[lifewallet_dev]

This is propaganda and you don't even know it... People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia.

I always noticed when certain amount of decades pass it's okay to say certain things, like "Allende was assassinated by the CIA", but back then you'd get persecuted to even mention that.

Yes, when it doesn't matter you can say whatever you want, god bless the USA... Because of opinions like yours is that America is the empire who gets the "Okay" to be the police of the world, and it's terrible at that.

[idontwantthis]

Here you are tacitly expressing your opinion about “the proxy war”.

Hope you don’t get persecuted too hard.

[lifewallet_dev]

That's what it is, but okay, I'll probably get banned here for saying that anyways :), the free world woo!

[varjag]

No, you're more likely to simply be downvoted into grey, as the aggregate of HN is not a conspiracist crackpot.

[lifewallet_dev]

Just that, it is, I've been banned before, for even lighter things...

[hkpack]

> for example the US proxy war with Russia.

Yeah, as a Ukrainian, this triggers me well, good job.

I think that it is good that you feel being silenced.

The world in which a person who have absolutely zero idea what he is talking about will feel cheered, is a very scary to me. Until then, there is hope.

[refused_cov_vax]

Your country is roadkill in a bigger race, you should accept that

[mschuster91]

> People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia.

Uh, sorry what? It was Russia that decided to invade a sovereign country for annexation. Not the other way around.

And of course everyone is free to disagree with your take. You are not being "silenced" or "canceled", you are being told your opinion is completely contrary to facts.

[paol]

Both things can be true. Yes, Russia is 100% responsible for this war, and yes, the US (and others) are fighting a proxy war through Ukraine in good old cold war style.

[mejutoco]

Another way to say it without the added narrative is to simply say Ukraine has allies, and the USA is one of them.

[paol]

I wouldn't call the term proxy war a narrative. It's a term with a definition, which applies here.

This is also a "both things can be true" case. Obviously the supporters of a proxy war are allies of the party they're supporting.

[mejutoco]

I am not trying to argue with you or change your mind, but I will write a few reasons why I see the term proxy war often used by pro-Putin commenters to push a narrative. Not saying you are. Using the term proxy war:

1. Makes it sound as if the USA is the cause of this war (they are in a proxy war) instead of an attack on Ukraine, and Ukraine seeking help from allies. As if the USA were driving the whole thing.

2. It perpetuates a cold war approach and vocabulary, making Russia look like the superpower it was (and is not anymore).

3. The cold war way of talking about it, additionally, makes it look like there are two sides, two alternatives, which are equally valid and justified.

Because of these reasons, I say there is a narrative, and do not consider the term neutral. I personally avoid the term proxy war because of the connotations above.

[shkkmo]

> It perpetuates a cold war approach and vocabulary, making Russia look like the superpower it was (and is not anymore).

It isn't the "superpower" status of Russia that makes this a cold war, but the "nuclear power" status. It is precisely a proxy war because you have two nuclear powers that are explicitly avoiding direct conflict due to the risk of nuclear war.

However, One might argue that the true cold war is between the USA and China and that both Ukraine and Russia are proxies.

> The cold war way of talking about it, additionally, makes it look like there are two sides, two alternatives, which are equally valid and justified.

In what way? "Cold war" absolutely doesn't have any connotation of moral equivalence between the two sides.

This is the sort of weird absolutism and rejection of nuance that is a hallmark of propaganda. It is absolutely possible to assign culpability to certain actions taken by the US without even remotely asserting that both sides are equally culpable for the war in Ukraine.

It is possible to think that containing an expansionist nuclear power without triggering a nuclear war is hard and requires a walking a fine line while also thinking that there are powerful forces inside the US that stand to gain a lot by encouraging and then prolonging this conflict.

Part of the power of narratives is that they become an easy way to group and dismiss dissent without engaging with any of the specific concerns expressed in that dissent.

[mschuster91]

Are the allies of Ukraine supposed to look away at the first time since the OG 1933-45 Nazis that someone tries to re-draw borders and annex countries using war?!

What Russia did was a complete and utter shart on the international rule of law.

[oefrha]

Propaganda’s working very well if you actually believe this is the first war since WWII to redraw land borders. And I’m not even counting the invade-and-install-a-puppet kind of wars.

[mschuster91]

> Propaganda’s working very well if you actually believe this is the first war since WWII to redraw land borders.

I was talking about annexation wars. Not about countries fighting for independence / collapse aftermaths (like the former Yugoslavian countries or the Vietnam war).

