What is up with the hardcore leftists taking the pro-Russia side? Did I miss the memo?
Contrarian brain worms
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I’m mildly uncomfortable about the fact that “the pro-Russia side” is anything short of the idea that Russian forces are 90% subhuman beasts hell-bent on the extermination of the Ukraine nation, but not so uncomfortable that I’m going to reply to any replies to this.
Pretty similar to how some people on this board talk about U.S. cops.
I agree with that, though I think that the sort of rhetoric you’re talking about operates in a cultural environment which is otherwise far too deferential to the police, whereas what I’m talking about operates in a cultural environment where Russia is already (quite reasonably) considered a bad actor.
The “pro-Russia side” is “propagating Kremlin propaganda” which is in turn “both-sidesing wars of aggression, war crimes, and genocide”.
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Poll needs a “genocide is a purely political word with no useful meaning” option.
This would probably qualify as trolling if I don’t explain myself so: I’m aware that it has a legal definition and whatever but it’s uncomfortably close for me to the “we had good intentions” trope, like the US invasion of Iraq wasn’t really that bad because they were spreading Freedom and Democracy. Like the argument that Russia is in the process of doing genocide rests heavily on the nationalist justification on state TV that Ukraine isn’t a real country or ethnicity. But to me the fact that they launched a war of aggression with no justification is the problem here? Like if they said “Ukraine is definitely a real country and separate ethnicity, but we’re going to annex them and murder their leaders anyway” that doesn’t make it better. The fact that they are domestically justifying it with appeals to Russian nationalism is borderline irrelevant.
My point here is not that the Russian invasion is not bad, it’s that the idea of “genocide” increasingly acts to distinguish The Real Bad Things That We All Agree Are Bad (the Russian invasion) from Sure, Kind Of Bad But Meh (the Yemeni war) and that the function of the word is now not delineating severity of badness but rather just a means to rhetorically browbeat people.
Edit: And the reason for this post is that I think your poll is an example of that, like every single option contains “genocide” and the reason the word is there is to accuse anyone who doesn’t agree with your point of view of “justifying genocide”.
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I think in Iraq and Afghanistan there were a few documented instances of US soldiers acting independently and murdering prisoners. Russia on the other hand has been openly murdering what seems like every male civilian they take prisoner with many females too. Murdering civilians as part of official policy definitely brings the term genocide into play.
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This, and also, the US prosecuted those soldiers when those crimes came to light (I can cite some convictions I know of if needed). I don’t see the Russians investigating any of the murders and rapes their soldiers are perpetrating, let alone prosecuting them. That strongly implies that violence against civilians is encouraged, or, at the very least, tolerated, by the Russian command structure. I can’t see how this is not genocide.
Probably some of this, but also when you’ve spent your whole life justifiably arguing that the US Is Actually Bad to people that reflexively disagree with that, then it becomes your guiding principle for everything. I wouldn’t say that’s quite the same as contrarian brain worms, which is more like the Joe Rogan approach of assuming that challenging orthodoxy implies intelligence because intelligent people challenge orthodoxy.
Those who say “they laughed at Einstein2” forget that they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. And for every Einstein2, there are tens of millions of bozos.
Completely absurd. Like just restricting myself to how the conflict is portrayed in the Western media, this is at odds with the large number of Ukranian people who are supposed to have been relocated to camps. Why weren’t they just murdered? Or there’s something like this:
The third such swap. I don’t mean to deny the existence of atrocities like Bucha, or that the regime seems to at best be turning a blind eye to such things, but the idea that Russia is murdering all of their prisoners is out to lunch.
Hmm. This reminds me of something.
Also, I think the term you are looking for is “deported”. They are being deported to camps in Russia.
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I think this is a good comparison because it gets to the core idea. When bad ideas spread throughout an institution with power then it leads to Really Bad Stuff, like US police force oppression of people of color or Russian Army invasion of a neighboring country. Why are we comfortable with slogans like All Cops Are Bad? It’s because their institution has power, and objectively bad ideas have taken root in a critical mass of their membership so that the power of the institution itself is being turned into dark corners. This isn’t really even denying the cops their humanity, in truth it’s acknowledging that cops are flawed humans with psychological weaknesses and a tendency to go with the crowd and have their views shaped by their peers. Like, you know, everyone else. Much of this can be applied to Russian soldiers as well. The individuals that commit atrocities have agency, and they deserve to be rightly criticized. And at the same time we can acknowledge that they are formed and shaped by the corrupt institution that they are a part of. These aren’t really contradictory. Individual people are parts of groups, and individuals and groups have characteristics. It’s ok to acknowledge that groups have characteristics, even though we have to be constantly on the lookout for unfair generalizations.
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Does this mean Lord of the Rings is problematic now?
Let’s approach this from another angle: just war theory.
Which of these criteria for jus ad bellum do you believe have been met by Ukraine?
- Just cause - there is a good reason to go to war
- Right intention - war is being fought for the right reason
- Legitimate authority - the war is being fought by an actor who has the right to fight a war
- Proportionality - the benefit of the war outweighs the damage caused
- Last resort - there was no other option
- Having a reasonable chance of success
- None of these conditions are being met
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Jus in bello, conduct during a war is a separate category.
“Having a reasonable chance of success”.
This is not a reason to wage war.
This, and I would argue that none of the other conditions are met, but also none of these conditions were met for the US invasion of Iraq. Which does not necessarily mean that the two are equivalent, but I think illustrates the way in which drawing lines around “genocide” obscures the monstrousness of other wars of aggression.
My friends pet LoTR theory is that it’s a history written by the winners to justify the unprovoked attack on Mordor and the genocide of the orcs.
I made the mistake of asking him about it once.
There is no unprovoked attack on Mordor, seems like a problem for this theory.