Lev Oborin posted a poem on Facebook that I liked so much I wanted to repost it here and make an attempt to translate it; he gave me the go-ahead and explained a couple of difficult bits, so without further ado:
смешно уму с телом
то течёт красным
то стреляет белымто к делам опасным
само себя клонит
то курсом напраснымсамо себя гонит;
то снова здорово;
то от боли стонет
то от иногосмешно, право слово
оно треугольник
и над ним кружочек:
мяч прыгнул на столиксел на клиночек;
пухни, тело, пухни,
лезь из сорочек,пульсируй на кухне,
выжимайся в сушке;
потом все рухнет —
шлам, хлам, кольца, дужки,крючки, завитушки
смешно уму с телом
устарелой картой
хоть ножом как меломпо доске шаркай
хоть наклонись над
исписанной партойвсе одно виснет
ум, понять силясь:
как признаки жизни
спеклись помутилисьво что превратились?
ум раскинул сети —
монашеским плачем,
бодрым междометьем,воем собачьим,
внутри себя вечем,
счётом неудачам:улов не замечен,
ожиданье зряшно,
рыбарь не вечен,
ворону брашно.смешно уму, страшно.
My version:
the body is funny
it flows red
it shoots whiteof its own accord
it gets into a fight,
on a vain courseit rushes ahead;
again finds itself able;
it groans from pain
or from some other foible;it’s funny, no fooling
it’s a triangle made
with a circle on top:
a ball jumped on a table,sat on a blade;
swell, body, swell,
burst out of shirts,pulse in the kitchen,
diet till it hurts;
then it all collapses —
slime, trash, rings, arches,hooks, curls
the body’s funny
like an out-of-date atlas;
use a knife as chalkon the blackboard in class
or bend over
a scribbled-on deskall the same the mind
hangs, it tries
to grasp how life’s signs
curdle and dimwhat have they become?
the mind has spread nets
with monkish laments,
hale interjections,the howl of a dog,
an assembly within,
for failures a log:the catch is unseen,
expectation in vain,
the fisher is doomed,
food for ravens.it’s funny and fearsome.
As always, it’s a struggle to deal with the rich rhymes of Russian in the less lush environment of English; I’ve gestured toward the pattern without trying to reproduce it, and have depended on assonance and rhythm to pick up some of the slack. My main priority is to capture the sound and feel of the original, which in this case means a refusal to pad out lines: the opening line (repeated later), смешно уму с телом, is literally “it’s funny for the mind with a body,” but there’s no way to cram all that in without bloating, so I settled for “the body is funny” (the mind is the only entity that can find something funny, after all). The original has an archaic ring in Russian; one of Lev’s commenters compared it to the 17th-century poet Simeon Polotsky, and that makes sense to me (if you read Russian, there’s a selection of his verse here).
Also, this poem taught me the word брашно ‘food, viand,’ a Church Slavic doublet of Russian борошно ‘rye flour’; Proto-Slavic *boršьno is derived from Proto-Indo-European *bʰars- and is thus cognate with Latin far and fārīna ‘flour,’ English barley, Old Norse barr ‘grain,’ and Old Irish bairgen ‘bread, loaf,’ among others. I love that kind of thing.
I think I got more of a Kharms vibe myself, but that’s because I wasn’t familiar with Simeon Polotsky’s works; they do look much more similar.
Yeah, I think Kharms was drawing on the same old tradition.
It is strange to see снова здорово in its literal sense rather than as ” here we go again”…
Mind laughs at its body, would probably work metrically. English isn’t too pliable a medium for poetry, but without case endings, one can pack quite densely in it…
Mind laughs at its body, would probably work metrically.
That could work, and then the last line would be “mind laughs and fears.”
And now I learn there’s a village Сново-Здорово!
I don’t know Russian, but I applaud your English version – it’s a great poem.
I wonder if a more conventional English meter would do this better justice given that English “wastes” precious syllables on things like articles, copulas, and personal pronouns.
You always have to give up something in translation, so I would probably give up the meter and keep more of the meaning. It seems to me that the mind-body juxtaposition is crucial to the original – and the implication doesn’t do it justice.
The first words that sprang to mind on reading the first few stanzas were something like:
The body is a funny thing
to the mind it streams in red
now spurting out with white
now rushing forth instead
its own dangers to invite
reasons in its own head
It chases its own tails
now it bursts out in rude health
now on pain its self impales
now complains of something else
It’s funny! Other words fail!
It certainly loses a lot of it’s compactness and a little bit of the feeling of the form of being off kilter as a parallel to what it says about the body. But for me it resonated better with the overall feel as I experienced it in the original (mind you, my Russian is beyond rusty and my English poetic skills questionable).
Mind the body.
It’s too bad Jim Morrison & co. missed the opportunity to make an album
Mind
The Doors
@AJP Crown: They never would have anyway, not being British.
It does remind me of syllabic masters – Simeon Polotsky (1629-80), yes, but also Dimitry Rostovsky (1651-1709) and Antiokh Kantemir (1708-1744). One of Kantemir’s best-known poems is subtitled “To my own mind” (K umu svoemu) and begins like this:
O underripe mind, fruit of brief learning!
Stay idle, do not impel my hands to labor…
To writing, that is. Oborin is playing a bit loose with the number of syllables – most of his lines have six but some, only five, which was would have been OK for popular and/or humorous verse but not for the more serious, moral poetry. However, he’s sticking to feminine rhymes faithfully, as any syllabic versifier is supposed to.
You always have to give up something in translation, so I would probably give up the meter and keep more of the meaning.
Ah, well, that’s where we differ. As I’ve said elsewhere, for me the whole point of poetry is the sound of it; if you want to send a message (in the immortal alleged words of Sam Goldwyn), use Western Union.
Beautiful translation — I have a minor criticism: in the line “то от иного”, in the Russian version my mind went to sex, doesn’t work if you specify “trouble”
Excellent point — I’ll change it to “foible.” Thanks!
I would like to join the applause.
But not knowing any Russian, I didn’t know what sort of `log’ was being referred to. You compared the body to an atlas earlier so I thought it might be `log’ in the sense of a book of record but it could also have been `log’ in the sense of a lump of wood. I guess that ambiguity is not there in the original.
No, it was meant in the “ship’s log” sense. I worried about possible ambiguity, and now I see I was right to worry. I’ll have to mull that over and see if I can do better.
for me the whole point of poetry is the sound of it
An extreme version of this position would claim that the following (in a non-rhotic accent) is the most beautiful poem in English:
In any case, when dealing with poetry in translation, it’s a matter of trade-offs: by the same token, you wouldn’t want to read a version of the Iliad in perfect English quantitative hexameters which is about “incestuous dukes in Tierra del Fuego” (h/t Philip Toynbee), would you?
An extreme version of this position
That’s not an “extreme version,” it’s a polemical caricature which has nothing to do with the position being caricatured. See the post I linked to in this comment for an example of what I mean.
Too repetitious. Maybe:
Seller – sell her cellar door!
Sell ardor!
Are door sellers cellar-door sellers?
Sailor dough or cellar door or sell herd, or?
Cell.
Her door.
Goddammit, I learn that Oborin has been arrested (along with a bunch of other people, of course):
Fuck these authoritarian assholes. May their end come soon, without too much blood being shed.
Hearty Amen, and wishing Wannabe Mini-Stalin a long, long life in a small, small cell.
Варвара Бабицкая is a sister of my oldest freind (but I am afraid, quite a number of them was arrested today). Actually, the situation here has been changing for a couple of years. We are a way more authoritarian now. That Moscow was never as authoritarian* as it was imagined (that is, having oppositional views here was safe – much unlike say Chechnya, so it is important to distinguish between cities) is a different story.
—
* not the right word, actually, but here it stands for “degree of danger for opposition”.
I have had my phone switched off for more than a month now. A friend of mine worked at the Spanish embassy in Kyiv for a while, and met Zelensky. I’m in Bulgaria, but who knows what the future will bring. Who knows what that psychopatic asshole (Putin) might get angry about — that we have Spanish military aircraft based here?
Варвара Бабицкая is a sister of my oldest freind
Wow, not many degrees of separation. I’m sorry about your friend’s sister, but glad she’s speaking out despite the danger. I hope they all get released soon…
And V, I hope your phone service gets restored and your future looks brighter.
Yes. I assume “friend’s sister” is a genre: I do not know her very well, but I saw her million times one millenium ago. I do not think she’s anyhow involved in politics (apart of being what she is and saying what she thinks). It is familial, though: her grandfather was on the red square in 68 and grandmother was arrested later (for ХТС I think).
You misunderstand me, I deliberately shut down my telephone, because the very sound of a call (even vibrating) makes me go into panic.
Oh! Sorry for the misunderstanding. Boy, these are hard times.
No, sorry, I really don’t want to talk about this.
Police make more than 1,700 arrests as protesters take to the streets in cities across country [Russia]
(Must be from a Russian source with that anarthrous “country”.)
I just saw a photo of a large protest in SPb. It’s heartening that so many people are willing to take risks to oppose the war.
While it is wonderful that there are hundreds of protesters, are they typical? I would not be surprised (from my little contact with Russians) if the mass of the population were highly supportive of Putin’s war and little interested in the travails of those who are not. I might be wrong, of course, but I don’t think I’m over cynical.
Who cares whether they’re “typical” (whatever that means)? It’s extraordinarily important for whatever portion of the population opposes official brutality to make that known. When I protested against the Vietnam War, it wasn’t “typical” — most Americans supported the war — but I’m glad I did it. The mass of most populations always supports their leader.
Bathrobe: I’m not sure what you’re trying to say?
> “if the mass of the population were highly supportive of Putin’s war and little interested in the travails of those who are not.”
What are you trying to say that has an even remote touch with reality?
I am suggesting that most people in most countries disappointingly get very jingoistic when wars are on. “Military madness”. As I said, it’s wonderful that thousands are out protesting, but I suspect they form a small minority. And I don’t think this is confined to Russia. If China invaded Taiwan, I think you would find almost unanimous support amongst ordinary Chinese. Yes, it’s very disappointing and disillusioning but (from my point of view) that’s just how it is.
(Perhaps I have jaundiced views because of my experience in China, where many people, ordinary people, hold views that are quite repugnant to me.)
Bathrobe:
> If China invaded Taiwan, I think you would find almost unanimous support amongst ordinary Chinese.
What are “ordinary Chinese”?
Basically, everybody. Perhaps there would be a few who didn’t agree but from my experience (and I didn’t move in dissident circles) they would be highly atypical. I think Hat experienced similar chauvinistic attitudes in Taiwan (not about a Mainland invasion but about similar notions with irredentist hues like “Vietnam used to be part of China”, as though it were some kind of missing limb…).
FWIW, the linked Guardian article quotes a survey which shows 45% of Russians support the war on Ukraine.
Thanks, Y. That’s interesting. Maybe not quite as resolutely chauvinist and irredentist as the Chinese after all.
(The one Russian I ever had a conversation about the Ukraine with, a multilingual cosmopolitan lady with (IIRR) a foreign passport who worked for several foreign companies, turned out to be a raving nationalist on national and territorial issues, which may have coloured my attitude.)
Bathrobe: I’ve had a lot of conversations with Ukrainians, Unkrainian-identifying Russians, Russian-identifying Ukrainians, and just plain Russian (and a Russian from NIzhni Novgorod is not the same as one from Moscow, and is not the same from Peter. And so and so forth.
They don’t wan’t to be ruled by Putin. They want to live in a free country. They don’t want to be ruled by a fucking dictator. Why are we even discussing that? A psychopath just invaded a country for no discenable reason beside his mania of empire.
Why are we even discussing that?
Maybe because history and countries are often guided and created by psychopaths.
And no, I dislike Putin (and Xi Jinping) intensely.
Bathrobe: I think you’re pretty ::biased:: but I guess you can’t help it. I’m trying to reach out to you.
Is cynicism a bias? If you think it is then I’m biased. I certainly don’t support inhumane, racist, or oppressive regimes, but I’m cynical about the extent to which people are actually opposed to them, especially when patriotism/jingoism kicks in.
What I imagine (and I hope someone who knows better will correct me if I’m off) is that Putin wishes he had a personality cult, where he could do no wrong. Stalin had it, even Trump. But Putin does not. He has right-wingers and nationalisats on his side because of his politics, not because they admire him, and if he fails he’ll be blamed (not that that would necessarily endanger his considerable power).
Bathrobe: That’s not cynicism, that’s Putin’s worldview. It has nothing to do with cynicism.
Also, I agree with Y.
So do I.
That’s not cynicism, that’s Putin’s worldview.
Not true. Putin revels in his worldview. I, on the other hand, am saddened and sickened by it.
Some people find cynicism comforting. I find it distressing but can’t see any other way of viewing the reality that confronts us.
At any rate, I’m glad there are lots of Russians opposed to Putin’s war.
The trick is to have realistic expectations of people, so you won’t set yourself up to be disappointed.
I endeavour to do this, but my efforts are continually thwarted by people gratuitously behaving much better than I could reasonably have ever expected.
I’d start giving examples, but I think I’d get maudlin, and in any case this margin is too narrow.
Some autocrats’ attempts to create a cult of personality work, but some—probably most, really—don’t. Putin has certainly made, over the years, some attempts to construct one for himself, but the results seem (to me as a total outsider, at least) very limited. I am reminded of a dry comment some historian wrote about his predecessor Brezhnev’s attempt to build a cult of personality—that the cult dissipated almost instantly upon Brezhnev’s death, since there “had never been much enthusiasm” for it to begin with.
Actually, if you succeed in convincing a person that something is the majority view/consensus, it is quite likely that it will become this person’s view and this person will join the consensus.
(and before reacting at this, imagine yourself reading in WP that the scientific consensus about something is […]. How likely you are to share it, if this “something” is complicated enough so that scientists can’t be really sure and familiar enough so that you could have your own opinion?)
Humans are capable of reflecting on a similar recursive phenomenon, namely the concept of a “leader” (but are not quite capable of noticing it with opinions).
And this is why taking over the Synchronizer (TV, that is) is important.
“Personality”
You are not allowed to appear in TV or politics unless you behave as if Putin is infallible. But no golden statues rotating with the sun as in Turkmenistan. He could have them if he wanted.
And of coruse what is happening is not just Putin.
I am relived to report that Lev Oborin has been released. I hope lots of others have too.
Yes, V. B too. The guy I worry the most about was arrested a day before (for singing anti-war songs):)
FFS! The algorithm has just coughed up an interview with Chomsky (recorded Jan 11). The Ukraine (starting about 11:00) crisis is America’s fault apparently, starting with George W Bush.
Meanwhile Trump, Fox News and large parts of the Republican Party are gung-ho for Putin and then for Xi Jinping to take over Taiwan similarly. Is this the Party of “Mr. Gorbachev tear down this wall!”?
A bunch of protestors are marching in New Zealand, to complain about vaccination mandates (there is no mandate, voluntary vaccination rates are around 94%), mask mandates and lockdowns — carrying ‘Trump 2024’ banners. (They seem unaware they’ll be unable to vote for him, on account of NZ not being a colony of the U.S.A.) Swastikas have been daubed on our War Memorial at their Canadian-truckers style encampment outside the Parliament.
That is the party of “War! Whooo! Party!”
FFS! The algorithm has just coughed up an interview with Chomsky (recorded Jan 11). The Ukraine (starting about 11:00) crisis is America’s fault apparently, starting with George W Bush.
Yes, a lot of lefties have gone off the deep end — or, to put it another way, revealed what has all along been the pathetic inadequacy of their analysis. People are wired to love simplistic on/off, black/white views of the world, lefties as much as anyone else. This is why it helps to be an anarchist: you’re insulated against thinking “my country’s leaders do bad things, so I’ll root for that other country’s leaders, they must be the good guys!” I still haven’t forgotten or forgiven Chomsky’s defense of the Khmer Rouge.
Did Ch. back then have enough information to distinguish between Khmer Rouge, and, say, pre-Pinochet Chile?
I still do not understand how one can substract propaganda against a regime without turning into its defender.
I was misunderstood as a defender of Meinhof because I was irritated by false accusations. But M. seems unremarkable to me, I do not know if he was a good or bad person, I was irritated because it took too much time to figure out what happened. False accusations annoy me because they have nothign to do with reality.
Still everyone assumed that I like the guy. But what if I were emotionally involved? What if I were not indifferent but wanted him to be a good guy? I am not fond of any regimes, I guess. Ask a modern, intelligent, educated and generally nice Serb about war crimes in Bosnia, she will say: “and how do I know that it is not lies?”
Yes, someone who does care about people in Cambodia likely would have noticed that somethign very wrong is happening. But this “we or them, if you defend them, you are with them, if you object to lies about them you are supporting them” mentality is pervasive and media publish bullshit. Dealing with it is hard.
Yes, a lot of lefties have gone off the deep end
I’m not sure that Chomsky is what you might call representative of left-wing opinion …
(There is actually a common thread between his poiltics and his linguistics: inconvenient facts are simply ignored.)
I can’t say that I’m seeing much support for Putin among left-wingers here.
(It’s not supporting Putin to suggest that poilicy mistakes on the part of the West may have played into his hands, though it strikes me as being wise in hindsight at best.)
A friend of mine was in Donbass in 2014 with the rebels (as a journalist). He sent his article to an “independent” Russian site where he worked. They did not publish it. He asked WTF, they sent a link to him and said “we did”. The piece was censored and only visible to people who have the link. He sent it to an independent Ukrainian site, they refused to publish it too, Then he wrote in FB and then both sites published it accusing each other in censorship.
I was misunderstood as a defender of Meinhof because I was irritated by false accusations.
I’m still not seeing what you mean by false accusations. He was said to be a Nazi and a racist, which he was. You were going into elaborate explorations of what exactly he said about various African groups, which seems pointless unless you’re denying the basic and obvious facts, which is why you seemed to be defending him.
I’m not sure that Chomsky is what you might call representative of left-wing opinion
Of course he’s not (thank God); I mentioned him as an example of what I objected to. I’m not sure whether by “I can’t say that I’m seeing much support for Putin among left-wingers here” you mean you’re not seeing any (in which case good for you, you move in the best circles) or just that you’re not seeing much support; in any case, there are definitely useful idiots who have been cluttering up Facebook (and doubtless other social media I don’t frequent) with increasingly tortured justifications of his behavior. Alex Foreman reposted a particularly hilarious tweet from an anguished woman who had just seen a clip of a Putin speech and wrote “Wtf is he talking about? He is wrong. He called Stalins [sic] regime totalitarin [sic]. Jesus… I thought he was smarter than this” and an apology from a guy who’d been defending Putin right up until the troops crossed the border and then said “What Putin is doing right now seemed genuinely unthinkable to me until this very moment. It is completely irrational from any standpoint and of course it is insanely criminal. Apologies for getting it wrong.” Apologies accepted, you twit!
And Craig Murray tweeted a guarantee that Putin would not invade, adding “If you can ignore the false frenzies whipped up by the toadies and sheep who make up the entire mainstream media, you will perceive the world much more clearly.” This is the loony left I’m talking about, the ones who drink their own Kool-Aid and perceive the New York Times as “fascist” (yes, I’ve seen that said).
I’m still not seeing what you mean by false accusations. He was said to be a Nazi and a racist, which he was. “
Well, it is not a Meinhof thread. And I really do not give a shit about him.
Then we’re all in agreement!
Fair notice: no linguistic content, current events blathering.
There is a small group of Russians who didn’t believe in the full-scale invasion as well and thought that the whole run up to the war was orchestrated by Biden and Putin to force Ukrainian concessions. They hate Putin, hate Minsk agreements and all that. Idiocy can be a part of every ideology. I propose idiology as a name for ideologically driven idiocy.
Works for me.
Yes, why?
What Putin claims to be is exactly what they wish to be; what he claims to want for Russia is exactly what they want for themselves.
They were never against Russia. They were against everything to their left, foreign or domestic. That just happened to include the Soviet Union as the most obvious example.
Well, yes.
I was convinced Putin’s goal was to keep threatening war indefinitely, because that would serve his interests of 1) distracting the Russians from their dismal COVID situation by promising to Make Russia Great Again and 2) raising the price of oil above 90 $ and keeping it there, so that, along with the usual gas exports whose price rose alongside that of oil, Russia would still have an economy and not plunge into poverty. After all, if he ever gets too unpopular to stay in power despite the propaganda apparatus and the poisonings and the show trials and everything, he can’t just retire to his illegal palace: once he can’t do anything for the rest of the mafia anymore, he’s a huge liability because he knows way too much, so he’ll be found dead the next day under extremely, extremely mysterious circumstances. Staying in power is a matter of life and death for him; he must stay in power, and that’s best accomplished by threatening war forever without ever actually triggering it. Of course that requires occasional gestures to the effect of “I really mean it this time”, like very publicly and pretty slowly moving ever more troops to the border.
It was obvious the whole time that actually starting the war would be precisely counterproductive: it would trigger a long list of sanctions and cripple Russia’s ability to export oil & gas, and the patriotic fervor would burn up all at once instead of being stretched out over years and years.
And then he started the war anyway.
It looks like he’s really been surrounded by nothing but yes-men in his bunker behind the disinfection tunnels for a long time. It looks like he really believes enough of the idiologies (thanks for that word!) of Dugin, Gumilev and the like to have gone completely bonkers, measurable on the Timecube scale. Maybe dementia from Parkinson’s or from Long COVID plays a role, who knows. In any case, “[i]t is completely irrational from any standpoint.”
Plus, I was wrong about the patriotic fervor burning up all at once! It isn’t burning at all, it seems. Instead, we’re seeing thousands of people protesting all over Russia even though street protests are currently illegal altogether. On the first day, the most common slogan was simply “нет войне”; on the second day of the war, yesterday, “нет войне и нам свободу” started to appear. If this goes on, the war is backfiring spectacularly.
Concerning NATO, I still don’t understand what kind of fear kept it from simply being dissolved, honorably discharged, in 1991 as having fulfilled its task and outlived its usefulness. But Putin made NATO necessary again in 2008 at the very latest. Everything since then is on him.
the most common slogan was simply “нет войне”
I’ve also seen the нецензурный вариант “ХУЙ ВОЙНЕ.”
I’m reminded of the joke that explains the history & politics of Congo/Zaire since independence. The Congo is flooding. A scorpion is trapped and asks various larger animals to carry him to safety. One after another declines for fear of getting stung. Eventually, a hippo agrees after reminding him once again that if he stings, they’ll both die. In the middle of the river, the hippo suddenly feels a burning pain. In agony the hippo screams about how unbelievably stupid that was. The scorpion replies: “Mais c’est le Congo…”
On the first day, the most common slogan was simply “нет войне”; on the second day of the war, yesterday, “нет войне и нам свободу” started to appear. If this goes on, the war is backfiring spectacularly
It would be quite ironic if that sentiment would lead to Putin being overthrown, but I’m not that optimistic. At the start of WW II, Hitler complained about the total lack of enthusiasm for the war on the street (that was quite different to the flag-waving and outpourings of patriotism at the start of WW I), but he nevertheless wasn’t brought down by a popular revolution or an army coup, but had to be forced into suicide by losing the war and having allied soldiers on his doorstep.
It has occurred to me that Putin might be brought down by his associates who grow tired of his driving the country into the ditch. That is, after all, how autocrats often end up. (Cf. the fate of the would-be autocrat Beria in The Death of Stalin.)
@David Marjanović: I would have thought that part of what made that funny was that the hippopotamus, unlike the canonical frog, would not actually be killed by a scorpion’s sting, merely severely pained.
Leopoldo Galtieri could have testified that for dictators to start wars to boost their popularity is not always a successful strategy.
Sadly, the parallel is not otherwise very strong. And Galtieri damaged the UK greatly in the longer term by rescuing Margaret Thatcher’s popularity …
But even for Galtieri the problem wasn’t starting the war, it was losing it. No offence meant to the Ukrainian fighters, but I don’t think they’ll be able to defeat Putin’s army – they may hold out against them in some areas and turn Ukraine into a quagmire for Russia, but I doubt they will be able to beat back Putin’s army and chase it out of the country. As for the sanctions*) – an unpopular regime that is ready to shoot at its own people can survive them for a long time, as Iran shows. So, I’m not optimistic at all.
*) The entire absurd theater of Russian diplomacy in the last few weeks makes sense in hindsight – Putin wanted to gauge the response, and when he was sure that his troops would only face Ukraine on the battlefield, and the West would only impose sanctions, he decided to strike.
I’m sure Congolese scorpions are worse than Greek ones… but then, hippos need a lot of effort to swim at the surface; they usually walk on the bottom.
And it’s not even his fault he got it wrong. To its own surprise, the EU is now doing things it would not have considered possible 3 days ago. Several Russian banks are being excluded from SWIFT, Germany is sending anti-tank weapons and Stinger missiles…
Iran is ruled by religious nuts, not by a mafia that needs its gigabucks. And it’s not at war while running out of weapons and ammo along with the capability to produce more.
Apologies for continuing the no linguistic content, current events blathering., but I’m confused.
… Chomsky …
@Hat Yes, a lot of lefties have gone off the deep end …
… This is why it helps to be an anarchist: …
In what sense was Chomsky ever a ‘leftie’?
I appreciate American measures of ‘left’ are screwy: public-funded healthcare is somehow an idea that will lead to wild-eyed loonies running everybody’s lives.
Chomsky is anti-big government, anti-capitalism, anti-Democratic Socialism of the European mode.
I rather thought that made him … anarchist. (And wikipedia tends to agree with me: ‘anarcho-syndicalist’.)
In what way is his flavour of anarchist helping anything?
[Galtieri] rescuing Margaret Thatcher’s popularity …
Um no, common myth. The Tory Party got fewer % votes (on a smaller turnout) after the Falklands War than the election before. There were some people waving Union Jacks in the streets, but most were totally pissed off and ashamed — even without Tam Dalyell’s acerbic commentary. What happened was that the wet Socialist/Liberals had split the counter-Thatcher vote before her tub-thumping began. And in a First-Past-the-Post electoral system, that left the Tory vote as the largest in many constituencies.
If you want to help the parlous politics of America or Britain, change the electoral system, so it stops delivering the majority of Politicians from a party that didn’t get a majority of votes. We did that in NZ in 1995; there were a very painful couple of election cycles before the Politicians figured out that what gets them re-elected is collaborating and listening to the electorate.
Anarchists are just a pain in the butt.
…Yeah, that’s left, pretty far to the left of Social Democratic parties. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a definition of “left” that excluded that.
Um no, common myth
I was there at the time … (as presumably you were.) I remember the public mood very well indeed.
Thatcher’s government was very unpopular indeed before the Falklands war. She was sufficiently less unpopular as a consequence that she didn’t lose the next election; helped by FTP (as you say) and by an extremely cack-handed response to the invasion on the part of the then Labour leadership, which was all too easily misrepresented as selling out the Falklanders.
In what sense was Chomsky ever a ‘leftie’?
I would, as an unequivocal leftist myself (for you Americans, that’s “extreme radical socialist”), certainly describe Chomsky as left. He’d fit in fine in certain sections of the Labour party*. I’ve encountered people just like him at meetings**, and plotted to outmanoeuvre them …
* A broad church, comrades. (Yes, we do call each other “comrade.” Just goes to show that Tucker Carlson is right about us, doesn’t it?)
** Especially the steamrollering approach to debate.
[Or even helped by FPTP. It may have been too early for her to be helped by HTTP, as happens at the present day …]
AntC: I have enjoyed having this as a refuge from the ugly outside world, even through the Trump years, but what to do? It was nice sitting by the fire and chatting about ancient wars, and here one drops right in our midst (especially in the midst of the Eastern Europeans here). So even I can’t avoid this. The elephant is not just in the room; it’s tearing up the furniture.
“The Left” in the U.S., to my mind, represents two different things. One is a collective noun for what you might call liberals, people who are drawn to certain political leanings. The other is more of a faction, in the sense of defining themselves through closing ranks and distancing themselves from Those Other People, the Right. I think of Chomsky as a representative of the second Left, which makes him automatically view everything through doctrinaire eyes and question the U.S.’s motives in everything it is against, including the current war, and, Lest We Forget, the Khmer Rouge.
As you can tell, in this dichotomy I like and associate myself with the first kind of “leftists”, not the second.
@Y:
You, too, would be welcome in the Labour Party. You could help in plotting against Chomsky.
The “Broad Church” self-characterisation is actually a thing in the party, and, yes, it is a conscious echo of the Church of England. A lot of it is the realisation that division on the left just perpetuates Tory power, not least because of the way the electoral system works. Unfortunately not-Tories are divided politically anyhow, which does indeed have the consequences that AntC points to. I spend some time with Plaid Cymru friends trying to convince them of this.
In what way is his flavour of anarchist helping anything?
Not at all. If he’s an anarchist, he’s one of the many asshole anarchists who give anarchism a bad name.
Anarchists are just a pain in the butt.
What the fuck? Do I come into your house and insult you?
I’d hate to belong to any party (except the type with balloons and singing or such.) Non-factional leftists can be as far left as the factional ones, they are just not tribal about it.
I’m not sure what you mean by “non-Tories”. It makes me think of the current anybody-but-Netanyahu coalition in Israel, which in theory brought together nearly the entire political spectrum of the country to dislodge the previous government. In practice the government veered to the right, with the leftist members of the coalition shorn of significant power and compelled to glue the thing together under the threat of “Surely none of you wishes to see
JonesNetanyahu back?” A comparable scenario may be in the works in Hungary.One of John Erickson’s military histories of the Red Army in WWII was titled “Soviet liberation, Soviet conquest, 1944”.
That describes current war on Ukraine perfectly.
Russian public supports war for liberation of Eastern Ukraine where Russian population is oppressed, but they are not at all persuaded about necessity of conquering the rest of Ukraine.
I don’t think Putin made a good case for that for the Russian people.
I think the goal of invasion was a negotiated settlement where the Eastern Ukraine is out of Kiev’s control forever and the remainder of Ukraine is neutralized and demilitarized.
But this requires Western support for such kind of diplomatic settlement and I don’t see it at the moment. On the opposite, the West appears to want a long protracted war in the Ukraine, a kind of Iraq and Afghanistan which would seriously undermine Russian military power.
We’ll see what happens.
I’d hate to belong to any party (except the type with balloons and singing or such.)
Well, that just means you’re normal. All but a few of my friends and relations share your opinion.
But disengagement, in a functioning democracy, means letting the Trumps and the Johnsons rule. As I have the good fortune to live in a country where opposition to bad government doesn’t land you in prison, it seems to me a civic duty to participate actively. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror if I didn’t. I understand well enough that most people do not share this view. I think they should, but I wouldn’t break a friendship over it.
Also, we have balloons and singing. Are you sure I can’t persuade you?
SFReader, I am sorry, but it seems we are well past the stage of “liberating oppressed Russians of Eastern Ukraine”. And honestly, most people learn some time before the official age of emancipation that whenever they want something, it doesn’t obligate other people to give it to them. Starting a major war because others are mean to you is a very dangerous approach.