But yes, you're correct, I forgot about the first Iraq war where Iraq tried to annex Kuwait and the US (and others) responded under UNSC authorization. And I completely ignored Africa, because honestly I don't have much knowledge about these and to be frank they aren't really relevant.

[pjc50]

And the (surprisingly similar to the current situation) annexation of Northern Cyprus by Greece in 1974: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus

The situation there has basically been .. abandoned. Yet another long term frozen conflict.

[okal]

The annexations, and proxy wars in Africa weren't relevant?

I'm struggling a little to reconcile your two statements, that you simultaneously don't have much knowledge about the situation, but seemingly enough to decide that the deaths of thousands/millions of people in proxy wars is irrelevant to the discussion.

[haldujai]

Also forgetting Pakistan-India in the 70s and multiple Israeli conflicts (some justified others not so much).

[zen_1]

Now do Israel (with the US on the colonists/annexers' side this time)

[Synaesthesia]

Turkey annexed Northern Cyprus with the blessing of NATO in the 70's.

[lifewallet_dev]

More propaganda, listen to the other side... oh well it's banned everywhere.

[ptsneves]

I have some sympathy for contrarians, not because of their accuracy but because they are the canary in the mine for freedom of speech. Wrong statements also give the opportunity for argument and thus replacement of dogma with reasoning.

I upvoted you above, and I believe your opinion on the proxy war is valid. Victimizing yourself though means that you are unable to stand by your arguments and are just poisoning the well for others who can. Having a different opinion requires effort and often disparagement.

> More propaganda, listen to the other side... oh well it's banned everywhere. This is just low effort.

[eloisius]

Can you please provide some examples of “the other side” that have been banned? I’m not in the US, but a country tightly aligned with the US, and I am able to access rt.com just fine.

[lifewallet_dev]

I also don't live in the west, rather the global south, in a not so allied country.

When in Europe and in the US. You'll get something like this on twitter, and obviously you cannot access the site either:

@ActualidadRT's account has been withheld in Portugal, Finland, Sweden, Ireland, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Italy, Malta, Germany, Greece, Romania, Netherlands, Bulgaria, Austria, Luxembourg, Latvia, United Kingdom, Denmark, Lithuania, Croatia, Estonia, Cyprus, France, Spain, Belgium in response to a legal demand. https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/tweet-withhel...

[B1FF_PSUVM]

The internet ... huh ... finds a way ... https://swentr.site/

[kbrkbr]

Then this is a court order based on laws and a legal process. In no way is this comparable to how Russia treats different opinions.

[_kbh_]

> More propaganda, listen to the other side... oh well it's banned everywhere.

What are you talking about this, is literally false, I see pro Russian narratives everywhere, including here, you guys don't get banned despite how despicable the views you hold are.

Support Russias genocidal, torturous, raping war in Ukraine all you want, but don't shout about being banned when you get shouted down by facts.

[chaosbolt]

Yes Russia did invade Ukraine, but wouldn't the US invade Canada if Russia had organized a coup there to get rid of Trudeau then put a Russian puppet there? Of course the US would... Or would you argue that the 2014 Ukrainian coup wasn't supported by the US?

The thing we never mention is how agressive Nato (the US since it has military bases in Turkey for example, while Turkey doesn't have military bases in the US) has been at pushing its borders towards Russia.

In the end we can call this whatever we want, the facts are clear, if Zelensky had resigned less Ukrainians would have died, and the only ones profiting from this are the US, you can't fight a country like Russia, they have 7000 nukes, it's like thinking Mike Tyson is losing against you because he's too nice to punch you in the face... eventually he will.

The arguments used today are the same as ever (we're freeing the Vietnamese, the Iraqis, etc.), if you look at it as it really is, less dead people is better than more dead people, eventually Ukraine will be destroyed and the US will not even help to rebuild it, if you think they will then look at Iraq.

[_kbh_]

> you can't fight a country like Russia, they have 7000 nukes, it's like thinking Mike Tyson is losing against you because he's too nice to punch you in the face... eventually he will.

Russia likes to rattle there nuclear sabre about everything regarding Ukraine (and beyond) because that is all Russia is capable of doing with there nuclear weapons without causing the quick, fast and hard collapse of there entire country.

7,000 nukes doesn't make a country win a war instantly, Russia lost in the first Chechen war even with all there nukes, they lost in Afghanistan with all the nukes, the US lost in a whole number of wars (Vietnam, Afghanistan, etc) whilst having shit loads of nukes.

Russia is throwing everything they have at Ukraine including mad max inspired franken vehicles and T-54 tanks, to pretend they are fighting with one hand behind their back is disingenuous.

