Image is from @Parsani@hexbear.net, who got it from @RNAi@hexbear.net, who got it from Discord.


Thread update: Prigozhin's fucking dead.

rip-bozo


The BRICS summit will begin on Tuesday and end on Thursday, with various world leaders, politicians, and representatives meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa.

America's anxiety about the summit has been obvious. They have been complicating the event by pushing for the arrest warrant for Putin to be upheld if he steps foot in the country. While this is a remarkably dangerous and unhinged thing to do - even by America's standards - to the leader of a nuclear superpower who could end the world within an hour, it does betray their desperation. Unfortunately, for those of us who wanted to see Putin surrounded by an army of security guards fending off people holding handcuffs, he has sent his Foreign Minister, Lavrov, in his place. Additionally, America has likely been spreading rumors about the lack of interest in gaining new members in the organization.

With apparently 20 countries formally seeking membership and another 20 informally doing so, the bloc has been elevated, whether they like it or not, to the position of the international vanguard of the non-western world. It is extremely important to say that this is not the same as it becoming an anti-American bloc, and many of them (including original members Brazil and India) wish to keep a friendly relationship with the United States. Nonetheless, with the United States' policy of "if you are not with us, you are against us," and as the US seeks to weaken China, in coming years many of them might find themselves under hostile pressure.

BRICS has to try and solve many problems if they are going to chip away at America's stranglehold of the world economy. These problems - like mitigating the dollar's status as a global reserve currency, and America's dominant role in the world economy - are extremely complicated, and will takes years, even decades, to be overcome. Therefore, one should temper their expectations and excitement for this summit. It took tens of millions of deaths in cataclysmic wars, and then several more decades, for America to reach its current position. I see no reason to believe why its downfall will be any less bloody and elongated.

To end on a less depressing note, I've been searching for appropriate anagrams given the list of countries that seek to join BRICS. Obviously not all of them will make it in, but even so. The best I've come up with is HIBISCUS EMANCIPATES BBBBKKRVV.

(also, "bulletins and news discussion" can be rearranged to "libidinous newsstands uncles".)


Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

This week's first update is here in the comments.

This week's second update is here in the comments.

Links and Stuff

The bulletins site is down.

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists

Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Add to the above list if you can.


Resources For Understanding The War


Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.

Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.

Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.

Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.

On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.

Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.


Telegram Channels

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

Pro-Russian

https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.

https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.

https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.

https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.

https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.

https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.

https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.

https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.

https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.

https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.

Pro-Ukraine

Almost every Western media outlet.

https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.

https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.


Last week's discussion post.


  • super_mario_69 [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    1 year ago

    🇫🇮 🔥 update! Became quite the effortpost!

    The energy crisis: The electricity is fucking ridiculously expensive this week, up to 70 cents/kWh, because the shareholders of the state energy company (Fortum) need new yachts for next summer. That, and because while one nuclear reactor was undergoing rout maintenance (Loviisa unit 2), another one (Olkiluoto unit 2) had some kind of sussy readings and had to be shut down for maintenance as well. There's also some kind of maintenance going on with the power lines connecting our grid to Sweden's, so the capacity is reduced even further. The government recommends The Poors don't use dishwashers, saunas, or ovens during peak hours, or simply live in darkness and bang rocks together until the situation improves. At least we'll freeze to death happy in winter knowing that we stood up for democracy and justice with the wholesome uwukrainians against evil.

    The government shitshow: The Finnish government continues to be an absolute dogshit dumpster fire. No new scandals or crises in particular, just the regular clusterfuck. The media are talking about the government shitting the bed completely, with potential reelections down the line, but I find that unlikely. The ruling party and its leader are absolutely spineless enough to work with anyone they can (except the left, naturally) to stay in power. None of the parties in the ruling coalition can agree on anything other than "fuck the poor" and "send every single weapon in the country, from giga-death-missile to slingshot, to Ukraine because fuck the Russians". Due to the extreme levels of red scare anti-russian brainworms here, speaking out against the war would be political suicide, so I imagine Finland will be one of the last countries in Europe to withdraw support. People think Russia is going to come for us next "like they did in WWII", because as we all know the material and geopolitical circumstances are still exactly the same and nothing has changed at all since then. I'll try and ask like "now why the fuck would they do that? We have literally nothing of value here except I guess trees, which I'm pretty sure Russia already has a fuck lot of a lot more of" and always get the same kind of vaguely racist canned lib response or some other vibes-based imaginary fucking drivel. Honestly I think it's mostly some kind of generational trauma coping because their grandmas dad got owned in the winter war. Like my brother in christ, my grandparents lost most of their families to that bullshit as well, but that's kind of what happens when you get into a war. Perhaps we should have considered that possibility when we allied with the fucking Nazis? Remember when national war hero Mannerheim, renowned anti-communist military boy and buddy of Hitler, won the civil war (the Finnish civil war and its consequences...) and had all the reds put into internment camps and/or executed? Pretty sure they were all somebody's sons and daughters and parents and grandparents as well. At least they died fighting for the common good, for whatever that's worth now. These god damn liberals, I s2g. What zero historical materialism does to a mf. Sorry, I got a bit carried away there, but anyway.

