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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   1722 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 2, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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No, I don’t like hearing obvious Russian propaganda talking points. I agree it’s been a topic discussed before, but there’s talking about the Ukraine war and there’s regurgitating Russian propaganda and I think the latter is happening and it is just a huge intellectual turn-off for me. I don’t think you can have discussions about it; it’s like debating at a geography debate club and suddenly the topic changed from the relevance of tectonic shifts to if the Earth is flat. Even if the conversation changes topic, the shock is still resounding for me.

My point earlier was that the realpolitik perspective is indistinguishable from the Russian propaganada, for me anyways. Continuing to fight a war you can't win is just not a good idea, even though invading your neighbours is not a nice thing to do.

So Russian propaganda says "Russia Stronk -- Ukraine can't win and should give up before we crush them" -- how do you tell the difference between this and a complicated analysis of military strength arriving at the same conclusion? (which is basically my position on this, despite not being a Russian propagandist -- I do read with interest (for example) Dean's complicated analyses showing that Ukraine might win in the end; I just don't think they are correct)

Probably the majority of the 'realpolitik' posts are bent on avoiding the stating of plain facts such as that 'Russia is a totalitarian state that invaded a democracy'. If they could actually bite the bullet and describe reality as is, while also advocating that Ukraine should surrender (or all but), that would be an honest realpolitik position, but it's no coincidence that they also want to blame Ukraine and empathise with Russia. That is not realpolitik at all but moral justification.

Probably the majority of the 'realpolitik' posts are bent on avoiding the stating of plain facts such as that 'Russia is a totalitarian state that invaded a democracy'.

I have no problem with this, but would tend not to include it in a realpolitik post because it's exactly the kind of thing that's irrelevant in a realpolitik framework.

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