Russia and Ukraine

[Leonardo17]

That’s a shameful page in our history yes.

But you didn't answer my question. Do you think Armenians should be forced to honor the Turks who slaughtered them? Because that is exactly what you state the Ukrainians should be doing.

But look what the Germans are doing. I think denialism does not lead us anywhere.

The Germans aren't practicing denialism, though. The German government freely acknowledges its Nazi past, indeed educates German students about the guilt Germany carries for the atrocities.

I believe in facing these realities, trying to understand why they happened and raising new generations who will not repeat these mistakes

I believe there are much better ways of doing this than retaining statues glorifying the oppressors. You know,, things like class-rooms and museums, books and television programs, and so on.

1) No that’s not what I said. Do read my post on the USSR once again
2) Yes, That’s what I am saying
3) Whatever you say. That’s not what I meant. I said something different. Then I agreed with the fact that (not suffering the horrible situation in Ukraine right now, I wasn’t in a good place to criticize the Ukrainians for doing that). I agree that they are probably right in willing to remove a symbol of Russian oppression. I think they are right to see it that way. It’s the Russians (or more precisely Putin) who dishonored what I see as a common cultural heritage in the first place.
 
Anyway. I’m leaving you for a week or two. Good luck to anyone who is in Canada right now. Forest fires are dangerous so try not to take unnecessary risks.
 
Auf Wieder Sehen

[Thumpalumpacus]

But you didn't answer my question. Do you think Armenians should be forced to honor the Turks who slaughtered them? Because that is exactly what you state the Ukrainians should be doing.


The Germans aren't practicing denialism, though. The German government freely acknowledges its Nazi past, indeed educates German students about the guilt Germany carries for the atrocities.


I believe there are much better ways of doing this than retaining statues glorifying the oppressors. You know,, things like class-rooms and museums, books and television programs, and so on.

1) No that’s not what I said. Do read my post on the USSR once again
2) Yes, That’s what I am saying
3) Whatever you say. That’s not what I meant. I said something different. Then I agreed with the fact that (not suffering the horrible situation in Ukraine right now, I wasn’t in a good place to criticize the Ukrainians for doing that). I agree that they are probably right in willing to remove a symbol of Russian oppression. I think they are right to see it that way. It’s the Russians (or more precisely Putin) who dishonored what I see as a common cultural heritage in the first place.
 

And you still haven't answered my question.

[LinuxGal]

Developments in Special Moon Operation (SMO) not necessarily in favor of Mother Russia

(CNN) - Russia’s first moon mission in decades has ended in failure after the Luna-25 spacecraft collided with the Moon’s surface.

The incident happened after communication with the spacecraft was interrupted, a blow to Russia’s space ambitions.

Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, said it lost communication with Luna-25 on Saturday around 2:57pm Moscow time.

“The measures taken on August 19 and 20 to search for the device and get into contact with it did not yield any results,” it said.

According to preliminary calculations, Luna-25 “switched to an off-design orbit” before the collision, Roscosmos said.

[arewethereyet]

What we did was shameful but the Germans are worse isn't a good argument or defense.

No, now if you allow me to speak openly;
 

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   In France WWI and WWII history is a very important part of the curriculum. They teach students about the movement of collaboration with the Nazi’s during the “Final Solution” as well as the French Resistance for instance. They worguanize trips to concentration camps and induce teenagers to reflect and to debates on some black-white pictures of the holocaust they are seeing. In the 1995 movie “Dangerous Minds” featuring Michelle Pfeifer you can see how the Character of Louanne Johnson (ex-Marine) is taking gang member Kids to talk with Holocaust survivors in order to have a better understanding of their own situation (race problems / Gang problems etc.). I saw video movies (as a 13 year old Kid) of the WWII atrocities, with very graphic pictures and all that (I graduated from a French High school by the way).
 
   In Germany they tell kids of similar age group to take a small suitcase and fill them with whatever is most precious to them as if they were going to a concentration camp after being ordered by Nazi’s to do so. They also replaced the name of streets bearing the name of major German Colonialist figures and replaced them with the names of African leaders who resisted to German colonialism.
 
