xzar_monty

It's news in a particular context. (Your point is still valid, though, as it's a bit strange even in that particular context. A context where it would be appropriate would be something like the family and friends of that dead person.) Reading about the war in different languages (via different outlets in different locations) gives fairly good insight on how manifold the perspectives are. It's somewhat disappointing to note, however, that the perspectives most certainly do not add up to a coherent whole. Some perspectives are, of course, rather obviously more outrageous than others.

Well let's say I'm not surprised.

As much as this is horrifying, it is also fascinating, in a terrible sense, because it is so close to what the Russians did during the Great Northern War. Babies were tortured in front of their parents, and parents were tortured in front of their children (not babies, as that would not mean much). It is not enough simply to kill, or even to kill by torturing: it is important that the loved ones of the people killed by torturing witness the act. This was three hundred years ago, and it's still their modus operandi. One particularly distasteful aspect of war is that not only is it itself brutalizing, but once you have a situation where enemies (either soldiers of civilians) are completely under your control, this gives the perfect opportunity for every resentment and every pathology you may carry in yourself to come forth. Which is why we see these horrific things over and over again. With Russia, the situation is particualrly dire because essentially the whole citizenry has been institutionally brutalized for centuries, with no respite. An unrelated but somehow related bit of trivia: the game show Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? works differently in Russia. Contestants tend to avoid the "Ask the audience" option -- because the audience will not help the contestant. It wants the contestant to fail. It will try to give a wrong answer. That's the spirit in Russia.

No change from what they engaged in in the early 18th century, then. Horrific indeed. One thing that has definitely changed outside Russia, perhaps irrevocably: nations outside Russia will recognize that all deals with Russia can be regarded as null and void, as Russia will not respect any of them.

Speaking of this question more generally, here is probably the cruelest of all historical ironies: Adolf Hitler's anti-semitism saved the world. Without it, and without the exile of several important Jewish scientists, the Nazis would've had the atomic bomb in 1942, 1943, something like that, and it would have been goodbye England, goodbye so many places. Albert Einstein pointed out in the late 1930s that Hitler's anti-semitism will prove very detrimental to his war effort. Einstein was right.

Incidentally, to anyone in general and @BruceVCin particular I recommend Masha Gessen's recent book The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia. Not a real historical study (like those done by, say, Orlando Figes and Ian Kershaw), but a thoroughly interesting document about the Soviet Union and Russia. Much of the stuff is rather harrowing, though, as the country has been and continues to be a very grim place to live in. The recent military failures can also be seen as a symptom of the overarching malaise. Why do generals make shockingly poor decisions, why do soldiers lack initiative and why do we see ridiculously stupid things done on a regular basis? Well, we are witnessing the operations of a culture where individual thinking is not only actively discouraged but has a history of being punished extremely severely. "Make good decisions!" is not an order that anyone can realistically be expected to carry out, if there is almost literally zero history of critical individual thinking being encouraged. Critical thinking has been dangerous: the system not only discourages it, but it actively punishes it. As a military strategist in my country pointed out, Russian low- to mid-level commanders have historically adopted a strategy of not making any choices so as to avoid making mistakes. But it doesn't work on the battlefield, as we have seen for two+ months.

I wonder about the jews these days in Russia. I mean, Russia has been extraordinarily anti-semitic in the recent past, but now? I don't know.

These mess-ups remind me of the kind of stuff we saw when Russia wanted to put on its most attractive face around the Sochi olympics. Stuff like this photo, for instance. I'm all for sharing and caring, but not in this particular business.

You know, that does sound plausible. There's no way it should, but it does. Can anyone point to any other kind of reason that would make displaying three copies of The Sims relevant in any way? (Also, why would a single person have three copies. Even that is a bit odd.) It does look like these guys had no idea what they were doing.

Interesting (apparent) contradiction yet again: how can the Moskva be a humiliation, if it was lost to a fire? Surely that's no one's fault... https://technotrenz.com/entertainment/after-the-humiliation-of-the-moskva-warship-putin-has-lost-interest-in-peace-talks-and-wants-to-win-big-1848173.html

Btw, the people who dedicate time to stuff like this appear to have established that Putin's subsequent televised appearance in a church is not authentic, and that the faked video isn't even particularly good. Apparently, the need to both fake the televised appearance and the poor end result suggest that people are worried (about Putin's image) and in a hurry (to come up with stuff) -- not my words, note, just relayed commentary. I haven't seen this supposed church appearance and can't comment on it, but what I posted above came to me from a realiable source, one that I at least trust. That doesn't mean it's 100% correct, of course.

