Got into a conversation with someone today and I mentioned the Soviets liberated a lot of Nazi camps. They looked at me like I was evil and said "Well they're bombing innocent people today and accusing them of being Nazis"
I said that while I'm not a fan of modern Russia, the Azov Battalion is in fact Nazi, and Ukraine has had a Nazi problem for a while.
They didn't know who Azov are and just said "Well they're probably all gone now. They're just bombing innocent people."
I'm sick of people thinking I'm some kind of evil modern Russian oligarchy stan or crazy conspiracy theorist just because I acknowledge the fact that Nazis exist and are a big problem. If Ukraine wins, those strengthened Nazi groups that are supported by western aid and the Ukraine government are going to go full fascist.
decades of war on terror propaganda has compressed the average American's brain into a pate-like paste
Too generous its more like deconstructed sea foam whistling in the wind.
Yeah they did a whole lot of stupid shit early in the war that gave Russia a lot of legal cover to just machine-gun civilians then point to Zelensky and the Rada and say "Well they made all civilian men combatants, not our problem". Handing out rifles to civilians, impressing everyone, etc.
There's nothing else you can do. Maybe, but probably not, you broke the spell that allows someone to think this is a straightforward matter of good vs. evil.
I just hope they don't think I'm crazy or a bad person
That's the hard part. I walk on eggshells at work over this stuff, but some people trust me enough or are open minded enough that they seem to believe me when I say something like Azov is a bunch of nazis and I was reading about them long before this war started, or if I point out that Ukraine has been at war with Donbas for 8 years and it this point it doesn't seem like it ever will or should be part of Ukraine again.
I try to tone down the critique of American hegemony and just talk around it.
What's this? Tavor rifles? From Israel? Gosh, it's almost as if Israel supports them. Oh wait they do. Tavor rifles are produced under license from Israel Weapon Industries and as such were manufactured and exported authorized by Israeli government bodies.
Well that's probably a Trump conspiracy theory, so let's consult The Atlantic Council, a hardcore NATO organization: Why [Ukrainian Nazis] should not be designated a foreign terrorist organization.
The post admitted that it is “indisputable” that Azov’s ideology is rooted in Nazism, and the “leading core of” it “was formed by the far right.” But Shekhovtsov argued that Azov must not be designated a terrorist organization because it is a special operations detachment of the Ukrainian National Guard, and therefore “an integral part of official structures” of the state, following “orders given by the Interior Ministry.”
Labeling this Ukrainian government-sponsored Nazi group a terrorist organization would be a “gift to the Kremlin,” Shekhovtsov insisted.
NATO thought so poorly of these Nazis that they embedded a journalist in their violent fascist group for a sympathetic inside look. The “Battle For Mariupol” report makes absolutely no mention of their fascist ideology.
Did the SuccDems do this song and dance with the Freikorps last time around?
But Shekhovtsov argued that Azov must not be designated a terrorist organization because it is a special operations detachment of the Ukrainian National Guard, and therefore “an integral part of official structures” of the state, following “orders given by the Interior Ministry.”
That'sworse.jpg
Azov Battalion literally has the black sun on their patch, just show them that lol it's so obvious
I was incredibly lucky that one of the only other communists at my job was working when it came up. Having someone to back me up when I cringed at photos of Azov's pinup girls at the very least deflated my lib coworkers' moral outrage.
Also I ran into a Ukrainian dude selling jewelry for refugee donations months before the invasion. I feel like that really helps with segueing into the complete 180 on the MSM narrative.
Most people have a two-valued orientation: black & white, good & evil, love & hate. It's an extremely effective propaganda tool, heavily utilized by the Nazi party to paint them as the only party that should exist. It's so effective because of the frustration you feel, it's hard to establish any middle ground, or even discuss it sensibly. What makes matter worse is that Russia is hated, which promotes even more two-valued orientation, and makes them assume you're taking the polar opposite stance of Russia Good.
To combat two-value orientation is to systematically apply multi-value orientation. Statements shouldn't be true or false but truth-valued somewhere between 0-100%. If someone tells you that all labor unions are a racket, saying "No, they aren't" would promote a battle, but saying "Only 1 in 100 unions are a racket, where did you hear they are all rackets?" can promote a more meaningful dialog.
I think an argument would go something like this, anyone is welcome to help, im not great at this & my details are lacking:
- One of the recent US mass shootings was from a far right extremist, ukraine also had far right extremists
- There were some fringe far right extremist rallies in ukraine, including marches like what happened in Charlottesvilles
- The Azov movement targeted far right extremists for recruitment for an ultranationalist agenda
- The Azov movement targeted russian separatists in ukraine after the succession referendum was successfully voted on and passed
- The Azov movement continues to be on the front lines, with far right extremists being indistinguishable from other honest fighters
Liberals will usually think you are just making excuses to muddy the waters and defend Russia because they assume everyone is as dishonest as they are.
You fallen for the first trick: “I was talking about soviets, not modern russians”.
Nazis in ukraine is ideological porky patina over war, while they exist (there are some volnov usb videos, but I didn’t want to hurt myself looking into them), it’s not fundamentally that different than contras/death squads in other places, reinforcing will of capital. Plus there are images of tattoos/unit insignias of questionable variety
If they’re a white brunch liberal tell them to wear a black sun shirt to a synagogue to support Ukraine
Don't bother telling them anything, these Eichmanns will turn you in first chance they get
to be fair, the number of nazis in Ukraine has rapidly decreased in the past few months :putin-wink:
I'd mention Stepan Bandera because he's held up as a hero by the current Kiev regime, not just Azov or other groups which can be dismissed as fringe (Right Sektor which uses the exact same symbols) and he was just a straight up Nazi collaborator.