Anarchists are just a pain in the butt.
I mean: one writes a load of fairy-tale claptrap in the Manifesto about the withering-away of the state, just to keep them on side. Then they go throwing bombs drawing the attention of the authorities at inconvenient times — tactically naïve but at least one thinks they’ve got the message. Then when putsch comes to shove, they go all idealistic and bleeding-heart for the noble souls of the Serfs and Proletariat. Pain in the butt.
You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs, comrade.
Do I come into your house and insult you?
Yes (electronically); I accept it as part of the cut-and-thrust. I thought that remark would be more anarchistic and more humane than kicking the cat. Cats not being known as Anarchists or Socialists, probably are up with my point already.
I think the goal of invasion was a negotiated settlement where the Eastern Ukraine is out of Kiev’s control forever and the remainder of Ukraine is neutralized and demilitarized.
Yes. Militarily relatively cheaply pin down most of Ukraine’s forces defending Kiev; easy to hop back across the border with ByeloRus. Meanwhile consolidate control in the East: Kharkiv is the main prize; and extending the seaboard as far towards Crimea as possible.
it seems to me a civic duty to participate actively.
And I did, back when there were Socialists to participate with, and Neil Kinnock was a Welshman. I even held my nose and campaigned for my local candidate, although his views were indistinguishable from the Tory. (Michael Barney Hayhoe I called him/them.)
I was rent-a-mob on the picket-lines at Grunwicks; I was backing the miners and steelworkers in the North.
But for sons-of-Thatcher [*]? I’d rather leave the country — which I did.
[*] Excellent political history by Simon Jenkins.
@DM, the ICG report of 2004.
The conflict began when Ossetia was an Autonomous Region in Georgian SSR. Georgian nationalists wanted independence. Sensing this, Ossetians wanted to change their status in Georgia (so they could stay within USSR). “And the battle began” as they say in Warcraft. The region never was in independent Georgia since 1801. It remained so on paper – and largely because Moscow wanted so. Same with Karabach.
Russian presence there also began earlier. I am not sure if it was continuous (that is: whether Soviet and then Russian forces were ever withdrawn), I have no reason to think it was not. Since 1992 a Russian (alonside with Georgian and “Ossetian”) unit was stationed there as a part of “Joint Peacekeeping Force”.
Georgian expedition to Ossetia in 2008 was a war of conquest against a hostile population in a situation of an inter-ethnic conflict.
I do not know if you really want NATO to take part in such things and possibly also to support an invasion from mainland China to ROC or from Taiwan to China or both (because mutual status of ROC and PRC is even worse) or “Western media” are indeed much worse than LH thinks.
“Georgian expedition to Ossetia in 2008 was a war of conquest against a hostile population in a situation of an inter-ethnic conflict.”
I won’t edit this line, but it is potentially inaccurate.
The “war of conquest against a hostile population in a situation of an inter-ethnic conflict.” is what you see in Karabakh. I think the degree of hostility and bitterness in Georgia-Ossetia case is somewhat below that, and my description is not accurate. But still Saakashvili tried to conquer a region that independen Georgia never controlled, and still there was a degree of hostility.
To put it simply: People who stand against the war in Russia today hardly would have supported Saakashvili’s invasion in Ossetia in 2008. Because they are against invasions.
I mean: one writes a load of fairy-tale claptrap in the Manifesto about the withering-away of the state, just to keep them on side. Then they go throwing bombs drawing the attention of the authorities at inconvenient times — tactically naïve but at least one thinks they’ve got the message. Then when putsch comes to shove, they go all idealistic and bleeding-heart for the noble souls of the Serfs and Proletariat. Pain in the butt.
You talk about anarchists the way right-wingers talk about leftists (or the way anti-Semites talk about Jews); you clearly don’t know any and have absorbed your ideas about anarchism from people who know nothing about it. I suggest you learn something before shooting off your mouth in future.
It is; everyone but Fidesz got together and agreed on a single (quite conservative) candidate a few months ago.
That’s similar to what I’ve been reading: that the “neutralized and demilitarized” part was to be accomplished by replacing the scarily, scarily pro-Western government of Ukraine with a friendly oligarch, and the plan (as distinct from the goal) was to create a panic in Ukraine, swoop in, declare “mission accomplished” and swoop out on the same day or nearly so, creating a fait accompli. No resistance was expected. Peace would have been restored before the West could quite grasp what had happened, let alone agree on sanctions or anything. This would have taken things off the table much like Trump’s sudden movement of the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Putin would have created a new status quo overnight, and everyone else would have had to adapt to it somehow.
This is why the whole adventure was so stunningly badly organized. Most of the soldiers are 19-year-old conscripts who were, according to several independent sources whose realibility I can’t check, not even told what they were doing – they were told this was some kind of exercise. The propaganda machinery was asleep at the wheel – seriously, one day Putin suddenly announces out of the blue that Ukraine needs to be “demilitarized and denazified”, and the next day he invades? He can do better than that. He didn’t believe he needed to.
It goes on. This tweet is by a MEP from Estonia. It contains a photo of a text in Russian. The text is retyped, I have absolutely no way of telling where it really comes from. However, it contains so many hypotheses we will all test by just waiting a few days longer (if that!) that it would be a very strange thing to just make up.
It says that Russia is already out of weapons and ammunition, and is physically unable to produce more anytime soon. The raw materials used to come from Slovenia, Finland and Germany – that’s history now.
The part with the panic didn’t work at all. Not only is there resistance, but it’s actually using the Javelins, N-LAWs and Bayraktar drones Ukraine got over the last few months, which everyone knew because it was all on the TV news. And the Russian tanks that aren’t being blown up have run out of fuel. There is no logistics – no logistics was expected to be necessary.
We’re past “The stupid! It burns!” here.
The stupid oxide! It stinks!
A day or two ago Putin, obviously desperate, asked Kazakhstan for assistance. He had after all just saved the dictator there – who didn’t care and simply declined. That would normally be stunning. Given the above, though, it’s not surprising at all. Today Belarus announced it’s joining the war; it’s not in a position to say no. I’m sure its conscripts have, like, any motivation to fight at all…
Meanwhile, Putin seems to have been completely unable to grasp the end-of-history idealism that is so widespread in the West in general and in Germany in particular. People like me, or Scholz and his entire three-party coalition government apparently, can’t imagine that someone just starts a war. Scholz is fucking furious that someone dared to start a war like some 20th-century asshole. This time it’s not a crazy American president like in 2003, this time it’s someone Scholz can actually do something about. (…And it helps that the other side isn’t a crazy murderous dictator like in 2003 either.)
Scholz is SPD. Half the SPD of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern was involved with Nord Stream 2 (up to and including a corruption scandal that came out last week). Half a dozen of the most important and influential former officeholders of the SPD are sitting on the boards of Rosneft, Gazprom and the like. Up to February 23rd, lots of people thought Germany would be very hesitant to join sanctions if Putin invaded. When Putin actually did the unthinkable, Germany immediately canceled the recently completed Nord Stream 2 despite all the money and prestige sunk in it, hesitated half a day to join the less spectacular sanctions, a day and a half to cut various Russian banks off of SWIFT, and two days to reverse a decades-long policy that Scholz’s party and especially one of its coalition partners had long fought for: not to allow weapons to be sent into a conflict zone. Yesterday Scholz barely restrained himself from tweeting “fuck you, you fucking fuck” and announced Germany is sending 1000 Panzerfäuste 3 and 500 Stingers to Ukraine.
Putin’s headspace, in contrast, appears to be stuck in the 1970s. Starting a war is no big deal, there’s always someone starting a war somewhere, isn’t there? And mine will be so short you’ll barely even notice…
Uh… no. The point, the single point of NATO is deterrence: to protect the member states by threatening war, potentially thermonuclear war, on anyone who’d attack one of them. Two third parties fighting each other is of no interest to this.
Indeed, like Ukraine, Georgia has not so far been allowed to join NATO because everyone knows Putin would feel provoked.
(That might change now that everyone has learned Putin feels provoked anyway. See also: Finland and Sweden suddenly making noises about potentially joining NATO, the exact opposite of one of Putin’s general policy goals.)
The ROC is not a NATO member. If it is attacked, the US alone could well intervene, but NATO would not.
(I don’t think such an invasion is going to happen. The PRC and the US both have nukes. Nukes are also why there’s not going to be a no-fly zone over Ukraine, for example.)
To put it simply: People who stand against the war in Russia today hardly would have supported Saakashvili’s invasion in Ossetia in 2008. Because they are against invasions
I’m not quite clear whether you’re being ironic here, drasvi, but I for one am exactly such a person. I think that would be the consensus here among those who actually know anything about the background to those events in Georgia, who admittedly may not be present here in huge numbers. That is not to say that the Russian strategy was not also highly opportunistic. The British were good at that “selflessly intervening outside our borders to prevent injustice” thing too, which similarly mysteriously tended to leave the helpees as British client states. (In fact the Romans pioneered this wheeze … there’s nothing like learning from the masters.)
Abkhazia is a pretty similar story, as regards both Georgian and Russian involvement.
And the Russian tanks that aren’t being blown up have run out of fuel.
This, like so much else in the invasion, is reminiscent of Operation Barbarossa (substituting “German” for “Russian,” of course).
Like… imagine a country where idealism is widespread enough that not only do people like this minister actually become ministers, but what he wants in this clip actually becomes official policy. Of course the practical limitations Sir Humphrey points out all remain; of course the implementation remains laughably uneven (define “conflict zone”…); but still.
Yes.
@DM: Many of your sentiments are what I was thinking at the time when Saddam invaded Kuwait. The outrage felt by many, even opportunistic unfeeling Realpolitik types (like the Bush I administration) came from the sentiment that That’s Just Not Done. You can foment civil wars, install puppet governments, or finance terrorists, if you want to bring down a rival country; that’s how gentlemen do it in this enlightened age. Simply invading a country and absorbing it is unforgivably gauche anymore. Saddam, another powerful but incompetent strongman who thought himself a genius, failed to appreciate that.
On idiot lefties, see the impassioned “letter to the Western Left” by a Ukrainian leftist.
Saddam,
(1) did not have nukes
(2) is a hero of many Sunni Muslims.
When I name Assad, Qaddafi and Saddam people do not understand me. One is an incredible asshole, one is stupid, one is the guy for whom so many people cried. Nothing in common:/ Like, you know, Princess Diana and Merkel. The situation changes, of course, when I speak to Iranians (especially those who lost family members in the war wtih Iraq).
Oh fuck.
Meanwhile all have a-aa (a-a for Assad) and a geminate.
@David Eddyshaw, this time I was addressing David M:). Yes, I too do not like Russia’s actions…
This, like so much else in the invasion, is reminiscent of Operation Barbarossa (substituting “German” for “Russian,” of course).
In the utter condescension and petulant anger towards the enemy, slovenliness in preparation and apparent corruption in the officer corps, (as well as the fierce and apparently unexpected resistance from the entire local population) Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reminds me quite a bit of Austria’s attack on Serbia in 1914. But the Russians have no German ally to bail them out.
Another good comparison.
Hat: Bilous’s letter is amazing in every respect. Thank you for posting it.
See, that’s why I wish there were two different words for the concept subsumed by “Left”. I cringe every time I hear myself lumped in a group with these fools, the sort of people who defended Stalin in the 1950s to show McCarthy that he will not be the boss of them, or (more in my direct experience) the people who defend any action of Hamas to show how far they are from Israel’s right-wing policies.
I know, me too.
(It’s just occurred to me that in my previous comment I imply that there is widespread ignorance of the background to the Russia-Georgia conflict over South Ossetia among those “here”: I should point out that by “here” I mean “in the UK”, not “among commenters on this site”, a goodly proportion of whom know a lot more about it than I do …)
@DE, let me remind then that Alans are credited by some for installing king Arthur and the round table…:-E
(though I still do not know who was that Caucasian guy whose offical name in his passport was “King Arthur”. Perhaps a Georgian)
Not only is there resistance, but it’s actually using the Javelins, N-LAWs and Bayraktar drones Ukraine got over the last few months, which everyone knew because it was all on the TV news. And the Russian tanks that aren’t being blown up have run out of fuel. There is no logistics – no logistics was expected to be necessary
I didn’t have much time to follow the news in detail today, but if that’s the case, suddenly Putin putting the nukes on alert makes terrible sense. If he really feels he is losing his gamble, god knows what he will do …
(though I still do not know who was that Caucasian guy whose offical name in his passport was “King Arthur”. Perhaps a Georgian)
No, no: you’re thinking of the patron saint of the English … he was Georgian …
Good point.
Ah, that I can imagine.
We’re about to find out.
Though he also fired the military chief of staff, Gerasimov, who in the video had simply said “есть” less than an hour earlier. Shoygu did not look happy in the video either. Maybe the craziest orders will not be carried out.
I’ve also seen the нецензурный вариант “ХУЙ ВОЙНЕ.”
Contamination from earlier путин хуй, the motto of protests in 2011 (it soon gave хутин пуй).
(not necessarily, actually:))
Russian tanks
And мотолыгаs—aka the MT-LBs—дон. One’s vocabulary is quickly expanding these bloody days.
“Я – это Россия, Россия – это я“. (from дон link above) –
the source of disagreement between him and listeners reminds ana’l-ḥaqq. But he is a Sufi…
On the other hand there was a joke about a kosmonaut Habibullin who forgot his call sign. “Земля, я Хабибулин, кто я?” “Сокол ты, жопа, сокол!”. (was there a tradition of using жопа in the sense of бля? Because there is also a здравствуй, жопа, новый год)
дон
Great stuff there; besides the fascinating “don” explanation, I love the first video clip with the parody of his incomprehensible speech.
A minor nitpick re the Ramzanka Dyrov page: it’s луьлла.
I guess it is https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/لوله …
It’s also Southern Russian/Ukrainian люлька.
жопа in that Habibullin joke (first I hear, great joke) is obviously a reference to Habibullin himself. It makes the joke very funny. In the first line H. names himself and then comically asks about his name and in the second he is given his official call and unofficial description.
(For folkloristic precision: I heard it as “Сокел ты, жопа, сокел”)
@D.O. yes, I always understood it
…as a paradox based on confusing use of numerous definitions and identifiers, and zhopa as an insult directed at Habibullin. It can be simultaneously heard as “falcon, you are arse!” (which is already crazy) and in many other ways. And even Habibullin (a common Tatar/Bashkir surname) sounds funny to Russian ear.
And this is why the joke (and the punchline) is retold.
But now I rememebered здравствуй жопа новый год “hello-arse-new-year”* (New Year is a holiday more popular than Christmas) which is also paradoxal. I do not undertand why it is funny, why it is repeated, and what on Earth this sequence of words is. I think I understand it as “Hello, arse! Christmas.” :-/
I only use it because it is a paradoxal phrase that others use. Funnily paradoxal. I do not know what the arse is doing here, and what new year is doing here.
But if there was a tradition of using жопа as блядь (or дон) both lines make sense.
Or well, “Hello [fuck it!] Christmas” does not make sense, but it makes more sense.
—
*Compare Эфраим Севела, остановите самолёт — я слезу, http://lib.ru/INPROZ/SEVELA/samolet.txt
Many translations here https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pipe (translations, “rigid pipe”) and most of them here https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tobacco_pipe contain labials.
Like pipe. Or like (for pipes other than smoking) Swahili bomba ( 1. pipe, pipeline 2. pump, < Port. bomba says Wiktionary).
Or ʾunbūb (they say from Aramaic from Akkadian, but I am not sure they are sources and not cognates).
This lula
“لوله • (lule) 1. tube 2. pipe” — I do not know how you distinguish between ‘tube” and “pipe”, are they truba and trubka? — “Probably from Middle Persian lwlk’ (rūrag, “*herb”). Compare Mazanderani لیله (lile, “stalk”) (hence Tehrani لیله (lile, “stalk”)).”
is anomalous. Liquid-liquid.
Yet there’re also Polish rura, Czech roura and a large family of Germanic words: Rohr, Icl. rör etc. They are liquid-liquid and clearly onomatopoeic.
I wonder why pipes (not smoking ones) may attract this liquid-liquid onomatopoeia.
(The labial is hidden in the root vowel…)
Funnily, it is Slavic languages that have lul- words for smoking pipe
キセル【煙管】 キセル【煙管】 ﾛｰﾏ(kiseru)
【<カンボジア語 khsier (管の意)】 1 〔喫煙具〕 a traditional Japanese (tobacco) pipe.
I wonder how the Cambodian word is to be pronounced.
https://www.jti.co.jp/tobacco/knowledge/variety/oriental_pipe/index.html
Kusaal for “pipe” (of the kind you smoke) is tabdʋk, which is a transparent compound of taba “tobacco” (from Hausa in the first instance) and dʋk “pot.”
However, there is a form tʋrʋg in Naden’s dictionary, which is actually inflected like a compound of dʋk (and the r/d change would be regular if it were); it must be a real word though, as the Toende dialect has tʋrʋk. It has a loanword-like look about it: it could just be a worn-down form of tabdʋk (Mampruli has tadukku “pipe”, again inflected as compound of dukku “pot.”) But Kusaal often adapts loanwords by analogy (e.g lɔmbɔn’ɔg “garden”, which has nothing to do with bɔn’ɔg “ricefield, swamp” historically, but is borrowed from Hausa lambu.) So this doesn’t at all rule out tʋrʋg “pipe” being a loanword. But if so, I don’t have any idea where it’s from.
Conceivably tʋrʋg could even be the original form, with tabdʋk based on a folk etymology of the same word rather than being an independently created word. The tʋ- component of tʋrʋg doesn’t seem to mean anything in Kusaal.
[You “drink” tobacco in Kusaal. And Hausa.]
que sorver?
As I was looking for Cambodia (found it here WP Kiseru) I also found an article trying to connect Siberian smoking pipe-words (Bur. ganza, Yak. xamsa Ky. qanja – Даль, Russian ganza “f. Siberian. Mongol or Chinese smoking pipe-DIM”) that sound like you all know what to what they sound like, that is Sanskrit gañjā.
(researchgate pdf)
tabduk does sound as a word for pipe for my Russian ear:)
Perhaps because it is similar to mundštúk (it is tempting to write it mundtštúk – not even hypercorrection, just let’s stumble on this consonant cluster properly:)), čubuq, smoking words, and also Arabisms sunduq, funduq.
I wonder why pipes (not smoking ones) may attract this liquid-liquid onomatopoeia.
Because liquids flow through them! Making noises like glug, plop, drip, rush, burble, rumble: i.e., liquid-containing onomatopoeias.
Not a serious suggestion, but not totally un-serious either. The phonetics term “liquid” doesn’t originate from the sounds of physical liquids, but rather, according to Wikipedia:
In the midst of reporting that is almost gleeful over what Putin has done to his country, the Guardian has an opinion piece that I heartily agree with:
Many predicted Nato expansion would lead to war. Those warnings were ignored.
I hold no brief for Putin (put in whatever expletives you like), but Ukraine was clearly a bridge too far for Russia. And failure to recognise that has brought on this catastrophe.
That’s ridiculous. Only Putin’s megalomania and paranoia “brought on this catastrophe.” Whether the expansion of NATO was a good idea is neither here nor there. That’s like saying France’s taking back Alsace brought on WWII. Dictators can always find an excuse for what they want to do, and Putin had no intention of allowing a democratic, independent Ukraine on his doorstep.
Here, read this letter to the Western Left. It addresses precisely that issue.
I am not a fan of NATO. I know that after the end of the Cold War, the bloc lost its defensive function and led aggressive policies. I know that NATO’s eastward expansion undermined efforts directed at nuclear disarmament and forming a system of joint security. NATO tried to marginalise the role of the UN and the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and to discredit them as ‘inefficient organisations’.
I totally agree.
Did it ever occur to Leftist critics of NATO that Ukraine is the main victim of the changes brought about by the NATO expansion?
What I was saying.
The argument of the Left should be, that in 2003, other governments did not put enough pressure on the United States over Iraq. Not that it is necessary to exert less pressure on Russia over Ukraine now.
Of course. And there should be continued pressure on Russia.
an overall reinforcement of the UN’s role in the resolution of armed conflicts would allow the Left to minimise the importance of military-political alliances and reduce the number of victims.
The main military-political alliance in question being NATO.
my last words are addressed to the Russian people: hurry up and overthrow the Putin regime. It is in your interests as well as ours.
Totally agree.
So what were you saying?
As one sarcastic comment I saw put it (translating from memory), “We strongly condemn all forms of domestic violence. But we must remember that this woman’s friend, the busybody homewrecker, encouraged her to get uppity with her husband, until he couldn’t take it anymore.”
EDIT: while I was writing this angry repost to Bathrobe a number of other comments intervened. Sorry for piling on, but I leave it here for the unlikely case that nobody made the same points.
Hey, Russians are people too. They are endowed by their Creator (in which we can include evolution) with an ability to make their own decision in agreement with reality and understanding of contemporary norms. And it is completely untenable to think that NATO is the main factor here. Putin doesn’t recognize the right of Ukraine to exist as an independent country. Almost nobody noticed, but he already anschlussed Belarus.
So what were you saying?
I was saying that whether the expansion of NATO was a good idea is neither here nor there and that it’s like saying France’s taking back Alsace brought on WWII. You’re basically saying “I don’t like Hitler either, but France shouldn’t have taken Alsace.” Do you now think Ukraine shouldn’t be part of NATO? We should just shed a tear and let Putin destroy it?
Do you now think Ukraine shouldn’t be part of NATO? We should just shed a tear and let Putin destroy it?
No, but I think a better approach might have helped avert this war and still kept Ukraine independent. Even the Finns didn’t want to join NATO. Why should the Ukrainians, who are much deeper in the bosom of Russia than Finland?
I’m not defending Putin. I just think that extending NATO eastwards ultimately created the conditions for this war. It could have been done better.
Extending NATO eastwards is why people in Poland and the Baltics sleep easier.
It would be nice if NATO was more independent of the U.S., but that doesn’t negate its primary purpose, which has always been to defend Europe from Russia / the USSR.
Exactly.
There is an ideal world and there is reality. Diplomacy is the art of bringing about the best outcome for yourself in the midst of those realities.
Perhaps Putin was always going to invade Ukraine, or at least interfere in intolerable ways. Perhaps. But threatening to join NATO was always going to produce the worst immediate outcome for Ukraine, given the realities on the ground (Russian military power, Russia’s geopolitical interests, and Putin’s psychopathy). Finland has walked a very fine line but has managed to stay independent. In my opinion, Ukraine might have done better.
Anyway, the die is cast. There is no turning back. Perhaps forcing the issue will prove in hindsight to have been the best course. At the moment we can only watch events as they unfold.
I suspect the “causes of the Russo-Ukrainian war” will be a much debated issue for future historians.
In 1990s I thought that Poland and Baltic countries are paranoid because they wanted to join NATO to protect themselves from Russia. Why? Russia wouldn’t destroy it’s democratic and integrationist choice by grabing pieces of territory. I don’t even have a justification of youth.
It might have been a good trade for Ukraine to denounce membership in NATO in exchange for security guaranties from Russia (by which I mean that Russia should guarantee a security from itself). But it is Ukrainian choice, not Western. Or do you think that Ukraine is just a Western puppet unable to make its own decisions? In any event, what sort of security guaranties can be taken seriously from an authoritarian ruler who thinks that your country shouldn’t exist at all?
It is true that the current borders of the Ukraine include significant chunks of territory stolen by Stalin from the predecessor regimes of several current NATO members (Poland, Romania, the former Czecho-Slovakia … and maybe arguably Hungary depending on how revisionist you’re willing to be*) but AFAIK none of those nations currently has any sort of serious irredentist claim to undo that theft (which the Ukrainians do not seem particularly ashamed about as best as I can tell …), and NATO membership fortunately does not seem to have emboldened them in that direction.
*The current Ukrainian regime does seem to have needlessly antagonized the current Hungarian regime by changing the law unfavorably to the provision of Hungarian-language education for the children of ethnic-Hungarian parents in the few locales near the border where that is actually a relevant issue. But I don’t think the current Russian regime cares about that.
It might have been a good trade for Ukraine to denounce membership in NATO in exchange for security guaranties from Russia
How about a security guarantee from both NATO and Russia? Great Powers do negotiate this kind of thing.
You don’t seem to have the faintest idea who Putin is. His guarantees are exactly as valuable as Hitler’s.
Oh, when I need to hear “who started it first?!” “Them!!!!” I really can go out to the street…
FWIW, the author of the Guardian piece bathrobe linked to is not really part of the “Western Left” (despite the Guardian having republished his piece) but was and is part of the ideological faction descending from the old isolationist/non-interventionist American Right, which was mostly marginalized and/or in hibernation during the Cold War except for weirdos like him. Of course, one disadvantage of that position (not necessarily the only one) is that it may put one on the same side of a public geopolitical controversy as Noam Chomsky.
To be fair, Chomsky may well have been right about something of a geopolitical nature at least once in his life? Just by random coincidence? Maybe East Timor?
Besides Germanic forms indicating *rauza-, there are also forms indicating *rausa- apparently without the effect of Verner’s Law. Note the form with -s- in Gothic, as in Mark 15:19:
Other explanations of the Gothic forms have been offered, but forms with -s- are also in Old Dutch rōs (see also here), and notably the Frankish form with -s- is continued in French roseau. The further etymology is unknown.
Ukraine, like Georgia, applied for NATO membership long ago – and wasn’t allowed to join precisely because everyone figured Putin would feel provoked.
(The official wording mentioned the unsolved conflicts over Crimea and Donetsk & Luhansk, which amounts to the exact same thing: NATO doesn’t want to be drawn into existing conflicts.)
Yesterday the citizens’ initiative to join NATO reached the 50,000 signatures necessary to be considered by the Finnish parliament.
That’s exactly what Ukraine has had since 1994, in exchange for giving up its nukes ( = the Soviet nukes that happened to be on its territory) and sending them to Russia. Putin kinda just forgot about it…
(OK, OK, it wasn’t technically NATO, it was the US and the UK, with Russia and Belarus. France signed a very similar agreement.)
Onomatopoeia is sometimes folk etymology performed on the outcome of regular sound shifts. Another example is High German pfeifen, which means “whistle” and sounds like it, but its pre-Shift form obviously meant “to go ‘peep'”.
BTW, German exhibits the usual Germanic word-formation madness in pairing Rohr n. with Röhre f.; the latter usually refers to larger tubes than the former, but this is all very vague (indeed outright false in the cases of Luftröhre “windpipe”, Speiseröhre “esophagus”, Eustachische Röhre “Eustachian tube”).
(Rohr also still means “reed(s)” sometimes.)
@dravsi : Actually, if you succeed in convincing a person that something is the majority view/consensus, it is quite likely that it will become this person’s view and this person will join the consensus.
You are slightly overexaggerating this phenomenon, but you are right, in general.
You “drink” tobacco in Kusaal. And Hausa.
And Japanese—among other ways:
たばこを吸う[のむ, 吹かす] (tabako o suu/nomu/fukasu ‘inhale’, ‘drink’, ‘puff/blow’) smoke (tobacco [a pipe, a cigarette, a cigar]); have [take] a smoke
Da tagrør n. is Phragmites australis, the species of water reed you use for thatching here. We rarely keep the mad German doublets distinct, so all kinds of manmade tubing is just rør n., also spise/luftrør. (Plural unchanged as befits a neuter, so it’s not easy to tell if a specific occurrence is mass or count).
Ukraine, like Georgia, applied for NATO membership long ago – and wasn’t allowed to join
Exactly. And there was no chance, before February 22, of Ukraine being admitted to NATO because the West didn’t want to get drawn into a war. By occupying Donetsk and Luhansk in 2014 Russia effectively blocked any membership chance for Ukraine for the foreseeable future. The whole NATO issue is a smokescreen and useful fodder for isolationist conservatives and anti-American leftists (who are increasingly hard to distinguish from each other).
It has always seemed obvious to me that Putin’s real issue is Ukraine’s increasingly close ties with the EU, Poland in particular. Millions of Ukrainians already work in Poland as Gastarbeiter – and we can see today how close the ties between Poland and Ukraine have become, as Poland has basically led the charge for the EU since the invasion. Putin is, reasonably from his point of view, very concerned that Ukraine is at a cultural and economic tipping point and about to be lost to the West forever. And if Ukraine goes, how long until gravity sucks Belarus back into the historic Polish/Lithuanian fold?
One underreported development is that Ukraine has been working for quite some time to disconnect its power grid from Russia. February 24th was the date when Ukraine was supposed to go autonomous start preparing for a future integration with the EU power grid. Coincidence that the invasion took place two days earlier? (as it is, Ukraine appears to have succeeded in disconnecting – which is why the lights are still on in Kharkiv and Kyiv.)
On a lighter note: Zelensky as the voice of Paddington Bear; Zelensky on Dancing with the Stars. My wife now officially has a crush on him.
Batman trained to be the best at everything.
In Manhattan, the legendary East Village Ukrainian diner Veselka/веселка has been mobbed by well-wishers. Not wishing to stand in a long line for the sake of a political-culinary gesture, I stopped by the lower-profile (but also quite good, although not open 24 hours) restaurant inside the Ukrainian National Home right next door yesterday evening, which also had a wait to be seated although I shorter one. At which point I went through the side door into the UNH’s in-house dive bar (the Лис Микита, loosely Englished as the Sly Fox) and had no trouble immediately finding a seat, where the bartender brought me a menu and got me the same borscht and deruny I would have had if I’d waited for a table in the restaurant proper.
Earlier in the p.m. I stopped for a drink or three at another legendary E.V. dive bar, the Blue and Gold Tavern, which no longer has the same visible degree of Ukrainianness among its patrons as it did 30-35 years ago (when the clientele was split between tough Ukrainian immigrant dudes over 50 and punk-rock aficionados under 25 without too much in between), but still has a very patriotic name and quite inexpensive-for-Manhattan prices for good whiskey.
https://nypost.com/2022/02/28/hundreds-line-nyc-block-to-get-into-iconic-ukrainian-diner-in-show-of-solidarity/
Thanks for that cheering report (and blast from the past — I miss going to Veselka).
It’s called the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances; the Wikipedia article contains a long section on breaches…
When I wrote that on Feb. 27th, I didn’t know that on the same day hacktivists from inside the country claimed to have hacked the railway system, reducing it to manual control – greatly slowing it down without endangering civilians. I haven’t seen anything else about this, but I also haven’t looked.
More on that mindset in general: 1, 2*; and in Germany: 3** and this short Twitter thread about two polls.
Relatedly, this article basically argues that – I mean, I’m not sure the author even noticed, and if he did, he’d never say it, because it would be taken as both an incredible insult and a manifest batshit absurdity in the American context it’s written in – but it argues that Zelensky isn’t a patriot. Sure he says Слава Україні at every opportunity these days, but what he’s really staying and fighting for isn’t a country that isn’t the one he had built his “entertainment empire” in, or a culture, or a language he only really started learning in 2014: it’s liberal democracy.
