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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31630 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 9, 2023

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But you can't expect much from the majority of people, they are easily mislead and believe all sorts of stuff. Are Americans as a group to blame for war in Iraq and should be hated for it because majority of them once supported it? I don`t think so. And I don't think that majority of Russians will support SMO in the next 10 years.

Are Americans as a group to blame for war in Iraq and should be hated for it because majority of them once supported it?

Hated by whom? By Saddam Hussein? Probably. But why would I care what Saddam Hussein would think, if he wasn't hanged and dead?

And I don't think that majority of Russians will support SMO in the next 10 years.

So all we need is to wait 10 more years or terror, murders, war crimes and atrocities, and then it all be ok. Or at least some guy on the internet says so. That really makes one confident, thanks.

Hated by whom?

I assume by the rest of the world. This was said in the context of the effects of war propaganda, most people "hating" Russia over the invasion aren't Ukrainian and aren't directly affected by the war in any way.

Even people not being Ukrainians can condemn war crimes and atrocities committed by Russians. Just as you don't have to be a Jew to condemn the Holocaust, or Armenian to condemn the Armenian genocide, or a Tutsi to condemn Rwandan genocide. Recoiling before the sights of inumane atrocity is not "war propaganda", it is a natural effect of learning about the atrocity and being horrified by it.

Yes, that was precisely my point. Even people not being Iraqis can condemn war crimes and atrocities committed by Americans. Not only Saddam.

Edit: the propaganda side of this is that you learn about certain atrocities and not about others. Effective war propaganda is indeed based in natural effects and natural human compassion. Propaganda doesn't necessarily mean lies. For example, it seems that you couldn't conceive that anyone but Saddam (and I charitably assume you mean Iraqis in general) could have aversion against the US invasion of Iraq, the lies it was based in and the war crimes committed (plus the many we likely don't know about). Saddam being a tyrant doesn't change that.

The war crimes that were committed by Americans - like Abu Ghraib incident - were also condemned, including by Americans.

the propaganda side of this is that you learn about certain atrocities and not about others.

We know about American atrocities and we call them that. But when it comes to Russian atrocities, somehow there's always somebody explaining that it's still America's fault because if only we gave them more people to enslave they'd finally stop. Somehow there's always justification for any foreign atrocity, as if America being imperfect justifies that.

Saddam being a tyrant doesn't change that.

It kinda does. Not about the atrocities, but about the war. War against a brutal dictator, ruthlessly oppressing local population, openly supporting international terrorists, developing and deploying weapons of mass destruction (even though not exactly in a way the ironically named "intelligence" services presented) and invading foreign countries - yes, it is morally different from a war against a democratic country which poses no threat to anybody but just looks too inviting not to invade. I'm not saying US should intervene into any case of brutal dictatorship - I am saying the moral calculus does differ, and Saddam being a tyrant does change it.

But when it comes to Russian atrocities, somehow there's always somebody explaining that it's still America's fault

Not me.

it is morally different

Disagree. They were already suffering under Saddam, they didn't need what the US brought to them: death and more wars, way beyond the war with the US lasted. Him being a tyrant has zero to do with the reasons for the war, the US has toppled democracies and supported (and still supports, daily) all kinds of brutal dictatorships. Which brings us back to propaganda in the form of selected truths.

Him being a tyrant has zero to do with the reasons for the war,

This is false, it has a lot to do with the reason for the war (unless of course you subscribe to the idiotic notion that US just wanted to steal Iraqi's precious bodily fluids oil). It wasn't the only reason for the war - being a tyrant merely kept Saddam in the running for the top villain, his numerous other actions brought him over the top. It's not a single traits that defines it. But it's a big factor. That's what you keep missing - you can not isolate single factor and claim that since other had this factor too, it has zero influence on the reasons for war. It does not work as a single factor, but as a combination and strength of multiple ones, and the opportunity factors too (some dictators are evil enough and their actions are evil enough, but the US does not have the power to do much about it - e.g. see Putin).

