Ignoring that there are a ton of people in the Donbass region that will never forgive Kiev for murdering them over the last decade in a bloody civil war

Oh yeah. Just completely unverifiable claims of indiscriminate shelling by Ukraine after Russia invaded Donbass and Crimea.

Also my bad, I was in another discussion and got mixed up. People tend to pile on you in .ml when you don’t toe the party line.

But, I did mean what I said about the discussion.

I think we’ll have to disagree to disagree. (Except for the parts where I completely agree with you)

To bring it back to the original point:

Personally knowing Ukrainians who are currently defending their homes from Russian invasion, I think I will never forgive Russia for what they’ve done and the innocent people they’ve killed. Just like I would never forgive the US, or Israel or any country that commits similar atrocities. Putin ultimately bears responsible for this.

I appreciate the thoughtful responses you gave to everything though and it gave me reason to think through my own convictions too (even if they remain unchanged).

Oh so you are actually a tankie by definition haha. Ok I guess this post makes more sense now.

I think it’s fair for me to assume that you’re just going to call me a brainwashed liberal for not agreeing with your narrative on the revolution. So, respectfully, discussing that probably isn’t going to be very productive for us.

But I do think you are misrepresenting the idea of authoritarianism. You are correct that at some level authority is applied in every society, but where that authority is derived from is the distinguishing characteristic.

In a democratic system, authority is derived from the will of the people through elections and voting. Unions, the original soviets and many communist structures are inherently democratic. However In a traditionally “authoritarian” system, authority is usually derived from the threat of violence.

While the threat of violence exists in a democratic system, there is a path to peaceful reform and resolution of conflict. In an authoritarian system, change is usually only achieved through violence.

So if I was just repeating Russian “talking points” you’d have no problem with that?

Tankie does have a specific meaning though. Authoritarian communists. It was a term used to describe communists in western countries who supported the human rights abuses of the Soviet Union. Specifically when the Soviet army invaded Hungary to suppress the 1956 democratic revolution.

It’s not a specific pejorative against all communists. I don’t think the type of people who say “commie, pinko or red” actually use it at all.

How to be popular:

• Use a loophole to run for a third term of presidency by becoming prime minister.
• Rewrite the constitution during your third term to remove your term limit.
• Jail your political opponents.
• Assassinate critics.
• Only allow approved opposition to run.
• Brutally crush any democratic protests.
• Force government employees to vote for you.
• Start a war to rally support for yourself.
• Take lots of weird, shirtless, old-man photos.

Yeah, fifth term and 88% of the vote.

Totally legitimate. Definitely not dictator for life.

I haven’t expressed any support for the US or NATO.

How can you call yourself a socialist when you support a fascist dictator (Putin) running a failing hyper-capitalist petro-state (Russia) conducting an imperialist war of aggression in Ukraine?

Sounds like you’re a liberal just wearing a tattered old Soviet hat. You’re the same as Americans cheering on their imperialist adventures.

deleted by creator

I don’t think a fascist dictator can legitimately accuse anyone of a coup.

You don’t know what we hope[1][2].

Is word salad still on the menu?

Russian “imperialist aggression” isn’t what this was in the first place[3][4][5][6].

This is what I’m talking about.

When presented with two truths, you’ll accept the pro-Russian one without criticism as it’s what you want to believe.

Your logic is:

West = bad
Russia is anti-west
Russia = good

For example, I bet you believe every dubious claim made about genocide in Donbass from pro-Russian sources, but you probably believe Bucha and Mariupol are false flag attacks made by “Ukrainian Nazis”

Not because it’s the truth, but because it fits your worldview.

Unsourced my ass:

Thank you, why couldn’t the article have actually linked this instead of a reddit thread??

Also how relevant are cold war documents to today’s situation? Ukraine was part of the Soviet union when this document was created. Do you really believe the KGB wasn’t producing similar documents? Look at the “Foundations of Geopolitics” a book that is actually still influencing Putin’s decision-making today.

“A negotiated end to the war” probably doesn’t mean “surrender unconditionally” as many .ml residents hope.

Ending the war without rock solid security guarantees just leaves Ukraine open to further Russian imperialist aggression in the future.

And as a side note, can I also confirm if the bar for evidence is so low in this instance that unsourced grainy scans of documents posted on tankie Reddit subs are considered authoritative?

Shit, thank you for the explanation.

So based on the article it’s safe to assume Thailand is starting this?