[coryrc]

> everybody else who is a regular person is an idiot.

Looking at your dictator's approval levels and the number of people willingly signing up to die while killing innocents, that sounds correct.

You all need help breaking the cycle of intergenerational trauma.

[Andrew_nenakhov]

Lol, the dictator's approval rating is so high that he bans, forces to exile or kills any opposing candidate, never risking elections vs anyone not fully controlled by him.

Every time someone like Bukele flexes that his approval rating is higher than Putin's, I laugh -- the guy clearly doesn't understand that this isn't the flex he thinks it is.

[throwaway290]

I used to be rosy eyed like you for a while

I think if you talked to more fellow russians you would be surprised how many support him unironically)

by my estimate more than 50% (of people who have an opinion)

control of information is a magical thing

[BobaFloutist]

I mean the whole thing about perverting statistics is we can't know the truth, since anecdotal surveys are useless (which I realized as a child in 2004 when Bush won despite everyone I knew hating him) and anything big enough to be meaningful is corrupted.

Even if they didn't massage the stats after asking people, I doubt everyone is fully comfortable sharing their honest opinions.

So...we can't know. We likely never will know, at least how people at large felt in this precise moment.

[throwaway290]

I know from talking to people outside of my friend circle. Sure it's not reliable statistics but it's what I have. Try talking to taxi drivers and so on.

[mopsi]

Putin's approval rating is genuinely that high, around 80%. Nobody cares about opposing candidates, because Russia has had one or two free elections in its entire history. Far more important is that Putin has flooded the lower classes with money. People who were used to surviving on a few hundred dollars a month are now receiving tens of thousands in sign-up bonuses alone, plus military wages and compensations. Absolutely life-changing money for them. It is comparable to flooding a troubled area like West Virginia with military sign-up bonuses ranging from hundreds of thousands to a million per enlistment, with additional money flowing into communities from injury and death compensations.

[Andrew_nenakhov]

This is absolutely delusional, but Putin thanks you for serving his cause.

Regarding your claim that Putin flooded the lower classes with money, this is simply false. What percent of the population do you think signed up for war? Do you really think that 0.5% (optimistic estimate) that did sign up had spread their wealth with anyone else?

Just last week I stayed in the hospital with 2 men, 72y.o and 64y.o. One has pension of 19k RUB, another one 23k RUB. That's fewer than $300. Showered with money, Yay!

[throwaway290]

contractors are getting paid VERY good money relatively. Imagine you live in a village, your education is so so. You live in an old house with parents. How much do you earn? Anything?

But now you go to war and you/your family gets 200000 monthly. You can buy a cheap car for that money AND buy a flat in a city (first mortgage payment) after first month. Not counting signup bonus.

[Andrew_nenakhov]

How many contractors do you think there are relative to the size of population, so that the previous poster was claiming that was flooded with wealth?? This is just plain nonsense. Mercenary payments have extremely limited impact on the overall 'lower class' wealth.

(And you somehow forget about the little insignificant downside of a mercenary career that you might be a bit dead or maimed, oops)

[throwaway290]

if you consider that almost all contractors are from poorer families it affects them disproportionately, you need to exclude upper middle class and up from your percentage calc.

I agree that "flooded lower classes with wealth" is an exaggeration but I think it is not completely wrong.

[throwaway290]

you are offtopic, but I will entertain your comment because I'm so confused/amused by what you say and what means "idiot" in your world.

- are you saying people forced to sign up for the war by force or rapists who do it to get out of jail in Russia are idiots?

- are you saying being pro putin/pro war is like being an idiot in Russia?

- are you saying russians in tech are saints and all like one are "not idiots" against the war? maybe you need a reminder about unit 26165 and APT28

- are you saying "everyone in russia/china/israel/iran/north korea/republican party is an idiot"? then allow me to congratulate you on such nuanced understanding of the world, enough said!

[coryrc]

I'm saying the vast majority of people who support Putin are idiots, just like the vast majority of people who support Trump are idiots, and the religious rural fundies of Iran are mostly idiots. There's a lot of idiots out there and they don't like to think. It causes them pain to think hard. So they like people who tell them simple lies.

Others are immoral or evil smart people. Unless you're working to undermine your dictator, that might be you.

[throwaway290]

idiot by definition is abnormal. if there is more idiots than non idiots then you have a wrong understanding of idiot. if almost everybody except you is an idiot then look in the mirror.

americans voted for trump because they are tired of democrats looking down on them. in other words, people with your attitude are to blame. until you seriously start trying to understand people and why they do stuff (it is not because they are idiots) you will keep making them do the opposite of what you think is good.

[coryrc]

> idiot by definition is abnormal

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/idiot "1 Informal., an utterly foolish or senseless person." Nope, no abnormality needed.

There was (and still is in some places) a lot of lead poisoning. That more people are dumber than their genetics would otherwise dictate doesn't make them not idiots in my obviously-informal ranting.

> americans voted for trump because they are tired of democrats looking down on them.

Please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Thought_They_Were_Free

[throwaway290]

Nope, still the same. If everyone else is "foolish and senseless" from your personal view then that's baseline, sorry to inform you

an american wrote a book about germans? why do I want to read it? but thanks for reminding me, as far as I know it was similar when hitler came to power, weimar was falling apart and people felt disrespected due to reparations and nazi preyed on that.