The issue here is I don't subscribe to the view of the existence of "evil" dictators/states/nations (yes, that includes the US). But that's too different of a topic from the one we started with, and I would rather discuss it in a different occasion, which I'm sure will appear.

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I think honestly the public needs to be much more skeptical of government propaganda in general. And I think given the fact that public support can and does help the war effort, the public is responsible. We shouldn’t just blindly accept the government narrative about war, in fact the default is better off being negative.

We shouldn’t just blindly accept the government narrative about war, in fact the default is better off being negative.

Europeans should be more scepticals but at least only small minority is failing for much lower quality Russian claims. So it is not a complete failure at least.

at least only small minority is failing for much lower quality Russian claims

Yes, but IMO only because they are falling for the (better) propaganda of "the other side". So the merit is not of the European public but either a success of European and American propagandists or (more likely) a huge failure by Russian propagandists.

I think honestly the public needs to be much more skeptical of government propaganda in general. And I think given the fact that public support can and does help the war effort, the public is responsible. We shouldn’t just blindly accept the government narrative about war, in fact the default is better off being negative.

How is Western public "helping the war effort" (assuming you are talking about Western countries)?

NAFO style direct fundraising is minuscule part of whole war effort. Western support for Ukraine consists of sending old weapons and material out of storage and new freshly printed money, none of it requires public cooperation or approval.

By cheering on the war to keep going despite its side effects on their lives (i.e. inflation, energy prices). Tolerating the side effects as "necessary" and "a sacrifice for Ukraine" does require public cooperation and approval.

To go further, I doubt that to the extent Americans say that they no longer think the Iraq war was a good idea, they do it because they realise that they lied to everyone, caused upwards of 200k civilian deaths and ran torture prisons. Rather, they'll say something vague about wasting lots of money, failing to build democracy and not having clear objectives. In 10 years, any Russian non-support for the SMO will probably look like this too.

Blaming every civilian death on the US isn't really reasonable to me (nor would I blame every civilian death in Ukraine on Russia). Yes, it's true that they probably wouldn't have happened without an invasion, but that kind of logic also makes it okay to execute prisoners of war- after all, so the logic goes, they wouldn't be here if their country hadn't decided to invade, therefore it is the fault of their country when we shoot a bound, complicit prisoner in the back.

It is very unfairly shifting the entire blame upon one party, when I can assure you it was not only the US that got its hands dirty, and I reckon if you took a look at who actually directly caused those 200k deaths, it would be a lot muddier. Really look at that chart. I love it because it really does paint the American occupation in such a good light. Look at how much those deaths decreased after the US established greater control around 2008-2011 and spiked in the years following, due to the withdrawal of US forces. This paints a picture where a higher American commitment leads to fewer deaths, not more, which is just one factor that leads me to believe that America was not anywhere near the primary source of these civilian deaths.

Really look at that chart. I love it because it really does paint the American occupation in such a good light. Look at how much those deaths decreased after the US established greater control around 2008-2011 and spiked in the years following, due to the withdrawal of US forces.

All the data in that table (which I assume you are talking about, as I don't see a chart) is still after the US initially invaded and plunged the country into chaos. "We invaded and caused lots of civilians to die, then after a while for three years we briefly tried to do a better job and had somewhat fewer civilians die, and then got tired of doing a better job and had lots of civilians die again" hardly paints the occupation in a good light, any more than a domestically violent spouse being nice to their spouse for a while and taking them to Disneyland paints their marriage in a good light. In terms of a comparison to the hypothetical where the US did not invade, the 1 million excess deaths figure from the introductory paragraph seems more indicative, since those presumably would have been calculated relative to demographic trends identified before the invasion.

Blaming every civilian death on the US isn't really reasonable to me (nor would I blame every civilian death in Ukraine on Russia).

I mean, I agree, but how many do you blame on the US and Russia respectively? I'm suspicious of reasoning that amounts to "the situation is not so clear-cut, so by gut feeling and some non-quantitative reasoning, the ingroup is probably not as guilty as the outgroup is".

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