Ferk

it’s rational for them not to want to have nukes on their doorstep just as it’s rational for Russia to want the same.

You agree with me there then.

Yet, the US does precisely that in Europe right now making it a target for Russian nuclear weapons

And I'm against that. Are you not? I don't see what point you are making.

Only valid peacekeeping is done through the UN.

Yes, that's what NATO argues. NATO's intervention in Libya was authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 1973. Similarly with NATO's intervention in the former Yugoslavia, they claim to enforce UN mandate. The UN has no army to enforce anything on their own.

As I said, of course each side will always twist the narrative to their advantage. You cannot just say that one side is right and pretend that you are being impartial and unaffected by propaganda.

Russians literally wanted to join NATO and create a joint security framework that would be acceptable to everyone. Why did NATO reject that?

They shouldn't have rejected it. No.

If Europe thought it could win against Russia and it had credible evidence that Russia was setting up an organization to invade Europe then it would be rational for Europe to take military action

I disagree sorry. It would be wrong and stupid for Europe to wage war against their Russian neighbors and create an environment that ultimately would lead to self-harm. Waging war is not benefitial. Europe being capable of winning (your scenario) would also mean that the Russia alliance would be less of a threat.. so I think attacking then would just be bullying and that decision would end up coming back to bite us at some point in the future. It would motivate our neighbors to guard themselves and invest in military, and it would also cause diplomatic problems in future relationships.

Do you think Russians are losing sleep over you judging them?

No. Why would you presume that?

Do you have reading comprehension problems?

I think we are talking past each other... these questions are clearly in bad faith and what follows shows that you misinterpreted the question that elicited the previous answer you are referring to.

I feel I've already explained myself way too much in too many ways, and I don't think we are gonna reach anywhere here. I don't think it's worth continuing.

I’m saying that when USSR put nuclear weapons in Cuba we know what the reaction from the US was. This is not a hypothetical debate.

Do you think the US reaction was "rational"?

That said, putting nuclear weapons is not the same as having a treaty. I don't want the US to set up their nuclear weapons in Europe.. I'm against that too.

NATO is not a defense treaty. It’s an aggressive organization that has been invading and destroying countries for decades now. Go read up on Yugoslavia and Libya as two examples. Meanwhile, the key member of NATO has been at a state of continues war all around the world.

Whenever a "defense treaty" takes any action it's always gonna be controversial because each side is always gonna argue that they are the ones that are actually defending themselves, each is gonna have a version of what they consider "pacekeeping", "humanitarian protection", etc.

But why would you think that the Russians would be any different? Do you really think this is one sided and Russia would not try to argue that they did not start any attacks even when they might have actually attacked? (even if it were to be by accident! ...or because of orders to pull off not arriving in time...)

Also.. you said "this is not a hypothetical debate" but at the same time you say that the level of "aggression" isn't the same... so tell me: if Russia DID set up an organization in the same level of "aggression" as NATO (whichever high you may believe that is), do you really think that Europe should be "rational" in reacting by automatically waging war against the country that the treaty is written with?

Where was I hinting that?

Here: "it is not harmed by the war the way Europe is"

You qualify it by saying "the way Europe is", implying that there might be some "way" harm was inflicted, just not in the same "way" (or level?) as Europe.

Do you really think Russia received ZERO harm? the war caused no suffering at all to any Russian?

the west is not able to impose its morals on Russia.

Sorry, but I'm not "the west" ... Chomsky is not "the west", you are not "the west" (or are you?)

Me, Chomsky, and any person with a set of moral standards should be allowed to judge whether they think that an action made by any third party is morally "good" or "bad"... if someone came and tried to kill someone else I would have no problem in accusing the killer of doing something wrong, regardless of whether they would listen to me or not.

We can of course try and take measures to try to prevent that person from committing acts that cause harm (and sure, that might imply making concessions.. like agreeing for us to drop the knives, if that works at preventing them from using theirs), but that does not mean that this person is immune from being judged in moral grounds when they actually go and kill someone.

If you truly believed that what the Russians did was not causing harm... if it truly was a just and well deserved war that is actually good and rational, then maybe Europe should not try to prevent it. But if the attack was a bad thing, morally, rationally, and in terms of causing harm, for both Ukrainians and Russians, then it's something that should be prevented. Even if you think that one side might have been more hurt than the other, that does not make it right for the "winner". There are no real winners here.

Can you demonstrate in what way this was irrational self harm on the part of Russia? I gave you concrete examples in this thread showing that standard of living in Russia has improved during the time of the war, Russian economy has grown, Russian military has become far stronger, and Russia has become a much more important geopolitical player in the world

Before, you told me that these things (the economic growth, etc) had nothing to do with the war... now you are using those things as a reason why the war was ok to wage?

