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I can give some background on this, I immigrated from Russia to the US when I was 5 and I still have a ton of extended family that lives there. Do I like Putin

I can give some background on this, I immigrated from Russia to the US when I was 5 and I still have a ton of extended family that lives there. Do I like Putin or what Russia is doing? Hell no. But at the same time I'm not going to saying anything negative in public about Russia. If I got on the Russian governments radar forget what they will do to me, I live in America, what will they do to my Grandmother, my uncles, my nieces, my cousins? I don't know what they will do, and for that reason I cannot risk saying anything. The same applies in places like Turkey, China, etc. Yeah you might not like what the govt there is doing, but at the same time you can't risk speaking up and having the blowback taken out on your family that still lives there.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
cblconfederate 6y ago
On the other hand public pressure from abroad does work , and since politics tends to run in families, their families are at risk anyway. I can tell from the experience of my country (greece) during the dictatorial regime 50 years ago. The greeks who were persecuted / emigrated to europe (France mostly) were very vocal about the (US-backed) regime and drew international condemnation, especially the high-profile ones. It certainly contributed to its eventual downfall a few years later, but importantly it helped the swift return of democracy, because there was already a group of people who were politically organized abroad.