Putin would have never ever appeared standing between two much taller, bulkier men. He’d die of the ego wound. When he still appeared in public, the poor bastard would make people hide all tall waitresses and shop assistants at the restaurants and stores to avoid traumatizing him.
There are two things men can do about their height and women about their weight. They can feel uncomfortable about it and make everybody around them know it and feel embarrassed for them. Or they can embrace it and become the strongest man in any room at 5’5 or the most desirable woman in any space at 250 lbs.
In the spirit of full disclosure, I’ve never been 250 lbs but I’ve been 230 at 36 weeks of pregnancy and still had men approach me with offers to be my “baby daddy.” (I didn’t wear the rings because my fingers were swollen like sausages).
Here’s the secret: most people have such high anxiety that anybody with the anxiety level lower than the societal norm is perceived as magnetic. It’s like in high school everybody would fall in love with the same boy / girl who was neither particularly cute nor funny nor seemingly special in any way. It seems incomprehensible until you realize that this is the low-anxiety kid. Teenagers carry a lot of anxiety, and any kid who has less is perceived as magical.
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I don’t know if this counts as public….
I’m wondering if it’s a double (according to generalsvr they were considering more extended use of one) the body language doesn’t look like him (or he could be tripping balls on medication….)
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Putin is going for the Udmurt look these days but this one looks a lot younger than the one filmed in his bunker. And less Udmurt. No offense to the Udmurts, of course.
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I am against this horrible attack on Ukraine, but listening to such videos make me (and I am not Putin) want to start throwing all kinds of bombs myself:
Primitive tribes living on charity?
Russian natural resources being robbed by international companies?
Come on, if somebody tried to do it to my country, he would get all bombs in the world, I am 100% sure.
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They started throwing bombs before the video was filmed, though.
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// They started throwing bombs before the video was filmed, though.
I know.
However, such videos give great support to Russian paranoia and the damaged worldview of “the West is preparing to destroy us completely, we have no option but support Putin, my country – right or wrong.”
If this man shared the Western current position, then Russians do have to fight to the last now, no matter which crimes they know Putin committed.
I am very sensitive to that since:
My own country throws bombs too. WE think of our wars as justified, but with the change in American public opinion and younger generations supporting BDS, who knows what will the future bring?
You may say “in reality there is a huge difference,” yet who defines reality?
The talk of natural resources being appropriated by ‘humankind’ (in practice, by international Western corporations) mirrors Russian ‘logic’ of taking whatever they want.
It brings to mind Bauman’s analysis of the destruction of nation states and the rise of unbounded elites with their shark-like behavior.
Do those elites care about humanity? Honestly?
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“give great support to Russian paranoia ”
Since when does russian paranoia need support? It’s a self-generating system that can be strengthened or weakened a bit but which is always present… Speaking as an American I can say that Americans (on the whole, the majority opinion) was entirely positive and hopeful for Russia in the early 1990s and wanted things like democracy, and individual rights and human dignity (which seem very alien to the russian weltanschauung) to take hold but russians had different priorities….
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Exactly. This swamp fantasy of the US wanting to conquer Russia and annex Siberia dates back to the 1990s and an invented statement ascribed to Madeline Albright. In 30 years, the US has made exactly zero moves to conquer Russia. The idea is truly out there crazy. The US hasn’t conquered any territories in God knows how long. Russia, on the other hand, keeps invading and annexing territories of other countries. This is the clearest example of projection anybody can imagine.
If I hit you, you are absolutely justified in hitting back. But if I don’t hurt you in any way but you decide I secretly want to based on zero evidence and start pummeling me to “protect yourself” from an imaginary threat, that’s not self-defense. It’s a crime.
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We might be talking about different videos. The one I saw was in Russian. The guy speaking looks like neither a Westerner or an elite anything.
If Biden, for example, came out with a speech announcing a plan to conquer Russia and appropriate its natural resources, yes, Russia would have a casus belli against the US. Still not against Ukraine, though.
Anybody can find (or record) any video of anybody expressing pretty much any point of view. But we only act against that if there’s a real threat in the real world, not in some guy’s fantasy on YouTube.
What Ukraine has to do with any of it is still a mystery.
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Arestovich and Gordon also talked about division of Russia and Ukraine administrating (some of?) those territories.
This is public talk of not last people in today’s Ukraine. Nobody expects Zelensky to say a word till it is a reality, but Arestovich shows where the wind is blowing.
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When was this?
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For some untranslatable comic relief:
Сообщают, что в руки ВСУ сдаются мобики-диабетики, которые не могут иначе даже инсулин получить.
Их украинцы называют “сахарная вата”
Never thought I’d find diabetes funny.
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\ When was this?