This article further argues that he has a personal motivation for that – related to the first footnote below. (Though it fails to mention the importance of Superman’s black hair.) It further points out that his success at becoming the icon of the resistance is evidence that his supporters, too, support liberal democracy first and foremost. That reminds me of Scotland’s independence referendum of 2014, which also looked nationalist but wasn’t: it was an attempt to create a social liberal democracy, which you can’t do in a country full of Tories.
* “Although we in the West sometimes lose faith that our values are universal, Putin certainly believes they are.” I’m not surprised at all.
** “Scholz’s sudden about-face over the past week, as Russian troops rolled into Ukraine, was in part a reaction to the overwhelming pressure his government had come under—both within Germany and among Berlin’s closest allies—after weeks of foot-dragging. But the pressure alone does not explain the measures Scholz announced, which go far beyond what anyone could have expected from a politician known for his Hanseatic reserve.”
Oh, wow. THAT is unusual.
More on vocabulary expansion:
Пропагандон (Propagandon)
1. Propaganda-condom (noun)
2. A way to insult a propagandist
Some Russians are elastic with the truth
Many Russians are sick of disinformation and propaganda. It erupts from their TVs and floods social-media feeds. A derogatory nickname has emerged to describe the people hogging these screens: propagandon, which literally means “progaganda-condom”. The term usually refers to journalists who spread state propaganda. Dmitry Kiselyov, a famous news anchor, is known in the West as the “Kremlin’s chief propagandist”. In Russia and Ukraine, he is the “Kremlin’s chief propagandon”.
https://www.economist.com/1843/2021/03/15/know-what-a-propaganda-condom-is
Important context: the word гондон ‘condom’ is itself used as an insult in Russian: “(vulgar, slang, offensive) dickhole.” Since that isn’t the case in English, “progaganda-condom” seems kind of random.
It sounds like it should stop propaganda spreading, or protect you from it. Whereas propagandon sounds like a dinosaur, which is at least potentially theatening.
Although note in English the shift over time from the “dated” sense 1 to the pejorative sense 2 of this lexeme: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scumbag
with such overlap (-gand-) either propa- can be treated as specifying the sort of condom, or -on can be treated as an agent noun suffix like -ist.
Ah yes, “scumbag” is an excellent equivalent — someone should add it to the Wiktionary entry for the Russian word.
How about “propagandumbag” for пропагандон?
propaganbag or propagumbag or indeed just propagandon would be closer to how the russian word feels.
Bathrobe is right.
NATO has been a major concern for Russians, and not for Putin.
“Propagandouchebag”?
I vote for “propagumbag”. It even evokes “humbug”.
Propagandalf, OTOH, wields his powers for the good.
George Grosz went by the title “propagandada”.
I vote for “propagumbag”. It even evokes “humbug”.
Yes, I withdraw my suggestion in favor of that one.
Propagandhi n. peacemonger
Gandalf.
I already complained: in my school someone inserted n in “gadolinium” in the chemistry room.
Unstressed o/a merge and for me it read as a not very plausible refernece to Tolkien’s Gondolin. Only later I realized that it was “gondon” (emphatical lengthening /gaandon/)
Propagandhi
!!!!!!!! wow
Propagandhi is a veteran political punk band.
gondon is expressive for about the same reason why doldon is expressive.
So cum ~ scum is a case of s mobile? I’m impressed.
My guess is that scum as an insult begat scumbag, as with douchebag and countless others, and that was adopted by some clever mind to mean ‘condom’.
@dm
If you are not joking, I always thought scum was cognate with Schaum but cum was ex come in sense of arrive (at the “highpoint”).
Another possible etymology is from the old meaning of come, meaning for butter to form in a churn, butter being another old euphemism. Even in the 16th century—especially then, even—men were 14 years old.
14 years
There is another meachnism at play, though. You need some sexual vocabulary. And “causal conversation of adults overheard when you are 1, 2, 3, 4 etc. year olds” are a poor sourse, and you do not practice this vocabulary as a child either.
@Y: The order of the senses is not actually very well documented. The oldest OED citations for both scum (meaning “semen”) and scumbag (meaning “condom”) are from the Dictionary of American Slang in 1967. I have located no other non-gloss attestations for the “condom” meaning until after the first documented appearance (1971) of scumbag as a general term of abuse. Green’s Dictionary of Slang has arguable citations for scum going back to 1944, however.
Scumbag meaning ‘condom’ appears in Jim Carroll’s The Basketball Diaries, from the early 1960s (which is where I first saw that usage). In the pejorative meaning, it’s attested in Hubert Selby Jr.’s Tralala (1958). Scum bag, as an insult, is attested from 1953 (In the U.S. Congressional Records, here, from anonymous hate mail to a senator who criticized McCarthy). Sexual scum and scum-bag might be attested from 1943, here, but I don’t trust GB’s metadata.
“Sexual scum and scum-bag .”
I can’t call condoms very sexual, but strawberry-flavored condoms at checkout are both absurdist and reassuring.
—-
“You are scumbag со вкусом клубники!”
Make love not war.
@Y: It looks like that 1943 date is correct, or at least close. The authors appear to have republished essentially the same article as: Frank J. Curran, Bernard V. Strauss, B. Frank Vogel, “Group Sex Conferences as a Diagnostic, Therapeutic and Pedagogic Method,” Journal of Criminal Psychopathology 1943, 289 (1946).
FWIW while I have no idea where my hard copy of The Basketball Diaries is, via the magic of the google books corpus I can report that there are two mentions of “scumbag” in the condom sense, one dated to summer ’64 (the same passage where he points out the dirty-jokeness of the intersection of Seamen and Cumming Streets in the upper Manhattan neighborhood he lived in) and the other in winter ’66.
Of course, I don’t know how much credence to give to the conceit that all of the prose in the 1978-published Basketball Diaries is in fact taken verbatim from what the author wrote down in his diaries 10-15 years earlier.
A petition by Yabloko:
“Война с Украиной, которую начал Путин*, принесет горе людям, разрушит семьи, погубит тысячи жизней. В этой войне невозможно победить.”
Compare:
“Роскомнадзор заблокировал издания-иноагенты «Медуза»*”
“В этой связи призываем правительство и протестующих решить существующие проблемы путем диалога и взаимопонимания», — написал представитель талибов (организация запрещена в России)* в Twitter.”
The second two asterisks refer to obligatory notes (“* Организация включена Минюстом в список иноагентов” in the first case, and (likely) that Taliban is terroristic organization forbidden in Russia in the second case). But no, Yabloko’s footnote is:
* После начала боевых действий РФ на территории Украины редакция текста была изменена. До 24 февраля в тексте петиции говорилось: “Война с Украиной, которую готовит Путин…”
Alla Gorbunova has been arrested (and released pending trial). I know she’s not more important than the thousands of others who have been arrested (and many of them will doubtless suffer more harshly), but I love her work (and Facebook presence) so much it can’t help but hit me hard. And of course this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Her friend Natalia Bogdanova writes on FB:
(mostly men) – Several people from a club where my friend plays go (from a small but highly apolitical sample) moved or are moving abroad: some are working in foreign companies, but one moved to Armenia, apparently to avoid conscription (he does not have a travel passport). FB has been blocked for several days, Youtube is working.
Keep safe, drasvi.
Ah, so we’re back to the joke my father told me.
A new arrival in the Gulag is being processed.
“How much did you get?”
“Five years.”
“And for what?”
“For nothing.”
The bureaucrat is enraged and threatens to hit the prisoner.
“LIAR!!! The punishment for NOTHING is TEN years!!!”
The silver lining is that it isn’t going to take five years for Russia to go bankrupt. If the nuclear deal with Iran is resurrected, as seems to be imminent, it’s going to go fast. Unlike Iranian oil, Russian oil is expensive to pump, expensive to get anywhere, and it’s “sour crude” with a lot of sulfur. Concerning natural gas, Germany’s stores are full, and winter is practically over (thanks to the Weini Emperor for enforcing Olympic peace).
According to Twitter, Yerevan was flooded with Russians two days ago for this reason. Also, Mexico was one of the last countries Russians could fly to – more Russians than members of any other nation have applied for asylum at the southern border of the US lately.
Good luck.
Would it be right to say that Russia (however, defined) has known only109 days of democratic, decent government, namely, from 21 July 1917 to 7 November 1917, when Alexander Kerensky was, first, Minister-Chairman of the Russian Provisional Government and, then, Minister-Chairman of the Russian Republic?
Depends on how you define “democratic” and “decent”.
I do sympathize Yeltsin.
Depends on how you define “democratic” and “decent”
Yes indeed: they are clines*, not neat binary distinctions. And they correlate, but far from perfectly.
The idea that you’re either democratic or you’re not, and that it’s all very simple, leads to terrible diplomacy and major mistakes in foreign policy, and blinds you to actual progress. I’m very tempted to say that’s it’s a characteristically American delusion, but our UK government’s foreign policy is so bizarrely inept** that we’re not in a position to throw stones.
* In fact, not so simple. There are several dimensions to consider, not just one.
** Well, it would be “inept” if the welfare of the UK population were actually an important objective (as opposed to asset-stripping the state for the benefit of party donors.)
On some “Muslim” site (I do not know why I was reading it, I normally do not read religious sites, both Christian and Muslim. But it was highly informative) a writer whose views are consistent with folk mythology (means: Yeltsin was a traitor and she hates him fiercely) wrote that paradoxally in 90s Communists and allied Christian clerics and Muslim [er… what do you call them], could freely say what they think in TV.
And now,when we are not ruled by traitors anymore, opposition to what she does not like is oppressed.
Presumably the moral is “be careful what you wish for” …
I’ve noticed (doesn’t take much perceptiveness) a very distinct tendency to the Fundamental Attribution Error in Western commentary on African governance, in particular. The astonishing thing about the Nigerian Federation really is that it has ever worked at all, not that it has major problems and once cracked open altogether into a bloody civil war. (And you rarely hear much about Federal help for rebuilding Igboland after the Biafra war, which was considerable.) Try to imagine a state comprising cultures as different as France and Turkey to get an idea of the achievement. Europeans have not achieved this …
As the most successful of all practitioners of Realpolitik said: Politik ist die Kunst des Möglichen.
Presumably the moral is “be careful what you wish for” …
I do not know. The folk mythology is that USSR was heaven and 90s were hell. Yeltsin too is likely a “traitor” because he contributed in collapse of USSR and was pro-Western.
Adherents of this mythology often are believers (discouraged in USSR) travel abroad (impossible in USSR) listen to rock (discouraged). And this lady (there was a Christian writer on that site. I do not remember if it was she or not) is sort of religious. If she too is fond of anti-religious USSR, i do not know how such people resolve the “paradox“.
1996 presidential elections were sort of ok and couple of duma elections more or less decent. There seems to be (bad, from my POV) a tendency of a significant portion of Russians to vote for anyone who is already in power. Arguably, Russian democracy helped at least once during 1998 crises when Yeltsin included communists in the government to stabilize the situation. And I really do not like communist politics.
Keep safe, drasvi.
Good luck.
And keep us posted.
D.O. So, in your opinion, the 1996 presidential election was sort-of fair (I can imagine that, and I actually sort-of-agree, even with including the communists) and the 1999 parliamentary elections was also (it was definitely not). I think that at point Putin (before 1996, plotting from 1986) thought he was already in power. And he was. In a definitely non-democratic way. He had took control of the KGB at that point.
I know it as des Machbaren, “of the feasible”.
I remember when John Oliver tried to get an interview with Gorbachov. Gobachov said something like “fuck off”. Can we get Gorbachov back? He was not prone to nuclear war. He is an asshole, but he’s not Putin. He’s probably the same age as Biden. EDIT: Biden is 11 years younger than Gorbachov.
Советский союз совершил ужасное дело…
http://www.ji-magazine.lviv.ua/2020/basilashvili-sovetskij-soyuz-sovershil-uzhasnoe-delo.htm
Stay safe and keep us posted, all of you — in Russia, in Ukraine and elsewhere. But how long will the Internet keep us all together?
And as someone said or didn’t say above: Please reach out. I don’t think I’m hard to find.
That seems to be a matter of VPN and/or Starlink these days.
Yeltsin looks like a human. And I prefer to be ruled by a human (inexperienced) rather than a professional scoundrel (like what many oh-so-democratic people believe every politician must be).
Communists (not leaders, but voters and supporters) of 90s were people who did like the change. The divide was both generational and regional (so called “Red Belt”). Also people who gained nothing but lost more hardly liked anything (not all of them were fond of USSR, I guess). Being against them would mean: being against people who are older than me, people from certain regions and people who are poorer than me.
The problem is that
shitpolitical programs come in packets. “Communism/USSR” does not mean merely a different economical course. I would be totally fine with more careful economic reforms.It also means an oppressive system maintaining this course:(
Read what they say, listen to what they say, do not travel, listen to idiotic propaganda, all because certain strata of people (maybe even majority) grew up within this oppressive system and learned to love it. It reminds the situation in what some call “traditional societies” (what refers to more oppressive/restrictive systems): it is their home, ruin it and they are homeless, keep it and someone is oppressed.
Yeltsin’s voters feared that if Communists take pover there won’t be any elections anymore.
And the three members of the parliament who spoke against the war were Communists.
But ER is not really a party: it is just “Russian officials and businessmen”. Membership is an expression of loyality in exchange for party support. I once met a girl – a manager in a swimming pool – in a video-game who was a member. Her boss was a member and was required to form a cell, so he asked his employees and they agreed.
About oppositionary comments in the Internet: If you live in Chechnya it is totally a good idea to move elsewhere AND use TOR.
In Moscow… хохлосрач < хохол (slur for Ukrainians), срач (a scandal, also a dirty mess < срать "to shit"). Quarrels about Crimea and Ukraine. In the internet and not only: in 2014 opinions of educated Muscovites split and old friends sometimes were yelling at each other.
In other words, the current habit of Muscovites is writing what they think.
Compiling a database of people with various views based on forum comments is possible with modern technologies, and likely some alredy do it both in Russia and some Western countries.:(
В.Путин: Я глубоко убежден в том, что у нас не может быть абсолютно никакого развития, и страна не будет иметь никакого будущего, если мы подавим гражданские свободы и прессу. Это просто мое глубочайшее убеждение. Потому что это важнейший на самом деле институт, который гарантирует государство от скатывания в трясину тоталитаризма. Мы жили уже в условиях тоталитарной системы. И как бы она ни приспосабливалась к внешнему миру, ничего не получалось в сфере экономики. Но важнейшим инструментом, который гарантирует здоровье общества, является свободная пресса.
Интервью телеканалу ОРТ
7 февраля 2000 года
http://kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/24373
He is sincere. Partly…
Акунин – что происходит с Россией / вДудь
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMJrKyWd_oI
“Я к сожелению или к счастью пропустил донбасс, крым и всю эту движуху, т.к. был ребенок.”
A very informative comment.
В.Путин […] Интервью телеканалу ОРТ
7 февраля 2000 года
Power corrupts. This is why leaders need to be replaced every few years.
From an interview with Dmitry Bykov, a novelist and critic I like a lot (despite some weird ideas):
I am sorry to disagree, but it is a complete crap. Russian society is as much consumerist as any “Western” one and Russians like foreign shiny objects just like everyone else. Family and social structure is as well that of a modern industrialized nation. And not of a Malthusian unlimited “human resources” which occasionally drives all sorts of madness. Saying that nationalistic psychosis in Russia reflects some fundamental feature of national character makes as much sense as blaming Napoleonic wars on some defects in French character, Boer war on British character, and “manifest destiny” on American character. Every nation is entitled to a bit of nationalism and jingoism, but the government should try to keep it in check rather than inflate it.
For your consideration, this eloquent comment by a Russian POW:
https://twitter.com/hackingbutlegal/status/1500465032966062082
And an apposite response:
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1500814992806981640
I see the Russian trolls are back on the job.
That’s the first accurate thing Greenwald has said in almost twenty years.
…and even then I don’t think the Geneva Convention makes it impossible for POWs to go public voluntarily. It’s just hard to tell if that’s what happened in most cases.
Greenwald is an idiot, and I won’t waste my time following a link to him. If by some accident he said something that happened to be right, I’m sure other non-idiots have said it elsewhere and better.
Oh yes. I saw a whole discussion on this yesterday, with no mention of Greenwald anywhere in sight.
I’m just saying, assuming the prisoner is indeed speaking his heart, his take is contrary to Bykov’s.
I also read an account of some Ukrainian living in the war zone, trying very hard to convince her relatives in Russia over the phone about what is happening, they not willing to believe that anyone would just bomb and shell citizens, and trying to find a logical way out of believing her. That does not match Bykov’s description, either.
No, I do not think that Bykov is accurate here.
@Y, alas.
Oh, I’m sure the mindset Bykov described exists. I just don’t think any such intellectual-philosophical-theological mindset is particularly common anywhere in the world.
Yeah, the overemphasis on it is one of his quirks.
, they not willing to believe that anyone would just bomb and shell citizens,
When you conduct a large-scale military operation there are civilian casualties, collateral damage or how do you call it. The problem with wars is that a war is when people kill people, is not it?
I do not think that the right argument is that Russian generals are not fighting it peacefully.*
But at the moment most Russians hear that “killing civilians” is what Ukraine does in Donbass.**
—
* I mean, the right argument is that it is fucking war and starting it means killing people, whether you fight it as “white people against white people” or as wars in colonies are fought.
**
Namely:
It is what bad guys do.
We are not bad guys.
If in Bykov’s statement we substitute America for Russia, it sounds creepily apposite (at least from the viewpoint of someone, me, who’s spent nearly all his life in WV, KY and IN). It’s the New Israel vs. the Third Rome.
Excellent comparison, and one that hadn’t occurred to me.
Bykov means the boring bearded thinker. A ‘thinker” because bearded.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Dugin
So общество Память won? Круто…
I haven’t heard about them since 1996 (when a Jewish biologist, the leader of the expedition I took part in told how they were inviting him to join. “А ничего, что я…?” “Ничего, главное что вы по духу русский!”)
But well, I know nothing about Dugin, he’s boring so i did not listen to him or read him. I just can recognize the reference. But
I have heard Dugin’s name bandied about for a dozen years or more but never tried to actually read anything by the man. I am intrigued to learn upon recent investigation that it requires a little bit of extra effort to do so in the U.S. because the mega-internet-booksellers are generally not selling his books in English translation — apparently because as of a few years ago both Amazon and B&N were convinced by activist pressure and/or bad PR to stop selling anything by the decidedly out-of-the-mainstream* publisher that puts out those translations.** One can find used copies online and new copies apparently stocked by some smaller outfits that have not blacklisted the publisher. One prominent bookseller apparently won’t sell you an English translation but will sell you a Portuguese translation, perhaps because no one has demanded that its separate publisher be blacklisted.
In the pre-Amazon Before Times, there was an infrastructure of small mail-order booksellers (including but not limited to the late Loompanics of famous memory) that would stock stuff too weird, controversial, or unsavory for the average brick-and-mortar bookstore to be willing to carry. Then the growth of Amazon and its seeming willingness to stock anything however outre destroyed that business model, creating a problem when Amazon then shifted to a less laissez-faire approach as to what it would stock and those non-mainstream channels of distribution were not still around to pick up the slack.
*Arktos Media, which disputes that it is a “far-right” publisher and claims instead to be “an ‘out-of-the-box’ media company, whose range includes titles from conservative, religious, libertarian, anarchist, anti-establishment and futurist writers.” I think it would be fair to say that Dugin is not really the most controversial author they publish, and they seem invested in the very unlike-American-rightism sort of European “Nouvelle Droit” thing that involves Julius Evola in particular and a fascination with non-Christian occultism in general.
**I’m assuming they are doing this because no one else (including university presses) was interested in doing it, not because Dugin himself would have refused to allow a translation to appear under more mainstream auspices.
*lightbulb moment*
The Shining City on the Hill. It fits perfectly.
A major influence on Dugin.
Here’s a very concise and compact portrayal of Dugin’s ideology in German. Eurasianism seems to contain the circular assumption that “liberal cosmopolitanism” “will never be accepted by Russian society” and to be founded on remarkably superficial observations: in this age when individualism is celebrated more than ever before, people everywhere look more similar and behave more similarly to each other than ever before, how curious and hypocritical – in reality, while the diversity between different places has gone way down, the diversity within any single place has gone up; maybe Dugin forgot that because he’s against it…
BTW, Hat, is ordering books from Russia not possible now?
Any connection between hat’s Bykov and the namesake of this Bykov that has been in the news of late? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_patrol_boat_Vasily_Bykov
(What with post-Soviet orthographic divergences I’m not sure whether or not that namesake might be this guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasil_Byka%C5%AD)
BTW, Hat, is ordering books from Russia not possible now?
I certainly wouldn’t want to try it. (I’m relieved I got my Ozon order just before the invasion.) Happily, I’ve found a good alternative source for Russian books, Globus Books in San Francisco; I’ve got an order on its way from them now. A lot of the books are pricey, but there are quite a few bargains, and they only charged me $4.95 for shipping, which is remarkable (shipping from ruskniga in Brighton Beach is $10, if I remember correctly, and of course from Russia is a whole lot more).
Ah, Globus Books. We walked past it once, and it was irresistible. So many books, all diferent-looking, neatly arranged and visible from the window! We walked inside, and quickly realized that all these riches were in Russian, and not for us. The proprietor realized it even before we did, and got what I read as an impatient expression, waiting for us to realize it and leave…
But if I could read Russian, I would have become a regular there long ago.
Dugin often appeared in influential Russian media 20 years ago. What it meant is that he belongs to the circle of people who often appear there, and is considered by them to be a thinker. But I was not interested in reading anything “becuase it is influencing someone” or “because of where it will lead the country”.
“Geopolitics” and “eurasianism” did not sound attractive.
For a state from Dublin to Valdivostok they could simply join the European Union.
Perhaps I was wrong. There is a Russian anime about Ahnenerbe so maybe Ahnenerbe is cool. I did not watch it. “If we want to liberate ourselves from the West, it is needed to liberate ourselves from textbooks on physics and chemistry.” is also cool.
And I haven’t seen any adherents or fans of Dugin, so I could have understimated his influence.
What is written about him and Communists neatly matches the notion of Red-Browns (where Browns stands for fascists/nationalists) or Communo-Patriotes. “Democrates” called so the strange unity between the left and right that arose in 90s. There also were some clerics with them which made it even crazier (Communists supposed to be anti-fascist and USSR was anti-religious….)
What he says about Putin strongly recembles what I heard from those young people from my wider circle who were involved in politics and supported Kremlin (some of them turned away from it in around 2010).
There’s no such thing as a Russian anime.
But how do iyou call it then?
Anime is very popular here, and many schoolboys and girls learn Japanese because of this (now Korean is also popular: K-pop and doramas).
The anime in question, WP: First Squad: The Moment of Truth (Japanese: ファーストスクワッド Fāsuto sukuwaddo, Russian: Пе́рвый отря́д, romanized: Perviy otryad)….
“Anime-styled cartoons” really looks like something you want to make shorter.
How ファーストスクワッド Fāsuto sukuwaddo is Japanese???
Mamma mia…
We call it anime, which is a general term not restricted to those of Japanese origin. Brett is just being picky, like someone who would say pizzas made outside Naples are not real pizzas.
How ファーストスクワッド Fāsuto sukuwaddo is Japanese???
And I’ve recently learned that ボディバッグ /bodibaggu is the Japanese for things like these. Clearly a case of Wasei Eigo, and I’d hesitate to call them body bags. But then, no one has a copyright on English, and the Japanese are entitled to call anything the way the fancy takes them.
So English is a register of Japanese (Japanese language system then)…
I’m not an anime fan, nor generally interested in policing genre boundaries. It’s just that anime really is a word that, in my idiolect, is about provenance, not content.
каррент муда…
So English is a register of Japanese
Of course. (As is Classical Chinese.)
Уау. Рашэн из инглиш.
He literally founded the (short-lived) National Bolshevik Party… (Start here, then go to the “analysis page” and click on “Let’s take the third way”.)
Here’s a bit more on him in English. It plays up the “ooh, scary – dangerous ideas!” angle, but does contain actual information: for example, “according to Foreign Policy, his 1997 Foundations of Geopolitics has been required reading for students at the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation for a generation. […] In Foundations of Geopolitics, which Dugin describes as a brief for Russian ambitions from “Dublin to Vladivostok,” the philosopher claims that “Ukraine as a state has no geopolitical meaning. It has no particular cultural import or universal significance, no geographic uniqueness, no ethnic exclusiveness,” fulminating that Moscow must solve “the Ukrainian problem.” If you want to know what the fascists intend to do, it’s always wise to pay attention to what they literally say, otherwise you might be caught surprised.”
I thought Putin was just keeping him around to secure his right political flank – like “sure, we’re going to Make Russia Great Again any year now, sure, there totally was a Russian state on the White Sea coast four thousand years ago, now be quiet and help keep me in power”. It looks like I was quite wrong. The article goes on: “That Russia is a state mired in oligarchical corruption is well known, but to see financial incentive as the core of Putin’s desire is to dangerously misapprehend the nature of our current threat, and it’s not to take men like Dugin at their word. Understood not as a conventional leader, or even as a simple autocrat, but rather as the de facto spiritual head of a fascist International, suddenly Putin’s behavior crystalizes into focus. The reactionary anti-LGBTQ laws in Russia, the financial and ideological support of far-right figures such as Marine Le Pen in France, Nigel Farage in Britain, and Trump in the United States, the forced annexation of Crimea and portions of Georgia, and now the offensive in Ukraine, don’t make sense if we simply understand Putin as just another Russian autocrat.”
Oh, the “bodybags” were all over Europe a while ago, too.
David, you do realize that’s a good deal older than Reagan? John Winthrop, 1630:
Wee shall finde that the God of Israell is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when hee shall make us a prayse and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “the Lord make it like that of New England.” For wee must consider that wee shall be as a citty upon a hill. The eies of all people are uppon us. Soe that if wee shall deale falsely with our God in this worke wee haue undertaken, and soe cause him to withdrawe his present help from us, wee shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.
JFK, 1961:
But I have been guided by the standard John Winthrop set before his shipmates on the flagship Arbella three hundred and thirty-one years ago, as they, too, faced the task of building a new government on a perilous frontier.
“We must always consider,” he said, “that we shall be as a city upon a hill–the eyes of all people are upon us.”
Today the eyes of all people are truly upon us–and our governments, in every branch, at every level, national, state and local, must be as a city upon a hill–constructed and inhabited by men aware of their great trust and their great responsibilities.
For we are setting out upon a voyage in 1961 no less hazardous than that undertaken by the Arabella in 1630. We are committing ourselves to tasks of statecraft no less awesome than that of governing the Massachusetts Bay Colony, beset as it was then by terror without and disorder within.
aware of their great trust and their great responsibilities. – great self-importance
Yes; I didn’t mention Reagan.
David: I, at least, associate the phrase containing “shining” with Reagan; I may be wrong.
drasvi: Oh, absolutely. JFK’s inaugural was where we started marching toward the cliff edge. How enthralled I was, hearing it in a school auditorium, a few days short of 13, and what a horror it had become by the time I was 20. (And my apologies for recalling this world-scale disaster as something that happened to America.)
Traditional leaders (a general who is someone’s nephew, or a lowest-ranking official who has a room and a phone and must sign a paper but won’t do that because “you see where you were born, don’t you?” etc.) are not deprived of this feeling. They just do not deliver sermons and live happily in their castles or at their tables.
…desks.
Update: Yes, the phrase “shining city on a hill” is definitely associated specifically with Reagan’s farewell address of 1989.
The reactionary anti-LGBTQ laws in Russia,
I wanted to grumble here (I do not know why people care about other’s sexuality, but it is not just Putin. If it were “just Putin”, there would be eben such a notion as LGBT.) and looked up maps of LGBT rights.
And discovered this:
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2020/06/25/global-views-homosexuality-2019-appendix-a/
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/10/15/european-public-opinion-three-decades-after-the-fall-of-communism/pg_10-15-19-europe-values-00-09/
Interestingly, Russians here are not different from Ukrainians.
“% who say that homosexuality should be accepted by society” is 14 for Russia, Ukraine and Kenya (in 2002 it is 22, 17, 1 respectively).
In the second table less people in Russia say that “X is very important” than in any European country for any given X. It is almost true for Ukraine as well. They are above Russia for every X, they value religious freedom more than European average (still not much), they value internet more than Lithuanians, and free media more than Lithuanians and Slovaks, but mostly they are below any country for any X.
Like Russians they don’t support freedom of opposition parties.
I honestly expected more difference. I wonder if Russia was above Ukraine in early 2000s for every X.
As for legislation: yes, we are getting righter and more populist, also what I said about “packets”: What is bad? [NATO-democracy-gays] is bad. Capitalism is complicated (the government is pro-capitalism), lesbians are… so-so. If you choose the pro-Western course you are supposed to be more tolerant to what the West is more tolerant to and less tolerant to what the West is less tolerant too, it does not matter to what. If you take an anti-Western stance you are supposed be against it.
But whether you interpret it as “Putin supporting anti-gay legislation” or “Putin not supporting worse legislation” is a matter of taste.
Before the legislation it were gay pride events that caused loud scandals. Gays gathered, far-right people also gathered to attack gays, conservative society criticized gays, progressive society criticized the far right, and I suspect of those people who did not take part in scandals more supported conservatives. The government did not intervene in social matters too much… except certain initiatives that both I and conservative society hate.
It is even remarkable that Putin did not intervene in such things for a while. Then he did and either it is a change in his attitudes, or just greater weight of certain groups. This conclusion is right (and to come to it is enough to listen to our TV).
But “… don’t make sense if we simply understand Putin as just another Russian autocrat.“? Most of authoritarian leaders in the world are much MORE into social engineering and oppression of gays.
Also since the legislation (and following international scandal) “Gayrope” became a slur for “Europe” used by politicized anti-Western comments and journalists. You have liberals, gays, NATO and other bad things.
Russian police are currently conducting random searches of people’s phones to determine if people are LGBTI of have LGBTI friends.
Sorry: what I am doing here is criticizing the article quoted by DM above (several days ago). I decided to comment on this because of this similariry between Russians and Ukrainians. But the article is superficial.
– supporting Trump. – WHY on Earth Russia would like Hillary?
– “the forced annexation of Crimea and portions of Georgia” – :-/
So what we have:
– European right.
I honestly do not know why we do this. I mostly was interested in refugees. Not Europe, not us, just refugees. So I did notice this “helping refugees is evil” thing and flirting with the right as well. A different but related story is that we are shifting to the right.
– “and now the offensive in Ukraine, don’t make sense if we simply understand Putin as just another Russian autocrat.””
At the moment I do no thave a working model where this war makes any sense.
