6 ms·

This is an outrage. 9.5 million people held hostage because of a few maniacs in government. Individual liberty is truly a precious thing.

codeecan 5y ago
North Korea has a population of 25M
ArkanExplorer 5y ago
Western Governments have done the same thing to their own citizenry for over a year... Melbourne, Australia is now in its 4th lockdown, a city of 5 million people, based on 50 positive PCR test results over the past week. Australian citizens generally cannot leave their country either, for over a year. Given that Belarus had no COVID lockdowns or restrictions, people there have enjoyed comparatively more freedom over the past year compared to the average Western citizen. The West also takes down airliners in attempts to apprehend journalists. If you have the wrong political opinions, you can lose your job, and be unpersoned by corporate groups with ties to the Government. The West no longer has the moral high ground and we should be aware of the propaganda levels of the world we are now living in. I'm not defending Russia or Belarus. They are mafia states. They are just less sophisticated operators without the global media on their side.
- misiti3780 5y ago
  What percentage of the city is vaccinated?
  - misiti3780 5y ago
    Please explain why I am being downvoted - That comment was not in bad faith, I was just generally curious
- Nursie 5y ago
  This is such false equivalence it’s silly. Travel restrictions in the west enjoy wide support and are in response to a global health emergency, not spurious political reasons put in place by someone who appears to be an illegitimate leader. Your ‘unpersoned’ comment is laughable.
  - ArkanExplorer 5y ago
    Lukashenko and Putin enjoy widespread support. Belarus has essentially zero poverty and zero unemployment. He has been in power for 27 years. Does popular support justify tyranny, be it from COVID lockdown or to preserve a dictatorship? What has changed in the last year to prompt these protests against him anyway? The obvious answer is nothing, that the agitation is stirred up by the West, perhaps since he didn't bend the knee and agree to COVID lockdowns despite being offered $940 million: https://eng.belta.by/president/view/belarus-president-unwilling-to-accept-additional-terms-to-get-foreign-loans-131164-2020/ https://eng.belta.by/president/view/belarus-president-unwill... Meanwhile, lockdown in the West has clearly failed - Sweden and Ukraine, with weak or no lockdowns, have a lower per-capita deathtoll than countries that did lockdown: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide-per-million-inhabitants/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deat... And deaths are only up 6% YoY in Sweden and Ukraine, basically in line with the aging of the population and the effects of a once-a-decade flu variant (similar in mortality to Swine Flu wave in 2009). The West is trying to start another color revolution in Belarus, as they did in Ukraine, where the US Government officials were on the street handing out sandwiches to protestors. https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/1213/Russia-cries-foul-over-Western-embrace-of-Ukraine-s-demonstrators https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/1213/Russia-crie... Is Ukraine better off since their revolution? Yes, I think so (I live here). Would Belarus be better off without Lukashenko? Possibly. However, since 2014, several million Ukrainians have fled the country to work in the EU, and a large chunk of territory has been lost. I'm suggest that there are layers of deception and propaganda at work here that we, as intelligent IT personnel, should be aware of if we want to comment on these articles.
    - Nursie 5y ago
      > Does popular support justify tyranny If you see travel restrictions during a pandemic as tyranny, I'm not sure I can help you.
- rendall 5y ago