In wars like these, you are either profiting from the suffering of others or (and often, in addition to) causing suffering for sections of your population. It does not matter whether it's Russia, US, Europe or whoever it is that wages the war.

I literally provide you with many quotes and references from top western academics, diplomats, and politicians who disagree with your bold statement mr Ferk.

I literally said, I think this is the third time.. but I'll repeat that I think the west was wrong in what they did, that NATO should not have expanded. I agree with those western academics.

Do you understand that? Do you disagree with that? I hope not!

The one statement that you seem to disagree with is the other one, the one I made before and that Chomsky agrees with, the one concerning Russian actions in response to NATO expansion. The one that states that the action was not "rational" because NATO wasn't really a threat FOR RUSSIA. It might be still be a threat FOR WORLD PEACE to expand NATO because of the reaction many, including those experts, were predicting Russia would have). This is not the same statement, Mr. ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆.

What I said is that it’s rational for a country to respond militarily to an aggressive military alliance surrounding it.

So you are saying that if there was a bordering country (let's say... Belarus.. for example) that decided to strike a military alliance with Russia (let's say they decide to call it "Union State Treaty"... or maybe for example "ODKB"), then do you really think this should be seen as a "provocation" and that it'd be a "rational" reaction for Europe to wage war?

I don't think war is the answer to a defense treaty. NATO was a defense treaty.. a weak one (by your own admission) without a lot of military investment, specially by Europe. I disagree that it was really a threat.. the same way that I would not have seen it as a threat if Russia started making some NATO-equivalent treaties with countries in the Europe-Russia border. If the roles were reversed and Ukraine joined a treaty with Russia, China and other big powers, I would be against Europe waging war. Would you not?

Nowhere did I suggest that Russia started the war to grow its economy. What I said, is that Russia managed to restructure its economy away from the west, and it is not harmed by the war the way Europe is.

Ah, so the economic boom has nothing to do with the war? Because what I wanted to ask is whether the war caused self-harm or benefit.

In your last bit there it seems you are hinting that Russia was harmed by the war, even if it wasn't harmed "the way Europe is".

So.. which one is it? was the war a rational benefitial thing for Russia that resulted in them being better off? or was it an irrational self-harming thing (even if not "the way" it was for Europe)?

You’re back to doing moralizing here

Chomsky is too. I believe that if you don't have morals in regards to which decisions are beneficial for a society then is when discussing these topics does become "not constructive".

it implicitly ignores the role the west played in starting the conflict.

I have no problem accepting the role of the West. I agree that NATO's expansion was a "morally bad" (irrational / self-harm) decision because it should have been the better person and realize earlier that Russia would end up behaving the way they did (irrationally).

My point is that Russia feeling entitled to wage a war was also "morally bad" (irrational / self-harm). I'm saying this because I feel that your comments imply that Russia was completely rational in waging war.

reason through this using your adult brain Ferk.

hahahaha thank you! I'll try to explain it clearly Mr. ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆! :D

Explain why would NATO expansion be a problem for Russia if the alliance isn’t becoming stronger?

Huh? That's not what I said.

My point is that NATO expansion was NOT a real threat/problem for Russia. That's why I think the attack was (to use Chomky's words): "unprovoked and unjustified".

Sorry, but if you truly don't think that decisions that lead to suffering should be "moralized", and you really think that it's "rational" and in the "own interests" of a country to wage war in order to grow the economy, then I think we simply disagree on what should be the goals of a society and where its interests should lie.

From the article you linked:

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine took much of the world by surprise. It is an unprovoked and unjustified attack that will go down in history as one of the major war crimes of the 21st century, argues Noam Chomsky

Chomsky even uses the word "unjustified". He's saying pretty much the same thing I said.

Note how what I was asking is whether NATO's expansion was a threat for Russia, not whether the expansion of NATO was a good decision. (or if you don't like the word "good" then... "rational and under our own self-interest").

I can perfectly agree with NATO's expansion being a "bad" (sorry... irrational / self-harming) decision by the West, but that wasn't what I asked.

You seem to have this infantile notion that simply adding NATO members makes it stronger.

hahaha... infantile? Mr. ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆ the adult.

You seem to have the delusion that I was talking about "strength" when I said "expansion".

Is it true or is it false that the war has motivated NATO's expansion (ie.. adding members)? because that's all I said, ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆.

What I’m actually saying that Europe is acting in an irrational and and self harmful way that’s at odds with its own interests

Ah, and don't you think that's bad? ...or you just don't think that acting in a way that harms the population should be "moralized"?

Do you think Russia is in a better position now than after the war? I don't think Russia's attack on Ukraine was a rational response to NATO's expansion or beneficial to the Russians. If you don't like the word "justified" then you can think of it in those terms.

I’m saying that we need to consider the context that led to the decision to start the war, and talk about what could’ve been done differently to avoid the war.