@V, I do not know how to evaluate it without knowing the source:/
I have no idea as to what you’re talking about, dravsi, sorry. I have friends that are helping Ukrainian refugees here in Bulgaria, now. I know a high-level Belarus general resigned, and Belarus troops are not participating in the invasion. I know people that know people that I know managed to either escape from Kyiv and Bolgrad, or stayed behing to help with the resistance.
@V, I am answering to an article quoted by DM a few days ago (in a conversation about Dugin).
And in another comment I am answering to your comment about LGBT:/
dravsi: oh, sorry I meant to answer to you comment about Dugin, but I forgot about it.
@V, Russia is as I said, flirting with far-right politicians in the West and becoming “righter” herself. It is really enough to watch our TV to see how folk xenophoby is used to make a politicial point.
But the article was making a specific argument about personally Putin and Dugin, and I just meant that most of the author’s arguments (Georgia and Crimea, Trump, LGBT) have little to do either with fascism (Trump, Ossetia) or with Putin (LGBT). “Anti-fascist Putin” would supprot Trump all the same.
I got my package from Globus Books a week after I ordered it, well packaged and the books individually wrapped. I highly recommend them to anyone who feels a craving for Russian-language books.
The Telegram channel of Memorial is called Полный ПЦ. In different circumstances (if the choice was motivated not by the situation, but by the authors’ stylistical preferences*) I would call it a positive development….
—
*If it were some other organization. A kindergarten or the minister of education’s blog.
The other day, I first read Министр in Министр иностранных дел as Монстр.
Oh, come on, he’s not a monster. He just has alternative facts!
Like, “The territory of Ukraine has suddenly and treacherously teleported itself a great distance right into Russia”?
Honestly, I do not give a shit about any territory. If I did I would support all this.
Why not? If it is all an argument about property…
I just had difficulty deciphering Lavrov’s “Мы и на Украину не нападали”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcUyRF86B28
Just in case: the above was not about juha. I’d never suspect juha in lack of humanism.
I do not understand what’s going on here, so I did the same that I do with some other countries: I read sociologists. As I was doing this, I came accross a bilingual site about Russia that I never heard about before.
I do not know if it is good, but I happen to know one of their authors.
I was reading this piece: https://www.levada.ru/2022/01/18/nas-vtyagivayut-v-vojnu/
and it says the original is published here: https://ridl.io/en/we-are-being-dragged-into-a-war/
(the English translation). No, it is not the author that I “happen to know”, it is just the article I was reading (opinions of Russians in December)
Very interesting, especially this:
One aspect of Putin’s tyranny v. 2.0 is realizing that the absolute control of dissidence in the USSR, DDR, North Korea and such is wasteful. Let the grumblers grumble. It is only when they get to influencing other people that they need to be warned, and then, if necessary, killed.
2.0
@Y, it is getting worse with time, so I am not sure about 2.0.
What you said looks more like early Putin. He soon began taking control of TV, but he nevertheless allowed Echo Mosckvy and Novaya Gazeta. Novaya Gazeta still exist, Echo does not. For a while it was banned both by Youtube and our state:)
Yeah, he’s clearly getting more and more intolerant. He’s heading for Ivan/Stalin territory.
I am not sure if it is Putin (or some other group), but the regime is changing.
The regime – again, Moscow, because in Chechnya you can’t be opposition – is milder than the Soviet regime. Compare Lev Oborin. and Varya B above (and Varya’s repressed grandparents in Soviet times).
Gannushkina was simply stopped (link) at the metro station (surveillance cams and facial recognition) and not allowed to join protests. (Gannushkina is the head of this organization, refugee.ru).
—
As for how Putin is changing personally, I watched interviews with Venedictov, because the man knows Putin personally.
Perfected in China. To get around the Great Firewall, all you need is VPN, which isn’t hard to get, and it isn’t hard to find out how to get it – but few enough people figure they have a reason to do that that the regime doesn’t need to care.
He doesn’t have time to reach it, though.
“Perfected in China. To get around the Great Firewall, all you need is VPN, which isn’t hard to get, and it isn’t hard to find out how to get it …”
They began blocking sites only a few years ago. And they began with repeatedly blocking our old Internet library (lib.ru) because its site for self-published poetry contained teenage poetry that that interpreted as call for suicide. [facepalm]. Then they began a crackdown on pirate sites. For many years they were fighting against sci-hub (apparently without realizing that Russian researchers simply can’t access scientific journals without it). Once Elbakyan herself blocked Russia (she was angry).
They tried Really hard. Since this summer sci-hub is “sci-hub.ru” and Elbakyan was invited at conferences here.
But only for a couple of years they are trying to do something with oppositionary sites.
—
It is expensive though, I mean China-style firewall. I am afraid we are learning from China. And you learn form China too.
At least one NATO member and EU candidate has blocked Wikipedia years ago, because their president did not like what they write about him:) And when Youtube blocks Echo (because they are blocking state-owned media), it is BAD. Yes, there is a war in Ukraine. Yes, you are kinda her ally. Yes, propaganda… But the step towards “let’s filter what our people listen to, because there is an information war”, в любви и на войне все средства хороши have been made. More steps will follow.
This was real crap:
You told me again, you preferred handsome men but for me you would make an exception….
Imagine a Russian user of porn sites and speaker of C++, who does not support Russian government and is shocked by the war reading this. What she will learn from it? The West is our enemy, that’s what.
And if she feels threatened by the West (what our propaganda has been trying to make us feel – but we porn watchers and java speakers do not listen), lives of people in Ukraine may become of secondary concern for her. It is “just” a battlefield, like Donbass was.
We are spiraling into something:( Sorry for bringing it to here. I saw it before and I am sure it has been discussed in the West too, but I was reading a Russian site where people post… funny stuff (they are celebrating Sasha Grey’s birthday now) and spotted it there again.
The site surprised me with that its rather cynical but otherwise apolitical audience tends to be against the government and even support protesters. And then I saw them discussing this, and fuck. Yes, it can “convert” some people into pro-war religion. What else it can do?:( It also will have an effect at home, i think.
Ah. So it was an internal e-mail, not an exceptionally diplomatic public statement (still quoted by many as a ‘statement’). That explains some things.
The problem is that escalation is escalation. The likely outcome of sanctions here will be rise of fascism. No dependence on the world (except China). Easier to suppress and shut up opponents. Easier to fight wars and mobilize people. Capitalists and consumerism (naughty people who want to eat Italian cheese instead of rebuilding the Russian world) will lose influence:) Fascist paradise. And you relaly do not need propaganda to convince people that we are encircled by enemies when we are actually encircled by enemies. For the rest see Iran.
Yeah, that was ridiculous. 😀 A comment at the time was that everyone who cares has VPN anyway.
…among others.
“all’s fair in love and war”
im Krieg und in der Liebe ist alles erlaubt and I’m sure the saying is much more widespread.
Yeah, that was not handled well.
bankruptcy. Read the article I linked to. (Stop the loading of the page before the paywall goes up.)
Let’s say my concerns are:
1. Ukraine. It is not a political point. I obviously know many people from Ukraine, among people who attend my brithday party there is one (a girl Masha). Of course she lives in Moscow (or how else?) but her family is in Kiev. So the war is simply when her family is in danger. I do not know why it is different for some people: they too have freinds and relatives there. My antoher friend’s gransmother speaks to her dauther in Ukrainian and her daughter responds in Russian (the gransmother is from the Western Ukraine).
Also my arrested friend.
2. when the war is over, maybe sanctions, but look, I can do without AMD:) If they affect the poorest people, that is bad.
3. politics. And here I am afraid of strenghtening of fascism.
Think Cuba, Iran, Israel among Arabs, North Korea. Think North Korea. Sanctions is not a too efficient tool. Korean madness would be dissolved (by the network of personal and trade contacts) long ago if there was not a wall. The wall is above all maintained by the Korean government itself. It wanted to change the situation (at least in 90s and 00s it DID – and Lankov noted that officials often asked about what happened to East German colleagues) but it was afraid to lose control. But then the West is also maintaining this wall, and this all look like… symbiosis? Clinch?
Yet this tool (sanctions) is applied indiscriminately (compare here Cuba).
So what I am personally afraid is consequences of sanctions for our politics. Liberal opponents of Putin were often accused in “the worse the better” thinking in 00s, that is “Putin was brought to power by rising oil prices, but may lose power if his rule is not associated with economic improvement”. Now “the worse the better” can be good for “down with consumerism” party.
Cheese is a meme: Putin sanctioned Europe and banned import, and what we did not know how to do well was cheese. Good (edible) cheese disappeared. And supporters of Putin’s policy were teasing opponents, hinting in their love for пармезанчик (Parmigiano sounds properly foreign, as something expensive and presumably accessible to the rich should. In reality both pro- and anti-Putin educated muscovites are middle class:))
Yes, business and officials who depend on it won’t love this change.
Young people…. Tehran is full of educated young people who do not like their government AT ALL (and totally can find common language with a Western tourist). And? It does not make the government less populist.
It wages several wars at once (or did so). Dissent is easy to oppress.
I wont’t make predictions, but it is simply what I am afraid of. Fascism is already on the rise.
bankruptcy
Perhaps, I am just not sure that its effect on our politics wil be “regime change”:)
—
Iranian students actually are not unlike Soviet people in 80s. Tired of this.
—
Well, they remind me USSR in something else. In their attitude to ‘conservative’ stuff, I mean modest dress and norms of behaviour. There are regions where it is an element of traditional life, and there is a region where “modest and observant” is a new thing (popular among youth) – but in Iran it is state-imposed. And many young people are fed up. State-imposed stuff is usually boring.
What I meant was that there isn’t now, and isn’t likely to be, the widespread system of informants, where a private comment could get you arrested or jailed or killed. I don’t know how that system was set up (I’m sure someone here knows), but I imagine that there’s only a small window in time when something like that can be established, say after an all-encompassing revolution and war.
Precedents go far back. An old Graf Bobby joke:
Graf Bobby is enlisted as an informant by the Secret Police. Upon meeting Baron Rudi, he asks him:
— What do you think of the Emperor?
Baron Rudi answers:
— Same as you, as you well know.
— Then I am very sorry, but I must arrest you.
Well, that is extreme. What is more usual is no free press and attempts at internet censorship.
What Putin did is:
(1) took over TV (first NTV – and it caused large protests that everyone watched on TV., other channels during next years).
(2) kept Novaya Gazeta and Echo Moskvy – it was clearly a conscious decision. The Echo is state owned and Putin knows its editor in person since before he ruled the country. Venedictov was invited to the president’s pess-conferences all these years, sometimes talked to him in private, and the Echo also was a platform to where foreign politicians were invited to talk. Aleksey_Venediktov_at_Radio_Echo_Moskvy_interviews_Hillary_Rodham_Clinton_2009.jpg
Novaya gazeta is VERY oppositionary.
(3) kept human rights groups, but TV informed people what all so called human right activists get HUGE foreign grants.
(4) did not control the Internet.
Taking control (not a crackdown, but taking control) over important newspapers and magazines is 2010s.
Meduza (Ru, En…. oops! Blocked too… But only since now) appeared because the owner of lenta.ru – back then already less independent – fired the editor in chief and the team resigned and decided to move abroad and make a new site. This new site is more oppositionary.
Mid 2010s is the law about “foreign agents”. That is, if you assigned the status of a foreign agent, you must publish a warning before each text that you publish, that you are a foreign agent and wrote it acting in capacity of a foreign agent (the word is chosen to soundlike “spy”:))). So people knew WHO they are reading.
I of course see how this all can be presented as cosmic information war between two evil forces.
WP says, meduza collaborated with Buzzfeed… I do not know, maybe Buzzfeed is something decent, but I saw one piece offered by it (on the main page of VK, Russian social network) and I am not going to try a second.
I suppose Buzzfeed might fit well into some sort of neo-Slavophil narrative about the superficiality and/or decadence of the West?
Hell, that works for me, and I’m not even a Slavophil.
Ah, then maybe Buzzfeed is all right. The only piece that I saw was a video about the siege of Aleppo (by Russians, but what bothered me was not that it was anti-Russian).
I remember, there were much more innocent-looking ones about applying make up….
There are worse things than being superficial and decadent. Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.
хуй войне
Oh. I forgot it:(
Khuy Voyne!
It was initially about Iraq…
Wonderfully:
В частности, в газете «Спецназ России» о лозунге упомянул[15] российский публицист и националист Константин Крылов. При этом он критически отозвался о российской эстраде в целом. Российский философ Александр Дугин в газете «Комсомольская правда» отметил, что акция ему «очень понравилась»; по его мнению, «Тату» написали «золотые слова» и «вовремя показали их»[16][17].
but when shown on Russian TV, the shirts were edited with an extra stroke through the letter Х to say Жуй войне! literally “Chew to the War!
a variant practiced in FB (for fun):
***̆ ***̆**
(not sure if it is going to be displayed properly)
No, it is not:(
And the link to …Khuy_Voyne! does not work even when I try %21.
It displays fine here (in Lucida Grande font).
I fixed the link so it works.
It is a bit surrealistic situation: people get arrested for protests: against war, for peace, for “thou shalt not kill” banners (by religious protesters) etc. And “fake” news (“fake”: different from official news) are outlawed, which possibly includes using a word “war” as opposed to “special operation”. The point of the joke with asterisks is that “dick” is asterisked because it is a dick, and “war” is asterisked because ….
Some wonder if War and Peace by Tolstoy must be forbidden too: two bad words in the tittle.
religious
It is a rare situation when the patriarch of Russian church could influence history. But the chances of a person who would to become a patriarch are slim:)
Some wonder if War and Peace by Tolstoy must be forbidden too
Held up, with one’s hand accidentally obscuring part of the title…
Wonderful.
Awesome. This is “straw-mud horse and the evil river crab” level. Actually, it represents both the horse (censorship of obscenity) and the crab (ideological censorship).
Even if they say nothing, just stand there holding a blank sheet of paper or a flower. Like in Hongkong.
Alla Gorbunova has posted “Штраф 11 тысяч.” [fine 11,000]. The ruble now being worth so little, that works out to slightly over $100. No fun, but it could have been a lot worse (and of course still can be).
Wonderful. – reminds Argentinian Jujuy, on Russian maps Жужуй, beloved by our football commenters (they need something to speak about during the second half or extra time if there is nothing to speak about*… so they speak about the adventures of Jujuy and other things like that).
—
*”что говорить, когда нечего говорить” used in theater by people in the crowd.
I remember at some moment when the Powers in Russia decided to crack down on protest (Navalny was arrested or somethig like that) people went in significant numbers and in prearranged times for a walk. When stopped by the police they explained that they are not protesting, just walking. I think it worked for about a week or two.
D.O., not now. they stop some famous activists already at metro stations, visit some other people warning them that they should not go, also stop people (as you can guess mostly female) who wear wrong symbols (I do not know if ☮ is “wrong” or not) etc.
…maintaining the impression that the country is unanimous.
The spiritual predecessor of хуй войне: миру – мир, войне – пиписька
Meet Elona Musk, don:
SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has changed his name to ‘Elona Musk’ on Twitter, leaving the users in frenzy. However, the reason behind the change is linked to the ongoing Russia and Ukraine conflict.
https://www.wionews.com/world/elon-musk-or-elona-musk-heres-why-tesla-ceo-changed-his-name-on-twitter-462788
This world is becoming increasingly strange.
Ilona!
Wiktionary: elon (uncountable)
1. (photography) Synonym of p-methylaminophenol sulfate (“metol”)
I like this definition. But in my head I always read his name as Элон, and the transcription Илон keeps confusing me. Apparently in my head ˈiːlɔn is just alon/elon with ɪŋɡlɪʃ accent.
The wounders of touching up:
https://twitter.com/mayemusk?lang=en
Well, at least one lucky cat and his owner have made it from Kharkiv to Paris:
https://www.newsweek.com/famous-meme-cat-ukraine-viral-platorm-plea-end-war-russia-stepan-1684488
And a former classmate of mine is still holed up in a basement or something there.
ЧГТРК “Грозный” – I wonder if it was written by their employee.
I posted it becaufe of this cute reference “его слова перевёл на русский язык СМИ-иноагент”. I can’t find the original post by the mufti and see if it is video or text and if GT can translate from Chechen:(
https://www.kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/373689/
Perhaps “this dirt” referst to what the patriarch spoke about in his sermon on “Forgiven Sunday”: xxx. It is unlikely that our “religious leaders” actually met and drank and discussed this (many of them are Muslims), but it is likely that they met and smoked something and discussed this, and came to a joint vision*.
—
P.S. Not sure if “joint vision” is a pun or just broken English. But it was unitended.
Men with a vision. visions. vision.
That in particular.
Yes, that’s a great pun.
I am not sure if I want to see a lady Kadyrov or not. But without the beard, please. The beard and Kalashnikov.
(and no, the same mufti does not allow niqabs).
The sermon in question (in Russian).
That mufti & patriarch spin reminds of our own German right… About a month ago, when Putin was gathering his troops, I saw memes to the effect “would be good if Putin marched on Berlin, we would be rid of red-green and gendering would stop”. Looks like these guys are lying low now, keeping that kid of vomit to their telegram channels.
Well, Putin is not waging a war on gay rights. From his latest (mendacity has reached at least Politburo level, but this fragment is funny for other reasons, or maybe not funny at all…):
Я совсем не осуждаю тех, у кого вилла в Майами или на Французской Ривьере, кто не может обойтись без фуа-гра, устриц или так называемых гендерных свобод. Проблема абсолютно не в этом, а, повторю, в том, что многие из таких людей по своей сути ментально находятся именно там, а не здесь, не с нашим народом, не с Россией. Это и есть, по их мнению – по их мнению! – признак принадлежности к высшей касте, к высшей расе. Подобные люди готовы и мать родную продать, только бы им разрешили сидеть в прихожей у этой самой высшей касты. Они хотят быть похожими на неё, всячески подражая ей. Но они забывают или не понимают вообще, что этой так называемой высшей касте они если и нужны, то как расходный материал, чтобы использовать их для нанесения максимального ущерба нашему народу.
I am not at all judging those who have a villa in Miami or on the French Riviera, who cannot do without foie gras, oysters, or so-called gender freedoms. That is absolutely not the problem, but, I repeat, the problem is that many of these people are mentally there, not here, not with our people, not with Russia. This is, in their opinion – in their opinion! – a sign of belonging to a higher caste, to a higher race. Such people are ready to sell their mother, only to be allowed to sit in the hallway of this higher caste. They want to be like it, imitating it in every possible way. But they forget or do not understand at all that if this so-called upper caste even needs them than as expendable material in order to use them to cause maximum damage to our people.
(DeepL with my help)
@D.O.
“…destroyed Libya, almost destroyed Syria” – Putin, 2015 or 16.
Libyans mostly lived in Libya, at home. Majority of Syrians were refugees (many of within Syria, many abroad). All Syrians who I know were. Cities were in ruins. So why did he say “almost”? I usually avoid listening to TV, but when I happen near a TV set I hear lines. Like this one (or like the one where he lied 4 times in 2 seconds and my jaw dropped:)). It is very instructive.
He actually does not see that Libya (that is “people and land”) was in a much better state than Syria.
For him both are states. He sees them so. As long as state institutions are still standing, they still can find subjects for them. For me the two countries are 20-something millions faces and landscapes.
Video with English subtitles; longer than the above, but abruptly ends before the speech is over. Basic message: all this is just going to purify Russia. I’ll refrain from making explicit who else was “purified” like that in history.
As I said, sanctions make fascism stronger.
There’s a link to an English translation of the full speech. The first half of it is not a bad wartime speech—a bit of hyperbole is to be expected—except that it’s all lies. The middle of the speech gets into wild-eyed frothing territory, so even if you didn’t know anything about anything, you might notice something’s amiss. The last third or so is an economic plan of sorts, attempting to calm anxieties about the economic situation. As far as I can tell, it comes down to, the Federal government will go into debt to float the economy.
More optimistically:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUSPBeSNzYw
A song “Такого как Путин”, performed by street musicians in, I think, Kazan. The English version of the original is here (but I do not understand words:(().
I first heard it in 2002 in a kiosk (laryok, a pavillion where they sell beer, juice, cookies, etc.), and was quite surprised.
@drasvi
This is a humorous song:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBFkPas6-DM
My favorite Putin song.
Hat, what’s with the pronunciation of the r’s in that song? And what do the lyrics say, roughly?
Hardly need to say it, but: Pussy Riot were right all along, and they did well in calling attention to him early on.
Added: Maria Alyokhina is still fighting from within Russia. I’m stunned.
@Y, хуёво.
(“dicky”, that is: very bad)
Россия и Украина
11-14 марта 2022, уличный опрос 1000 респондентов, Москва
Роман Юнеман
Russian Field
https://dropmefiles.com/oNhnB
Not very different from what I expected. I would expect 60% pro-war, 15% anti-war.
53% of young people using Telegram as their main source.
“Как Вы оцениваете свои финансовые перспективы в ближайшем будущем?”
In this case people who excpect improvement are fooling the interviewer but not themselves.
На ваш взгляд, каких результатов России наиболее важно достичь по итогам
специальной военной операции на территории Украины?
Средние по 10-балльной шкале
“Удаление сторонников неонацизма из органов власти Украины” 8.0
That is unexpected.
If it will be forced conversion of all Christians to Islam and all Muslims to Buddhism – will opinions also be split as ~15%-~60%? Like, all Yabloko voters against, and all supporters of the government supporting.
Of course after 20 years-long campaign meant to convince everyone that Christians make better Muslims than Muslims who are, honestly, are terrible Muslims and would make much better Buddists.
(and yes, most Muslims are terrible Muslims:-E But we do not have better Muslims… and this exact problem my plan is meant to solve! [same is true for Christians of course])
He actually does not see that Libya (that is “people and land”) was in a much better state than Syria. For him both are states. He sees them so.
I think this actually helps me understand Putin’s particular brand of psychopathy – and his appeal for some – much better. Thanks for that comment, drasvi.
In Putin’s Weltanschauung, everyone is inherently bigoted; everyone is a “fundamentalist” — it just depends what kind of “fundamentalist” you are, or pretend to be.
Y: The title means “Our madhouse voted for Putin,” and here are the lyrics (you can run them through DeepL or GT):
Since neither translator understands the word пиндос ‘goddam American’ (see this LH post), I’m mentioning it here.
Oh, and I don’t hear anything odd about the pronunciation of the r’s.
They’re particularly far retracted, sort of Indo-/Tibetospheric.
Специально для издания «ASTRA» корреспондентка Яна Фёдорова решила поговорить с теми, кто покинул свои родные места и узнать, как они живут сейчас и что они думают о происходящем.
https://telegra.ph/YA-hochu-v-svoyu-zhizn-do-24-fevralya-03-18
Ovsyannikova, pro-war source: picture
Ovsyannikova, anti-war source: picture (someone’s FB, I do not know the owner)
Боевые птицы Никиты Михалкова/Nikita Mikhalkov’s Warbirds
Из всех птиц на ум приходит кукуха, которая совсем слетела.
… и его младший брат Рогозин:
Глава «Роскосмоса» Дмитрий Рогозин утверждает, что целью биологических экспериментов, якобы проводимых Пентагоном на Украине, является разработка «этнического оружия» против «русского населения России». Он заявил, что это оружие якобы воздействует на репродуктивную систему россиянок. Какие-либо доказательства он не привел.
https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/5269932
I guess some birds are also trained to collide with Russian satellites in orbit to bring them down.
Ovsyannikova
According to Kleimenov, she was in the pay of the UK embassy. Has anyone doubted that? Also, she had been digging a tunnel from Moscow to Washington, DC.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZVd41NI59c
Read the comments, too.
The exchange between Scott Kelly and Rogozin (nothing interesting apart of that R. called him “moron”, K. called R. “Dimon” which is not too interesting) reminded me that video where Padalka, Kelly and Kornienko were ascending to ISS….
https://meduza.io/shapito/2016/08/12/my-zhivem-poka-letaem-na-divan-leg-i-kirdyk
(highly recommended for lovers of science fiction set in space… Asterisks left intact because they are always more obscene than actual fucks)
Someone wasn’t taught enough biology in school.
Of course. As we all know, the US government has replaced all birds by drones who spy on Real Americans and probably Russians, too. It logically follows…
How quaint!
Why would I read YouTube comments? I just made that mistake yesterday!
The word of the year?
rouben
@newaviator
·
19 мар.
Дебермудизация – процесс перерегистрации/перекрашивания бортовых номеров ВС с бермудской регистрации (либо иной: VP-, VQ-, EI-) на российскую регистрацию (RA-), без одобрения владельца ВС/лизинговой компании, вопреки запрету владельца/лизинговой компании эксплуатировать данное ВС
https://twitter.com/newaviator/status/1505124650312941570?s=20&t=mESH8IqwNeCBnnUH3oH4UA
I do not follow military slang, and a question of a [pro-]war correspondent to a comander whether мирняк просачивается or not impressed me.
мирняк is a mass noun. Civilians.
«Война стала последней каплей»
Что происходит в госСМИ: проверки, увольнения и методички
https://borzunova.substack.com/p/–2f6?s=w
There was no need for this when we fought in Syria, because there was not serious opposition to it.
But bombing Kiev (or Mariupol) is something many could dislike.
When 50% of people around support war, and 50% people around are against the war – you scratch your head and you remmeber that you or your friends have relatives in the Ukraine. And you join the “againt” camp: you are with people.
But when 100% of people around support war, you support war. Else you are a traitor, you are agains Russia.
You are not wtih your motherland in a difficult hour. You are not with our boys who are risking their lives when fighting with Nazi in Mariupol.
ِAn impression of overwhelming support is equivalent to it. And мирняк просачивается.
I suspect that the propaganda is not secondary to the purposes of the war on Ukraine; on the contrary, the war on Ukraine is intended to justify the propaganda: Putin incarnates Russia, and all opposition to him is treason.
Bingo. Putin and only Putin can Make Russia Great Again, now watch him do it.
Why would I read YouTube comments?
Because they are an ideal example of an одобрямс и осуждамс ‘condemn enemy-inspired voices/views and support our brave leaders’ point of view. Dissenting voices are enemies of our great peace-loving country.
Exactly. I’ve had enough of that. 🙂 What I had read the day before included such gems as “we here in latin america also hate volodymyr nazinsky”…
@David Marjanović: As I was scrolling, I somehow read part of what you wrote as, “… only Putin can Make Russia Cake Again….”
Then poutine…
@juha, “peace-loving” is obsolete. It is fascism, not USSR.
My greatest schock during the war in 2008 was that the community on a Russian-langauge forum who supported the war in Iraq and spoke back then about human rights and terrible things done by Saddam were not interested in that.
They were explaining that Russia is wrong, but the arguments for why it is wrong were the same arguments that people here know by heart. They were not interested in what happened to locals. When Georgians are reconquerring a territory where a different (and after 1992, hostile) ethnicity lives, there is a danger of genocide. But that was Russian argument. When Russians reconquer it, the Georgian population is in a greater danger. But no, human rights were fashionable in 2003, now the party line is different.
So I realized that they simply do not have their own opinion, they are simply retelling what newspapers tell and I can read the newspapers to the same effect. And they are all PhDs.
I do not know if I am different. Maybe not. I normally do not watch news, so my opinion usually differs. But I read linguistics and… yes, I do not think anything original about lanuages.
I do not know if I am different. Maybe not. I normally do not watch news, so my opinion usually differs. But I read linguistics and… yes, I do not think anything original about lanuages.
The same applies to me.
Some years back I didn’t know who Xi was. Now I do.
«Интерфакс» назвал массовое сокращение «высвобождением от работы»
В соцсетях предложили и другие эвфемизмы — например, «отрицательный приём на работу».
[…]
«Высвобождение от работы» — не новый термин. Под ним понимают увольнение или отстранение от работы на длительные срок большого числа работников по причине экономического кризиса.
https://tjournal.ru/internet/571808-interfaks-nazval-massovoe-sokrashchenie-vysvobozhdeniem-ot-raboty
ТРВ-Наука (the newspaper that published the letter of sceintists against the war) is now a “foreign agent” as well.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oskar_Maria_Graf
“Graf’s books were not included in the Nazi book burning; at the time, most of them were actually approved by the Nazis as recommended reading. In response, Graf published an appeal that subsequently became famous, Verbrennt mich! [“Burn me!”] in Vienna’s Arbeiterzeitung.”
The obvious response for scientists or groups of scientists not connected with the letter but with similar feelings is to ask the Government to help them obtain foreign funding in order to qualify as foreign agents…
It was a lot easier for Graf to cock a snook at the Nazis from abroad than for Russians in Russia to do such a thing.
Reminded me a song (or rather a polyphonic Baroque and middle east inspired canon for two voices or something) “I am an agent of Mossad (and CIA)” that my friends, then students of a musical school composed in 90s. I do not rememeber if there are still any recordings and if there were any other lines apart of я-‘а-ген-тмас-саАаАаАаАаАада (baroque/ME ornamentation and then in low voice:) и-цэ-рэ-у… и-цэ-рэ-у… и-цэ-эр-у….
Apparently there were. There was recitative in Hebrew.
@PP, yes. One of the authors of the canon moved to Montenegro just because he likes it, but since recently the first small colony of Russian political emigrants has began to forming around. E.g. another my freind who was among the first to get personal status of “mass media—a foreign agent”. And now when TrV is an agent too, it starts looking … cool?
”Party in the CIA”
That’s only consistent. Science is rather literally globalist.
…in the sense that both Vienna and the Arbeiterzeitung were owned by the Social Democratic Workers’ Party as it was then known.
Seems to be unavailable, except maybe from China. Even scientific institutions have stopped working together with scientific institutions based in Russia.
Actually, yes. If a scientific paper is based on a research funded by a foreign grant, then it would only be logical to require from the author and the journal to add ДАННОЕ СООБЩЕНИЕ (МАТЕРИАЛ) СОЗДАНО И (ИЛИ) РАСПРОСТРАНЕНО ИНОСТРАННЫМ СРЕДСТВОМ МАССОВОЙ ИНФОРМАЦИИ, ВЫПОЛНЯЮЩИМ ФУНКЦИИ ИНОСТРАННОГО АГЕНТА, И (ИЛИ) РОССИЙСКИМ ЮРИДИЧЕСКИМ ЛИЦОМ, ВЫПОЛНЯЮЩИМ ФУНКЦИИ ИНОСТРАННОГО АГЕНТА to everything they publish.
dravsi: “Dugin often appeared in influential Russian media 20 years ago. What it meant is that he belongs to the circle of people who often appear there, and is considered by them to be a thinker.”
Dugin was an influence on people close to Putin, though. He was considered credible in Russian media.
I do not know. In 2014 specifically people in TV were scary (and much scarier than Putin).
Then I did not follow news. Then a year ago I checked the news and discovered that I am now living in a fascist country and the change is rapid and recent. I do not know whether it is Putin or just a certain community/ideology has gained power.