   For information purpose: My government has rejected the term “Genocide” in the past. It did agree with the facts of mass-deportation, sometimes mass-murder etc. without agreeing with the term “Genocide”. (I’m talking about real-Turkey before 2001, I don’t know or care about Belisarius’s vision on that).
 
   So what I am trying to say is: You become stronger when you talk about slavery, racial discrimination, ecocide or for instance forced assimilation of native population and all these stuff. It’s good to remember these things instead of wrapping them under the carpet and to be able to say “I will do all that is in my power so that this never happens again”. That’s how I see it.

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You can speak openly but be prepared to be called out on bullshit.

[The Grand Nudger]

They have no common cultural heritage, what little they share could be persuasively argued....by the kremlins means...to say that russia should surrender to fucking ukraine, as a country. By their batshit logic, there should be a little ukraine which is conveniently...you know...ukraine....., and a fucking big one the size of russia.

Russia doesn't believe the shit they say, though, so why should anyone else? Do you?

[Leonardo17]

Yes I think you are right. Sometimes I tend browse through the different messages very fast. Sorry about that.

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 The ottomans were a multi-cultural but still ethnically Turkish family. The second half of the 19th Century and the beginning of the 20th century was an era during which the empire was being torn apart because of agitations based on religious and/or national identities. Turkish nationalism was on the rise too. And it was also a very decadent and corrupt empire at the time. So something terrible happened with the Armenians and to be honest, I don’t know that much about the details.
 
The Soviet Union was something different. Putin is doing all that is in his power to emphasize the parallels between the Russian Federation, the Soviet Union and even Imperial Russia. I see these three things as being three different Russia’s with three different social contracts.
 
Eventually, when I read about the Holodomor for instance, I have no choice but to agree that it was very similar, yes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
 
Grand Nudger: When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, we started to learn about this and many other atrocities, which existed within the very fabric of the Soviet Union (like the Genocide and/or forced assimilation by the Bulgarian dictator Todor Jivkov for instance).
 
The only Communist rulers that I still like in some way are Josip Broz Tito and Mikhail Gorbatchev. I am also very critical of Lenin and the Bolchevik movement in general. Even the more romanticized figures of Socialism like Che Guevara or the more humanistic Leon Trotsky are highly reproachable in today’s standards.
 
So yes, I think I agree that Ukrainians are right to remove that hammer and sickle from that statue.
 
But no, I think Putin has no right to act as the heir of the Soviet Union. As I said. The Soviet Union was not really a “Russian” thing. I was a “Commie” thing. And that’s still important because: Look at the state of the world today. Overconsumption, plastic pollution. 1% of the richest emitting more CO2 than the 50% poorest half of mankind, mass migration, increased inequalities, climate crisis, no-exit conflicts (like Ukraine) that do not serve anyone at all. Etc. etc. And these guys were the “Bolsheviks”. They were very brutal complete hypocrites that have not really managed to do anything good for this world. They committed many atrocities other than the Holodomor that we can mention in details if you want. But during their time 1919-1991, they were still successful in providing an alternative social model to the world. That social model was actually worse than capitalism but it was still an alternative to something that is destroying us as a whole if you are willing to look at it very objectively.

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So that’s all I am saying and this time I am really leaving for a week or two. So take care

[Leonardo17]

Ukrainians are getting 42 F-16’s from a coalition of countries (that includes Denmark and the Netherlands) by the end of 2023:
 
https://www.yahoo.com/news/ukraine-war-l...37104.html

[The Grand Nudger]

So they only need to find 30 more english speaking pilots. - I'll let myself out.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

So they only need to find 30 more english speaking pilots. - I'll let myself out.

Estimates vary slightly, but the consensus is that about 60% of Ukrainians are proficient/fluent in English. At least some of them must be pilots.

Boru

[Fake Messiah]

Oh well, Prigozhin should have gotten Putin when he had a chance. What else did he expect? To live?