Regarding the video with a castration of a Ukrainian POW, comments from the Russian ДШРГ Русич may give some context to the story:
"I have seen up to ten such clips. They're usually published 1-2 years after the events though to make perpetrators more difficult to identify"
Русич (Rusich) is a Russian Neonazi group fighting in Ukraine. They're reportedly closely associated with the Wagner mercenary company
A Rusich fighter who told he had seen "up to ten such clips" is Evgeny Rasskazov (Topaz). Here you see his post commemorating Hitler's birthday:
"Today is birthday of out comrade who became example for many of us... his Word and Deed inspires us to beat the Ukro-Bolshevik scum"
That's Topaz with Egor Prosvirnin, the editor of *the* most important Russian nationalist media Sputnik and Pogrom which played an important role in setting the ideology of this war. When Putin made his speech, ppl described it as "Putin repeating Prosvirnin's talking points"
Weirdly enough, Western media make very, very few mentions of the main Russian nationalist media, Sputnik and Pogrom when discussing this war. That leads to either intentional or unintentional massive representation of the Russian internal debates. Which led to what we have now
The cultural influence of Sputnik and Pogrom (Спутник и Погром) in Russia is massive. It's so noticeable that the careful omission of them in almost any debate on this war looks almost intentional. Why would they avoid talking about them so carefully?
Because Prosvirnin was an integral part of the Moscow political and media establishment. Once you bring him and the Sputnik and Pogrom up, too many important people get associated. Here you see Prosvirnin hugging Ksenia Sobchak and political scientist Stanislav Belkovsky
Random photos with other media personalities. Nationalist leader Belov, internet guru Nosik, writer Akunin. Regarding the first two, they might share lots of common agenda, I doubt about the third guy. I post this photos to show associations and a level of his connections
Few key media personalities of the "Russian spring". They are little known in the West but very well - in Russia. Some commenters from Russia may deny it, but they 100% heard about them. Prosvirnin, Olshansky, Kholmogorov. They all stand for the war and escalation of violence
I follow pro-war media personalities with great interest, because they're very talkative. For example, in an interview with a Ukrainian journalist Gordon Khodorkovsky @mbk_center wept on camera very persuasively, begging forgiveness. Forgiveness for what?
Perhaps Russian nationalist Kholmogorov may shed some light
Feb 28, 2022
"... we both know you're not pro-Ukrainian. We discussed this in Brussels long after the Crimea. We have no big disagreements except for your conviction that it's you and not Putin who should be in charge"
Any comments from @mbk_center on that would be helpful. Kholmogorov's testimony seems to fit well to what we know about Khodorkovsky. In his interview to @albats he openly proclaimed himself a nationalist. But then she *deleted* this statement from the printed version. Why?
My answer: Moscow media establishment like @albats is systematically whitewashing the figures like @mbk_center or @navalny . She knows that much of what they say isn't gonna be accepted well in the West. So she cuts it out or as I'll show later helps them to avoid responsibility
The theme of Sputnik and Pogrom is avoided so carefully, because once it's brought up, one may wonder in which way Moscow "liberal" opposition is different from Kremlin and how was their positive image constructed. I'll cover it in next material on the Russian liberals. The end
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What I am saying is that "capitalist reforms" are a buzzword devoid of any actual meaning, and a buzzword that obfuscated rather than explains. Specifically, it is fusing radically different policies taken under the radically different circumstances (and timing!) into one - purely for ideological purposes
It can be argued, for example, that starting from the 1980s, China has undertaken massive socialist reforms, specifically in infrastructure, and in basic (mother) industries, such as steel, petrochemical and chemical and, of course, power
The primary weakness of this argument is that being true, historically speaking, it is just false in the context of American politics where the “communism” label has been so over-used (and misapplied) that it lost all of its former power:
“We want X”
“No, that is communism”
“We want communism”
Basically, when you use a label like “communism” as a deus ex machina winning you every argument, you simultaneously re-define its meaning. And when you use it to beat off every popular socio economic demand (e.g. universal healthcare), you re-define communism as a synthesis of all the popular socio economic demands
Historical communism = forced industrial development in a poor, predominantly agrarian country, funded through expropriation of the peasantry
(With the most disastrous economic and humanitarian consequences)
Many are trying to explain his success with some accidental factors such as his “personal charisma”, Cuomo's weakness etc
Still, I think there may be some fundamental factors here. A longue durée shift, and a very profound one
1. Public outrage does not work anymore
If you look at Zohran, he is calm, constructive, and rarely raises his voice. I think one thing that Mamdani - but almost no one else in the American political space is getting - is that the public is getting tired of the outrage
Outrage, anger, righteous indignation have all been the primary drivers of American politics for quite a while
For a while, this tactics worked
Indeed, when everyone around is polite, and soft (and insincere), freaking out was a smart thing to do. It could help you get noticed
People don’t really understand causal links. We pretend we do (“X results in Y”). But we actually don’t. Most explanations (= descriptions of causal structures) are fake.
There may be no connection between X and Y at all. The cause is just misattributed.
Or, perhaps, X does indeed result in Y. but only under a certain (and unknown!) set of conditions that remains totally and utterly opaque to us. So, X->Y is only a part of the equation
And so on
I like to think of a hypothetical Stone Age farmer who started farming, and it worked amazingly, and his entire community adopted his lifestyle, and many generations followed it and prospered and multiplied, until all suddenly wiped out in a new ice age
1. Normative Islamophobia that used to define the public discourse being the most acceptable form of racial & ethnic bigotry in the West, is receding. It is not so much dying as rather - failing to replicate. It is not that the old people change their views as that the young do not absorb their prejudice any longer.
In fact, I incline to think it has been failing to replicate for a while, it is just that we have not been paying attention
Again, the change of vibe does not happen at once. The Muslim scare may still find (some) audience among the more rigid elderly, who are not going to change their views. But for the youth, it is starting to sound as archaic as the Catholic scare of know nothings
Out of date
2. What is particularly interesting regarding Mamdani's victory, is his support base. It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that its core is comprised of the young (and predominantly white) middle classes, with a nearly equal representation of men and women
What does Musk vs Trump affair teach us about the general patterns of human history? Well, first of all it shows that the ancient historians were right. They grasped something about nature of politics that our contemporaries simply can’t.
Let me give you an example. The Arab conquest of Spain
According to a popular medieval/early modern interpretation, its primary cause was the lust of Visigoth king Roderic. Aroused by the beautiful daughter of his vassal and ally, count Julian, he took advantage of her
Disgruntled, humiliated Julian allied himself with the Arabs and opens them the gates of Spain.
Entire kingdom lost, all because the head of state caused a personal injury to someone important.