It may look like Russia is fighting with one hand behind their back, but the reality is, that this is all Russia has.

> The arguments used today are the same as ever (we're freeing the Vietnamese, the Iraqis, etc.), if you look at it as it really is, less dead people is better than more dead people, eventually Ukraine will be destroyed and the US will not even help to rebuild it, if you think they will then look at Iraq.

The only one who has the power to decide the number of dead people is Russia, when Russia leaves the killing stops, until then the Ukrainians have to kill Russians until enough die and they decide to go home.

[mschuster91]

> Or would you argue that the 2014 Ukrainian coup wasn't supported by the US?

Yanukovich fled the country all on his own, after police didn't back his government any more following months of massive protests. These protests in turn came from Yanukovich not signing an agreement with the EU that was already ratified by the parliament.

> the facts are clear, if Zelensky had resigned less Ukrainians would have died

Lol. Just look on Butcha and all the other places where Russian troops massacred the local population, or where they eradicated everything Ukrainian, from street signs to library books. There would have been no freedom under Russian rule.

> you can't fight a country like Russia

Of course one can fight a country like Russia. They lost 100.000 units fighting over Bakhmut in the last months and made absolutely zero progress in their war.

> they have 7000 nukes, it's like thinking Mike Tyson is losing against you because he's too nice to punch you in the face... eventually he will.

That assumes two things: first, that the nuclear weapons and their launch systems actually work - the sorry state of the ordinary Russian troops makes me seriously question just how much of the rest of their military has gone downhill. The second thing is, it assumes Putin is completely lost in madness. China and the US have it made very clear behind the doors that using anything nuclear is something Putin does not want to do, and in exchange the US and Ukraine's other allies have placed the condition on all major arms deliveries that these are not to be used to attack targets in Russia. Seems to have worked out pretty well so far.

[OkayPhysicist]

>> you can't fight a country like Russia, they have 7000 nukes

That's why people join NATO: Access to nuclear firepower. NATO serves as a list of countries that cannot be invaded, because they have bent at the knee to US hegemony, and thus the US is (at least convincingly postured as) willing to use its world-ending nuclear arsenal to defend them.

That's the post-WWII world order: sovereignty belongs to those with the power to wipe out any other country on Earth. You can either be a nuclear power, join in on one's protection scheme, or pray you stay irrelevant enough to not get conquered.

What you're misconstruing as "NATO's aggressive expansion" is countries scrambling to get the US's protection, because the alternative is Russian occupation. NATO was founded specifically to counter Russia's aggressive expansionism.

[_kbh_]

> This is propaganda and you don't even know it... People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia.

The irony of your blatantly false statements is that half of what people express on the war in Ukraine here would cause them to end up in jail in Russia, but the opposite views don't cause you to end up in jail in the west.

[berdario]

Of course you don't "end up in jail in the west".

First they freeze your assets, and only then if you're foolish enough to subject yourself to the due process, you might end up in jail.

There's an handful of people from the west who went to Donbass to report the situation. They are (of course?) mostly supportive of Russia, so you shouldn't delude yourself in thinking that they are unbiased... but they have regularly been threatened with prosecution if/when they'll return, example:

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/german-journalist-...

[_kbh_]

> https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/german-journalist-...

Do you have a source that doesn't just wholeheartedly parrot Russian and CCP talking points?.

[berdario]

We're talking about criminal proceedings here, it's not a "talking point" for which you can doubt its veracity. There's plenty of corroboration

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/01/11/alina-lipp...

[_kbh_]

Much better thank you.

> https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/01/11/alina-lipp...

but I don't understand how your claims hold up when this is one of the lines of the article.

>> It is understood that there had been no warrant for her arrest.

[berdario]

I feel like you're trying to poke holes in other people's arguments, and not really engaging with an open mind.

The straightforward answer is: you don't need a warrant to risk ending up in jail.

I'm not a German jurist, but I believe that warrants are used if there's a risk that a suspect would commit violent crimes or alternatively if prosecution found someone guilty in absentia. For Alina Lipp, the prosecution just started.

It's not the only case, btw. Another famous case is Steven's Dozinger. I think that Legaleagle's video is quite evenhanded and yet entertaining in explaining his situation:

https://youtu.be/B7d2KoXmPXk

Another more recent case, is Omali Yeshitela's

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/breaking-four-citizens...

My point is that being silenced in such ways in the west is more likely than people think. Dissenting speech gets granted a lot of leeway, but that's only until it has few chances to influence people.

As soon as dissent can actually threaten the establishment, that's when you start to see a reaction against it.

Of course, in wartime little leeway will be granted for dissent.