No, but anyone interested in western genre fiction should read The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt, because its take on the genre is so unusual. If you've seen the movie, too bad, as the movie kinda sucks but the book is superb.

Apparently, Ukraine has made another successful strike inside Russia, in Bryansk: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/large-fire-oil-depot-russias-bryansk-near-ukraine-agencies-2022-04-25/ Easy to find videos on this, too.

We know almost nothing. That's a bad thing. Also, given how Putin has operated during his time in power, can we think of anyone who might have been able to build any kind of support or coherent policy? I don't think so. Putin has killed part of the opposition and silenced the rest. I live in Scandinavia. I have worked for decades in both journalism and the publishing industry, which is a curious combination as it gives you very thorough information on some things (depending on your assignments) while at the same time leaving you quite ignorant about others. So, for example, I know an awful lot about Mossad but my knowledge of FBI or CIA is as poor as anyone else's -- I happened to work on a long and thorough Mossad-related project which left me with a lot of info on that.

To an extent this is true, but Russia is completely different from the US, in general. Russia has been around for over a thousand years, and it has had two very brief periods of something resembling an attempt at democracy; one around 1917 and one around 1990(*). For nearly all of its history it has been extremely authoritarian. So, in all likelihood, Russia will NOT change after Putin. Do not pin your hopes on any kind of structural change in Russia. One important distinction, for example, is the (shall we say) Hegelian structure that exists in the west and does not exist in Russia; never has. Western countries will have a government, and the government will have an opposition. The government will have a view ("thesis"), the opposition will have another view ("antithesis"), and the policies of the country will often resemble a mixture or a compromise of the two ("synthesis"), with the government in more control than the opposition, of course. In Russia, there is a government and no properly recognized opposition whose views are respected in any way. The views of the opposition are often regarded as rebellion, and if the rebellion succeeds, the opposition will become the new government which will, again, not respect any new opposition. The entire thinking is different: much more brutal, much less inclined to listen, not open to debate. (*) In Russia, this period is not remembered fondly at all, which is a bad thing.

I also wonder if it was very poorly lit or something, but really can't say. Anyway, while I pretty much disregard any "clinical analysis" of the situation (there's too little material and there isn't anything too obvious in it), I also thought the footage was shocking, as I said. Not so much because of what Putin looks like per se, but because of what Putin looks like in comparison to what he looked like just recently. The change was the big thing for me. Like he got very very old in a matter of days. And yes, the meeting also gave an update of sorts on Shoigu.

The DLCs for P:K were, in my view, only notable for their lack of quality. I was only going to go for one of the DLCs this time (can't remember the name), but after the Ukraine war started, even that became a no-no.

I agree, they probably don't. However, there is no way I will ever send any of my money into that economy no matter what. I can live without their future games, even if I have enjoyed the two I've purchased so far.

It's a Russia thing, nothing against Owlcat. But absolutely no money from me towards Russia ever again.

Boycotts are also something to consider. My sample of 1 has a 100% boycott rate: never going to buy anything by Owlcat anymore.

The recent photo of Putin and Shoigu meeting (in a short table!) looks frankly horrendous -- from a medical point of view. While it's not proper or reasonable to read too much into one photo or one appearance, Putin's physique does appear to have deteriorated an awful lot. Shocking to see, really. As a side note, I find it curious to see the amount of cynicism on these forums and specifically on this thread. I think I am quite a bit older than many others here (could be wrong, of course), and I find this jadedness quite baffling. What kind of a life does anyone expect to live if their approach to other people / nations / history / etc. is as black as that? Very lonely at least, it seems to me.

The Russian explanation for the fire(s) appears to be faulty wiring, or something. This is completely understandable. Someone confused input and putin.

Not just one but two mysterious fires in Russia within the past 24 or so hours. Odd. The big question seems to be whether this is local or Ukrainian work. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/22/die-in-fire-at-russia-defence-institute

Some very odd news right here. https://www.lbc.co.uk/world-news/huge-fire-at-top-secret-russian-defence-hq-leaves-one-dead-and-30-wounded/

There's the rub. Russia wants to have its cake and eat it, too. In other words, it wants to be a part of the international community that takes part in Wimbledon and so on -- but it also wants to break all the rules of that international community. And now it gets angry because it can't have both. "Russian Wimbledon" would have such a small number of participants that it would look ridiculous, and of course we all know this. Good that you brought up South Africa, the bans on SA were a good earlier example of this same thing. The way these bans work is not entirely fair, but it's not entirely unfair, either. I.e. I think banning both SA then and Russia now are good ideas, although there have been plenty of bad ideas, too.