The Making of Vladimir Putin (archived): a long NY Times piece that has a good description of how he’s changed since taking power.
there is also Venedictov’s classficition. In his classification it’s Putin 3.5 now (unless he has uploaded an update and it is Putin 4)
– Yeltsin’s course
– realizing that “this all was some морок” (V’s words, not P’s), and following his own course
– (after 2011) reactionary Putin
– (2018) мракобесный
It goes without saying — but I’ll say it anyway — that the Times piece is repellently smug about the West in general and the US in particular, and takes for granted that everything “we” do is good and righteous. However, that doesn’t affect what they have to say about Putin.
(meduza. The words are copied from kemerovo.ru though)
Braille for З and Z is the same…
takes for granted that everything “we” do is good and righteous
Well, where “we” excludes Trump. But yes, the whole thing reeks of the fundamental attribution error: Putin does thus and so because it’s his (rotting) nature, whereas “we” merely try to keep the peace (or whatever).
That said, FAE theory turns out to rest on the same shaky foundations as the rest of psychology: a meta-analysis shows that while the effect is robust, it has an effect size of zero. In addition, the term “fundamental attribution error” is inherently propagandistic, as if it was always an error. Lastly. of course people act both because of who they are and where they are: that’s basic to the producer-product worldview.
Ah, we have our first 110% Gauleiter.
I’ve read elsewhere that supposedly there’s a joke going around in Russia: “Why are Putin’s fascists using ‘Z’?” “Because someone in his mafia stole the other half of the swastika.”
*********var. ёбнулись (by mood: the difference is mostly rhythmical).ебанулись
In MY time the forum convention was е**нулись or е*анулись. Being intelligent people we speak directly and swear badly, but there are ladies (gentlemen) around and we need to acknowledge their presence. Still they are intelligent people too, so the exact from must be recognizable, so they do not have to ask.
Что за манера, ставить звёздочки вместо начальной буквы и суффиксов?
Как будто Пушкина читаешь. “Наружу ******, милый вид” – вот и гадай, сиська это или титька.
I wouldn’t go that far. Here’s a clear expression of unhappiness with something NATO did:
What it does not do is criticize in one direction or the other. It completely avoids implying that Ukraine and Georgia should either have been offered “an action plan that would make such membership possible” or told no. I think that’s because the NYT has crafted itself into the pinnacle of the art of bothsiderism.
In keeping with this, there are striking omissions:
“Now”, in 2005? Wasn’t Putin already convinced, when it was happening in 2004, that the Orange Revolution was entirely Hillary Clinton’s doing?
But you can’t take sides on something that isn’t there, can you.
Nested within this, note the complete avoidance of any hint at whether “a neoconservative vision” might be a good or a bad thing. Describing it makes it look bad, so it isn’t described.
No bothsiderism there. I think that’s because this statement is a potential criticism of neither any Republicans nor any Democrats.
I think the NYT interprets journalistic neutrality as steering precisely in the middle between the two political parties of, specifically, the US. Anything that can’t touch either party is fair game for being stated as a fact. Facts, on the other hand, that one of the parties denies cannot be stated as such.
Ha! A criticism of the Obama administration! …No, it’s blamed on Putin in the preceding paragraph. Mostly. Probably.
OK, that’s criticism of Obama, but it’s framed as hindsight.
Direct criticism of the West, namechecking the US – but not any political figures in the US, and therefore neither of the parties. That’s safe.
(The last sentence is quite misleading in context, of course. That started in the middle of the Cold War and is a famous part of a James Bond flick.)
There’s the political figure in the US! But the NYT decided on 6/1 that criticizing that one was safe. He remains the only one.
Back to linguistics… or copyediting.
Thank you! I was wondering. 🙂
All true; I exaggerated as usual. And one can’t expect any more from the Gray Lady. But I didn’t want non-US readers to think I was uncritically endorsing the article.
@David Marjanović: Ah, The Living Daylights, from way back in 1987. I had expected that sending a defector to the West through a petroleum pipeline would be the silliest, most unrealistic thing in the movie, until they showed Timothy Dalton and Maryam d’Abo having a great time riding the Hochbahn at Prater.
It’s a natural-gas pipeline, not a petroleum pipeline. Still silly, but decidedly less.
I wanted to explain bothsiderism to my fellow non-US readers. 🙂
In the Earth science biz, petroleum refers not just to liquid oil, but also to natural gas (smaller molecules) and paraffins (larger). I specifically chose that word because I didn’t want to check what they say about the contents of the pipeline in the movie. In real life, it would be gas, but who knows what the script would say? (And, in light of recent events, does Putin know his Siberian pipeline is trans?)
Huh. I wouldn’t have guessed that from the oleum part.
(…and in German, Petroleum is specifically what you burn in petroleum lamps; otherwise it’s near-calqued as Erdöl. Likewise, natural gas is Erdgas.)
Now I know what Ukrainian/South Russian h sounds like with Arabic accent.
Not bad, actually.
I asked Arabic speakers when stuggling with x 7 h 3 what my Russian laringeal fricative sounds like, the answer was “something strange”
@David Marjanović: I checked the OED and was surprised to find that petroleum is a very old word, in fact (so far as the OED knows) being first attested in English, although presumably not having originated there:
However, that doesn’t affect what they have to say about Putin.
How the United States Created Vladimir Putin
@Hat But I didn’t want non-US readers to think I was uncritically endorsing the article.
(Of course you weren’t. Plain to see.)
@DM I wanted to explain bothsiderism to my fellow non-US readers.
As a non-US reader enjoying a functioning democracy, I see bothsiderism only doing harm to politics in the U.S. — and indeed it’s poisoning everybody else’s politics. The disgraceful treatment of Ketanji Brown Jackson is not bothsiderable with the treatment of Brett Kavanagh: in the one case, it’s the Republican line of questioning that’s undermining respect for U.S. institutions; in the other, it was the behaviour of the nominee so undermining (and I mean his actual behaviour under questioning — that snarl of the over-privileged being called to account — not merely/not only the alleged past behaviour).
Invading the Capitol is not an act of freedom of speech/civil disobedience bothsiderable with the Selma marches.
Covid lockdowns and so-called vaccine mandates (New Zealand does not have/never has had compulsory vaccination) are not bothsiderable with the Warsaw Ghetto or Mengele’s experiments. And yet there’s now a splinter of NZ society who thinks they can say such stuff out loud, and set up a ‘Freedom Camp’ on the grounds of the Parliament, and daub swastikas on our war memorials (and wear MAGA hats and fly Trump 2024 flags).
Bothsiderism destroys the nuance needed to preserve the ‘strategic ambiguity’ of Taiwan or “Ukraine and Georgia [being] left with an empty promise, consigned to drift indefinitely in a strategic no man’s land” — which realpolitikly is the best they can hope for.
The U.S. doesn’t have a functioning democracy so far as I can see — this is going back over decades. Bothsiderism might be an adjunct to consensus politics; but there’s no working consensus; then bothsiderism works as a clapper in a cracked bell: it only makes the discord louder.
The people of Ukraine are suffering too much already. Any attempt at peace must avoid the bothsiderism clangour of counterposing Putinism vs U.S. ‘democracy’ with its repellent notions of ‘freedoms’.
«Это не просто война. Все гораздо хуже»
Интервью Владимира Зеленского Ивану Колпакову, Михаилу Зыгарю, Тихону Дзядко и Владимиру Соловьеву из «Коммерсанта»
https://meduza.io/feature/2022/03/27/eto-ne-prosto-voyna-vse-gorazdo-huzhe
Almost two hours, and the blurb is useless. Could you summarize the video?
Ah, so it’s in Meduza! I was wondering. 🙂 Interesting that they’re from the Kommersant; I wonder if that says something about Alisher “totally not my hyper-mega-yacht” Usmanov.
…one of them is from the Kommersant.
I had almost forgotten the Kommersant even existed still. Did they take it over and make it Putinesque or did they not bother?
@Bathrobe, yes.
It is an accurate representation of how a certain segment sees the situation.
Not knowing this view is comparable to not knowing in what part of the world Russia is: it is possible of course to discuss politics without geography, but it is easier to first learn some geography.
Usmanov has taken it over and apparently toned it down, and he’s personally Putinesque enough to be sanctioned, but I don’t know anything more specific than that.
…and it’s taking me well over two hours to read with my cutesily small vocabulary. I’ll interrupt, and resume later…
he’s personally Putinesque enough to be sanctioned
You mean “allowed to publish,” I presume. The verb “sanction” is so multivalent as to be useless except in very clear contexts.
The verb “sanction” is so multivalent as to be useless except in very clear contexts.
I have eliminated this annoying word from my active and passive vocab. As a bonus, I now don’t have to worry whether to treat a context of its use as clear. Anyhoo, if such contexts were clear, the word would not be multivalent, and thus sanctionable.
Ditto sanktionieren.
Funnily enough, it’s a rare case where it’s true in both major meanings of “sanctioned”
Well, Russia is most certainly in the Northern Hemisphere but whether East or West is a question of where you see fit to draw lines.
Oops. I meant the EU has put sanctions on him.
Echo Moskvy was state owned (and was simultaneously blocked by Youtube because of this and by ours:-))
“Ивану Колпакову, Михаилу Зыгарю, Тихону Дзядко и Владимиру Соловьеву из «Коммерсанта»”
“из «Коммерсанта»” I guess, because he is not THAT В. Соловьёв.
Yes: “специальный корреспондент «Коммерсанта» Владимир Соловьев (не путать с одноименным пропагандистом)”.
(Yessss, I guessed the ё correctly.)
the Times piece is repellently smug about the West in general and the US in particular, and takes for granted that everything “we” do is good and righteous.
As the U.S. exported its culture to an astonishing degree, it imported very little. The result: American parochialism (Review of Sam Lebovic’s A Righteous Smokescreen: Postwar America and the Politics of Cultural Globalization.)
Post-WWII restrictions “amounted to a guarantee of the _American_ right to spread information and culture across the globe.” “Containment, Lebovic shows, wasn’t just a territorial strategy committed to holding back Soviet expansion into Europe and Asia. Rather, it began at the American border and it involved policing the flow of people and ideas that were potentially inimical to the American status quo (this form of containment caught a much wider array of ideologies than just Soviet communism in its net). An Iron Curtain, to rejig Churchill’s famous speech about Soviet policies in Eastern Europe, had descended around the U.S.”
Yeah, I don’t think many Americans have the faintest conception of that.
I guessed the ё correctly.
solovéj “nightingale”, Solovjóv “Sparrow[‘]s”, but solóvushka, diminutive
vorobéj “sparrow”, Vorobjóv, but voróbushek, voróbyshek (у/ы)
Tolstój, Tolstája, Tolstýje (all are relatives of the most bearded Tolstoy),
tólstyj “fat”, “a fat person”
and usually
Ivanóv, but some of them are Ivánov. E.g. painters: Ivánov, Ivanóv.
Sliver-Age poets are usually -ánov.
Ivánov the co-author of Gamkrelidze is Ivánov, like his father (a writer Vsévolod I.).
But there is of course a Slavist Ivanóv.
*runs screaming*
I’m reminded of the extremely common surname 王 Wáng and the much less common surname 汪 Wāng, or the three Cantonese surnames Ng…
There are a number of three-syllable names with possible stress on any of the syllables, like Babenkov.
*runs screaming*
Keep on running!
Алекса́ндр Алекса́ндрович Але́хин (распространённое написание и произношение «Алёхин»[1] ошибочно[2][3];
Алехин, Александр Александрович
An aspect of the fallout from the special operation:
Ташкент — город хлебный 2.0 Россияне бегут в Узбекистан от репрессий и мобилизации, как раньше бежали от голода и Гитлера
https://mediazona.ca/article/2022/03/28/tashkentagain
….startign from Khiva Mennonites. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claas_Epp_Jr.
(or not actually starting… who knows)
And do not forget Чебышев. He spelled his surname Чебышев, but pronounced it Chebyshóv. Professors and students in some universities (consciously) retain it, others read it as Chébyshev. Fierce debates in WP (not only on the talk page) reneved for many years and they chose Чебышёв:/
P.S. juha, thank you for the piece about Tashkent. I could follow local news, but I did not:( Also seeing fresh impressions of unprepared Russians who move there is incredebly interesting, I wish they wrote more about their impressions of the city/country…
See here:
Сторонники возвращения буквы в печать утверждают, что необязательность употребления этой буквы на печати исказила массу личных имён, и множество имён нарицательных. Так, например, буква “ё” исчезла из написаний (а затем и произношений) фамилий: кардинала Ришелье (фр. Richelieu), философа и писателя Монтескье (фр. Montesquieu), физика Рентгена (нем. Rontgen), микробиолога и химика Луи Пастера (фр. Pasteur), художника и востоковеда Николая Рёриха, математика Пафнутия Чебышева и др. (в последнем случае даже с изменением места ударения: Чебышев вместо правильного Чебышёв).
@ David Marjanović
The video is two hours but the talk is much less than that, about 40 minutes if I remember rightly. The rest is Q&A. The speaker once worked in Soviet propaganda and says his speech is partly mea culpa.
I would recommend even more highly another talk at Youtube, Why is Ukraine the West’s Fault?, delivered in 2015. It is eerily prescient of the current situation. It also has Q&A, which makes it look longer than it actually is.
Я уверен, что наш народ это примет, если захочет, потому что все все равно будет так или иначе голосоваться народными избраниями.
I guess sleepy Zelinski meant …избранниками.
“Х будет голосоваться” (Х голосуется) is parliamentary slang for “Х будет вынесен на голосование”, “по вопросу Х будет голосование” (Х вынесен на голосование, по Х идёт голосование).
Though, of course, his langauge policy is ugly.
This lost me at the point where he started talking about promoting democracy, as I think this description cannot really be applied to giving moral (and perhaps even material) support to organisers of a putsch against an elected (however corrupt, unpopular, etc.) President, except with some kind of special pleading and truisms about breaking eggs to make omelettes.
@Bathrobe,
English WP does not give a good idea of what Pozner is for USSR. But he hosted this thing: https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Телемост.
He is introduced in the video as “journalist #1” of Perestroyka, but for Soviet people of the time… in the row of images that form the athmosphere of the time, those телемосты are as important as Gorbachev:)
And the very fact that such talks were aired felt like a historical event.
Conversations in this form also were unusual for Soviet TV (but became the main form of our modern TV).
The guy is absolutely worth taking a look at, maybe for historical reasons (but maybe it is better to watch an actual historical Pozner/Donahue)
the piece about Tashkent
Есть их у нас, as they say.
To boldly go where no echt-Russian has gone before, or tackling unfamiliar Uzbek food:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DX-9dzJxOM
@LH, I do not know if WP editors invented this spelling, but I have not seen it before they chose it for WP.
I am totally accustomed to Чебышев.
Also it is how he wrote his surname and like with Алехин there was a point I think: following the noble Slavonic norm, cf. совершенный/совершённый perfect/made, Владимир/Володя (the official form of the name Володимѣръ is slavonicized, but not the short form) etc.). If his family changed their surname, it would be Чебышов. So it is not a case of “omitting the trema”, it is a case of not adding one where there never was one.
And to me it feels weird. There are шёлк-шёлка-шелка (shólk-shólka-shelká, silk–of silk–silks), шёл-`шедший, but the possive suffix is always -ev (unstressed) or -ov. -ëv is weird.
noble Slavonic
Or literary Russian as opposed to vilalge Russian.
Cf. Slovak Rusyns. Their first grammar (1768? I do not remember) is called “Russian grammar” – but it seems (I haven’t seen it) it is Slavonic grammar. Russian thus means “our acrolect/Dachsprache”.
Чебышёв
It’s only natural if the surname goes back to чебеш ‘chick’.
себеш
Etymology
From onomatopoeic сеп-сеп (sep-sep).
Compare to Tatar чебеш (çebeş), чеби (çebi, “chick”), Kazakh шіби (şibï, “chick”).
Pronunciation
IPA(key): [sɪ̞.ˈβɪ̞ʃ]
Hyphenation: се‧беш
Noun
себеш • (sebeš)
1. chick, young chicken
2. (by extension) chick, young bird
In Tashkent, there is Институт Шредера, which is clearly Schröder.
YO!:
LH, i was trying to find in Google Books the specific context where P and Ch used “Чебышёв”, that is, a line:
“а великий русский математик Пафнутий Львович Чебышев”
and Google offered
Zakony i pravila russkago proiznoshenii͡a (“laws and rules of Russian pronunciation”),
Vasiliĭ Ilʹich Chernyshev · 1908
He is Chernyshóv:))))))
But is it just a phonetical spelling in P and Ch? In textbooks he has always been Чебышев (likely now Чебышёв because everyone now learns THE correct spelling (and knowledge) from WP – and WP is arbitrary).
In the “Mathematical Encyclopedia” he is of course Чебышев (but, of course, Нётер). It does not have a biogrpahical section, even though it is 5 volumes.
In the Mathematical Encyclopedical Dictionary (1 vol.) there is a biographical chapter with portraits.
ЧЕБОТАРЁВ Николай Григорьевич…
ЧЕБЫШÉВ (произносится Чебышёв)….
Änd honeslty, it is not a problem that some say Чéбышев.
It is even cute when a bunch of particular snobs, students of students of his students tell everyone that he is /-óv/ when other universiuties say /-ev/
You don’t want a world without footnotes, do you?!
@Plastic Paddy, the pattern that Putin can find a common language with a certain kind of regimes is there. The West indeed often works with a different kind of regimes (but actually many of traditional allies are official monarchies). So maybe indeed it is more comfortable working with them, I do not know.
The fact is that Putin does gather authoritarian regimes. I guess he is simply more comfortable with hierarchies. When something has a head, you can
– make the head your subordinate
– buy it
– come to an agreement with it
– threaten it
but they are controllable… He can work with them.
But anyway, the speaker needed to refer to this pattern somehow, so “democracy”. Yes, it is not a neutral word (and maybe does not correctly explain what is that thing that the West likes and that sometimes does not like the West).
He understands them, that’s what I am saying.
With German names there’s always the question if they were actually borrowed from an unrounded pronunciation. Over half the German dialects have unrounded the rounded front vowels, and until the mid-20th century (at least) there were people who had serious trouble pronouncing the rounded ones.
Oh, is this Mearsheimer warning that Ukraine should not join NATO?
Ukraine hasn’t joined NATO, and it turns out that’s exactly what made it possible for Putin to attack it. He’s not attacking Estonia or Latvia, tiny countries with large Russian minorities that we’ve previously talked about – evidently because that would trigger Article 5.
Mearsheimer talked about three prongs in Western efforts to integrate Ukraine with the West: ‘democratisation’, integration with the EU, and Nato, all of which made Russia extremely nervous. Plus the fact that the Russians (Putin) felt betrayed by the West’s failure to keep its promises.
You don’t want a world without footnotes, do you?!
Боже сохрани!
Mearsheimer talked about three prongs in Western efforts to integrate Ukraine with the West: ‘democratisation’, integration with the EU, and Nato, all of which made Russia extremely nervous. Plus the fact that the Russians (Putin) felt betrayed by the West’s failure to keep its promises.
Who cares what makes Russia nervous? Nothing would keep Putin from feeling paranoid/betrayed short of the entire submission of all of Eurasia to him permanently. I admit I used to mutter about NATO’s eastward expansion, but now I agree with DM that Ukraine’s not joining NATO is exactly what made it possible for Putin to attack it. I wish it were possible for countries to just coexist peacefully without military alliances, but as long as there are Putins, there will be a need for NATOs.
@DM, LH years ago a MGIMO student retold me what her professor told :
– Yeltsin was a shame for Russia because vodka
– Gorbachev is an idiot, because he gave away East Germany. A whole country. Just for nothing! Did not even sell it.
I happen to disagree with her and her professor. It is immoral to keep a whole country as hostages.
Exactly right.
@drasvi
What I meant to say is that the point Mearsheimer lost me is when he talked about “protecting or establishing democracy” as a US foreign policy goal, particularly in the context of the Orange Revolution, which removed a democratically elected President by force. What you say about Putin seems to be true, and I find you more worth listening to than Mearsheimer….
@PP, I understand. But this pattern (Putin hangs with this type of regimes, the West hangs with another type) needs to be referred to somehow. There is a split along a certain line.
So he referred to it as “promoting democracy”. The words are not perfect, but he needed same label and this one is familiar… Communicatively it makes sense, but
….does not sound like he is promoting it.
Ooh, scare quotes.
NATO is a defensive alliance, and the EU isn’t a military alliance at all. So what is it that made Vladimir “Russia” Putin extremely nervous?
It makes sense that he was suspicious of NATO. As I’ve said before, I used to think NATO should have been dissolved – honorably discharged – in 1991 when its entire raison d’être was suddenly gone. I think it was kept alive by American cultural anxiety: some people simply couldn’t believe the Soviet Union was gone for good – after all its nukes weren’t. This was parodied here and played straight in… I forgot the name of that ever-so-slightly embarrassing Hollywood flick where an explicitly Russian extremist hijacks a plane and starts to murder hostages until the POTUS personally saves the world. Putin, and no doubt many others in Russia, probably thought NATO had a secondary function that had not disappeared: to be an instrument for exerting American power in Europe. I don’t think the US would need NATO for that, but perhaps that makes it easier, what do I know.
Anyway, when all the countries from Estonia to Bulgaria begged to join NATO and were eventually granted their request, I thought they were being paranoid for purely historical reasons.
So why would Putin go from “suspicious” to “extremely nervous”? After all, Putin eventually managed to buy all the extreme-right parties in all of Europe except Poland, along with a few loud leftists; RT and Sputnik became the preferred news sources for a lot of people worldwide, and Putin’s influence on Twitter and Facebook, not to mention Cambridge Analytica, is hard to overstate.
What he’s extremely nervous about is exactly the scare-quoted democratisation. That’s what the EU stands for. Once the Russians notice that right in front of their noses there’s a prospering democratic country full of Russians and of people that are not easy to distinguish from Russians, they just might figure they can have a prosperous democracy, too, and then he’s in serious trouble.
(That’s the exact same problem Xi has with Taiwan and used to have with Hongkong.)
Remember, Putin can’t just retire to his illegal palace. He’s in power for the rest of his life. Once he’s out of power, he’s useless to the rest of the mafia, but he knows way too much. He’d be found dead the next day under extremely, extremely mysterious circumstances. He has boxed himself in (as if symbolized by the bunker he lives in), and it’s entirely his fault.
If you mean the supposed promises that NATO wouldn’t be enlarged, those are very poorly documented. It looks like some Western politicians did say such things at a few occasions in the 90s, but they never wrote them down, and they never had the power to actually enforce them any more than Trump could have bought Greenland.
Georgia and Ukraine, in contrast, have not been allowed to join NATO…
Then he was unceremoniously reelected in 2010, and nobody tried to stop him until he faked the election of 2014. In the ensuing revolution it turned out he was a kleptocrat; he fled to Russia rather than face justice for his blatant crimes.
Putin is not a cartoon villain:(
The Right of Revolution is the last of those self-evident truths in the Declaration of Independence—the truth to which all the others are working up to.
@brett, dm
My point was about labeling certain actions as “promoting democracy” and stating this to be a US foreign policy goal. I do not see that encouraging
selected peoples to remove their elected leaders (kleptocrat, election-faking, cryptoFascist/Communist, whatever the “reason” for removing them is) by force fits my naive definition of “promoting democracy”. Even if you change the label to “enforcing the doctrine of Jeffersonian permanent revolution” (which perhaps fortunately has not been enforced in its country of origin), I have difficulty with stating it as a US foreign policy goal, due to the extremely selective and inconsistent nature of its application.
@dm
Finland is a prospering (although less so since EU sanctions against Russia started) democratic country (also with x% ethnic Russians, with x some number under 5). But would you describe Poland or Hungary like this? My Euro MP at the time, the redoutable Patricia McKenna, stated at the time that the accession conditions applied to Poland, Czech Republic, Baltics would just create a two-tier Europe.
In other news:
Deputy of the Russian State Duma Mikhail Delyagin, speaking at the state television of the Russian Federation, called for the “punishment” of Azerbaijan for “aggressive actions” in Karabakh. He also conducted a survey on the topic of whether “is it worth it to hit the oil industry of Azerbaijan with nuclear weapons”. The Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov and the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, had to intervene in this matter. Only after that Delyagin apologized to the Azerbaijanis.
https://jam-news.net/russian-mp-threatened-azerbaijan-with-a-nuclear-strike-the-kremlin-had-to-intervene/
Putin is not a cartoon villain:(
Give him time; he’s working on it.
I’ve got to agree with DM. Whether Putin rationalises it that way himself or not, I’m pretty sure that is an important part of what’s driving him at this point.
the Orange Revolution, which removed a democratically elected President by force.
Umm (apologies for not keeping up). I though the point was that the elections “were rigged by the authorities in favour of [Yanukovych] ” [wp]. So he was maybe elected, but not democratically. (Or is this too much of a ‘no real Scotsman’ argument?)
Yes it’s puzzling how come Yanukovych was then elected 5 years later. And then ousted 4 years after that. That might be described as “removing a democratically elected President”. Or do we (again) say his corruption and abuse of power had negated democratic legitimacy?
(How to characterise all that in a way that doesn’t legitimise the Jan 6 attempted insurrection?)
Membership in the EU has prevented them from transitioning into full authoritarianism. They’re certainly close, but in Poland the opposition almost won very recently, and in Hungary it’s probably about to win, even though that’s taking an Israel-style coalition of absolutely everyone against Orbán.
Economically prospering compared to Russia, though? Yes.
Not that much. The Yushchenko/Tymoshenko government didn’t fulfill the high hopes placed on it, and people figured good relations with Russia were important, so they brought Yanukovych back. Good science: try two options, then pick the one that sucks less.
Then, however, Yanukovych failed to deliver as well, so he faked the election of 2014. The ensuing revolution revealed his palace; that’s what turned the public opinion decisively westwards.
By recognizing that there’s such a thing as a fact. The US election of 2020 was, in fact, not faked, and Biden had not, in fact, engaged in corruption or other abuses of power. (I’m prepared to argue over his not very smart son if there’s interest.)
@dm
The question was whether e.g., Poland was prosperous in an absolute, not relative sense (for a relative sense, why not take say Austria or Portugal for the comparison instead of Russia)? But I see you are a glass half full man, whereas I tend to be a glass half empty man for Eastern Europe, and this bias may be affecting my judgment.
I can’t stand Bret Stephens, but I’m afraid he’s all too plausible here:
“the mass killing of civilians puts immense pressure ”
WP, Russian bombing in Syria: ~4000 civilian casualties, ~11000 combatants
WP, Western bombing in Syria: ~4000 civilian casualties, ~12000 combatants
WP, Donbass (8 years before the invasion) ~3000 civilian, ~4000 pro-Russian, ~4000 the other side.
WP, invasion in Iraq: ~7000 civilian, ~5-10k combatants.
WP, Iraq pre-2011: ~100 000 civilian, ~25k combatants
What was it called, “shock and awe”?
Sounds good compared to “intimidating Ukraine by targeting residential areas”?
The last thing I want is diverting criticism from Russia, and I support drawing attention to what they are drawing attention to (war crimes).
But I hear the bullshit about how we are figting nice clean “operation” (not a war) everyday. How we “target military objects” AS IF soldiers, Russian, Ukrainain, Syrian, any are not human beings.
When I do not hear “war is EVIL” and instead hear about how “Russia fights a dirty war” (as opposed to clean) from the other side I am disturbed.
Putin did something terrible when he STARTED it. But I can compare this war to others.
I don’t think Bret Stephens makes any sense. So far, Crimea and Donbass were charity cases. And if Putin thinks that what Russia needs most economically is a bit more natural resources, he is even stupider than I thought. Also, Putin didn’t need a pretext for purges, closing oppositional (or independent) press or whatever else is imputed to his motives. I understand that it is an “opinion” piece, but could people base their opinions on facts or else write books of imaginative literature.
What was it called, “shock and awe”?
Sounds good compared to “intimidating Ukraine by targeting residential areas”?
Good lord, I hope nobody here thinks I’m in any way defending the US war in Iraq, or any other stupid, destructive US military operations. Yes, war is EVIL, and this is the war that’s going on now, so this is what we’re talking about.
So far, Crimea and Donbass were charity cases.
But they’ll be less so if he connects them up with Russia more securely.
Look, I don’t think Stephens is necessarily right (and neither does he), I just said I found the idea plausible. Bullying Ukraine to pick up more territory and natural resources makes more sense than trying to conquer the entire country. But nobody said these things have to make sense.
Ok, this is probably public information at this point, two days later:
> the Ukrainians have now gone on the offensive. Counterattacks around Kyiv have just liberated the suburb of Irpin and driven the Russians back at least 20 miles. The invaders are not in artillery range of the city center and Ukrainian air defenses preclude heavy bombing, enabling the return of some ordinary life in the capital.
@LH, I once mentioned: in 2014 I stopped watching news completely because of their reports of war crimes in Donbass and suffering of people in Donbass.
I knew very well that people in Donbass do suffer. And if I wanted to listen about war crimes committed by Ukrainian side specifically (but I do not know why I would feel stronger about war crimes depending on the “side”) – I would go to the (recently closed) Memorial and listen to Orlov’s lecture about war crimes committed by Ukrainians side.
The problem is that the whores on TV would show fake strories about suffering and fake war crimes, because it is cheaper and because they do not care. Listening to such stories without knowing if they are true, and having a good reason to think they are not, and knowing that there are actual terrible things happening there was unbearable.
I mean there is a good ethical reason to present stories about suffering objectively. That what is done in Ukraine is terrible is out of question absolutely.
My comment was not directed at you and I assure you: I explode, in Russian, aloud (privately, though) when I hear Russian narrative about our neat “operation”. But the assumtion here is “there are good wars and bad wars. Ours is good because we are targeting military objects”. When I turn on foreign news (not “Western”, foreign) and hear the same “there are good wars and bad wars. Their is bad, because they are targeting residential area/civilian infrastructure”. I too want to expode and so I did.
Of course starting from 24 February I do care HOW Russian generals and soldiers act. If they are mad enough to start it, then what else they will do? I FEAR for Ukrainians and their cities. So I do watch. I watched other wars before.
I feel the same way. I’ve been hating war as long as I can remember. I don’t understand why people keep going along with it (the common people who have to fight, not the maniacs who send them to war).
Oh, that’s easy. There’s always the loophole of self-defense. Convince people that bombing hospitals is what you need to do to get rid of “nazis” or whatever.
In fact, that worked really well in WW2. Not many — not enough, anyway — questioned the killing of hundreds of thousands of civilians and the destruction of cities throughout Germany and Italy. It served no purpose, other than to satisfy Lindemann and such crazies, but the public and the people in the bombers didn’t question it because there were, in fact, actual nazis to be put down.
Oh, that’s easy. There’s always the loophole of self-defense. Convince people that bombing hospitals is what you need to do to get rid of “nazis” or whatever.