"Slava Ukraini" (glory to Ukraine) and the reply "Glory to the heroes", comes directly from Bandera's OUN Nazis too. Since 2018, the official salute of Ukraine's army has been a slogan taken from Nazi collaborators, in replacement of the old greeting "Hello comrades". This shit ain't subtle.
they arent bombing innocent people at all. get them to join the war telegrams.
also, all US media is controlled by the CIA so obviously they arent going to show anything that goes against their narrative.Lmao, there's a big gap between realizing all US media is propaganda and "join this sketchy telegram chat where hundreds of guys will share blurry videos of definitely russian soldiers definitely being wholesome hecking good".
the context people miss here is that the Russians have little incentive to bomb civilians. they are mostly operating in the separatist donbass region where LPR/DPR declared independence 8 years ago. A civil war has been raging for 8 years between West Ukraine and the Donbass separatists. The Donbass separatists are largely sympathetic to the Russian military, and so the Russian military has a strong incentive to minimize the casualties of these residents, both for propaganda purposes, as well as because they are allies. The people in Donbass speak Russian and have been getting shelled by the Ukrainian military for 8 years. They have had their language outlawed in schools and media. They have had their rights curtailed. There's plenty of evidence that shows this and it's not just random grainy cell phone footage but 1080p interviews conducted by independent journalists in the war zone. Russian state media like RT shows this stuff too but you can also get it through other outlets. Non-combatant DPR/LPR residents testify over and over that the method of the Ukrainian military is to station artillery in residential areas in order to put the Russian military in a tough position. If they strike back at Ukrainian artillery, there will be collateral damage and civilian casualties. If they don't strike back, they will suffer artillery fire as they advance. Additionally the Russian military has provided green corridors for civilians and surrendered troops to evacuate through. The Ukrainian military holds people hostage and refuses to let Donbass residents use these corridors. In any case I would rather watch 100 "sketchy" telegrams of documentary footage taken on the ground by civilians and cross reference them and read international documents and draw my own conclusions than let Anderson Cooper or Tucker Carlson tell me what is happening. Many of the war telegrams largely consists of interviews of civilians and I've done a lot of work to archive some of this footage.
Another context people miss is that Zelensky really doesn't have any say here, which is exactly why he's the face of US/NATO propaganda. He wanted to pursue Minsk II (as did the German, the Russians, and the Polish) but he's clearly afraid of the Ukrainian far right. He's a Jewish man and a Russian speaker so he's convenient for presenting a sanitized image of the Ukrainian government but he himself isn't really in charge. Every time he has tried to pursue peace he has been sabotaged by the far right in the military. He was even cajoled into banning 11 different parties for the sake of "national unity". Conveniently Right Sector and Svoboda were not on that list.
What we have here is a war that was completely avoidable. Everyone wanted Minsk II except 2 groups: The USA, and the Ukrainian far right. Russia wanted Minsk II. Germany wanted Minsk II. Zelensky wanted Minsk II. This is to say nothing of 30 years of NATO expansion after 1989. A military alliance that was predicated on preventing "soviet aggression" continued to exist after the collapse of the USSR precisely because it was a convenient way for the USA to establish military dominance in Europe through lily pad bases, weapons sales, military interoperability, and pursuing "prompt global strike" (A US/NATO program to be able to strike any coordinate on earth with conventional weapons in less than an hour)
I mean unless the russians have made a special nazi-detecting missile or something they're gonna hit some civilians as collateral damage
This is some QAnon shit. You're limiting your sources to fkn anonymous telegram channels where anyone can post whatever and writing off any contradicting sources as "controlled by CIA".
Seriously, do not do this. Critical thinking doesn't mean only questioning the beliefs of others, it means questioning yourself.
If you find yourself getting your news from anonymous telegram channels and categorically ignoring any and all mainstream media sources, it's time to question whether or not you may be existing inside an echo chamber.
The problem is that for this war in particular almost everything in the media would give you the impression russia is collapsing, that ukraine is winning, and that the west are the goodies against the evil asiatic hordes. It's been wall to wall lies with almost nothing useful within it whatsover. I turn on the tv to BBC or Sky and within minutes of a Ukraine segment I am seething with literal steam coming out of my ears. I have never shouted at the tv before this conflict before but it's regular right now.
When it's this bad it's pretty hard to blame people for just finding ANY alternatives that are out there giving a more reasonable position, anonymous or not.
I just say something about how the US has a rich history of "getting into bed with bad guys"/supporting regional extremist organizations to destabilize governments opposed to US financial interests and that we have been shown not to care at all about what those groups stand for or what they do about human rights when they take power, so long as they continue to serve our financial interests.
that opens up the dialogue to all the US military actions in recent history to deal with the blowback from such a blanket policy, and the regimes we sell assist/support with abysmal human rights records.
to me the value is not in demonstrating today's crime, but the institutional policy behind it. the idea that the US supports actual Nazis is hard to swallow for the ignorant and they have been primed to reject it by daily media.
it's much easier to get people to see Iraq/Afghanistan in this context, or Saudi Arabia or wherever you want to take it (LatAm, Plan Columbia, Chile) pointing out the media support and PR for those actions and actors. then you can circle back to Ukraine and say, "doesn't it seem possible, if not likely that nothing has fundamentally changed?"
Yeah I usually say "Yes because the US arming and funding right-wing militias always works out great for everyone. Let's thank the brave Mujahadeen freedom fighters for taking on the Soviets, no way that backfired." If they actually are interested in having a conversation, Azov and Right Sector ignored the Minsk II protocols (including ignoring direct commands from President Zelenksy) and have spent 8 years killing civilians in the Donbas. 80% of ceasefire violations came from Ukraine with similar figures for casualties.