    Bonus: some state media article picks from this week. Check out what kind levels of cope we're reaching, while risking taking 4d10 psychic damage!

    https://yle.fi/a/74-20046194 – Finland considers swastika ban - good, but you'll never guess what other horrible hate symbols they want to ban! This proposal comes from Ben Zyskowicz, who is almost always wrong about everything.

    https://yle.fi/a/74-20046173 – Niinistö [the president]: Russian propaganda against Finland increasing - Joining NATO totally owned the russians lmao!!! this will not have any unforeseen consequences in the future.

    https://yle.fi/a/74-20046011 – FDF [finnish defense] Commander: No surprise in Russian rhetoric - The burgerländers are coming. this will not have any unforeseen consequences in the future.

    More in comments if you want to suffer further ->

    • super_mario_69 [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      1 year ago

      There you have it, the current state of the certified happiest, most fair and democratic and wholesome country in the world! I hate it here. Or, well, I actually really like it here. Likely it's just liberalism I hate.

    • daisy
      ·
      1 year ago

      Perhaps we should have considered that possibility when we allied with the fucking Nazis?

      I vividly remember this past christmas, when I was at my grandfather's house here in Canada with a lot of my uncles/aunts/cousins. They are the most liberal liberals to ever liberal. They were gushing over Finland's possible entry into NATO, because they'd heard from the news media that Finland bravely fought against the USSR in the Winter War. Which none of them had previously heard of due to our shitty history education, and had been led to believe by the media to have happened vaguely sometime in the cold war. I was able to bring the conversation to a screeching halt when I pointed out (a) when the Winter/Continuation Wars happened, (b) who the Finns were allied with at the time, and (c) who Canada was allied with.

      • VILenin [he/him]
        ·
        1 year ago

        If they’re true liberals it won’t take them too long to justify allying with Nazis.

        • daisy
          ·
          1 year ago

          Oh, they're getting there.

          All except for that grandfather, weirdly enough. Racist and misogynistic as fuck, and dipping into the early stages of senility. But he still remembers losing two older brothers to kriegsmarine torpedoes. He's no fan of fascists.

    • super_mario_69 [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      https://svenska.yle.fi/a/7-10040131 (Sorry, I could only find this one in Swedish) – Russia expert: In Russia, globalisation is seen as the bigger threat than the Kremlin to individual freedom - This is the worst one I've seen today. Maybe ever. If you can't understand Swedish, good. Don't read the translated version, it's not worth it.

      but if you really want to know...

      Google translated and edited for clarity

      Vladimir Putin's interpretation of globalization led to the war in Ukraine. This is what the Israeli Russia researcher Vera Michlin-Shapir says in an interview for Svenska Yle. For several years, Vladimir Putin was afraid that Ukraine, despite all its flaws, wanted to become a free society characterized by diversity, and a technologically progressive place with an open economy. So says Vera Michlin-Shapir, Russia researcher at King's College in London and expert on the impact of globalization in Russia.

      Yes, that's the reason. That's literally the only reason, nothing else. You nailed it.

      According to Michlin-Shapir, a Westernized Ukraine was not only a threat because of Ukraine's geographical proximity. It was also a threat that the Russian people could see a culturally related people choosing Europe over Putin's Russia.

      Yes, choosing, by their own free will! Perhaps you don't get it, as the russian brainpan simply cannot comprehend superior Evropean freedom.