That depends on 1) complete control of media, so you can convince people of lies, and more importantly 2) people’s prior willingness to drop everything, pick up a gun, and go get killed because the Big Guy says so. If people weren’t so willing to place the good of the Big Guy over their own, it wouldn’t work.
I mean, I don’t like nazis either, but I wouldn’t pick up a gun. One of the stupider questions I was asked when I was applying for conscientious objector status was “What if everybody thought like you?” “There wouldn’t be any war!” Talk about a slam dunk.
“One of the stupider questions I was asked when I was applying for conscientious objector status was “What if everybody thought like you?” “There wouldn’t be any war!””
It seems obvious to us, but apparently it does not occur to most people to just not be aggressive.
“Convince people that bombing hospitals is what you need to do to get rid of “nazis” or whatever.”
I think the loophole is the concept of blame. I do not see how it is defence. “We are bombing Donbass to defend Donbass from bombing“????
But enough hatred to Nazis and it is all right.
Yes Azov battalion is partly Nazi, see WP.
They fight fiercely because “they know, they can expect no mercy” says a DPR commander. All right, so the objective is securing a strategically important city and killing Nazi.
Well, DPR fighters are different from ordianary Russians. You do not need to sell it to them.
With ordinary Russians, I guess noble rage .
You know: you rush in my neighbourhood screaming: “they killed a [Jewish, Muslim, …] boy and raped a girl!”. And then I run in their quarter and kill two and rape two. And so on.
Look, I don’t think Stephens is necessarily right (and neither does he), I just said I found the idea plausible. Bullying Ukraine to pick up more territory and natural resources makes more sense than trying to conquer the entire country. But nobody said these things have to make sense.
I can understand people trying to make sense out of what doesn’t, but I agree with D.O. – if those were Putin’s goals, he chose a quite inefficient way to achieve them. And while he seemingly neither understands nor values the creative / professional middle class, assuming that he wanted to actually drive them out of the country and started a war to achieve that seems over the top to me. It’s like assuming that Hitler wanted Germany in ruins and half of it under Communist rule because that’s what he achieved (BTW, there is an old Soviet joke about this: What were Hitler’s last words? – “Inform Comrade Stalin that the mission has been successfully fulfilled.”)
On the other hand, declaring that what has been achieved is what was intended is time-honoured organisational behaviour, so if Putin and an isolated Russis will hold on to some chunks of Ukraine at the end, expect that getting said chunks and freeing Russia from the economic chains binding it to the West will be declared to have been the goals from the start.
Sure. I just hope he doesn’t manage to hang on to the chunks, because that will encourage other revanchists, like Xi.
Yep, I said way back Putin wants the east (esp industrial Kharkiv and south coast down to Crimea). Attacking Kiev is to pin down the defence forces so he can secure the transport lines.
Irrespective of economic/resource considerations, the east is territorially adjacent. It’s the standard buffer zone tactic.
Many will agree that the invasion of Iraq was a crime. Even more will agree that it did irrepareable damage to the post-war strive for international rule of law. The major divide in the west is between those who mourn the idea of international rule of law and those who say “good riddance”. It was the latter bunch who orchestrated the war just for that purpose.
An isolated Russia is a very likely and very destructive outcome of the war. Our problem is really not that Europe’s too dependent on Russia, because Russia’s even more dependent on Europe, and that’s power. The problem is that Russia for a long time has been ruled by an uncontested leadership that no longer sees itself constrained by normal concerns like the prosperity and future of its constituents. Once the smoke has settled, Europe will have to reinvent the Schuman doctrine yet again and get Russia on board.
But for that to happen, Russia will have to realize that the greatest threat to Russia is being ruled by an unpredictable and insular regime outside the reach of international law. What would Russia get in return? Stable trade, but also security through a renaissance for and a renewal of international institutions. Good for the country but bad for the current elite, I.e. good.
Also, the US would have to realize that to build institutions the most powerful will have to yield most power. What would the US get in return? Increased international stability and reduced need for military capacity, and an external system keeping it off the path to absolute corruption that comes with absolute power. Good for the country but bad for the current elite, I.e. good.
And Europe? To take on board even more members or closely connected institutional partners it would have to reform its institutions and increase its ability to make common, broadly legitimate decisions. Good for the union but bad for the current elite, I.e. good.
And the likely outcome? Russia will be cut off and forced into junior partnership with China, playing
BlairLukashenko to Xi’sBushPutin. The US will prefer polishing its self-image as protector of the free world with the right and ability to use unlimited power whenever it sees fit. Europe will be caught in yet another stalemate, torn between the need to include Russia in the European economy and the fear for Russian nationalism, and between the need for American involvement and the fear for the future of American democracy.So what do I suggest? A realization that stable, widely representative democracies are fundamentally important to peace. A generation of politicians taking upon them the burden of being states(wo)men rather than poseurs and using the fresh horror to create a new Pan-European-Atlantic framework of security through democracy. An international constitutional treaty and a treaty of mutual protection for all countries adhering to it. A supranational court with the authority to strike down any attempt to undermine democracy and the rule of law in any country, to protect the rights of all individual citizens and minority groups, and to impose mandatory sanctions on countries and even order the arrest of national leaders and parliamentarians responsible for violations, even when they were democratically elected to do so.
Undemocratic? No, that’s the point of democratic constitutions. The democratically elected authoritarian could always withdraw from the constitutional treaty, but that would mean immediate, automatic exclusion from international trade and travel and from the treaty of mutual protection.
The US will prefer polishing its self-image as protector of the free world with the right and ability to use unlimited power whenever it sees fit.
I’m afraid that’s a virtual certainty.
Everything Trond just said.
The point is Ukraine. It’s a democracy, it’s more prosperous than Russia, it’s right next door to Russia, and it’s full of ethnic Russians and of people who are close enough, so that’s what people in Russia are going to compare themselves to.
Bret Stephens is a dead-tree troll.
Yes, the gas & oil fields are real, they were in a YouTube video over a month ago; it would take a decade or two to develop them, which in many cases would require hydrofracking (indeed that’s why they haven’t already been developed), but in the long run they could be a nice bonus for Putin if he had them and Ukraine did not.
If that’s all Putin had wanted, he’d have stopped after sending troops into the “People’s Republics” on February 23rd. He would not have bothered shelling almost all big cities in the morning of February 24th while dropping paratroopers (i.e. mythologized riot police) on the airport of Kyiv (Hostomel). Neither would he have begun to level Kharkiv, let alone involved Belarus at all (long before the war, remember). Asking Toqayev for troops after a few days doesn’t fit this picture either.
Now the army is a paper bear in the eyes of the world, 7 or 8 generals are dead and so is the lieutenant commander of the Black Sea fleet, and the losses are staggering. Oh, and Putin looks stupider than he ever did since before he was mayor of St. Petersburg. All according to plan, if we take Stephens anywhere near seriously.
This is all so screamingly obvious I really can’t imagine Stephens hasn’t noticed it. He’s not being honest. And the New York Times prints this deliberately crafted bullshit because it believes journalistic objectivity requires having one “left-wing” and one right-wing opinion writer on staff.
I even read today that the “energy expert” Stephens cited is no such thing. It’s all just bullshit in Frankfurt’s sense – or trumpiness in Colbert’s sense: “it doesn’t even have to feel true, it just has to feel good“.
When 300,000 young, well-educated people suddenly leave, that’s going to leave a mark.
How? Nobody is going to buy all that oil and gas. Germany, for example, will be independent from Russian oil, gas and coal in two years or less. “Russia’s new energy riches” would be as useless as Russia’s 2.3 kilotonnes of gold are right now. No, selling them to China in reasonable quantities will neither be practical anytime soon, nor will it ever break even.
Including three attempts to assassinate Zelensky in the first few days, complete with “elite Kadyrovites”? And telling Lukashenko to send troops after Toqayev said no, because the huge numbers of Russian troops attacking northern Ukraine through Belarus weren’t enough?
And if he wants Kharkiv, why is he flattening it?
(“Элитные Кадыровцы” should be a band name or something.)
“It’s a democracy, it’s more prosperous than Russia, ”
Belarus is more prosperous than Russia, not Ukraine.
Ukraine is
This.
HDI 2019, 52th, 53th, 74th places, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine.
On the standard GDP-per-capita lists (using pre-war data) that one finds on the internet Ukraine is materially poorer than Belarus which is in turn materially poorer than Russia. Ukraine is at or below the level of Moldova, below all three former SSR’s in the Caucasus, and below two out of the five Post-Soviet-Stans. Now, GDP per capita (with or without PPP adjustments, not that that does much for the Ukrainians) is certainly an imperfect metric for wealth, but what’s the alternative metric that *doesn’t* still make the Ukrainians look like they’re battling it out with the Moldovans and/or Kosovars for the distinction of being the poorest folks in Europe?
FWIW, as of 5 years ago, Ukraine had the second-lowest GDP in Europe ($3400), with only Moldova ($3200) lower. That of Belarus is twice higher, Russia’s almost twice higher again. Maybe Ukraine’s economy improved since then; its currency stayed flat between the 2014 invasion (after it dropped its value threefold) and the current war. That said, I don’t know how to reconcile these numbers with its image of a developing, stable country, presumably drawing rich foreign investors.
Ed.: Double Jinx!
Ed.: Kosovo isn’t on the list I checked.
Bret Stephens is a dead-tree troll.
Yes indeed.
2021,
GDP PPP per capita is 55th, 66th, 108th and
GDP nominal per capita 64th, 84th and 119th
GDP (PPP) per capita
International Monetary Fund (2013), 58th 64th 107th
World Bank (2012), 46th 65th 100th
CIA (2013), 60th 67th 112th
Belarus wins because tehy do not have oil.
Who are our “economic miracles”? Ireland? Korea?
You know, how long did it take for Ireland to become one? 70 years I think…
How long did it take for Korea?
What if we have honest elections in Russia?
All right, we elect Putin again and nothign happens. But maybe we have free TV. And maybe next time we elect someone else and maybe not. But next time it is some other jerk.
But maybe after a few tries it is not a jerk. It is a Very Wise Woman. And how does she make us prosper?
Who are our “economic miracles”?
Albania.
Bret Stephens is a bedbug.
He would indeed appear to be a right bedbug.
(I’d never heard of him before, and I will now forget all about him. I have that power …)
On the supposition that there are not that many Canadian Davids Knight-Legg, this
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-premier-s-principal-adviser-spent-18k-in-taxpayer-money-on-trips-to-london-ndp-says-1.5358598
seems to be about the energy expert in question. He seems to have at least one area of genuine expertise.
He should have gone to Paterson, NJ, instead. It’s quite cheaper, I understand.
Спецоперация как часть третьей мировой
https://vpk-news.ru/articles/66370
Oh. They are copying the “foreign agent” thing.
Oh, come on. I am old enough to remember “Radio Liberty is funded by the United States Congress”.
Speaking of it
24 марта 2015
Новые друзья ждут продолжения банкета
За чей счет прошел конгресс российских и европейских правых радикалов в Петербурге
https://www.svoboda.org/a/26915775.html
I only learned about our new freinds in the autumn, when our media began the campaign against refugees in Germany.
Ah, so maybe I fell for the image. In that case, lots of Russians might as well!
Related: Patrick Radden Keefe’s “How Putin’s Oligarchs Bought London” (archived) is excellent and made me send off immediately for a used copy of Catherine Belton’s “Putin’s People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took on the West” (2020), which she has had to alter for new printings because she was sued by the rich stooge Roman Abramovich in Britain’s notoriously friendly libel courts:
Russians might as well! No, apparently some of us are “stopping Ukraine Nazi government’s crime agaisnt its own people” while others тихо хуеют.
Yeah, that’s really awful and if it keeps up is going to drain away sympathy for Ukraine.
@LH, V, I can’t find it. Could you share a link?
There seems to be some racism against black and asian people with regards to the evacuation, but I don’t have concrete data. I know some black and asian people have been stranded somewhere in the battlezone, but not by whom.
The only interview I saw was with a Nigerian tourist, IIRC. I can’t find it now, sorry.
‘Pushed back because we’re Black’: Africans stranded at Ukraine-Poland border
The Russian invasion of Ukraine shows racism has no boundaries
Black Ukraine refugees allege discrimination while trying to escape Russian invasion:
DM: It looks like the Ukrainian economy took a while to recover from the 2008 recession, got knocked back by the events of 2014, and has been recovering steadily until this war. A big cause for the downturn after 2014 was the loss of trade with Russia, which had been its principal trading partner. No wonder they want stronger ties to Europe.
racism has no boundaries – very true (idk about the south pole).
According to Bagui Sylla, the Ukrainian border guards said they were merely following instructions from their Polish counterparts – a claim denied by officials in Warsaw.
Soudns familiar.
LH, V, thank you!
dravsi : this is not a Ukrainian people thing, this is a policemen thing. You do realise I am otherwise completely terrified of Putin and Russia in general? And have Ghanaian refugee friends here in Bulgaria?
Don’t be silly, there’s plenty of racism in Ukraine (as there is everywhere). It’s a mistake to turn people resisting aggression into saints.
V, both I guess. Russian, Belarus and Ukrainian people are quite similar. And since the fall of USSR xenophoby is on the rise. It was already there in USSR, but then we all learned a lot of new stuff.
LH, when my cousin (a doctor) got a job in a hospital a large Russian city, she was requred to get a “registration” (of her stay in the city) so she went to the official who said “I can’t register you. You see where you were born!” and showed to her her passport so she could learn from it that she was born in Tashkent. No racism. My cousin is an ethnic Russian. But for some reason the official saw a problem…
My ex-gf’s mom worked for Niyazov, for KPMG. How’s that for fucked up?
Certain confused Turkmens in 1991 said that they heard on TV that Niyazov staged a coup in Moscow (confusing him with Yazov).
Ok, that’s borderline funny.
@drasvi
Perhaps such problems (if not caused by endemic and persistent racism) can be helped by a small charitable contribution to the Civil Servants’ Retirement Fund. Or as with grease stains or insect bites, by application of a sufficient quantity of vodka…
PlasticPaddy: working for KPMG is itself fucked up. It’s an evil corporation. That’s something you learn at age 12.
What is KPMG?
Edit: this?
David: yeah, that. My gf’s mother was one of top employers in Turnmekistan.
The list of lawsuits, settled by them for hundreds of millions year after year, is impressive. They probably have specialist accountants estimating fines in advance of every malfeasance, and working them into the budget.
I can see someone getting a pretty good comic/absurdist novel about financial-globalization types like KPMG parachuting into post-Soviet Turkmenistan full of hubris and naivete and bumping into wily locals who figure out that if they hook up with KPMG they can get a little bit of modernizing-liberalizing-globalizing camouflage for the rather old-fashioned ways they wish to conduct business now that the Marxist style of camouflage has fallen out of fashion.
@J.W. Brewer: That kind of thing was was actually a significant part (and probably the best part) of Gary Shteyngart’s 2006 novel Absurdistan.
Sounds like the Soveticate world has hijacked -stan from the Persianate world:(
J.W. Brewer: the tentative title of Iron Sunrise was Space Nazis must Die and then Space Pirates of the KPGM.
-stan means just “camp”. as in “stand”.
Габардино-Балкария.
Таджичий стан, шелками схваченный…
stan happens in Russian toponymy. Cf. Тёплый стан in Moscow.
It was not Yazov and Niyazov!!!!
It was Yanayev and Nyanayev. Nyanayev in question is not even in Google.
“We’re KPMG –
As strong as can be –
A legend of power and unity;
We go for the gold,
Together we hold
Onto our vision of global strategy!”
Not disagreeing with V on this one – that song is clearly some kind of crime in and of itself…
I’d forgotten about the corporate theme song debacle. Also:
> During March 2022, in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, KPMG announced that “our Russia and Belarus firms will leave the KPMG network”.
O. K… I mean, today is April the first, so I might have to check if this was added today to the wikipedia article. But on the other hand, they’re leaving the “network”, so I guess this means they’ve figured out a way to evade the sanctions.
It was there yesterday.
David Marjanović: thanks for checking.
Pelevin is almost as universally relevant as Kozma Prutkov. From Generation «П»:
Глупо искать здесь следы антирусского заговора. Антирусский заговор, безусловно, существует — проблема только в том, что в нём участвует всё взрослое население России.
Заговор is so much better a word than discourse.
Language Hat: I have not read Generation «П» in probably 17 years and it’s strangely apropos, even if I don’t particularly like Pelevin lately.
As LH correctly surmised, Prutkov is never far away: “Не робей перед врагом: лютейший враг человека — он сам” (Don’t shy away from the enemy, man’s fiercest enemy is himself)
And now for something slightly different: a leftist view of the far right on both the Ukrainian AND Russian sides: Beyond Putin’s Propaganda, the Far Right Is a Major Problem in Ukraine.
And from Left Voice:
Russia Is Not Fighting an ‘Anti-fascist’ War — And Neither Is Ukraine.
Заговор is so much better a word than discourse.
That’s not hard, on the ground “discourse” is a wuss word anyway, along with “narrative” and “what’s-your-pronoun”.
Is заговор like Gerede or Geschwätz ? Please remember to take Austrogermanic differences into account …
(DeepL)
https://t.me/ovdinfolive/7201
@stu
just on morphology, the za in zagovor is a preposition that indicates “with purpose” or “in the manner of” (compare Ger. für) or “(from) behind”, which is one sense here, a zagovor can be a secret or private conversation. But I suppose in the discussion sense, it is more like the over in “talking over” (compare zagladit’ “smooth over”).
Is заговор like Gerede or Geschwätz ?
It’s ‘plot, conspiracy.’
So “Заговор is so much better a word than discourse” is a comparison full of mystery, apt to mislead the ignorant.
Yes, I didn’t really get that, but I figured DM was making an obscure joke.
Oh, I misunderstood it.
From there:
Oh, come on.
The article gets mostly better after that, and yes, Ukraine’s current attitude of closing both eyes while the Azov people and various (other) Banderists are aimed in the right direction will have to end in a reckoning. But the article completely fails to point out that the Azov regiment’s political arm joined with two other extreme-right parties for the election of 2019 – and the fusion ticket failed the three-percent hurdle to get into parliament, reaching only 2.15% of the vote. And while the 2014 decision to integrate all the militias, Azov included, into the national guard, certainly legitimizes them falsely, it also takes away their ability to act independently of orders from the ministry of the interior, making them quite a bit less dangerous than before.
Russia’s extreme-right scene seems to be several times larger than that. For starters, the Wagner Group is much larger than the Azov regiment and has fucked up a lot more countries.
The more grimly determined segments of the left are desperate to find a way to blame the US (the Devil!) and Ukraine (the pet of the Devil) without outright justifying Putin’s invasion. Bothsiderism is the obvious way out, and they’re clutching it with both hands.
…
Teehee. I didn’t know they still made them like that.
KPMG: It seems that it still follows the “partnership” model, with formally independent companies sharing branding and expertise. Much like a franchise operation, where even if the mothership cuts the umbilical there is no legal way of making the baby MacDonaldses change their names. They just call it a network.
KPMG: It seems that it still follows the “partnership” model
I’m not sure your “still” is appropriate: all of the ‘big five’ (or rather the four that were left) accountancy practices reorganised themselves after the Arthur Anderson collapse 2002: they didn’t want their global network to be brought down by one rogue practice. (Although the U.S.’s audit practices at Enron were suspiciously similar to everybody’s practices.)
I was at Deloitte at the time: we all had to sign new employment agreements with a new local legal entity, with screeds of small print about our jobs not being rescued by the global firm in case of local malfeasance. Those in the Management Consulting practice (me) got shuffled into an arms-length legal entity to avoid accusations of conflicts of interest with the Accounting practice (joke!).
The clients were like meh, whatever: we want the Deloitte name for the Accounting; we want the Deloitte name for the Consulting; stop making your problem into our problem.
Ah, so there was a time when it was all one global company. Or five. Having lots of independent companies just sounded like the way you did things fifty (or two hundred) years ago, so I assumed it was a hold-over.
Having broken themselves up is pretty convenient for them now, though.
@Lars Mathiesen: No, they were always professional services networks, not unitary firms operating on the global scale. The precise structures of the networks have always been in flux though. Over the last half century, there have been, in response to economic and regulatory pressures, both internal consolidations and arm’s length split-offs.
For starters, the Wagner Group is much larger than the Azov regiment and has fucked up a lot more countries.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/05/russian-mercenaries-and-mali-army-accused-of-killing-300-civilians
@DE, Putin is a западник (zapadnik, West-nik). And he is pro-democracy (I am not kidding).
He is similar to Peter the Great: he is modelling Russia after the Western states. Or to Arab nationalists (you know this type who would shave off everyone beards).
The West is powerful. He was Russia to be powerful too:)
Apart of borrowing from the West exactly the things that I consider the ugliest, whenever he sees that the West used a tactics that in his view is below the belt, he parodizes it. You remember these scandals?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_military_company#PMCs_in_Iraq
A private military company Wagner Group is a copy of those. “It is how things are done in the hypocritical West”
@DE, and I do feel bad about Russian intervention in the Middle East and Africa. It is just that the point made by DM and LH was not that Russia deserves criticism. It was specifically that Ukraine and the West do not.
@drasvi
I read what hat is saying not that “the Ukraine and the West do not deserve criticism” but that “it is false and dishonest to create an impression that the West and Ukraine have equal responsibility with Russia for the outbreak of war between Russia and the Ukraine.” I like to distinguish between cause and trigger in cases of aggression; the behaviour of Ukraine and West could have triggered Russian aggression but did not cause it.
@PlasticPaddy, the Russian share of responsibility is greater.
But LH says: …grimly determined segments of the left are desperate to find a way to blame…
Haven’t noticed the angel wings:/
the Russian share of responsibility is greater.
@PlasticPaddy, honestly i do not know what is shares of responsibility. We contributed more in the escalation.
Regarding the invasion, Putin ordered it. Was it a good decision? No. I do not know about responsibilities, it was just better not to order it (from my perspective). And it would be better to stop it.
But apart of fguring out “who is to blame” (which is an idiotic question, I think) or “whose share of responsibility is larger”, one can ask “what we could do differently, better? What we can do now?” And LH and DM answer: we were not aggressive enough.
And now: critics must shut up. People trying to explain Putin’s motives (Bathrobe) are naïve, he has no motives, he is just Hitler. We are just good guys, and they are just bad guys.
It is what I hear on the Russian TV:-/
@drasvi
I generally agree (although I doubt world leaders and opinion-makers will consult you or me) that kto vinovat’ is not a good question for settling disputes equitably. I would say however that it is necessary to address real causes (e.g., Great Powers vs. emerging nations/states in WWI) rather than triggers (assassination of an Austrian royal).
No, the opposite: Ukraine and NATO, and the US in particular, deserve plenty of criticism, but Putin blows them all out of the water.
Not that either. I’m saying it’s ridiculous, in hindsight, to frame NATO expansion as aggression.
He has lots of motives. Some of them are stupid, some of them are evil, some of them are both. 😐 The same holds for Hitler, and for GW Bush, and probably for everyone else who ever started a war.
In this case I can’t even find a trigger. Putin had so much freedom to choose the date of the invasion that Xi evidently got him to postpone it till after the Olympics. There was no such freedom in WWI – once the assassination happened, the alliances, cultural attitudes etc. constituted a mechanism that set the war in motion, and nobody thought they could do anything about it.
Hungarian royal; Austrian imperial. 😉
And he is pro-democracy (I am not kidding).
I have no idea what you mean by this (unless demos = Putin); can you explain?
It is just that the point made by DM and LH was not that Russia deserves criticism. It was specifically that Ukraine and the West do not.
I have no idea why you think this; have you even been reading my comments? I’ve been criticizing the US all my life (it’s my personal part of the West, and I know more about it, so I can criticize it intelligently rather than stupidly, the way idiot leftists do), and Ukraine has been full of corruption and bad leadership ever since independence (and, of course, before as well, like all the rest of the Soviet Union). But this war is in fact entirely Russia’s fault, unless you believe the propaganda about Nazis and mass killings of Russians. Perhaps you also believe Poland provoked Hitler? Please try to read and think more carefully.
@LH, your exact words (desperate to find a way) sound like you are discouraging any self-criticism.
But I know that it is not your usual position.
You are misreading me. I said segments of the left are desperate to find a way to blame the US and Ukraine, and that’s true. I hope you too are not trying to find a way to blame the US and Ukraine. Can you just come out and say what you mean, both about Putin-the-democrat and about who’s responsible for the war, rather than sniping at what you falsely imagine to be my views? It’s hard to have a discussion that way.
Oh, come on. [first appearance]
Allow me to translate. Reactionary and bourgeois both mean ‘not committed to the speaker’s flavor of
Communism“revolutionary socialism”, whereas all countries whatever may be described as either imperialist or pro-imperialist, depending on their sizes.It’s my personal part of the West, and I know more about it, so I can criticize it intelligently rather than stupidly.
Precisely what Chomsky does, in fact, which gets him condemned for being one-sided (or lacking bothsiderism, depending on context).
“Russia cannot afford to lose, so we need a kind of a victory”: Sergey Karaganov on what Putin wants
A former adviser to the Kremlin explains how Russia views the war in Ukraine, fears over Nato and China, and the fate of liberalism.
https://www.newstatesman.com/world/europe/ukraine/2022/04/russia-cannot-afford-to-lose-so-we-need-a-kind-of-a-victory-sergey-karaganov-on-what-putin-wants
Anton Shekhovtsov, a researcher of the Far Right, demystifies the Azov Regiment:
https://euromaidanpress.com/2022/04/02/how-the-west-enabled-genocide-in-mariupol-with-its-misguided-azov-obsession/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CPlZT3hKxY
«Мы теперь будем их всех е***ь». Что происходит в российских элитах через месяц после начала войны
Санкции и пропаганда сплотили вокруг Путина даже тех, кто был против вторжения в Украину
https://faridaily.substack.com/p/–3c3?s=w
“Now we’re going to f*ck them all.” What’s happening in Russia’s elites after a month of war
Sanctions and propaganda have rallied even those who were against the invasion around Putin
https://faridaily.substack.com/p/now-were-going-to-fck-them-all-whats?s=r
From there:
Counterpoint: Bill Clinton’s article in The Atlantic.
Karaganov further:
There is no way he actually believes this.
and
Oh, so maybe he does believe it, because the rest of his mindset is stuck in 1920, too!
Literally half of the current territory of the PRC would seem to contradict that logic, wouldn’t it.
That seems self-evident – but as long as the sanctions stay up, it’s actually quite unlikely. Russia’s only tank factory had to stop producing a week or two into the war because it ran out of parts.
That has happened often enough, but even if we decide the US Civil War doesn’t count somehow, there are still counterexamples like Germany in the late 90s.
Interesting, though it does leave me wondering why they couldn’t simply get rid of the Wolfsangel symbol – or at least tilt it so it becomes a Z with a stroke through it!
I wonder what this part means:
Is that implying that Chechens and, I don’t know, Yakuts are overrepresented in the Russian army? Or what?
Yeah, Shekhovtsov clears up some things, I think, but his discourse seems biased, even if it’s biased toward clearing up the people on the good side. Some of what he’s saying seems consistent and reasonable though: the far right has been quite marginalized in Ukraine, and the founders of an organization need not represent its current mindset. It’s better than “yes, they are nazis, but they are helpful right now.”
Our favourite linguist weighs in on the war:
We’re approaching the most dangerous point in human history
We’re approaching the most dangerous point in human history
A hedged hyperbole.
Climate change’s horrible effects are present and increasing, for sure. Nuclear war is no joke either. But there is no ‘point’ to be approached. What we have is what is called a slow-motion car crash. If you don’t want to be specific, you can posit a “point” and say that it’s coming soon and not say when. Cheap demagogy.
And he condemns Putin, but says NATO made him do it. I’d just as soon take Move α seriously.
@ David Marjanović: Is that implying that Chechens and, I don’t know, Yakuts are overrepresented in the Russian army? Or what?
Buryats and others seem to be heavily represented in Russian forces invading Ukraine, as can be seen from various news reports:
From the Guardian:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/30/coffins-in-buryatia-ukraine-invasion-takes-toll-on-russias-remote-regions
And an article from India:
https://hindustannewshub.com/russia-ukraine-news/military-from-buryatia-suffered-the-most-serious-losses-in-ukraine-the-moscow-times/
This has aroused a certain amount of comment in Mongolia (although there are plenty of Mongolians, including right-wing nationalists, who are pro-Russian). A comment on a Facebook group:
“Apparently Putin wants to clean Russian name by putting blame on asiatic nations! They are forcefully recruiting buryats, tuvas, and khalimags. Now Ukrainians already started hating slanted eyes! Easy to instigate racial hatred!”
@ Y
But he does put a different (and more recent date) on NATO’s ‘provocations’:
in September 2021 the United States came out with a strong policy statement, calling for enhanced military cooperation with Ukraine, further sending of advanced military weapons, all part of the enhancement programme of Ukraine joining Nato.
Y: Francis Fukuyama was both optimistic and not very optimistic. Stanislaw Lem was more satirical about the whole thing. (I agree with your comment).
I dimly remembered something about Buryats and wanted to mention them, but then figured this didn’t make probabilistic sense (don’t they mostly speak L1 Russian now?) and wrote Yakuts instead…
Хуй войне sighted in Germany (just in the picture at the top, not mentioned in the text of the article).
SYKA PUTIN!!! (tram number)
https://www.is.fi/kotimaa/art-2000008745133.html
Ukrainian southern port city is under chemical attack
The Azov Regiment, part of the Ukraine National Guard, reported on Monday evening that the southern port city of Mariupol is under chemical attack.
Russian troops use chemical weapons against the entrenched Ukrainian garrison in the southern port city of Mariupol.
According to Azov’s statement, an unidentified agent was delivered with an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.
“The victims have respiratory failure, vestibule-atactic syndrome,” Azov said.
A local source reported that the Russian military used Nerve agent GB (Sarin) in Mariupol, though there has been no official confirmation.
https://defence-blog.com/ukrainian-southern-port-city-is-under-chemical-attack/
Zигзаги журналистики. Как небольшое издание из Смоленска стало рупором «партии войны» с миллионной аудиторией
https://telegra.ph/Kak-rabotaet-voennaya-propaganda-na-primere-izdaniya-Readovka-04-11
Zигзаги
Etymology of the week!
Or of the decade:(
the word гондон ‘condom’ is itself used as an insult in Russian: “(vulgar, slang, offensive) dickhole.”
…as exemplified by the following:
Производители презервативов Durex и Сontex уходят из России.
А гондоны остаются
(Сталингулаг)
Did we have yet a chance to marvel at the expression “гондон юзаный!” ?
Around me it is usually штопаный “darned”.
It is hard to say if it is anyhow related to its use as a swear word in English: it is plausible in the contex(t) of condoms, it is also plausible that someone saw a film or a book where “darned” was translated as штопаный and remembered it as a posisble synonym of грёбаный, to re-use it later with condoms.