In many videos and posts. Am searching now for a few examples:
“Сегодня – день, когда Украина возвращается на свою духовную родину – Запад.
Никаких больше буферных или серых зон.
Мы не просто возвращаемся, мы возвращаемся моральным авторитетом и крупнейшим донором безопасности.
В новом миропорядке мы займём (занимаем) важнейшее место, ибо нам администрировать от Запада все построссийское пространство, а Восточная Европа становится украиноцентричной.”
This video 33:12
Украинскому обществу нужно привыкнуть к мысли администрирования разбитого врага России;
In another yesterday’s video Arestovich and others discuss that Ukraine will take steps to “help” disintegration of Russia.
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I’m now sincerely confused. You are talking about recent videos? Filmed after the invasion? But you are saying they provoked the invasion?
Isn’t it more likely that the invasion provoked the reaction?
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// I’m now sincerely confused. You are talking about recent videos? Filmed after the invasion?
Yes.
// But you are saying they provoked the invasion?
No. I do not mean that.
// Isn’t it more likely that the invasion provoked the reaction?
Arestovich and others I listened to are not the kind of people who are provoked into saying things w/o thinking.
That’s why I am wondering which message they are sending to Russians, including the ones around Putin, with such talk. Is it “you are gone already and we are planning to conquer, divide your country and control you”? If I perceive it thus, wouldn’t paranoid people around Putin think that too and fight to the last?
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They will fight to the last no matter what anybody says. Putin is dead if he loses power. Physically dead. And everybody in his circle is, too.
What do we care what they perceive or not?
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\ What do we care what they perceive or not?
I care what happens with Russia after the end of Putin. That’s why wanted to ask you what you foresee. It’s one thing if Chechnya becomes independent, but the idea to divide ethnic Russian people into different states sounds horrible. Germany was divided after WW2 and it was a huge trauma and ended with Germany uniting once again.
Also, Russians are not only Putin and his most inner circle. Western position surely has influence on some not unimportant people there.
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“the idea to divide ethnic Russian people into different states sounds horrible”
The end of colonial empires is always going to be a bloody mess (I mean that literally) why do you want to maintain russia as a colonial empire?
Do you think it’s terrible that russians are (big) minorities in Latvia and Estonia (and a somewhat smaller minority in Lithuania)? If so, what should be done?
Just as Mexicans and Argentinians don’t have enough in common to have any kind of common state (despite a common language) I doubt if Kaliningrad and Vladivostok have enough in common….
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\ why do you want to maintain russia as a colonial empire?
If ethnic Russians are a majority on different territories, keeping them united in one state of Russia doesn’t mean being a colonial empire.
Besides, many territories are not viable as independent entities. They will be either a part of Russia or f.e. a part of China. Just yesterday listed to a Ukrainian expert saying that today’s Chinese maps used by school children show the border with Russia 1000 km away from its current position.
Is USA a colonial empire if its Indians don’t have a nation state of their own? Do Hawaii and NY have enough in common to be considered one nation state? Many Russian (true) patriots want their country to transform into a real federation and democracy. America unites 1001 ethnic groups, why can’t Russia or China, if they have a democratic future?
\ Do you think it’s terrible that russians are (big) minorities in Latvia and Estonia
I heard there are many problems and two-sided hostility. Even Russians who learned the language and received citizenship describe something akin to antisemitism in FSU both from the state and from their coworkers.
\ If so, what should be done?
First of all, Russia should become a normal democratic state.
The next step would be a national program, similar to one in Israel, to receive all ethnic Russians who want to return to their historical motherland.
Jewish people have a long history of being a minority, sometimes a big one like in pre-WW2 Poland. The result hasn’t been great.
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Ethnic Anglos seem very happy not to live under British rule in the US, Canada, Australia, etc.
Why Russians can’t get themselves together and live like normal people without threatening the world constantly? I don’t know. Maybe they simply don’t feel like it. Russia was given every chance to be a normal democratic state but they clearly don’t want it. They have expressed it in every possible way. When do we start believing them?
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Great Britain lost all its colonies and has done very well since. So did Spain, France, Portugal and Belgium. Everybody got over it and continued on doing well and having a great standard of living.
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I’ve believed for many years and continue to believe that there will be no peace in the world for as long as the RF exists. Germany is not a colonial state, so it’s a complete different situation. It also hasn’t threatened the world with nuclear annihilation for 70 years. Do we continue living in fear that they’ll keep freaking out and decide to destroy the planet?
It’s strange that there’s so much talk about some potential global warming catastrophe but very little discussion of now daily nuclear threats from Russia.
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➤ 24:25 В случае нанесения ядерного удара Украина будет претендовать на российские территории из-за загрязнения своих;
➤ 25:30 Всем нужен мир без России с враждебной идеологией;
Regarding the first, Arestovich says he would demand 1 for 5 exchange of territories, meaning warmer parts of Russia like Rostovskaya oblast and etc.
