They have a centuries-long history of extremely brutal and downright psychopathic rule. You really need to read up on Russian history if you think that Putin is the reason things are the way they are.
Analysts of Russia differ about many things, but the most important difference concerns their interpretation of the roots of Russia’s ongoing aggression. One side argues that Russian history and political culture are to blame — or, to put it more simply, uniquely Russian characteristics are the cause of Russian aggression. The other side argues that the causes are not uniquely Russian, but typical of the behavior of certain kinds of states, regimes, societies and leaders.
Unsurprisingly, historians of Russia and Ukraine tend to fall into the first camp
Eeeeeeexactly. The few times Russians have managed to produce or acquire leaders who weren’t sociopaths, they were fairly universally hated.
It’s just incredibly short sighted of people to think that Putin is some kind of an anomaly and that he alone is the reason why Russians are so fucked up, when they have a centuries-long history of genocides, violent repressions by various secret police organizations, colonialism etc. Nobody seems to even understand that Russia is still a colonial empire, just one with contiguous borders
EDIT: Some Russian genocides and ethnic cleansings over the years
Just to drive the point home, here’s a list I copied from an earlier comment of mine of just the easiest to find genocides and ethnic cleansings perpetrated by Russians that I found with a minimum of searching based on what I remember from history. Note that there’s some overlap between these, so you can’t just sum the “victims” column to get a total victim count.
Well I hope we are both differently wrong and we get a peaceful Russia some time soon. Doesn’t seam possible with Putin and there doesn’t seam much hope after him, but let’s hope there is.
Oh yeah, I wouldn’t mind being wrong, but unfucking Russia would be an absolutely monumental task and like you said it doesn’t seem like there’s much hope of it happening. Here’s to hoping, I guess
It is really an ongoing low. There have been reports of this with nepalese “joining” the Russian military for a year now. Some may have been voluntary but many took jobs as private support staff only to be sent to the front.
I think it is important to remember to separate the regime from the people. This has nothing to do with the Russian public. We know there is real opposition, it is just heavily suppressed.
Please remember that dehumanizing a culture or group is one of the ways used to justify treating them exactly how the Russian regime is these people.
It’s not some abstract regime that is routinely torturing people in Ukraine and elsewhere, though. There’s something deeply fucked up about their culture when you consider that absolutely hair-raising brutality has been a hallmark of theirs for centuries now. It’s a colonialist, imperialist, violent and deeply racist mentality.
I had a significant proportion of my family tree (who were Ingrian Finns) genocided by Russians. I’m the first generation in my family for about 100 years who hasn’t either had to live under Russian occupation, fight invading Russians, or dodge Russian agents because somebody in the family dared stand up to them (yes I’m old and my parents are practically ancient). The argument that the problem is their regime just doesn’t sit right with me, considering the shit that the individuals get up to pretty habitually, and the hundreds of years of brutal regimes have to come from somewhere.
This is not to say that all Russians are terrible, nor that it’s a fundamental biological feature of the people, but even scholars think that their culture is – to put it very mildly – extremely problematic
Once in Russia, they were told to join the Russian Army. To motivate them, they were:
Offered Russian work visas, brides, and passports
Denied food and water when they refused.
Burned with heated wood and matchsticks, cut with knives, and other torture methods
Threated with knives and guns
Finally arrested for illegally entering the Russia.
I’ve heard other reports of people from India getting forced into fighting for Russia after fraudulent job offers, so it seems like this is becoming fairly widespread.
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