For Vladimir Putin, Syria was a rehearsal for Ukraine
@Bathrobe: That offers an interesting point of view, but I am leery of any source that contains such an obvious error in only the second sentence of the running text.
Assad didn’t take power until 1970 and wasn’t really in a position to force anyone out of Syria until 1969 at the earliest. While this is not directly relevant to the topic of the interview, it does suggest a worrying lack of awareness on the part of the interviewer and/or interviewee.
I wouldn’t have caught that, but what strikes me is that more than the first half of the interview is actually a list of separate interviews: one question, one answer, followed by a completely unrelated question and its answer, then another completely new question…
They did not seem unrelated to me, but it does look like an interview taken online (possibly e-mail). It can explain its disconnectedness.
it does suggest a worrying lack of awareness on the part of the interviewer and/or interviewee.
Surely the interviewer, whose knowledge and/or competence aren’t crucial. The background provided by Kodmani was very interesting to me.
“Knight of the Legion of Honour (2012).” (WP, Bassma_Kodmani). Is the title “Dame” (or “Lady”) only applied to those orders where it is the official title?
The background provided by Kodmani was very interesting to me. – I am mostly familiar with it, but it would be interesting to read more of her.
I do not understand what she means by “the last battle against NATO in Europe”. A nuclear war? Undermining NATO diplomatically? (how?) Or as usual, winning the argument over what Arabs to bomb?
Her father, a senior diplomat, was exiled in 1968 due to his opposition to Hafez al-Assad, father of the present ruler Bashar al-Assad.
Read on its own, that suggests to me that her father was exiled by Hafez al-Assad. If Hafez exiled someone, I don’t imagine Bashar would welcome them back with open arms.
@Bathrobe: Yes, of course that’s what it sounds like. However, the president of Syria in 1968 was Nureddin al-Atassi. Or am I missing something else?
You’re missing the extreme complexity of Syrian politics in the ’60s. Atas(s)i may have been the official head of state, but the country was run by the Ba’ath party leadership, and as Patrick Seale says in his (superb) biography, “By the end of 1968 Asad had already outstripped [Fu’ad] Jadid in the accumulation of power.” As with Stalin in Russia, there isn’t a single moment you can point to and say “Now he’s in total command”; it was a gradual process.
“Following the defeat of the 1967 war, he had a skirmish with the Minister of Foreign Affairs and was subsequently jailed for 6 months.[4]”
WP. The reference is to her book. French WP references Le Monde:
(link) and some other artcile (link) that harshly criticizes her but does not add many details.
@drasvi: That second story appears to come from Rene Naba’s Web site. Naba is a weird character—sometimes seemingly on the right moral side of an issue, but sometimes also going to bat for obvious crooks and scumbags.
This belongs more on a thread about mutual intelligibility of Slavic languages, of which I remember at least one, but guess there are lots of them. But I am too lazy to search for one and put it here in a “war thread”. Sorry, from Twitter
Russian (or maybe DPR/LPR) soldier reads insructions on a Polish RPG
It seems to be a “war thread” by default. After Hat asked people not to comment on the war, they did anyway and this seemed to become the main thread for discussing it.
“They” is LH.
Because the authors of the war arrested the hero of this thread.
Yeah, this is the de facto war thread, because how can we not talk about it? But I prefer to keep it isolated here and let people who want to talk about the usual LH subjects avoid it.
A podcast by meduza about Buryatia (in Russian), an interview with two Siberian journalists. They claim that Buryatia has a record number of dead soldiers among Russian regions. I do not like video and audio (I read faster…), and mostly listened to it because the girls speak unprofessionaly (that is: as a people who work as journalists rather than as journalists) and because of the Siberian accent of one of them. But what they are telling is that (1) army is the best or maybe only economic opportunity (2) friends of killed soldiers want to join the army and fight too [in different visited places] (3) small children also say they want to join the army and die as heroes [one village, in others children apparently were not asked].
army is the best or maybe only economic opportunity
I’m afraid that’s the case in a lot of places, the US included. I remember seeing something about some top-level economic guy letting it slip that he was concerned that if workers’ pay rose too much it would be hard to recruit people for the military. Нет войне!
There is no way he actually believes this.
“Russians! To arms, defend your country! The Ukrainians are coming!” Uh-huh. And birds aren’t real. (You do not have to be Gen Z (born 1997-20??) to understand that web site.)
if we decide the US Civil War doesn’t count somehow
That war is a spectacular counterexample, because under the greatest possible stress, a literally fratricidal war, we can watch the U.S. tilt toward autocracy, then right itself.
● In order to allow suspected Southern spies to be imprisoned behind the front according to military necessity, Lincoln suspends the right of habeas corpus[1] between Philadelphia and Washington, as permitted by the Constitution, but Chief Justice Taney[2] declares in Ex parte Merryman that only Congress has that power[3]. Detention continues on a smaller scale, but Merryman himself is relinquished to the civil authorities of Maryland[4] freed on bail, and all charges are dropped.
● General Ulysses S. Grant, worried by the large-scale cotton smuggling in the Military District of Tennessee[5], issues the equally infamous General Order #11, which bans all Jews from the District, whether they had anything to do with the cotton trade or not. Grant is a known anti-Semite and is winning Lincoln’s war for him, but when Lincoln hears of this thanks to the protests of long-settled Jews, he immediately revokes the order, and Grant admits that it was not justified. During his presidency beginning three years after the end of the war, Grant appoints an unprecedented number of Jews to public office[6] and sends a Jewish diplomat to Romania[7] to protest the ongoing pogroms there.
[1] The writ of habeas corpus requires all prisoners who demand it to be brought before a judge where definite and public justifications must be given for their imprisonment.
[2] Taney was pro-Southern and pro-slavery, but anti-secession, and the author of the infamous Dred Scott decision, which said that black men — not merely slaves — had no rights that white men need respect.
[3] The Constitution merely says: “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it”, which conspicuously lacks an actor. In the first draft, Congress was explicitly mentioned, but this was dropped in the second draft for reasons unknown.
[4] Maryland was a slave state that never seceded; almost half the black population was free, including almost all the black population of Baltimore. Lincoln had to tread carefully to prevent secession until after the Southern invasion of the state.
[5] Because at least some of the smuggled cotton going north was being paid for in arms and munitions going south that were much superior to any the South could produce.
[6] This was before the U.S. had a civil service, so the President had to appoint among other things literally every postmaster in every one-horse town throughout the country. Often they got to Washington on foot, sometimes followed closely by a rival hopeful, in which case the race was indeed to the swift.
[7] Notoriously the most anti-Semitic country in Europe. The Horthy regime began officially killing Jews before the Nazi regime did, and didn’t bother building “humane” extermination camps: they packed their victims into slow trains that chuffed around the countryside until everyone inside was dead of thirst and exposure, horrifying their German allies when they heard of it. After all, they had plenty of oil.
Romania[7]
[7] Notoriously the most anti-Semitic country in Europe. The Horthy regime
Something has gone amiss here.
that song is clearly some kind of crime in and of itself…
“Songs of the I.B.M.” from 1937.
Sorry, a brain fart. s/Horthy/Antonescu/.
~~ all dictators are One Dictator ~~
Evil men are boring, which makes it hard to tell them apart.
(Simone Weil)
if workers’ pay rose too much it would be hard to recruit people for the military
I wish (I wish!) people stopped reading some morality into economics. Because US has a professional (as they call it all volunteer) army, soldiers pay reflects what sort of people would like to sign up. Yes, family traditions, patriotism, respect of the community and such play a part, but the hard (and soft) cash speaks the loudest. Army has to offer competitive pay. It’s neither good nor bad. If income inequality is somewhat reduced, the government would have to pay more for the army and also maybe less (in relative terms) economically squeezed people will sign up. So what?
So there will be fewer soldiers and less appetite for war, that’s what. To eliminate morality from the equation is monstrous. War is an unmitigated evil.
That’s actually a “no”. There are various ways the recruitment can react to an economic squeeze. Standards can be lowered and an army can be more poorly trained. That would lead to more dead soldiers on “our” side and worse treatment of civilians on “their” side. Or maybe the army will rely more on automation and that would lead to more reckless policies because people don’t care that much about equipment loss in unnecassary wars. Or maybe something else happens. The only way to reduce wars is more peaceful mindset and also economic cooperation might help. War is unmitigated evil indeed, but it has nothing to do with economics of raising armies.
Indeed. “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you want” turned out to mean “you go to war with the army Sgt. Rummy wants, not the army Gen. Shinseki wants”.
the hard (and soft) cash speaks the loudest
“Or else it doesn’t, you know,” as my father used to say to me when I made dogmatic statements like that. Perhaps an economically rational soldier would run away, figuring that the conquerors won’t get around to them for quite some time.
That brainfart was, I must say, quite a libel on the late Admiral Horthy, who was forcibly removed from power by Hitler’s stooges for inter alia being insufficiently anti-Semitic. To perhaps be more nuanced, Horthy shared a lot of anti-Semitic stereotypes, among which was the stereotype that Jews were, while supposedly prone to disloyalty and Communist sympathies, unusually clever and productive if properly monitored and supervised. From which Horthy drew the obvious conclusion that it would be Totally Batshit Insane to deport or massacre your own country’s Jews while you were, for example, at war with the Soviet Union and could benefit from their contributions to the economy. Which conclusion helped lead him to oppose massacre-or-deportation policy initiatives. Which in turn led to him being financially supported in his old age, as a fugitive/emigre living post-WW2 in Salazar’s Portugal, by subventions from American Jews of Hungarian origin who appreciated how he had conducted himself when contrasted with the politically-plausible unsavory alternatives in the relevant time and place.
an interview with Dmitry Bykov
Дмитрий Быков: Людям не нравится быть плохими. Скоро все кончится
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndBvOMXp3wo
I guess some novoyaz is in order. Here goes:
хтонь
Русский
Морфологические и синтаксические свойства
хтонь
Существительное, неодушевлённое, женский род, 3-е склонение (тип склонения 8a по классификации А. А. Зализняка).
Корень: -хтонь-.
Семантические свойства
Значение
1. неол. зло, нечистая сила, умершие предки, гады ◆ А главное, какому ещё охотнику за нечистью довелось победить такую хтонь? Камышовый, «Ск-9: Рау та любви», 2019 г. ◆ Хтонь заявляет свои права. Среди характерных особенностей хтонических существ традиционно выделяют звероподобие, наличие сверхъестественных способностей. К ним относились умершие предки. В славянской традиции к хтоническим существам относились прежде всего гады, в число которых включались и животные, связанные со смертью и потусторонним миром. М. Струкова, «Отступник, значит, верный. (О поэзии А. Широпаева)», 2012 г.
2. неол. пренебр. народ, электорат ◆ Люди, которых нынешние элитки свысока называют быдлом, гребанным электоратом, хтонью, и так далее… Ю. М. Семецкий, «Мы», 2020 г. ◆ Как известно, любой массовый протест можно погасить боевой химией, водометами, бронетехникой… Каждый первый может продолжить и детализировать список способов загнать хтонь в стойло. Но слабость и беспомощность народных масс… Ю. М. Семецкий, «Мы», 2020 г. ◆ Только язык Салтыкова-Щедрина, Аверченко, Зощенко и Даниила Хармса способен передать эту русскую хтонь, просочившаяся даже в тот вид криминала, который мы привыкли считать наиболее романтичным и элегантным. С. Багдасарова, «Воры, вандалы и идиоты», 2019 г.
3. неол. чёрт, бог (в качестве междометия) ◆ — Да и хтонь с ним. Сдох и сдох, — решил Нумо и осушил кружку. — Спать пойду. Устал. Камышовый, «Ск-9: Рау та любви», 2019 г.
вертухай
Russian
Pronunciation
IPA(key): [vʲɪrtʊˈxaj]
Noun
вертуха́й • (vertuxáj) m anim (genitive вертуха́я, nominative plural вертуха́и, genitive plural вертуха́ев)
1. (slang, derogatory) turnkey, jailer, prison guard
2. (derogatory) militiaman, policeman
3. employee of the “State Vehicle Inspection” / “State Patrol” (ГАИ, or Государственная автомобильная инспекция)
Битва за Донбасс: сможет ли армия России окружить и разбить украинскую, и каковы преимущества сторон
https://telegra.ph/Bitva-za-Donbass-smozhet-li-armiya-Rossii-okruzhit-i-razbit-ukrainskuyu-i-kakovy-preimushchestva-storon-04-19
@J.W. Brewer, but then I share this stereotype:/ Is not it just a statistical observation?
I studied in one of so-called “math-schools” in Moscow, most of my classmates were Jews and most of people who took the exam were also Jews, which excludes the possibility of discrimination* (also I simply never observed discriminatation). Our teachers were Jewish too.
One of the forms of state anti-Semitism in USSR was not letting Jews in certain universities, among them the mathematical faculty of Moscow university and several others hard sceince and engineering schools here. The explanation was “there are way too many of you guys here”.
It would be rather idiotic not to think “mathematics is popular among Moscow Jews” (it is a fact) and “Soviet anti-Semitism was detrimental for the economy”. Preventing access to education to the population most interested in it because it is “too much” interested in it?
I think the observation per se is not good or bad, just like “Muslims drink less than Christians”. It can have bad conequences: either privileged position of Jews or anti-Semitism, or discrimination against some other minority which is believed to be “less clevel” or “less interested in education”.
But it is all about the effects of observed statistical fact. As argument against already-existing anti-Semtism it looks fine. Whether capability of making statistical observations is evil per se is a good question:)
—
* I mean, discrimination BY Jews.
Well, of course, “prone to disloyality” is an anti-Semitic stereotype. Again, as an observation it can be true*, especially if the choise is “Nazi or leftists”.
—
* I mean disloyality to the regime.
It is a part of Soviet anti-Semitism, of course. Sakharov was particularly trusted because among the main authors of the Russian bomb he was an ethnic Russian. But…
By 1970s it was more like a conflict between the party and a part of the Jewish community (if not all), but again, “loyality” to the party means agreement with its course (that includes anti-Israeli policy and even mistrust to Jews) and absence of certain views and interests and then if the disloyal part wants to emigrate, this desire is already disloyality.
An excpetionally drunk friend of mine (not a Jew) once came to me. He drank with another guy E. (not a Jew), a friend of our friend L. (a Jew) . This another guy once became very interested in opposition politics, mostly listening to characters particularly hated by our nationalists – but not particularly attractive to me. Then he was disappointed and began supporting nationalist/pro-regime politicians.
We drank two more bottles of red wine and then my freind said that E. said that Jews are going to просрать (screw up? Or what is the translation?) everything here and then leave. It is not normal pro-regime discourse (I do not see signs of state anti-Semitism) it is his personal I think: he referred to L. because there are many Jewish human rights activists around L. and they are predictably anti-Putin. So my freind (being two bottles more than exceptionally drunk) said: “but I do not want that! I do not want them to prosrat everything and leave!” said he. “Undrestand? I do not want that they leave!!!!”. And he cried.
He is a musician, and he is worried: the Moscow Conservatory used to be very Jewish but seems to become less so. He likes Jews and as for screwing up the country, he could not care less.
As we have discussed before, the contrasting approaches of the Horthy regime and the Arrow Cross’s subsequent Nazi puppet state do serve as a clear example of how there can be very important distinctions between a regime that is merely ultraconservative and authoritarian, versus one that is genuinely ethno-fascist.
Oh, oops. I do not know how, but I thought J.W.Brewer wrote not about Horthy but some lower rank character. In that case “potentially disloyal, but useful” is anti-Semitic, of course.
Heh:
No idea whether it’s true or not, but it’s funny. (I imagine most Russians would recognize Polish without problem, but there are always random idiots.)
D.O. posted another tweet about this two days ago in this thread. Instead of a screenshot from the video (with subtitles), it includes the video (without subtitles).
I haven’t watched it yet, though.
Oh, that’s right — I didn’t click through for some reason! Go click DM’s link to DO’s link, it’s got the whole video and is hilarious (and proves that there really are such idiots).
I wonder what they thought about the meaning of the text in large black letters: “TU TRZYMAĆ RĘKĄ”. I don’t think knowledge of Ukrainian and the English alphabet would have been enough to decipher it, without at least some idea of Polish spelling rules…
(in the video they don’t seem to discuss that part)
On the other hand, it’s really striking how many words and calques-or-etymological-nativizations from Polish there are in Ukrainian.
Sometimes there seem to be doublets, too, e.g. любов(ь?) and кохання…
Rashism or Ruscism (Russian: Рашизм, tr. Rashizm, pronounced [rɐˈʂɨzm]; a portmanteau of “Russia” and “fascism”) is an assertion that Russia has been transformed into a fascist country. That transformation was described as based on the ideas of the “special civilizational mission” of the Russians, such as Moscow as the Third Rome and expansionism. This is also a claim widely used to identify supporters of Russian military aggression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashism
I would have thought Rashism was an ideology based on perhaps excessive devotion to the teachings of the medieval rabbi commonly known as Rashi. I think (at least to an Anglophone ear) it is a failed attempt at a portmanteau. If the first vowel is that of “Russia” it doesn’t particularly successfully evoke fascism and if the first vowel is that of “fascism” it doesn’t particularly successfully evoke Russia.
Maybe it needs to be inserted in a longer list, a la “Everybody’s talking about
Bagism,* Shagism, Dragism, Madism, Ragism, Tagism
This-ism, that-ism ….”
*I remember with fondness some cold winter’s day in suburbia in the very late Seventies or very early Eighties when I walked around with a few other teenagers writing pro-Bagist agitprop in the snow on people’s front yards.
I think (at least to an Anglophone ear) it is a failed attempt at a portmanteau.
It’s not an English word but a Russian one, and I see no reason why Russians should worry particularly about the effect of their neologisms when and if they get transliterated and exposed to English-language eyes.
Well, I’m not conceding that it’s a successful portmanteau in Russian, just noting that I’m not in a position to judge. I don’t know enough about how portmanteaus conventionally work in Russian to know what level of transparent/compositional etymology is generally required by the genre.
But more to the point, I’m not convinced it’s a “Russian” word in a useful sense, since at least according to the internet it is primarily used as a pejorative by speakers of Ukrainian or Georgian or Chechen or whatnot who are very self-consciously Not Russian, although they certainly may understand Russian well enough due to the Soviet-etc. legacy. Maybe it’s more plausible than a “Russian-sounding” word made up by Anglophones engaged in anti-Kremlin polemic would be, but again I can’t say for sure. And I suppose it could still be a “Russian word” in the sense in which “Sassenach” is an “English word,” i.e. one generally used only by self-consciously non-English speakers of some regional variety of English.
FWIW the no-longer-alive Chechen leader who wikipedia credits with coining the word seems to have had it as Русизм although Рашизм seems to be the Ukrainian preference. I assume this is different from a Kiev/Kyiv sort of distinction and is more about which half of the would-be portmanteau is being made more legible at the expense of the other.
@jwb
It seems clear why Ukrainians could not use Rusizm as a pejorative. The ethonym Rus’ applies equally or even more specially to those living in the heartland of the Kievan Rus’ state (or those who speak Rusyn, as discussed in another thread).
@JWB, it is a word created in a language
– whose speakers have already borrowed English “Russia”.
Which makes Dudayev very unlikely – even if he knew English, “Russia” was as familiar to him as Allemagne or Semitic nimsa “Austria” are for me.
– whose speaker hear the vowel in “Russia” the same way as the vowel in fascism (true for many languages).
Most likely the language is Russian. Of course it also can be Ukrainian. The word is hardly attractive for anti-Putin or pro-(Ukrainian/Chechen/….) Russians, because anti-Putin does not mean anti-Russian.
“Semitic”
https://www.google.com/search?q=nimtsa+Austria finds some Hebrew examples (e.g).
I watched the video. Dudayev did not mean the English “Russia”. As for fascism, he lists “fascism, nazism, racism”. He draws a parallel between “rusism” (/u/) and fascism saying that the whole civilized world must cure rusism the same was as it cured fascism but only “racism” has /s/ like “rusism”. The video is made by members of the Congress of Ukrianian Nationalists (has to do with Russian claims that Ukraine is taken over by banderovtsi) who, as one can see here compare русизм and расизм “racism”.
it’s really striking how many words and calques-or-etymological-nativizations from Polish there are in Ukrainian.
When I was working in Ukraine back in the late 1990s, I recall that Ukrainian speakers in Kyiv/Central Ukraine would claim that Western Ukrainian was too Polonized and was not “pure” Ukrainian (e.g. addressing strangers as “panie/pani”). I suppose given Russia’s behavior over the past 8 years, it would not be surprising if more and more Ukrainian speakers are now consciously choosing “Polonisms” in preference over vocabulary and constructions that seem superficially more Russian.
Yes, I’m afraid so. I can’t tell you how much I hate linguistic nationalism. Languages don’t kill people, people kill people!
people kill people – ..and to stop it we need to kill more people:-E
No, we need to get people to stop thinking of killing as the solution to their problems.
Of course, I ironized not about your words, but about what usually happens.
Gotcha, thanks for the clarification!
the hard (and soft) cash speaks the loudest
“Or else it doesn’t, you know,” as my father used to say to me when I made dogmatic statements like that.
Fair enough. These are the things better studied with some concrete information. Which I have neither desire, nor time, nor ability to find. Can we agree at least that soldier’s pay is the easiest thing for the government to manipulate?
Perhaps an economically rational soldier would run away, figuring that the conquerors won’t get around to them for quite some time.
Why soldiers stay and fight, but sometimes run, is even more difficult problem, which I even less prepared to discuss. It has something to do with troops cohesion and with understanding that the most dangerous moments for soldiers were during routs for times when battles were more personal.
how much I hate linguistic nationalism.
When you put it that way, sure. But linguistic and cultural prescriptivism from the side of the dominated is very different than when it’s from the side of the dominating. A speaker of an endangered language creating a language nest in a corner of their house, where the dominant language is not permitted, or a Ukrainian pushing away the harbingers of Russian domination, are not, ipso facto, chauvinists.
That’s not what I call linguistic nationalism, it’s just love of your own language and a desire to keep it alive and vibrant. It’s when you start seeing other languages as bad that you fall into linguistic nationalism, just as when you see other countries as less worthy than yours you fall into nationalism tout court.
@Y, can
– South Ossetian Ossetians do whatever they like to South Ossetian Georgians (because they are dominated by Georgian imperialism)
– Georgians do whatever they like to Ossetians (because they are dominated by Russian imperialism)
– Russians do whatever we like to Ukrainians (because the Western imperialism)
… and ad infinitum? (for: “…a Flea / Hath smaller Fleas that on him prey / And these have smaller yet to bite ’em …”)
And should we like it, doing something bad to Ukrainians (irrespectively of the Western whatever -ism)?
“That’s not what I call linguistic nationalism, it’s just love of your own language and a desire to keep it alive and vibrant. ”
This is a good thing. Moreover, langauge revitalization does mean some sort of unequal treatment for languages.
But revitalization efforts can be stupid or smart (and very easily can be detrimental for the “revitalized” culture) and also respectful to speakers or not quite so.
Well, the flea argument likely has nothing to do with, specifically, Polonisms.
Really now, drasvi.
I’m against anybody being mean to anybody. Also, I’m against oppressors pretending that a minority is oppressing them, as an excuse to putting the boot on it harder.
I’m saying, language has symbolism, and it can’t be denied. If Ukrainian individuals want to fortify their spirits by excising Russian loanwords from their language, I can fully understand it. (If their government tried to enforce that kind of thing, I’d be much less fond of it.)
I’m saying, language has symbolism, and it can’t be denied.
Sure it can. Like anything else, it has only the symbolism we choose to give it — nothing “has” symbolism on its own. If one chooses to dump one’s anger at people’s behavior on the language they speak, that’s one’s own choice; there’s nothing natural or inevitable about it. You might as well blame the clothes they wear.
All right, then: people give symbolism to language; that is, they ascribe social significance to the kind of language one speaks. In the abstract, maybe it’s not essential, but in practice it’s true everywhere. Sociolinguists have things to observe always and everywhere.
@Y, I think I was not as much supporting LH (this example with polonisms is too hypothetical for me: I do not know whether anything like this is happenuing or not) as objecting to this oppressor-oppressed model.
You earlier wrote about Azov. The most important thing about it is that they are being killed now. I quoted above a DPR commander who said that Azov fighters are fighting fiercely, “because they know they should expect no mercy”. Nazi or not, what the commander is speaking about is a war crime. It also increaces civilian casulaties. A word “Nazi” is becoming an excuse for doing more evil. Some people raped girls with German surnames here in 50s and yes, it is true that the country was recovering from severe collective trauma so it is not surprising…. Except it does not become a bit less evil.
But then the article you linked says the Western “obsession” with Azov is why the “genocide” in Mariupol is happening.
In reality there were numerous war crimes in Donbass war, both sides. Are there wars without war crimes? And there were ruined cities. Our news were showing cities shelled by Ukrainians, their news were showing cities shelled by DPR. Human rights groups would show both. And there is collaboration between Ukrainian right and Ukrianian security and it is not a good thing. Same for Russia: yes, fascism is on the rise here.
Finding “the good guys” in a conflict and speaking about crimes of their enemies (but not theirs) is a trap. You constantly have to choose between “if I condemn their crimes, they lose support” and “if I support them, I give them a licence to kill”. We need some way out of this.
In reality any country will benefit from more respect for human rights in that country. All of this is not and should not be about judging anyone. If an Ukrainian does something stupid it harms her (by definition of “stupid”), if she does something bad, but irritating for Putin, then she does something bad to another person, most likely an Ukrainian. During the war in Donbass the victim is the same all the time: whether it is Russian or Ukrainian bombs, they destroy the very same population. It is just that our propaganda have been speaking about “genocide” in Donbass by Ukrainians and it turned out that they meant “we need to kill more!”.
And it is not about Ukraine, I just mean we need a way of supporting an oppressed population wihtout encouraging it to oppress someone even weaker. Back to langauge, I mean there is a good reason to remember what is objectively stupid and what is clever, what is beautiful and what is ugly and what is good and what is evil rather than limiting ourselves with finding the oppressed and oppressors. No, using polonisms does not look exactly “evil”, my objection is to keeping the notion of “oppressed and oppressors” – and eventually the idea of judging and determining who are good guys and who are bad guys – central to anything.
I am tired of this. Georgia gives us a perfect food chain: when Russians came they expelled local Georgians (those remaining after 1989). They were a minority population in SO. SO is a minority within Georgia, and Georgia tried to conquer it (“Russia provoked an impetous Georgian attack on its proxy forces” if you prefer this formulation). Georgia is minority within USSR. Russia is minority globally. So one just picks an even or odd link by taste.
Ah, that would not be surprising.
That’s one reason why EU membership for Ukraine will be a good thing: the EU has all sorts of laws about minority issues. Indeed the very hope of EU membership is why Erdoğan introduced such things as schools teaching in Kurdish.
@DM, I agree.
Yes, in terms of human rights certain European countries are much more advanced and are a good example for everyone. And yes, I guess it is the hope of many pro-Western Ukrainians: that being intergrated in Europe somehow will help with corruption and everything.
“How does one hate a country, or love one? Tibe talks about it; I lack the trick of it. I know people, I know towns, farms, hills and rivers and rocks, I know how the sun at sunset in autumn falls on the side of a certain plowland in the hills; but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply? What is love of one’s country; is it hate of one’s uncountry? Then it’s not a good thing. Is it simply self-love? That’s a good thing, but one mustn’t make a virtue of it, or a profession… Insofar as I love life, I love the hills of the Domain of Estre, but that sort of love does not have a boundary-line of hate. And beyond that, I am ignorant, I hope.” —Therem Harth rem ir Estraven, as reported by Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)
If you can’t love people who resemble yourself, you are probably* deluding yourself if you imagine that you love people who are not much like yourself (and if you can’t love people who are not much like yourself, you are undoubtedly deluding yourself if you imagine that you love God.)
* I put in the “probably” for a reason. But there is often something off about xenophilia in people who don’t care for their neighbours much. Borrioboola-Gha …
Finding “the good guys” in a conflict and speaking about crimes of their enemies (but not theirs) is a trap. You constantly have to choose between “if I condemn their crimes, they lose support” and “if I support them, I give them a licence to kill”. We need some way out of this.
Yes, I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately.
@DE, it is interesting how the word for neighbour came to mean different things in Russian and English.
וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ says Wiktionary
ἀγαπήσεις τὸν πλησίον σου ὡς σεαυτόν says the NT…and I guess LXX?)
In Russian it is ближний, the word is used
– as adjective, contrastively “in the [one which is near] grove squirrels live, while in the [one which is far] grove nightingales live”. This contrast makes me want to use “one”.
– often in toponyms: “This is Near Shitfield, the Far Shitfield is beyond that hill”. Similarly, in toponyms that you create on your own, like “the near grocery”
– as a noun it means: “those who thou shalt love as thyself”.
Sometimes it is used similarly to “близкие” (that’s people who are close to you and mean something to you).
One translation that I checked (Elizabeth Bible 18th c.) has a different word for “near one” in Matthew (but not Luke or Mark): и҆́скреннѧго (ACC sg.) which today means “sincere”.
I do not know where they took it.
In English you have … nigh Boer:) I wonder if it already meant “neighbour” back then and what the Hebrew and Greek words meant.
—
Having this said, the formulation is practical:) It is clearly a bad idea to be bad to those who you already love. Bad as in detrimental to your heart.
It is also bad idea not to notice and not to care about a beggar who you can see and are passing by, but a few people are able to notice them, and those are famously overwhelmed when there are more suffering people around than they can help (which is the case if you simply walk in Moscow and really see what’s going on around you).
But then there are people of East Timor, generalized people of East Timor, without names and anything. They are abstract for me. I can by a mental effort try to be at least responsible with them but loving them would take God-like powers (or I miss something about human abilities).
(I know that above is not too polite to possible readers from East Timor. But from me it is quite far:(
WP: “Timor” is derived from timur, the word for “east” in Malay, which became recorded as Timor in Portuguese, thus resulting in the tautological toponym meaning “East East”; in Indonesian, Timor Timur. In Portuguese, the country is called Timor-Leste (Leste being the word for “east”); in Tetum Timór Lorosa’e (Lorosa’e being the word for “east” (literally “rising sun”)).)
“Of course in ‘real life’ causes are not clear cut — if only because human tyrants are seldom utterly corrupted into pure manifestations of evil will. As far as I can judge some seem to have been so corrupt, but even they must rule subjects only part of whom are equally corrupt, while many still need to have ‘good motives’, real or feigned, presented to them. As we see today.
“Still there are clear cases: e.g. acts of sheer cruel aggression, in which therefore right is from the beginning wholly on one side, whatever evil the resentful suffering of evil may eventually generate in members of the right side. There are also conflicts about important things or ideas. In such cases I am more impressed by the extreme importance of being on the right side, than I am disturbed by the revelation of the jungle of confused motives, private purposes, and individual actions (noble or base) in which the right and the wrong in actual human conflicts are commonly involved.