  Yeah, no. Australia is not Belarus. The comparison is absurd. Just, stop. Scroll through the timeline of these Belarusians, who are literally risking their lives by exposing and combating these situations. Really take some time to grasp the situation there. https://twitter.com/HannaLiubakova https://twitter.com/HannaLiubakova https://twitter.com/franakviacorka https://twitter.com/franakviacorka https://mobile.twitter.com/Tsihanouskaya https://mobile.twitter.com/Tsihanouskaya
  - robotnaoborot 5y ago
    Well the girl who got arrested from that plane had a telegram channel which exposed home addresses of families of cops. And she advocated to lynch their wives and children. In western media she is called "opposition journalist". But in my book it's basically a classic terrorism.
    - rendall 5y ago
      You're lying
- dzyanis 5y ago
  Oh, dear! Nobody cares about covid here. Everything works as usual and we have no idea how many people died. Funeral tax profits increased by more than 50%. Government closed the border because we want to escape. The state takes revenge for our protests. And it’s impossible to describe the whole situation but political prisoners die in prison or commit suicide. Today, for example, one guy tried to cut his throat right in court https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591
  - sam_lowry_ 5y ago
    That sounds like an informed opinion from someone who is now in Belarus.
david38 5y ago
I have a good friend from Belarus. This isn’t what’s happening. The current dictator has a lot of supporters, and I mean real supporters, not people “supporting” him at gun point. It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  As first generation out of Portuguese dictatorship, this is unfortunately how it starts. When everyone realises their mistake there is no turning back for several years to come.
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    Also Venezuela.
    - failwhaleshark 5y ago
      Juan Guaidó wasn't elected. He and his US backers keep shouting "no, I'm the president" and "yes you are" respectively doesn't make it so. It's gangster capitalism Monroe doctrine to install another Pinochet or Branco. The US calls Maduro a "dictator" despite being elected. The reason the US does is simple: money (which uses US ideological politics as a means-to-an-end), since he specifically stated his purpose after the death of Chávez: "Compatriots, I am not here out of personal ambition, out of vanity, or because my surname Maduro is a part of the rancid oligarchy of this country. I am not here because I represent financial groups, neither of the oligarchy nor of American imperialism ... I am not here to protect mafias nor groups nor factions. IOW, because he wouldn't sell-out his own people or his own country, so he's been marked for death/removal, his people marked for sanctions, and Fox News leads the charge smearing the man and the country to make some vampiric rich Americans more money.
      - ethbr0 5y ago
        I didn't say anything about Guaidó. I stated that Venzuala was another example where "It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity." In Venezuala's case: poor people would rather support unsustainable state subsidies and industries, at the long term cost of running their economy and currency into the ground.
dgudkov 5y ago
Belarusians had a good chance to overthrow these maniacs just a few months ago. Instead, they chose to protest softly and not make it a fierce standoff "like it was in Ukraine". Now they pay a price. I'm not judging Belarusians. Freedom is hard.
- livueta 5y ago
  This seems harsh, and yet: > And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward. -- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Apropos to nothing, but it feels like mainstream Western media shut up pretty quick about Myanmar when it became evident that peaceful protest wasn't a viable strategy.

