GivingEuropeASpook [they/them, comrade/them] @ GivingEuropeASpook @hexbear.net

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2 yr. ago

I haven't seen either of these phrases, but in my experience even when something is supposed to be the equivalent versions of each other, it somehow feels different to hear and say. Like, it feels alright to call my group of friends "bros" but not "sisses." Could it be that "go off queen" and "go off king" have different connotations despite the fact that they should mean the same thing?

What part of this reads as a "surrender" to you?

"It's not clear how Zelenskyy himself responded to Johnson's reported push to halt peace talks. On the same day of the British prime minister's arrival in Kyiv, Zelenskyy told the Associated Press in an interview that "no one wants to negotiate with a person or people who tortured this nation." "It's all understandable," he continued. "And as a man, as a father, I understand this very well." But, Zelenskyy added, "we don't want to lose opportunities, if we have them, for a diplomatic solution."

Also the only time the word "surrender" shows up is in a quote here where it was the west telling Zelensky to surrender and flee.

If your goal is to prevent deaths, surrendering would have been the ideal yeah.

This has literally never been true in any war ever. Foreign occupations rarely tend to be bloodless and I doubt a Russian one would have been an exception. At no point were any of the peace talks about Ukraine's surrender – only renouncing it's NATO ambitions in exchange for the withdrawal of Russian troops, as per:

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/05/06/boris-johnson-pressured-zelenskyy-ditch-peace-talks-russia-ukrainian-paper

"In the weeks ahead of Johnson's April 9 visit, high-level diplomatic talks held in Belarus and Turkey had failed to yield a diplomatic breakthrough, though reports in mid-March indicated that Russian and Ukrainian delegations "made significant progress" toward a 15-point peace deal that would involve Ukraine renouncing its NATO ambitions in exchange for the withdrawal of Moscow's troops."

At no point was surrender on the table - that would have likely lead to Zelenksy's detention and execution in the early days of the invasion.

Right, but it's not like every country not filled out in green is actively supporting Russia in the same way. In terms of countries supplying Russia the way the US, NATO, and the EU are supplying Ukraine, I'm pretty sure it's just Iran and North Korea. The US has largely failed to isolate Russia the way it wanted to, but Russia hasn't been able to get the kind of support from its allies that Ukraine has (like, unless there have been some Chinese Type 99s tanks spotted in operation by the Russians that I hadn't heard about, I'm not exactly tracking the front every day).

even more political groups and discussions rarely involve ukraine except when lula decides to own zelensky in some way, no one here cares about nato's proxy war

I mean why should they? Brazil as a country (you mention lula, so) isn't in NATO so it doesn't have an ideological reason to support Russia or Ukraine in the matter. There's nothing to be gained geographically for Brazil either, since whoever controls Kyiv doesn't directly impact any strategic concerns for Brazil afaik.

You say no one cares, so while I think most people in Canada and US hope that Ukraine "wins", does that mean apathy in that regard or would you say most people are passively hoping Russia achieves its war goals?

And that makes it okay for them to escalate it, how?

Yes, but the liberal pro-EU protestors got sidelined by literal neo-Nazis. The following President was basically handpicked by the US Ambassador. There's plenty of western media from 2015-2021 about the integration of Azov into the Ukrainian military structure, the rehabilitation of World War II collaborators, and the suppression of the Russian language. The people of the East are, in principle, just as entitled to wish to join Russia as western Ukraine is to join the EU.

Until Democratic centrists sacrifice trans people to pass various "must pass" bills after House GOP reps put poison-pill regulations into them and try to make a new Hyde Amendment, prohibiting Federal support for gender-affirming care and opening the door to outright legal discrimination federally.

And that's assuming they don't lose the Senate/Presidency.

There's a state-by-state map updated last in June here: https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/june-anti-trans-legislative-risk

It's also still something that might need to be litigated in courts, which in and of itself is also a danger for people who can't afford it.

TBH I don't think "legitimacy" matters. They function as an independent country. They issue passports, and flights between them and the mainland function as international flights despite both countries making up legal mumbo jumbo that calls it "cross-strait travel". There are countries with more widespread "legitimate" recognition that are functionally less of a nationstate than Taiwan.

The ideological makeup of Taiwan has nothing to do with whether or not they are entitled to sovereignty from a diplomatic perspective. International relations isn't about right and wrong. In fact, the KMT and CPC are in agreement in maintaining the status quo - the KMT and the CPC work together to oppose any attempts at renouncing claims to mainland China by Taiwan and formally becoming the Republic of Taiwan.

Sovereignty as a concept in international relations stems from the Treaty of Westphalia, in that each nation has an absolute say within its own borders and that said borders are inviolable.

Being a sovereign nation is when you don't have a seat in the UN and most sovereign nations refuse to recognize you as an independent nation.

I really don't think this is the view people on the left should hold. Someone could say the same thing about many nations or groups that don't have a seat in the UN and aren't recognised but are still supported by communists and anarchists.

Tbh I think chain gangs, whether they are public or private, are gulag-like

what's the difference between a Soviet gulag and a Western prison?

The popular depiction of the soviet gulag existed for a relatively short time within the USSR's history whereas at least US prisons haven't changed since the 1800s?