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Is it possible to understand that Russia is the aggressor but also oppose sanctions? Russia has absolutely committed more atrocities than Iran and Cuba, but non

Is it possible to understand that Russia is the aggressor but also oppose sanctions? Russia has absolutely committed more atrocities than Iran and Cuba, but none of these countries are democracies, and therefore I find it difficult to support measures that disproportionately affect the citizenry over the ruling class in any of these countries. I also hope the dialogue in these threads can improve. The quality of the comments, at the time of writing mine, are poor and quippy.

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SllX 4y ago
It doesn’t matter what form of government Russia has on paper when they’ve invaded a separate sovereign nation and worst than that: appear to be very serious about genocide and also appear to be very serious about using their nukes in some capacity. They can stand equal among nations with advanced financial markets, medicine and technology if they want. I have no problem with that, but it comes with a price: checking their territorial ambitions at the door. At this point I would even add on to that fully surrendering their nuclear arsenal because the leaders they’ve either chosen or “chosen” (and for the purposes of this conversation it doesn’t really matter which anymore) have proven to be irresponsible caretakers.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > appear to be very serious about genocide Words don't mean anything anymore.
  - SllX 4y ago
    No context? I might be agreeing with you. But Putin led off with “Ukrainians aren’t a real people”. Signaling counts for a lot in war and diplomacy.
  - megous 4y ago
    You sure? https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Russia_Should_Do_with_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Russia_Should_Do_with_Ukr...)
- swe_dima 4y ago
  I hate Putin and completely oppose this war, but there's no genocide. Putin's words are that Russians and Ukranians are the same people and Ukraine is not a real country, but a part of Russia. There are many casualties among civilians because of how idiotic this war is, but nobody is killing Ukrainians on the basis of their ethnicity.
  - SllX 4y ago
    If the result is to erase Ukrainians as a people and Ukraine as a nation, then the result is still genocide. I know this is a contentious word for a lot of reasons, but this is completely within the scope of genocide.
    - swe_dima 4y ago
      According to Wiki "Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people, usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group...". The initial goal of this war was to change Ukraininan government to a more friendly one. I have no idea what the current goal is, but it's very clear it's not killing people. Propaganda is trying very hard to deny any killings of civilians that do happen, if the goal was genocide they would try to portray Ukrainians as less than humans, the way some Germans considered jews to be vermin during Hitler. Russians identify deeply with Ukraine, many have relatives and roots there (myself included). For this reason propaganda is trying to say that they are not fighting Ukraine, but NATO mercenaries. Again, this is horrible but does not sound like genocide.
      - lostmsu 4y ago
        > Propaganda is trying very hard to deny any killings of civilians that do happen, if the goal was genocide they would try to portray Ukrainians as less than humans I fail to follow the logic here. If I beat you with a baseball bat, and will try very hard to deny that, does it mean my goal was not to beat you with a baseball bat? What if at the same time I will post articles in popular blogs about how you are a great human being and we are basically brothers?

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SllX 4y ago

It doesn’t matter what form of government Russia has on paper when they’ve invaded a separate sovereign nation and worst than that: appear to be very serious about genocide and also appear to be very serious about using their nukes in some capacity. They can stand equal among nations with advanced financial markets, medicine and technology if they want. I have no problem with that, but it comes with a price: checking their territorial ambitions at the door. At this point I would even add on to that fully surrendering their nuclear arsenal because the leaders they’ve either chosen or “chosen” (and for the purposes of this conversation it doesn’t really matter which anymore) have proven to be irresponsible caretakers.

pessimizer 4y ago
> appear to be very serious about genocide Words don't mean anything anymore.
- SllX 4y ago
  No context? I might be agreeing with you. But Putin led off with “Ukrainians aren’t a real people”. Signaling counts for a lot in war and diplomacy.
- megous 4y ago
  You sure? https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Russia_Should_Do_with_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Russia_Should_Do_with_Ukr...)
swe_dima 4y ago
I hate Putin and completely oppose this war, but there's no genocide. Putin's words are that Russians and Ukranians are the same people and Ukraine is not a real country, but a part of Russia. There are many casualties among civilians because of how idiotic this war is, but nobody is killing Ukrainians on the basis of their ethnicity.
- SllX 4y ago
  If the result is to erase Ukrainians as a people and Ukraine as a nation, then the result is still genocide. I know this is a contentious word for a lot of reasons, but this is completely within the scope of genocide.
  - swe_dima 4y ago
    According to Wiki "Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people, usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group...". The initial goal of this war was to change Ukraininan government to a more friendly one. I have no idea what the current goal is, but it's very clear it's not killing people. Propaganda is trying very hard to deny any killings of civilians that do happen, if the goal was genocide they would try to portray Ukrainians as less than humans, the way some Germans considered jews to be vermin during Hitler. Russians identify deeply with Ukraine, many have relatives and roots there (myself included). For this reason propaganda is trying to say that they are not fighting Ukraine, but NATO mercenaries. Again, this is horrible but does not sound like genocide.
    - lostmsu 4y ago
      > Propaganda is trying very hard to deny any killings of civilians that do happen, if the goal was genocide they would try to portray Ukrainians as less than humans I fail to follow the logic here. If I beat you with a baseball bat, and will try very hard to deny that, does it mean my goal was not to beat you with a baseball bat? What if at the same time I will post articles in popular blogs about how you are a great human being and we are basically brothers?