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[brewer bob]

Jesus, what the hell is happening here?

[Strongpoint]

Jesus, what the hell is happening here?

RuZZian in the thread is happening! And believe me, he is very rational and polite compared to what I encounter on the Russian segment of the internet on a daily basis.

And no, I am not replying to his novel of nonsense even if I am tempted to.

[MaxTheFox]

I'm speechless. I won't even bother picking apart his "arguments". This one's for Toady to deal with.

[brewer bob]

I honestly didn't expect to see an unironic Putinist shill around here. Also note the implicit denial of Russian war crimes. 🤡

Same here. Quite surprised, actually.

It's like one thing to say Ukrainians have committed war crimes (it'd be surprising if one side didn't commit any during war), but claiming that "Russians take care not to hit civilians" (with evidence *clearly* pointing it's quite the opposite) is seriously delusional.

Oh, but let me guess, it's just that most of the world is conspiring against Russia and spreading falsehoods, while Russia has done absolutely nothing wrong and is right in all matters, no matter what.

[Strongpoint]

Heh, interesting that my and Max's anticensorship views are quite opposite yet again. She wants Sean gone. I want more of Sean in this thread so everyone will see more of how a typical Russian thinks.

[heydude6]

This one's for Toady to deal with.

Doubt that’s gonna happen, the dude isn’t some Escaped Lunatic who came here to troll. He’s a long-time user who happens to be Russian, he just never ended up red-pilled like you Max. In a way, he’s sort of like your evil twin. What you could have been if you were a normie.

There’s no malice in what he says, he genuinely believes this crap. And I don’t think Toadie has ever banned someone for simply expressing their beliefs, only calls to violence against oppressed groups, but he’s been careful to only talk about the “plight” of  Donetsk civilians...

I think the best thing we can do is to share some sources for our facts with him and let him take a look at them. I doubt he’s heard of the Bucha massacre. He probably won’t bite, but at least he won’t think we’re fragile snow-flakes who ban people from our echo chambers because we’re afraid to defend our points in debate.

[Strongpoint]

I doubt he’s heard of the Bucha massacre.

1) It is staged or
2) Those were, in fact, pro-Russian citizens of Ukraine killed by the Ukrainian nazies


This guy actually believes the nonsense like that there is no military units in the city of Donetsk (someone should tell the Ukrainian army on the outskirts, taking unguarded Donetsk would be useful). It is a flat-earther level of denying reality.

He is also from the camp that thinks that the Ukrainian army should leave the cities and let itself be destroyed in the open field. Doing otherwise is terrorism and using civilians as shields. 
He conveniently ignores that all armies in the history of warfare did this. Including the Russian in this very war. 

[MaxTheFox]

Heh, interesting that my and Max's anticensorship views are quite opposite yet again. She wants Sean gone. I want more of Sean in this thread so everyone will see more of how a typical Russian thinks.

This one's for Toady to deal with.

Doubt that’s gonna happen, the dude isn’t some Escaped Lunatic who came here to troll. He’s a long-time user who happens to be Russian, he just never ended up red-pilled like you Max. In a way, he’s sort of like your evil twin. What you could have been if you were a normie.

There’s no malice in what he says, he genuinely believes this crap. And I don’t think Toadie has ever banned someone for simply expressing their beliefs, only calls to violence against oppressed groups, but he’s been careful to only talk about the “plight” of  Donetsk civilians...

I think the best thing we can do is to share some sources for our facts with him and let him take a look at them. I doubt he’s heard of the Bucha massacre. He probably won’t bite, but at least he won’t think we’re fragile snow-flakes who ban people from our echo chambers because we’re afraid to defend our points in debate.

Long-time members have been banned for denying genocides. Which he did, quite clearly, with this quote:

and get a feel for which side is the one committing war crimes.

I can guarantee you he did hear of the Bucha massacre. He just bit down on Russian propaganda about it and thinks it's fake. No amount of facts will change his mind. I tried with people like him, I really did. But they must either come to that realization themselves or continue to wallow in propaganda.

I don't care what a banned person would think of us as a community.

I don't understand Ukrainians who want the person denying that their people are being massacred to stay around. I literally don't understand.

[Strongpoint]

Freedom of speech loses its meaning when there are exceptions. But we have discussed respecting the rights of people who want you dead in the twitter thread. No need to repeat it there. 

Also, I am not afraid that a thinking, rational, and moral person may take his position.

[heydude6]

I believe such a person may take up a position like this if he was controlled by an authoritarian government that only ever exposed him to “info” that supported that narrative, but I also expect that person to be willing to change his mind once he’s seen real facts.

I believe there is bare minimum amount of effort expected of us to educate him before we can be allowed to write him off as a lost cause.

Unless he doesn’t believe Putin is Authoritarian of course. In that, case the amount of effort required to convince him of this basic fact alone will be too much to reasonably expect from your average person.

[MaxTheFox]

I believe such a person may take up a position like this if he was controlled by an authoritarian government that only ever exposed him to “info” that supported that narrative, but I also expect that person to be willing to change his mind once he’s seen real facts.