      • Globalization has affected Russia very much. But the conclusions that Putin and the Russians have drawn do not fit together at all with the Western vision. In Russia, the global world is neither free nor democratic, but corrupt and hypocritical. What they experience is that everyone thinks only of themselves - leaders everywhere in the world want to get rich at the expense of others.

      ??? yes? where's the lie?

      Michlin-Shapir, herself from Israel, does not dismiss these conclusions, but sees them as grossly simplistic.

      • In the West, we also see equality, civil society, human rights and solidarity as essential parts of globalization. At least in principle, in practice globalization has not achieved what it should.

      Ah yes, of course. Again, the Russian brainpan cannot comprehend such concepts. I also absolutely love that part about "in principle, but not in practice". A bug, not a feature, naturally. lol. lmao even.

      In Russia, people appreciate a different freedom than that which the West offers A clear difference between Russia and the West, which is reinforced by globalization, is the view of what freedom means. This also applies to most Russians living abroad, says Michlin-Shapir.

      • In Russia, freedom is something you can practice on your own. You can be against the war in your heart, in your home, around the kitchen table. Freedom is private. And maybe secret?
      • Yes. As long as neither the state nor anyone else forces me to do anything, I am free. This is different from the West, where freedom is to leave the kitchen and go out and speak your mind.

      Jesus fucking christ. I don't even know where to begin with this take. Sure, I'm fine with fascist death squads gunning down minorities in the streets, as long as I can leave my kitchen and go out and said "hey that's not very nice". The government really just lets me do that. Ah, sweet freedom.

      It also contrasts with the democratic ideal where citizens are expected to act collectively when leaders do wrong.

      A thing that happens regularly in the west and is effective at bringing about change. I'm sure the author is in full support of the palestinian people who act collectively when the leaders do wrong. or any other left-wing uprisings, for that matter. fuck off

      Michlin-Shapir says that the Russian ideal of freedom simply stands in the way of an effective opposition. The regime has had no problem shoving aside the small minority that wants to bring it down.

      That's right, here in the West we let small minorities of literal fascists do what they want, because Freedom.

      On the other hand, for the same reason, the war is becoming a problem for Putin.

      • The longer it goes on, and especially if there is another mobilization, the Kremlin has let it affect the freedom of Russians. Many Russians realize that things are not going well for the country.
      • The Kremlin's authority is collapsing, but there is no one who can confirm to the people that it is happening.

      Is it? Is it really?

      Nor is there anyone who can offer an alternative that fits into the kind of isolationist and highly individualistic view of freedom that the Russians pursue.

      • We see from the outside that Russia has already collapsed in many ways, but what holds the country together is the people's belief that the state still works. Russians feel that they are freer than people in the West despite the increasing repression, says Israeli Russia researcher Vera Michlin-Shapir from King's College in London.

      Something something stones and glass houses, I can't remember the saying.

      • emizeko [they/them]
        ·
        1 year ago

        Vladimir Putin was afraid that Ukraine, despite all its flaws, wanted to become a free society

        projecting Bush's lie against Iraq onto Russia... deeply deranged

        :no-oil:

    • super_mario_69 [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      1 year ago

      https://svenska.yle.fi/a/7-10039924 (also only in Swedish, sorry) – Russia expert Keir Giles: Almost impossible to change the Russian mentality in several generations - Another banger, filled to the brim with the most galaxy brained takes imaginable. Unbiased, objective, and completely free from projection. Please don't read it, you're gonna get hypocrisy poisoning.

      but if you really absolutely insist...

      One of the biggest obstacles to Russia becoming a democratic society is the Russian victim mentality, says British Russia expert Keir Giles in an interview to Svenska Yle. According to Keir Giles, the fall of the Putin regime is not enough in the long run for Russian society to change. He believes it will take generations.

      • In the Russian narrative, Russia is always a victim of the evil manipulations of the outside world, he says. It cannot be shaken by presenting historical facts. Giles is a Russia researcher at the British think tank Chatham House.

      Hohoho, silly russians, what nonsense they believe in. oh shit, sudden pop quiz!!! What was the main reason NATO was founded?

      • All the evidence will inevitably be twisted so that Russia is a victim. Indeed, there are several occasions when the West and several nations together have collectively helped Russia.
      • In the Russian narrative, they have deliberately omitted facts, says Giles, such as that the West provided extensive financial support and food to the Soviet Union during glasnost in the 1980s.
      • The USA and allies also provided food, money and war material in the years 1941 to 1945.

      out of the kindness of our hearts. we just wanted to provide humanitarian aid to your suffering population.