codeecan 5y ago

North Korea has a population of 25M

ArkanExplorer 5y ago

Western Governments have done the same thing to their own citizenry for over a year... Melbourne, Australia is now in its 4th lockdown, a city of 5 million people, based on 50 positive PCR test results over the past week. Australian citizens generally cannot leave their country either, for over a year. Given that Belarus had no COVID lockdowns or restrictions, people there have enjoyed comparatively more freedom over the past year compared to the average Western citizen. The West also takes down airliners in attempts to apprehend journalists. If you have the wrong political opinions, you can lose your job, and be unpersoned by corporate groups with ties to the Government. The West no longer has the moral high ground and we should be aware of the propaganda levels of the world we are now living in. I'm not defending Russia or Belarus. They are mafia states. They are just less sophisticated operators without the global media on their side.

misiti3780 5y ago
What percentage of the city is vaccinated?
- misiti3780 5y ago
  Please explain why I am being downvoted - That comment was not in bad faith, I was just generally curious
Nursie 5y ago
This is such false equivalence it’s silly. Travel restrictions in the west enjoy wide support and are in response to a global health emergency, not spurious political reasons put in place by someone who appears to be an illegitimate leader. Your ‘unpersoned’ comment is laughable.
- ArkanExplorer 5y ago
  Lukashenko and Putin enjoy widespread support. Belarus has essentially zero poverty and zero unemployment. He has been in power for 27 years. Does popular support justify tyranny, be it from COVID lockdown or to preserve a dictatorship? What has changed in the last year to prompt these protests against him anyway? The obvious answer is nothing, that the agitation is stirred up by the West, perhaps since he didn't bend the knee and agree to COVID lockdowns despite being offered $940 million: https://eng.belta.by/president/view/belarus-president-unwilling-to-accept-additional-terms-to-get-foreign-loans-131164-2020/ https://eng.belta.by/president/view/belarus-president-unwill... Meanwhile, lockdown in the West has clearly failed - Sweden and Ukraine, with weak or no lockdowns, have a lower per-capita deathtoll than countries that did lockdown: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide-per-million-inhabitants/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deat... And deaths are only up 6% YoY in Sweden and Ukraine, basically in line with the aging of the population and the effects of a once-a-decade flu variant (similar in mortality to Swine Flu wave in 2009). The West is trying to start another color revolution in Belarus, as they did in Ukraine, where the US Government officials were on the street handing out sandwiches to protestors. https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/1213/Russia-cries-foul-over-Western-embrace-of-Ukraine-s-demonstrators https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2013/1213/Russia-crie... Is Ukraine better off since their revolution? Yes, I think so (I live here). Would Belarus be better off without Lukashenko? Possibly. However, since 2014, several million Ukrainians have fled the country to work in the EU, and a large chunk of territory has been lost. I'm suggest that there are layers of deception and propaganda at work here that we, as intelligent IT personnel, should be aware of if we want to comment on these articles.
  - Nursie 5y ago
    > Does popular support justify tyranny If you see travel restrictions during a pandemic as tyranny, I'm not sure I can help you.
rendall 5y ago
Yeah, no. Australia is not Belarus. The comparison is absurd. Just, stop. Scroll through the timeline of these Belarusians, who are literally risking their lives by exposing and combating these situations. Really take some time to grasp the situation there. https://twitter.com/HannaLiubakova https://twitter.com/HannaLiubakova https://twitter.com/franakviacorka https://twitter.com/franakviacorka https://mobile.twitter.com/Tsihanouskaya https://mobile.twitter.com/Tsihanouskaya
- robotnaoborot 5y ago
  Well the girl who got arrested from that plane had a telegram channel which exposed home addresses of families of cops. And she advocated to lynch their wives and children. In western media she is called "opposition journalist". But in my book it's basically a classic terrorism.
  - rendall 5y ago
    You're lying
dzyanis 5y ago
Oh, dear! Nobody cares about covid here. Everything works as usual and we have no idea how many people died. Funeral tax profits increased by more than 50%. Government closed the border because we want to escape. The state takes revenge for our protests. And it’s impossible to describe the whole situation but political prisoners die in prison or commit suicide. Today, for example, one guy tried to cut his throat right in court https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57320591
- sam_lowry_ 5y ago
  That sounds like an informed opinion from someone who is now in Belarus.

david38 5y ago

I have a good friend from Belarus. This isn’t what’s happening. The current dictator has a lot of supporters, and I mean real supporters, not people “supporting” him at gun point. It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity.

pjmlp 5y ago
As first generation out of Portuguese dictatorship, this is unfortunately how it starts. When everyone realises their mistake there is no turning back for several years to come.
- ethbr0 5y ago
  Also Venezuela.
  - failwhaleshark 5y ago
    Juan Guaidó wasn't elected. He and his US backers keep shouting "no, I'm the president" and "yes you are" respectively doesn't make it so. It's gangster capitalism Monroe doctrine to install another Pinochet or Branco. The US calls Maduro a "dictator" despite being elected. The reason the US does is simple: money (which uses US ideological politics as a means-to-an-end), since he specifically stated his purpose after the death of Chávez: "Compatriots, I am not here out of personal ambition, out of vanity, or because my surname Maduro is a part of the rancid oligarchy of this country. I am not here because I represent financial groups, neither of the oligarchy nor of American imperialism ... I am not here to protect mafias nor groups nor factions. IOW, because he wouldn't sell-out his own people or his own country, so he's been marked for death/removal, his people marked for sanctions, and Fox News leads the charge smearing the man and the country to make some vampiric rich Americans more money.
    - ethbr0 5y ago
      I didn't say anything about Guaidó. I stated that Venzuala was another example where "It is similar I think to the situation in the US where poor people will sometimes vote against their financial interests to support an identity." In Venezuala's case: poor people would rather support unsustainable state subsidies and industries, at the long term cost of running their economy and currency into the ground.

dgudkov 5y ago

Belarusians had a good chance to overthrow these maniacs just a few months ago. Instead, they chose to protest softly and not make it a fierce standoff "like it was in Ukraine". Now they pay a price. I'm not judging Belarusians. Freedom is hard.

livueta 5y ago
This seems harsh, and yet: > And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward. -- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Apropos to nothing, but it feels like mainstream Western media shut up pretty quick about Myanmar when it became evident that peaceful protest wasn't a viable strategy.