I believe there is bare minimum amount of effort expected of us to educate him before we can be allowed to write him off as a lost cause.

Unless he doesn’t believe Putin is Authoritarian of course. In that, case the amount of effort required to convince him of this basic fact alone will be too much to reasonably expect from your average person.

Many vatniks know Putin is authoritarian, they just don't care or think it's preferable to Western democracy. I don't have very high expectations of this person.

Guess we'll see if I was right about the viability (or lack thereof) of reeducating fascists online.

[Starver]

My first thoughts were (in the bit I pre-post-deletedbin favour of Strongpoint's ninjaing) that it was just Poe's Law in action. That it was just "this is the k8nd of thing they say" which wasn't quite explained properly.

And even when it became obvious it wasn't... No, I wasn't going to report him. I saw the "which side is committing warcrimes" as more a "well, your lot does it too!" thing.

Definitely not an opinion I'd agree with, but not an unagreeable personality, just misguided. Not trolling, just (however) either too closed of a mind, or such an open one that actual facts pour out again on the other side. By my reading, not a bannable condition. But it's not my criteria he'll be judged by. I'd like to know how he stayed unaware/unconcerned of the evidence against Russia's illegitimate warmongering and be reading threads such as these which should at least cast doubt on his local-type propogandising sources. The knee-jerk of doubling-down may have twitched but not lasted long, and I'd have expected more a mulling-over stage, right now, lurking and perhaps just dismissing everything we say but not capable of thinking thete was a valid complete-dismissal to be discussed.

But I'm no psychologist.  And clearly I can be wrong about relative perspectives...

[MaxTheFox]

"Russian forces take care not to hit civilians" is a more blatant lie.

There are some opinions for which I'd ban someone on sight. No matter how politely they are expressed. Call me bloodthirsty, or authoritarian, or whatever. It's a forum, not a country. It's not ruining someone's life by sending them to jail, it's kicking someone out from a forum about a dwarf game.

[Strongpoint]

Back to the war news...

There is a good chance that we will see a nasty battle for Kherson in a few weeks. Ukrainian advance is creeping closer and closer to the city outskirts (~10km away).

It will be unpleasant... Ukraine won't employ an easy tactic of turn the city into a pile of rubble and then capture that pile like Russians did with each and every settlement except South where the Ukrainian front collapsed in the first few days.

There will be some accurate strikes into Kherson (I already anticipate Russian propaganda going - see! They kill their own citizens!) but it will have to be an honest assault of urban terrain.

Ukrainian infantry is far better trained and equipped for "counter-strike" and moral is way higher but it will be a bloody mess nevertheless.

__________________

Sieveredonetsk-Lysychansk agglomeration is becoming Mariupol 2.0. Just smaller in scale and without a full encirclement (at least yet). Still, I expect those towns to cease to exist during the next weeks and fall in Russian hands. At least, the majority of civilians were evacuated. Then, the Kramatorsk-Slovyansk agglomeration will be the next major battle of Donbass front.

Looks like the whole Western part of Donbass region will be utterly destroyed and become unliveable for a long time even if Ukraine will reclain it and the West will help rebuilding it. If it will stay Russian... It will be depopulated ruins for decades with a fraction of the pre-war population. Way to help "donbas nation", Russia.

_____________

There are also indications that Russia has begun a new push toward Kharkiv but Kharkiv front is very fluid with constant back and forth.

[Starver]

"Russian forces take care not to hit civilians" is a more blatant lie.

A lie[1] but not an outright denial. Almost any fool knows that there will inevitably be civilians in the range of the crosshairs almost anywhere they shoot (if only the real stubborn/ ones who were too late to evacuate once the reality hit) but by using Exact Words there may be some care taken to hit more legitimate targets than illegitimate ones.

I expect conscript artillerymen will just be plugging coordinates into their sliderules and hoping they're hitting the things they were given map-references for by some higher-ups, divorced from the reality that whatever their commanders think they are doing, that big explosion when they hit that farm just happens to be a year's stock of fertiliser doing a Beirut, not indicative that they've just blown up an enemy supply depot. At some point (especially near the top of command) I expect it to be more sheer maliciousness than blythe incompetance, and I expect this also directs the misinformation trickled down into state-controlled media reports, but I probably tend to think well of the majority of those involved. It's not their fault they're being bamboozled into accepting bad things being done (or doing them, except for the true vicious bastards that get a taste for this kind of thing, with or without prior indoctrination).


And as for punished for telling blatant lies, your country punishes those who tell blatant truths, so that will shift perceptions and the range of motives a lot. Not necessarily a mitigating factor, but a consideration. Which isn't mine to judge.


[1] Or lack of knowledge, charitably. Though the cluster munitions dropped on railway stations crowded with evacuees, childrens' playgrounds, etc, are something discussed around here. The apparent targetting of much non-military infrsstructure cannot all be explained away by terrible aiming or because they suspected it was a covert military HQ. We hear very little of what Ukraine does in response (reliably) but I don't think this cleans the slate of what the very much relatively unfettered press reports have revealed of such 'accidents', especially with proven counter-misinformation re: maternity hospitals, etc.