White supremacy, racially motivated hate crimes, and the murders of racial, religious and sexual minorities don’t happen in a vacuum. They are encouraged, given life, and ultimately driven by leaders who knowingly deploy the terror to advance and increase their own power.
Looking through some old travel photos today from 2016.
Georgia in the Caucasus Mountains has a long history. Wine was being made in Georgia 8000 years ago. The modern city of Kutaisi is said to be the location of ancient Colchis, where Jason got the Golden Fleece. Georgia was, for a long time, a buffer state between the Roman Empire and the Persian Empire, and became one of the first Christian countries.
In more recent times, Georgia has tried to become a modern country, despite some "bullying" from their neighbour to the north, and they are looking to join the EU and NATO.
Mikhail Myagkov, the scientific director of the Russian Military Historical Society, said Monday that Russia’s new history textbook will provide an “objective” view of Joseph Stalin’s role in Russian history. He contrasted the book’s approach to that of past Russian history textbooks, including “the ones financed by...
When #BorisYeltsin, the all-too-eager puppet of Washington, D.C. was maneuvered into power as the #SovietUnion collapsed, a decade of #Western plunder of #Russia followed. This video gives a brief history.
But the #Neocons in the #USA & #UK had by that time already bought off Yeltsin, who had his own grudge against the #USSR because of his family's fortunes suffering under #Stalin. Yeltsin was bent on undermining Gorbachev at every turn.
Today in Labor History August 12, 1936: The First International Brigades arrived in Spain to fight against Franco. Organized by the Communist International, between 40,000 and 60,000 men and women from around the world fought on the Republican side against the fascists. 10,000 of them died. Thousands more activists joined anti-Stalinist forces, like the socialist POUM, or anarchist groups, like the FAI, CNT and the Durruti Column.
Today in Labor History August 10, 1923: Italian-American anarchist and IWW organizer Carlo Tresca was arrested in the United States on the charge of publishing anti-fascist literature. Tresca opposed fascism, Stalinism and mafia-infiltration of unions. He was assassinated in 1943. Some believe the Soviets killed him in retaliation for his criticism of Stalin. The most recent research suggests it was the Bonanno crime family, in response to his criticism of the mafia and Mussolini. Tresca wrote two books. His autobiography was published posthumously in 2003. He also wrote a book in Italian, “L'attentato a Mussolini ovvero il segreto di Pulcinella.”
“My ex-husband wanted to go fight — he claimed it was his duty,” she said. “I said, ‘No, you have an 8-year-old daughter, and it’s a much more important duty to be a father to her.’”
“People are dying there in Ukraine for nothing,” she said.
He finally understood and stayed, she told me'
“I fight out of duty to the motherland. Our grandfathers went all the way to Berlin to ensure we not have an enemy country next door. We won’t allow America to install that.”
As he spoke, a clock with the faces of Mr. #Putin and his servile sometime stand-in, Dmitri A. Medvedev, stared down from the wall.
“My mother gave it to me because she thought I criticized them too much! our Russian grumbling, taxes and corruption. We criticize — the czars, #Stalin and his gulag, Yeltsin — and we accept”
'He told me that there were now two options. The first was that Mr. #Putin would be replaced somehow, and that a period of reform would start, as under #Khrushchev after #Stalin .
“The second option, which is more realistic, is that the regime stays in place and #Russia will be slowly dying,” Mr. Orlov said. “It will fall behind other countries, and to make this regime stable, the level of repression will rise.”
On 29 July 1936, on Stalin's initiative, a secret instruction was adopted on the admissibility of any investigative methods against "spies, counter-revolutionaries, White Guards, Trotskyists and Zinovievists".
Anatoly Podolsky: "Ich bin 55 Jahre alt, Historiker, Ukrainer. Mein Vater und meine Mutter kommen aus einer jüdischen Familie. Während der Sowjetzeit durfte man darüber noch nicht einmal reden. Meine Großmutter und meine Tanten wurden von den Deutschen ermordet, in #BabynJar.
Die Deutschen töteten die #Juden. #Stalin tötete die Erinnerung daran. Und nun kommt #Putin mit seiner 'Spezialoperation' und behauptet die #Ukraine von den Nazis befreien zu müssen." https://www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/putin-und-das-juedische-kiew-dlf-kultur-08f8872f-100.html
Putin, Prigozhin, and Russia’s Long, Bloody History of Fallen Favorites
Like his predecessors from Peter the Great to Stalin, Vladimir Putin has flaunted his unchecked power by elevating ruthless outsiders into positions of prestige and influence. When such relationships sour, things get very ugly, very fast.
@acousticmirror Old Major from #AnimalFarm by #GeorgeOrwell should represent #Stalin and the ambiguous view Orwell had. When the humans attacked, Old Major kept his head up with flying bullets, just like Stalin stayed in #Moscow.
Today in Labor History June 16, 1937: The POUM, a significant constituent of the Spanish Republican anti-fascist forces (and the group with which George Orwell fought) was outlawed and its militants persecuted by the counter-revolutionary Stalinists and the Republic's police, thus making both the Republic, and the Stalinists, more vulnerable to the fascists, who ultimately defeated them. Orwell had to flee because of this betrayal by the Stalinists. For a good fictionalization of the Spanish war against the fascists, and the POUM's and anarchist's betrayal by the Stalinists, see Ken Loach's Tierra y Libertad. Also, Orwell himself wrote about it in his excellent book, “Homage to Catalonia.” Another great book from this war is Hemingway’s, “For Whom the Bell Tolls.”
With the Apollo app for Reddit shutting down soon, I’m going to need to start relying on Mastodon for all of my cute animal photo, gif, and story needs. #Apollo#Reddit#Animals#SmallTalk
3.) Anything remains 👉visible on federated servers!👈
4.) When you delete your account, 👉media does not get deleted on any server👈.
Since the 👉operator and developer of lemmy has very problematic politics (defending genocide and homophobia👈 for example), and is demonstrably 👉incredibly..."
"Member of the European Union Turkey Civic Commission (EUTCC) called on the EU to remove the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) from the bloc's list of terrorist organisations [... saying] “Anyone who is serious about feminist foreign policy, that is, foreign policy based on peace-building measures, anyone who is truly convinced of Jin Jiyan Azadi (“Woman Life Freedom”), cannot persist in criminalising the authors of this slogan”" https://medyanews.net/eutccs-dagdeviren-calls-for-delisting-of-pkk/
IMHO I think that for people in the 21st, and probably the 20th century after WWI there'd be enough secondary sources, including radio and then TV, at least starting with #Hitler, including #Mao, #Mussolini, #Franco, and possibly even #Stalin.
What would be more interesting (argumentatively) is whether people who came to power legitimately (e.g. #LuisXIV and #Sulla) would also be in the sample.
Russian Military Historical Society representative says new history textbook presents Stalin ‘objectively’ (rather than as a ‘tyrant’) — Meduza (meduza.io)
Mikhail Myagkov, the scientific director of the Russian Military Historical Society, said Monday that Russia’s new history textbook will provide an “objective” view of Joseph Stalin’s role in Russian history. He contrasted the book’s approach to that of past Russian history textbooks, including “the ones financed by...
Popularity of Stalin in Russia (red) and Ukraine (blue) from 2012 to 2023.