Ok, what should Russia have done differently to avoid the war? or is this exclusively Europe's responsibility? Is Russia like a wild animal that simply reacts mechanically, taking only reactionary action, even when the decision can hurt them more than it can benefit them?

Do you really think that NATO's expansion was such an existential threat for Russia that waging war was "rational"? Because a moment ago you were saying that "NATO expanding is pure nonsense", that it can't really keep up, etc. So was NATO a threat or not?

I’m referring to you saying: “And ironically, this Russian reaction is helping NATO expand further.”

Yes I said that. Is it wrong? you mean the war has not triggered several countries to start having interest in joining NATO?

And this article is even about European members of NATO wanting to spend more in military... I think this is the opposite of what Russia wanted, which is why I find it ironic.

I didn’t say it wouldn’t, but something benefiting the USA isn’t contrary to it also benefiting Russia. It’s not a zero sum game.

I didn't say it's a zero sum game. The fact that this whole thing is forcing everyone to make deals with the US is quite telling, imho.

Same for Europe, the deal was brutal, but the pressure was high due to the breaks with Russia. Losing European business was a hard blow for Russia too, and they are overall in a much worse position now, imho.

I'm not surprised at Europe's stupidity, but Russia is not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, to put it mildly. Both Russia and Europe are best when they work together... and they will destroy themselves if they continue this way.

Thanks! I'll try with nofail and see if the lockups stop!

Another thing to look out for: SDCards or USB flash drives that might randomly fail to “spin up” and hang, unplugging those helps.

Honestly, that could be it now that you mention it.. I have had for a while an external hard drive plugged in that I've used for some backups.

Talking about justifications is just moralizing, and it’s not constructive in nature.

Then why do you moralize Europe's reaction? Or are you saying that you don't think wasting money in military is bad?

"Moralizing" just means "making judgments on whether it's good or bad".

Are you saying that we should not judge whether the decision to start a war was good / bad?

Meanwhile, the whole talk of NATO expanding is pure nonsense. NATO has been shown to be impotent in Ukraine, and the US is now actively pulling out of Europe.

Can you explain what you mean by "this whole talk"? which talk? is this something I said?

I don't see how this challengues anything I said (if this was your intent).

"NATO provoking Russia with constant expansion to Russian borders" is something you said, not me. I was just following up from that.. I didn't say anything about the power of NATO in Ukraine.. you are making up your own straw man....

Not really, the most likely scenario here is that Russia and the US will make a deal over the heads of the Europeans.

And you think this will not benefit the USA?

Europe also does deals with USA over the heads of the Russians.. this is not benefiting Russia either.

I don't think Russia wants to "invade and control their neighbors when it wishes", but I also don't think the expansion of NATO justifies in any way the war Russia started.

And ironically, this Russian reaction is helping NATO expand further.

Russia is playing into USA hands by behaving this way, imho. Just as much as Europe is.

The thing is that this would mean you also need to list the non-free projects that you are looking an alternative for (otherwise you wouldn't be able to map them to their free software equivalents). And in order to not repeat the same lists, you will end up also having to list equivalents between closed source software (since the alternatives to Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop are likely gonna be the same).

This essentially would make it a subset of existing places like https://alternativeto.net/ where you can find alternatives to a software and filter to only show the alternatives that are open source.

That's actually a good idea. A very simple "click the frog" captcha might be solvable by an AI but it would work as a way to make it more expensive for crawlers without wasting compute resources (energy!) on the user or slowing down old devices to a crawl. So in some ways it could be a better alternative to Anubis.

I've also wanted to try out Guix for a while.. part of the reason I'm leaving a comment is just so I can recheck these posts later :P

But when I do I for sure will start out from nonguix because I'm quite confident that my hardware won't be supported (I even have a recently purchased Wifi 7 card that relies on ath12k module that I'm quite sure won't be in the official Guix repo.. maybe I'd even need to compile it myself..)

I see in the nonguix readme that there's a way to generate an iso that includes already a nonguix kernel, so I'll have a look at that.

It even looks like you can create a writeable image to run from a USB thumbdrive, which looks very interesting, I gotta try that!

guix system image --image-size=7.2GiB /path/to/this/channel/nongnu/system/install.scm
dd if=/path/to/disk-image of=/dev/sdb-or-whichever-drive-is-usb bs=4M status=progress oflag=sync

I've been burnt by Arch before which is what has got me into exploring other distros. I might ultimately end up again in Arch like you, who knows, but it looks like the way Guix works is well suited for hosting your own repo too.. I think I've seen before someone hosting their own Guix repo in github, including also a bunch of configuration for their system, which got me curious.

I agree! what makes it a genocide is the intent to target the civilian population belonging to that nation. It does not necessarily have to be about race or religion, it can still be genocide. Russia doesn't have a problem with the kids race, religion or ancestry, but with them being raised under Ukranian society and values.