      It was during those years that Russia sacrificed so much to, together with its allies in the West, defeat Nazi Germany. The so-called Lend–Lease Act was adopted in 1941. In May 2022, US President Joe Biden signed a similar support package for Ukraine.

      • In today's Russian historiography, the help the Soviet Union received has been turned into the West exploiting the Soviet Union, says Giles.

      objectively false, as western aid has always been 100% no-strings-attached.

      Giles on the Iron Curtain: Foreign influences have always been a direct threat to power

      • Vladimir Putin's Russia has for a couple of decades built walls to keep foreign opinions and ideas out. This in itself is nothing new in Russian history, says Giles.
      • The elite in the Kremlin have for centuries protected themselves by isolating the people from the outside world, he adds. Foreign influences have always been a direct threat to power.

      we, the enlightened ones, the beacons of freedom, openness, and democracy. would never do such a thing.

      The Kremlin's logic is inherently correct, a clueless people are easier to handle. This is also a conclusion foreign guests of the Kremlin have come to for hundreds of years.

      • If the Russians learn what the outside world really looks like, and vice versa, says Giles, it leads to the fall of the government. And that's actually how it went in the 1980s.

      fuckinggggggg, duuuuude, jesus christ, I'm gonna have a stroke

      • In order for Western narratives to reach the Russian population and really convince the broad layers of the population, it takes much more than the fall of the Putin regime, says Giles.
      • It requires a fundamental change of the entire Russian society. Such a change takes a long time. According to Giles, this is one reason why the ongoing conflict between Russia and the West cannot end soon.

      Now he's saying that we are trying to destroy Russian society? Just not with nukes, but by propaganda non-violently enlightening them about the wonders of neoliberalism in the rational and objective marketplace of ideas.

      We are talking about a conflict that takes generations, but is also waged between different generations within Russia.

      • The Russia problem will not disappear in such a way as many think.

      "The Russia problem", yes. That's not even google translate being wonky. What exactly is the Russia problem? That it exists in opposition to western hegemony? We're gonna have a lot more "problems" in the future then.

      For example, it is said that a Ukrainian victory could be a miracle cure for Russia.

      Many are saying it!

      Although Giles believes that Ukraine must win on the battlefield, this does not necessarily mean that Russia will change.

      • Russia is still on the way down and is in a historic phase that we have seen before. The oppression and aggressiveness get worse and worse until we approach a totalitarian state.

      Something that is exclusively happening in russia right now, and nowhere else on earth (except in china, I'm guessing).

      anakin-padme-1 Ukraine cannot create a Russian revolution. History shows that the turning point is always a radical change inside Russia.

      anakin-padme-2 Sure dude I'd fucking love another bolshevik uprising in russia, hell yeah dude. I'm glad we agree on at least one thing: bring back the soviet union, am I right.

      anakin-padme-3

      anakin-padme-4 ...right?

      • A Ukrainian victory is only a catalyst in that change. It wouldn't even be the beginning of it. We have a long way to go.

      Interesting take I haven't considered before: an ukrainian victory would be a catalyst for the next bolshevik uprising. These people are referring to a communist revolution when they say "change", right?

      Is Russia's victim mentality Putin's strongest weapon?

      • Russia's victim narrative is inviolable. It is part of the national myth.

      yeah yeah yeah shut the fuck up, I'm done with this fucking garbage

      • Rod_Blagojevic [none/use name]
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        The people of Russia are gonna be so mad at Putin when they learn that the rest of the world has asphalt.

      • notceps [he/him]
        ·
        1 year ago

        If the Russians learn what the outside world really looks like, and vice versa, says Giles, it leads to the fall of the government. And that's actually how it went in the 1980s.

        One of the possibly funniest things is that as younger guy I was kinda all over like some social democrat/libertarian/conservative/whatever mix that probably most people had and what really radicalized me was visiting the USA. Seeing just the amount of misery and suffering in a city like San Francisco. So yes please Mr Think Tank take the russians on a tour, show them the US of A they'll probably turn against Putin I'd hate for them to turn into communist, marxists and anarachists don't do it noooooo.