm disengaging as your thought process and explanations don't make much sense from one post to the next.
I'm not clear on your stance outside of Yemen vs Saudi.

I hope you find the peace you are searching for in this life.

 

[DaveXA]

Ok, I get it. Are you willing to explore US modern atrocities or not? I don't know how to understand Putin's atrocities without understanding my own governments atrocities first. How do you order your distaste for attrocities?

They've been explored ad nauseum again and again here and elsewhere. You continued insistence that we're ignorant of our own shortcomings is just plain insulting. You're talking to us like we haven't considered the things you're talking about. There's simply no both sides of the issue when it comes to Putin.

 

[DaveXA]

Yeah, it can be hard to simply say what you think.

Why is that? It might be hard to articulate a point of view. But the problem as I see it is your assumptions about the knowledge and sense of justice posters have here is flawed. You seem to be making excuses for Russia's actions rather than calling them out as a bully.

 

[SamAndreas]

I think everyone here has been doing a good job of expressing their thoughts without attacking the man. Ad Hominem has not reared it's ugly head.

That complement includes mjcouvi. Very civil.

I happen to agree with everyone else more than I agree with mjcouvi, but he has been being most sincere. Hi.

I just can't find my way past the fact that Russia invaded Ukraine to mix that issue up with issues of fault of the US or NATO.

With a bull in the china shop, a mouse in the corner chewing on the shop's business ledger book doesn't register in a meaningful way, it doesn't have to be dealt with when the issue of getting the bull out of the shop is being considered.

 

[rail]

Man . . .

 

[SamAndreas]

 

[mjcouvi]

Your earnestness is generally appealing but it's these kinds of comments that make it so hard to take your "deep" thoughts seriously.

This is just a ridiculous statement. You're either making it in an attempt to 'virtue signal', or it really is true for you -- which suggests a complete inability to employ any kind of governor on your ego slavishly serving your id.

So, since I'm on the slippery slope of responding to the poster and not the post, I'll remove myself from further interaction on this point.

First, one suggestion: go and start a new (NON-PARTISAN) thread on the current (or historical) American atrocity of your choice. You can point out how we don't pay enough attention to it. Then, a goodly portion of the posters on this thread will likely respond with some form of "you're right, we really should do better as a country and I should think about that more". You'll be right if you choose wisely...and it will still have nothing to do with Ukraine and "understanding Putin's atrocities".

Fair.

 

[mjcouvi]

Honestly guys, sometimes I get forked up and write stuff just for pleasure, to the point that I am contrarian to be contrarian. I like writing, I like challenging common points of view. I think of it as an enjoyable hobby.

I don't ever mean to offend anyone, maybe just want you to think outside the box a bit. There are completely valid worldviews that most of you don't accept, I get it. I don't know what's true but I think it's important to look at impactful things from wide ranging perspectives. I might disagree with you without really being in disagreement, for the sake of just trying to expand a realm of thought.

Personally, I believe myself to be just a dumb commenter on this forum. I think most of you are smarter than me, really. I don't want to come across as being someone who thinks I'm a better person than you, I'm not. I simply try to explain what I think. Humility, my own humanity, is something I try to maintain, even if it's not apparent.

I really just don't have the capacity to fully address all of your responses to me. Maybe I'll get to it, maybe not.

 

[superchuck500]

 

[efil4stnias]

And I'm sure 80% of that is young, bright and contributing men and women.