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Arestovich is trying to prevent the nuclear war, which is in the interests of all of us, I’d say. Russians are now talking about a nuclear strike daily. They are clearly revving themselves up for it. What would be a good strategy to prevent them from doing it, in your opinion? Tell them that if they do it there’d be absolutely no negative consequences for them?
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“Why Russians can’t get themselves together and live like normal people without threatening the world constantly?”
Because too many people enable them? Wanting russians to stay together in a single country is, by now, a wish for them to start a nuclear war….
russians are bad at society… they’ve never been the majority in any kind of successful one…
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That’s very well-put.
What’s funny is that Putin wants Russians to act like they live in the nation-state. Go fight, die bravely for the homeland, sacrifice everything for the nation. But he doesn’t behave towards them like a national leader. He’s behaving like a classic post-national neoliberal one. And the result is… 5,000 Russians surrounded near Lyman. 1,500 Russians dead already. He could have let them retreat day before yesterday. They’d be alive. But nobody cares.
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“And the result is…”
Dont’ forget that more russians have left the country to avoid mobilization than took part in the original invasion (not that I support that – I support locking them in the country rather than running and holding on to the idea that being russian is in any way special….)
That’s not mentioning the videos (I choose not to watch) of guys getting their limbs broken to avoid the draft… not because they don’t like the idea of killing Ukrainians, they just don’t want to exert themselves by pulling the trigger….
I think Galeev put it well: “Russia is a country of extreme, unthinkable passivity. … Very few would make a choice to lift a finger against regime. But even less people would make a choice to lift their finger for regime. That’s why Russian political structure is super fragile”
The quicker and more thoroughly it breaks (or shatters) the better for all concerned….
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\ I support locking them in the country rather than running
Do you support locking Palestinians or Syrians too? They are not less responsible than Russians for the state of their societies.
If they do less damage, it’s simply because they have less power. The greatest Palestinian dream is Jew-free Middle East; I can guess what they would’ve done with an atom bomb.
Imo, locking people up simply gives Putin more manpower to throw at Ukrainians, more death and human suffering for all sides.
My Jewish relative left already, other relatives remain. Should only Jews and other minorities be let out, or would you love them to be shipped to war and locked up too?
Russians are not unique in their passivity or inability to create a functioning democratic society. Look at Africa, Middle East, Latin America and more. There is no intellectual ground for treating Russians in a “special” bad way.
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I heard the argument that not admitting Russian escapees from the draft will give Putin more people to send to the frontlines. Arithmetically, it doesn’t make sense. It’s a 140 million population. How many people need to leave for there to be a shortage of bodies to conscript?
As for people in Africa and Latin America, whom have they invaded except each other? To the contrary, Russia sent troops and meddled in these regions since 1946. It’s getting close to a century now. Whom did they ever threaten with nuclear strikes? When did they start the Cold War?
Everybody would be perfectly happy if Russians stayed in their authoritarian hell and didn’t bother anybody else. But they are refusing to do it.
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“They are not less responsible than Russians for the state of their societies.”
I don’t know the middle east well enough to make grand pronouncements (I do but from a more humble place).
I imagine Poland during martial law… if people had been able to cross a border easily and be accepted…. then the Polish People’s Republic might still be a thing.
Poles and Ukrainians at different times in different ways stood up to tyranny even though the price was high… why can’t russians? Why shouldn’t russians? Why should they be enabled in maintaining their current dysfunctional relationship to their government?
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Another problem with these Russian escapees is that they have learned nothing. I’ve seen masses of messages they post on social media where they seethe with contempt and rage for the countries that accepted them and their citizens. They are very upset, for instance, that people in those countries continue speaking their own languages and not Russian.
As they say, wherever you go, you’ll always bring yourself with you. And the selves they bring are the same superior, contemptuous, “Russian world” selves.
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Yesterday, a young rapper in Krasnodar killed himself to avoid being drafted. This is very symbolic of the general Russian attitude. It’s better not to live at all than to make decisions, do something, be active.
As my Russian teacher said not on the subject of the war but simply to explain her husband’s and hers life philosophy, “We are the typical Vanya-valenki, passive, quiet, we don’t like to make decisions.”
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On another topic, found those two descriptive posts by the same person who was poor but then started working in hi-tech :
On The Experience of Being Poor-ish, For People Who Aren’t
https://www.residentcontrarian.com/p/on-the-experience-of-being-poor-ish
On Being Rich-ish: Lessons I learned becoming suddenly middle-class
https://www.residentcontrarian.com/p/on-being-rich-ish-lessons-i-learned
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