“If the conflict really is about things properly called right and wrong, or good and evil, then the rightness or goodness of one side is not proved or established by the claims of either side; it must depend on values and beliefs above and independent of the particular conflict.A judge must assign right and wrong according to principles which he holds valid in all cases. That being so, the right will remain an inalienable possession of the right side and Justify its cause throughout.
“(I speak of causes, not of individuals. Of course to a judge whose moral ideas have a religious or philosophical basis, or indeed to anyone not blinded by partisan fanaticism, the rightness of the cause will not justify the actions of its supporters, as individuals, that are morally wicked. But though ‘propaganda’ may seize on them as proofs that their cause was not in fact ‘right’, that is not valid. The aggressors are themselves primarily to blame for the evil deeds that proceed from their original violation of justice and the passions that their own wickedness must naturally (by their standards) have been expected to arouse. They at any rate have no right to demand that their victims when assaulted should not demand an eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth.)
“Similarly, good actions by those on the wrong side will not justify their cause. There may be deeds on the wrong side of heroic courage, or some of a higher moral level: deeds of mercy and forbearance. A judge may accord them honour and rejoice to see how some men can rise above the hate and anger of a conflict; even as he may deplore the evil deeds on the right side and be grieved to see how hatred once provoked can drag them down. But this will not alter his judgement as to which side was in the right, nor his assignment of the primary blame for all the evil that followed to the other side.” —Tolkien, Letter 183
@drasvi:
Interestingly, the Kusaal version of Matthew 22:39 goes
Nɔŋimi fɔ tiraan wɔɔ fɔ mɛng nɛ
“Love your neighbour like yourself.”
where tiraan is actually “peer, fellow”. There is a perfectly good word for “neighbour” in the “nearby-person” sense: kpi’a, transparently cognate to kpi’e “get near”; interesting that the translators didn’t use it.
It’s the same choice as in the Kusaal proverb
Fʋ ya’a tɛn’ɛs bɛɛ tʋm bɛ’ɛd yɛ fʋ tisi fʋ tiraan, fʋ maanni fʋ mɛŋ ya’as la
“If you think or do evil to your neighbour (tiraan), you’re doing it back to yourself.”
In the Good Samaritan passage, the Lawyer replies to Jesus’ question about what is written in he Law with ka nɔŋi fʋ tiraan “and love your tiraan” in Luke 10:27, and then (“willing to justify himself”) asks Anɔ’ɔnɛ aan m kpi’a? “Who is my kpi’a?” in verse 29; they have translated the very same Greek (and English) word differently in the space of three verses.
Evidently Kusaal “has no word for neighbour.” In fact, the English meaning is no doubt highly influenced by this very passage.
I notice that the 1996 Bible version here uses tiraan throughout instead of kpi’a, but translates “love your neighbour” in the quote from Leviticus as ka noŋ fu taab “and love your fellow.” The revisers in 2016 had a better idea, though they still must have felt that “neighbour” had no single equivalent.
[The Kusaal version of Matthew 22:29 above ought to read Nɔŋimi fʋ tiraan wʋʋ fʋ mɛŋ nɛ. Apologies to all Kusaasi Hatters. Why the spellcheck didn’t pick that up, I’ll never know …]
@drasvi. I’m having trouble understanding what you mean here:
“Semitic”
https://www.google.com/search?q=nimtsa+Austria finds some Hebrew examples (e.g).
Do you mean that in the following romanized Hebrew title the word nimtsa belongs to the family of Slavic words going back to Proto-Slavic *němьcь 1. ‘foreigner’. 2. ‘German’?
Hagadah shel Pesah : ketav-yad me-osef Baron David Gintsburg ha-nimtsa be-Sifriyah ha-le’umit be-Moskva
If so, Hebrew nimtsa ‘is found, is located’ is unrelated to that family. Rather, it comes from the Hebrew root מצא ‘find’.
If however you have something else in mind, please explain.
Dunno what Austria is in Hebrew, but in Arabic it’s an-Namsā (via Ottoman Turkish); I assume that’s what drasvi has in mind. I wouldn’t be surprised if the term found its way thence into early modern Syriac and Sephardic Hebrew, though it obviously is not to be reconstructed for proto-Semitic 🙂
Austria in Hebrew is ostria. As M. says, nimtsa is the passive (niphal) of mṣʔ ‘find’ and means ‘found, located’ (m. sg.) The example drasvi links to is an index to eulogies in the library of the Jewish community in Vienna. M.’s example is a Haggadah from a manuscript found in the National Library in Moscow.
No, I mean absolutely nothing:)
I meant Arabic. But there is this neo-Aramaic form that I know only from Wiktionary: ܢܸܡܣܵܐ . I wanted to check it but I made typo (I keep writing “nimtsa” in transliteration, because of my native nemtsy). And I saw this result in Google. Instead of trying to read it (my Hebrew is at the level “I can decipher it sometimes”) I took a mental note “wow, some writers in Hebrew borrowed it too. Why -ts-?” and corrected my typo. Then I wrote “Semitic”. Then I felt I need to explain why Semitic and copied the link …
In other words, the comment was a mess.
I should have written “Middle Eastern”, not “Semitic”, I should have read the Hebrew title…
The werid thing is that I am not fully used to Hebrew (or Syriac to that matter) alphabets. It too looks like “deciphering” unless I have already spent some 5 minutes doing it (and then I totally confuse diacritics). But I think it is the fact that it was transliteration and I hardly ever tried to read Hebrew right-to-left that made my eye catch this form and ignore the rest. The fact that the book is in Vienna does have to do with this too : google said so and my eye catched it.
@JC, it look like two gentlemen brawling, “I punched your face and you punched mine”.
But in reality it is “I raped your cousin, you raped mine”.
Our Internet is full of this. When someone writes something against the war, the answer is always “but where were you all these 8 years when people of Donbass were suffering?”. Or else they think that the anti-war guy was Ukrainian and write “ha-ha, now you love peace!”.
That even has an English name: whataboutism:
“Your country is oppressing its minorities: it needs to stop.”
“But what about your country’s treatment of the Native Americans?”
“Your country is also denying the human rights of all its citizens.”
“But what about your country’s treatment of the Native Americans?”
The OED’s first citation is to 1978 and is an explanation of the term, suggesting that it was fairly new then. The synonymous whataboutery is traced to 1974 with specific reference to the Troubles in Northern Ireland. As one of the other citations says, it goes on forever and leads nowhere.
where tiraan is actually “peer, fellow”. There is a perfectly good word for “neighbour” in the “nearby-person” sense: kpi’a, transparently cognate to kpi’e “get near”; interesting that the translators didn’t use it.
It’s the same choice as in the Kusaal proverb
My guess would be that the translators knew the proverb and that influenced their choice?
“How does one hate a country, or love one? Tibe talks about it; I lack the trick of it. I know people,
Gustav Heinemann, 3rd president of the Federal Republic of Germany, famously when asked if he doesn’t love the German state: “Ach was, ich liebe keine Staaten, ich liebe meine Frau; fertig!” “Nonsense, I don’t love any states, I love my wife, that’s it.”
My guess would be that the translators knew the proverb and that influenced their choice?
Could well be. The general feeling about the Bible versions among Kusaasi seems to be that they’re pretty idiomatic; I have heard complaints that they are “difficult”, but that would be hardly surprising given that the Bible texts are far and away the most extensive written works in a language with no written tradition.
The revisers in 1996 and 2016 seem to have disentangled some of the more convoluted constructions for clarity; but even quite ordinary Kusaal is abundantly supplied with subordinate clauses of all sorts, which nest quite freely. It does multiple embedding quite as much as English does.
The most striking syntax change in the 1996 revision was replacing all the indirect speech with direct, which has been done so thoroughly that it must have been a conscious strategy. I suppose it does aid clarity, but the indirect construction seems to be much more in line with the usual way Kusaal does it, judging by other sources, so it seems a bit of a pity, in a way. Translationese …
The Irish word for neighbour is comharsa,
Leviticus 19:18
Ní foláir duit grá a thabhairt do do chomharsa mar thú féin.
Matthew 22:39, Mark 12:31
Gráóidh tú do chomharsa mar thú féin.’
Apparently this is from Middle Irish co(m)+airsa, where the second element is literally “door-post” and figuratively “support”.
Russian does have a word for neighbour, sosed, where so- is co- and sed is the same as in Latin sedere and IE. Here means co-dweller.
It just is not used in the Bible in this passage. In modern translations it occurs in
Proverbs 27:10
Thine own friend, and thy father’s friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother’s house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off.
Jer. 6:21
Therefore thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will lay stumblingblocks before this people, and the fathers and the sons together shall fall upon them; the neighbour and his friend shall perish.
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/shachen_7934.htm
The Welsh Bible uses cymydog in both Leviticus and Matthew. It’s the ordinary equivalent of English “neighbour”; etymologically, it’s a transparent derivative of cwmwd “district, province”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commote
(“Not to be confused with ‘commode'”, indeed!)
Same construction as the Russian сосед, basically.
I suppose that in Kusaal you could summarise the point of the Parable of the Good Samaritan as “a kpi’a ought to be a tiraan.” (“A neighbour₁ ought to be a neighbour₂.”)
German is parallel to Russian blizhniy here – the German Bible translation uses dein Nächster “your nearest / closest (one)”, not dein Nachbar. I think English and traditions going through English are actually the ones that are deviant here.
The good news is that there is a Greek school in Crimea…
To confuse matters further, the Hausa Bible uses ɗan’uwa “brother/cousin/relative” for “neighbour” pretty much throughout (and in all occurrences in the Good Samaritan passage, including the Leviticus quote), but, curiously, not in the Leviticus verse itself, where it has the colourless sauran mutane “other people” instead.
I don’t know if this is because Hausa ɗan’uwa has been bleached of any particular affective sense or just means that the translators didn’t particularly focus on the issue. It’s likely that they were largely translating primarily from the English versions in practice, too, which may well have confused matters.
I notice that the original Hebrew in Leviticus uses רֵעַ “friend, companion”, which is indeed tiraan rather than kpi’a. But the LXX renders it τὸν πλησίον (i.e. kpi’a) which may be the origin of the mischief.
Then the natural question is what was pre-King James English…
…and Old Irish.
I can’t find an old Latin Leviticus.
Vulgata Clementina (16th century, http://catholicbible.online/side_by_side/OT/Lev/ch_19) has:
Latin: Non quæras ultionem, nec memor eris injuriæ civium tuorum. Diliges amicum tuum sicut teipsum. Ego Dominus.
Douay-Rheims (1500s-1600s): Seek not revenge, nor be mindful of the injury of thy citizens. Thou shalt love thy friend as thyself. I am the Lord.
Knox Bible (XX century): Do not seek revenge, or bear a grudge for wrong done to thee by thy fellow-citizens; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself; thy Lord is his.
Asd for gospels, it is diligis proximum tuum in all texts that I am able to find.
Including Matthew 5:43 in Diatessaron by Tatian:
Audistis quia dictum est: diligis proximum tuum et odio habebis inimicum tuum. Ego autem dico vobis: diligite inimicos vestros, benefacite his qui vos oderunt, et orate pro persequentibus et calumniantibus vos.
Ír gihortut thaz giquetan ist: minno thinan nahiston inti habe in hazze thinan fiant. Ih quidu íu: minnot iuuara fianta, tuot then uuola thie íuuih hazzont, inti betot furi thie háhtenton inti harmenton íu.
Then the natural question is what was pre-King James English…
…and Old Irish.
I can’t find an old Latin Leviticus.
Vulgata Clementina (16th century, http://catholicbible.online/side_by_side/OT/Lev/ch_19) has:
Latin: Non quæras ultionem, nec memor eris injuriæ civium tuorum. Diliges amicum tuum sicut teipsum. Ego Dominus.
Douay-Rheims (1500s-1600s): Seek not revenge, nor be mindful of the injury of thy citizens. Thou shalt love thy friend as thyself. I am the Lord.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knox_Bible (XX century): Do not seek revenge, or bear a grudge for wrong done to thee by thy fellow-citizens; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself; thy Lord is his.
Asd for gospels, it is diligis proximum tuum in all texts that I am able to find.
Including Matthew 5:43 in Diatessaron by Tatian:
Audistis quia dictum est: diligis proximum tuum et odio habebis inimicum tuum. Ego autem dico vobis: diligite inimicos vestros, benefacite his qui vos oderunt, et orate pro persequentibus et calumniantibus vos.
Ír gihortut thaz giquetan ist: minno thinan nahiston inti habe in hazze thinan fiant. Ih quidu íu: minnot iuuara fianta, tuot then uuola thie íuuih hazzont, inti betot furi thie háhtenton inti harmenton íu.
The Syriac Peshitta, which seems to have been translated from the Hebrew, not the Greek, has חבר “companion, friend” in Leviticus 19:18 too.
Interesting. The Lawyer’s “who is my neighbour?” in Luke is actually a very good question on a linguistic level (and it makes a lot more sense if you imagine the conversation as having taken place in Aramaic, not the Greek version of the text.) I Did Not Know That.
The Peshitta version of the Good Samaritan parable uses qarri:b (i.e. kpi’a) throughout, though, including in the Leviticus quote; evidently it’s just directly translated from the Greek.
“…a very good question on a linguistic level (and it makes a lot more sense if you imagine the conversation as having taken place in Aramaic, … ).”
What do you mean?
I have a 19-th century copy of the Gospels* in Gothic (only where extant), Old English, Wycliffe and Tyndale: Matt 12:39 has OW Lufa ðínne nehstan swá swá ðe sylfne (thorn/eth choices and accents are editorial), Wycliffe Thou shalt loue thi neiȝbore as thi self, Tyndale Thou shalt love thyne neghbour as thy selfe. “Neighbour” does go back to OE neáh-gebúr but evidently that wasn’t the most obvious translation; something changed in the intervening centuries. I blame the Normans… No extant Gothic for the Matthew passage but Luke 10: 27 gives nieghbour as “newhundyan” ( 𐌽𐌴𐍈𐌿𐌽𐌳𐌾𐌰𐌽, nehwundjan in more modern transcriptions), again just the superlative of ‘near’.
* edited by Joseph Bosworth, MDCCCLXV
what do you mean?
Well, in the Greek Gospel text, the word used throughout for “neighbour” is etymologically and transparently “nearby-person”; but if the exchange took place in Aramaic (or Hebrew), the Lawyer may actually have been asking “Who exactly is this ‘companion/friend’ (who I’m supposed to be loving like myself)?” This actually seems to me to be to be a perfectly sensible question of Biblical exegesis; Luke’s parenthetical remarks about his motivation, on the other hand, seem to reflect the Greek text, in which the question looks much more like a mere bit of pettifoggery.
But (ignoring questions about the historicity of the entire exchange) if the conversation actually took place at all, the Lawyer would surely not have been citing the Torah in Greek. He’d have quoted the Hebrew, or maybe an Aramaic targum.
Mathtew 5:43-44 is also a nightmare for a literalist.
First πλησίος here is contrasted to your enemy. It must mean the same thing when we are commanded to love him, our πλησίος? So the Austrian far right can celebrate a victory: we do not have to love понаехавших.
But then he says we should love your enemies;-( (which too must be the same thing)…
The Kusaal version, again, uses tiraan:
Nɔŋimi fʋ tiraan ka kisigi fʋ bi’em “Love your peer/companion and hate your enemy.”
It seems reasonable to think that the original Aramaic would have used a “companion/friend” word rather than a “nearby-person” word, as the reference is again to Leviticus 19:18.
(The Syriac just directly translates the Greek as qarri:b again; it’s not one of those tantalising cases you occasionally see where the Aramaic-speaking translators have second-guessed the Greek.)
I wonder if I’ve missed a trick with the the Greek word πλησίος? Just because it means “nearby” etymologically, it doesn’t necessarily follow that it was actually constrained to the “nearby” meaning. We have scholars amongst us who will Actually Know …
The various translators obviously did take that as its core meaning, though.
The entire Sermon on the Mount is a problem for literalists, but not for any linguistic reason. It’s perfectly clear what it means; you just rather wish it wasn’t. (I agree with CS Lewis: it’s hard to imagine a more desperately deluded spiritual state than that of someone who thinks the Sermon on the Mount is comforting …)
FWIW, I have never understood din næste as denoting any sort of in-group, despite the etymological equation to “nearest,” and I have never heard a Danish priest interpret it that way in a sermon. Rather it’s “anybody you meet or hear about,” and in this interconnected age that means “any human being.” When not substantivized, næste = “next”.
I’m sure the other interpretation exists among Danes who think of themselves as good Christians, though.
(Now dine nærmeste, which is a substantivized superlative [formed to nærmere < ON nærrmeirr which served as a comparative because the inherited comparative of nær was nærr and that was confusing] does mean close family (~ “next of kin”). Danish does have a newly formed regular comparative of nær:nærere, næreste, but the m-forms can be used in all contexts in all but the most stilted registers. Also nærmer and fjermer are used by coachmen [cf Kocs] about left and right horses, wheels, a.s.o., because kusken [cf Kocs] traditionally walks or sits on the left side).
(EDIT: The ON stuff above only makes sense if you ignore ná and assume they had already substituted nær for the positive, which is the situation in Danish. My sources are not in agreement on this).
Yes, I wonder too. But then the Hebrew word does not seem to mean “neighbour” either.
“Wycliffe Thou shalt loue thi neiȝbore as thi self”
Aha, so “neighbour” predates King James. My only idea then is that in possibly OE it could mean “adjacent”.
Welsh and Irish can be calques from English (the transition nigh > neightbour is more likely in English) but: this exact commandment is famous and proverbial. It must have been in use since the early medieval times in Cletics, and likely is mentioned in extant manuscripts…
qarri:b )
“love qariib, hate ghariib!” must be a great idea of anti-refugee banner…
“(“Not to be confused with ‘commode’”, indeed!)”
“cognate with Old Breton compot (“division of land”) and Modern Breton kombod “)
The semantic range of רֵעַ rēa‘, the term used in Leviticus 19:18, is all over the place, from ‘friend’, to ‘another person’ to ‘one of the same people’. From the context in Leviticus, “Do not avenge and do not bear a grudge towards ones of your people”, it seems to me pretty straightforward that gentiles don’t count. So much so, that later exegetes had to specifically say that yes, you really should be nice to everyone, not just other Jews.
(Not that anyone ever took this seriously, within or without the in-group.)
I’ve always taken the “love your neighbour” injunctions as Jesus simply picking up something that was already there for the taking in Leviticus 19:18 and running with it, but looking more carefully at the context of the parable of the Good Samaritan, it looks a lot more like the same thing as he’s doing in the Sermon on the Mount: he’s once again going “Hah! you thought you were observing the Law, did you? Not so fast!”, and not merely heading off a wilful misunderstanding on the part of the hapless Lawyer, which is the way the frame story usually seems to get interpreted (including by Luke himself, apparently.)
Somewhere along the line, this may have got further enabled by what looks awfully like a mistranslation on the part of the LXX crew of the original Hebrew of Leviticus; a mistranslation then duly propagated into many translations via the Greek. It’s rather like the עַלמָה who gets turned into a παρθένος …
(For my DD thesis, I will be taking the topic “Mistranslation as Prophecy.”)
I think that Y and DE are onto something. Remember, that in Luke the Leviticus quote is in the intro to the parable of the good Samaritan. Which means that it can be viewed as pretty much the discussion on the scope of the first half of Lev 19:18.
Now, historically, Greek speaking Luke writing more than half century after the fact a story to which he wasn’t even an eyewitness pretty much rules out that it is intentional, but the death of the author and all that…
@Y, David Eddyshaw, D.O.: Putting the question in the mouth of a lawyer also suggests that the parables is intended as an exegesis of the passage from Leviticus.
Well, here the text is clear:
@Brett:
Good point.
“The good news is that there is a Greek school in Crimea…”
In this case it is a school where Greek is taught (Greek-as-mother-tongue). Also German and Bulgarian.
I wonder if I’ve missed a trick with the the Greek word πλησίος? Just because it means “nearby” etymologically, it doesn’t necessarily follow that it was actually constrained to the “nearby” meaning. We have scholars amongst us who will Actually Know …
The various translators obviously did take that as its core meaning, though.
I don’t know if that answers your question, but the meanings indicated in Liddle-Scott all revolve around "near" and "neighbour".
I do not understand if in Greek it is just a substantive of “near” (which would be translated to English as a “neighbour”) or actually a neighbour.
[substantive of near] – [dwelling near] – [a member of a social institution]
Russian sosed is 2 strongly affected by 3: my neighbour comes once in a few month to tell that she does not have the keys and can’t open her door, and I would give her an extra set. It can be used in the sense “adjacent”, e.g. I can speak about “neighbours” of a vertex in a graph (these still “dwell” near this vertex and this sence could be borrowed).
“Subst., neighbour, “ἰδὼν ἐς π. ἄλλον” Il.2.271, etc.; “οἱ π.” Hdt. 7.152, Ar.Lys.471, etc.”
Il.2.271 But the Achaeans, sore vexed at heart though they were, broke into a merry laugh at him, and thus would one speak with a glance at his neighbour
Hdt. 7.152 This, however, I know full well, namely if all men should carry their own private troubles to market for barter with their neighbors, there would not be a single one who, when he had looked into the troubles of other men, would not be glad to carry home again what he had brought.
Ar.Lys.471 ἀλλ᾽ ὦ μέλ᾽ οὐ χρὴ προσφέρειν τοῖς πλησίοισιν εἰκῇ
τὴν χεῖρ᾽: ἐὰν δὲ τοῦτο δρᾷς, κυλοιδιᾶν ἀνάγκη.
Эта история очень мила моему сердцу. Я так давно и так часто рассказываю ее, что многие привыкли считать меня ее автором. Между тем я лишь прилежный пересказчик принадлежащих истории фактов, летописец, что ли.
…Начало моей истории относится к памятной дате 5 марта 1953 года. Уже пару дней радио торжественным голосом диктора Левитана передавало о “постигшем нашу партию и народ несчастьи: тяжелой болезни нашего Великого Вождя и Учителя Иосифа Виссарионовича Сталина (наверняка перечислялись еще какие-то титулы и должности, но я их не запомнил).
https://web.archive.org/web/20090422174253/http://serafim.msk.ru/index.php?lan=0&module=98
@Hans:
Thanks. Unfortunately, the English gloss “neighbour” is itself ambiguous between the “comrade/peer” sense and the “nearby person” sense, so one would need to look at the actual contexts, really.
It’s a pretty natural metaphor to extend “spatially close” to “socially close” (even though that hasn’t happened in Kusaal, among other languages); what I was wondering was if this had happened in Greek (and if so, whether the extension antedates the New Testament.) If it had happened, the LXX translators didn’t make a an actual mistake in translating Leviticus 19:18: it would just be confusing for future exegetes that the Greek word they picked had a significantly broader semantic range than the original Hebrew (the opposite of the עַלמָה/παρθένος thing, where they picked a Greek word with a significantly narrower semantic range …)
The fact that the Peshitta consistently translates the Greek word by a form which surely does just mean “spatially close” *, and which they didn’t use for the Leviticus verse, seems to suggest otherwise, though. However, I may well be overinterpreting this; ancient translators did not share our modern criteria for accuracy.
* Also “close” of family relationships, I see from my dictionary; but that, though also a metaphor, is not the same as the “socially close” metaphor (of course.)
But is qarri:b just spatially close?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/قريب#Arabic
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/קרוב#Hebrew
As an illustration that the Peshitta translators had other criteria for accuracy than our own, I’ve just noticed that the עַלמָה “young woman” in Isaiah 7:14 actually is a בתולתא “virgin” in the Syriac.
The usual story seems to be that the Peshitta Old Testament was translated directly from the Hebrew, but it can’t be that simple. French WP is distinctly more forthcoming on this than the English:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peshitta#Influence_de_la_Septante
But is qarri:b just spatially close?
Judging by Payne Smith’s dictionary, yes (although also used for “close” as in “close relative.”)
Etymologically, of course, it means “spatially close”, but then my entire point is that that doesn’t necessarily settle the matter …
The “spatially close” sense of neighbor in English means “habitually spatially close” – other people who live on the same block (or larger geographical “neighborhood”) as you as contrasted with other people who happen to be at the moment merely riding in the same subway car or seated in the same movie theater as you. So what happens when people leave their own neighborhoods to go wandering around the vaster and more complex and cosmopolitan world? The man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho was almost certainly not in his (unspecified) home neighborhood when he fell among thieves, nor is it a plausible inference that the inn where the good Samaritan took him (and paid the innkeeper in advance to give him continuing care) was in that neighborhood.
That said, the story only makes sense if you assume the man who fell among thieves was socially closer to the priest and Levite than he was to the Samaritan, although that’s not inconsistent with his home neighborhood being one in which Samaritans did not reside but priests and Levites did. (I don’t have an immediate good sense of how residentially segregated the Samaritan community in the Holy Land was in those days.)
I will say that the lawyer’s question is extremely evocative of the atmosphere of a first-year class for American law students, or at least that’s how it struck me quite powerfully one cold-but-sunny afternoon during early Lent of 1990 when I happened to be reading the passage while in my first year of law school.
But the point is, as DE and Y probably figured out, is not about who is your “neighbor”, but who is your “fellow citizen”.
Disappearing down the rabbit-hole of the girl in Isaiah 7:14, I’ve just come across a suggestion that was entirely new to me, viz that the Classical Greek word παρθένος itself did not (yet) necessary imply virginity, but meant simply “young unmarried/marriageable woman.” This would mean that the LXX translators didn’t make a mistake; rather, the change of the meaning of the Greek word over the succeeding centuries gave the LXX version of Isaiah 7:14 the meaning that Matthew ascribes to it in Matthew 1:23 …
I might have to change the topic of my DD thesis from “Mistranslation as Prophecy” to “Semantic Drift as Prophecy” …
I was trying to think of reasons to jettison this idea based on my dim recollections of παρθένοι in Classical Greek literature: the more difficult when you’re dealing with a culture in which a “young unmarried/marriageable woman” is assumed to be a virgin …
I think I’ve mentioned before the Kusaal word pu’asadir, which means “young woman who has not yet given birth”, this – not unreasonably – being felt in Kusaasi culture to be of somewhat greater significance than having sex … (Kusaal has “no word for ‘virgin'” …)
It reminded me also of Christopher Logue’s excellent War Music, in which Athene’s standing Homeric epithet is consistently translated “teenage” …
DE, “The Syriac Peshitta… has חבר “companion, friend” in Leviticus 19:18 too.”
Y, “The semantic range of רֵעַ rēa‘, the term used in Leviticus 19:18”
I wonder if there are any cognates for רֵעַ rēa‘ in Aramaic. Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament: Volume XIII, https://books.google.com/books?id=RAwg47G0M2IC&pg=PA523:
“…Nöldeke has noted, however, there is no other evidence for an Aramaic word corresponding to rēa‘ …”
I played with double plurals targumims or targumsim in my head – we do that in Russian, English “bucks” is pluralized in Russian as baksy, and hobbitses are hobbitsy – and realized that I can form targumimsy, my precious.
Historically, Hausa (“you can never have too many different ways of forming the plural”) has gone a bundle on double plurals, not only in repluralising perfectly innocent existing plurals, but also because in quite a few cases the original plural has got demoted to singular, which now needs a new plural; thus gida “house” was originally the plural of giji, and it’s now got the plural gidaje “houseses” (preciousss …)
The original singular stilll ekes out a pitiful existence as an adverb: Za ni giji “I’m going home.”
In America they are called McMansions.
The Septuagint of Genesis 34:3 has a use of παρθένος for a young woman (Dinah) who ceased to be a virgin in the previous verse (though she was not given any choice in the matter); the Hebrew there is נַּעֲרָ na’ara (spelt without the final he for some reason), more like “girl” – KJV goes for ‘damsel’. Meanwhile Isaiah’s עַלְמָה alma is a rare enough word that it’s difficult to be too sure what it implied to every Biblical author.
Good find.
Proverbs 30:19 springs to mind as an instance of a עַלְמָה who is presumably not virginal.
(She is a pu’asadir in the Kusaal version.)
Едет хиппи в автобусе, рядом бабушка.
Бабушка: “Девушка, ну как вам не стыдно, [generic babushka-grumbling about the mores of of the youth… possibly she’s asking the hippy to give her a seat]” “Я не девушка” “Нашла чем гордиться, дура!”
Quite recently it was not seen as appropriate in Russia to assume that “virgin” and “unmarried” are semantically different. As for “young”, it also gets close to both (but it is approprite to assume that a woman is still young).
As result Russian words for this drift from one shade of meaning to another quite freely.
But that was very… recently ago. Nowadays, “virgin” is devstvennitsa (and mostly appears in vicinity of unicorns) while devushka and devítsa are just young lady. Deva and dévitsa is poetic (high epic and folk epic), devka is dated unmarried village girl, as is usual with words for village women, somewhat peyorative/dismissive.
Devochka, devchonka, etc are “a girl” and devochka too and devchushka….
So yes, it occured to me that the word could have driftd.
“Нашла чем гордиться, дура!”
Gave me a laugh.
Proverbs 30:19
LXX seems to have had a different Vorlage; it goes … ὁδοὺς ἀνδρὸς ἐν νεότητι.
The Disney version, perhaps …
devka is dated unmarried village girl … somewhat peyorative/dismissive
Indeed, some people feel uncomfortable singing Выйду на улицу.
When i first heard it (I was 10 maybe), the guy sang devchónki gulyayut. Only later I learned that it is dévki and giggled.
Muzhik came to mean “reliable, strong, robust” (even if smelly and with uncombed hair), the ideal of a man. Мужчина должен быть могуч, вонюч и волосат (body hair).
But words for peasant women baba and devka are pejorative (sorry, it is not peyotl..).
Sometimes baba is used similarly to muzhik by women. “Am I a baba or not after all? I need a man”.
Genteel word for an unmarried (like in never married) woman is барышня, but it’s almost never used as a generic unmarked word. Баба is definitely more neutral than девка. В сорок пять баба ягодка опять is not raising any eyebrows.
Is барышня still in use? Somehow I thought it was thoroughly obsolete.
No, it’s a normal word, but is a bit off-center, not sure how exactly pin it down. In my undergrade school it was a normal word for a female student. We called ourselves мужики и барышни.
@LH, as an address in Soviet Russian (and maybe now) sometimes instead of devushka in contexts like «Девушка, милая, как вас звать?» — «Тома. Семьдесят вторая». Also ironically. It is boring to call men “men”, women “women”, tables “tables” all the time, people need synonyms that have their smell and sound. For the same reason you have “dude” etc.
“We called ourselves мужики и барышни.”
A good company…
Also ironically. It is boring to call men “men”, women “women”, tables “tables” all the time, people need synonyms that have their smell and sound. For the same reason you have “dude” etc.
Sure. I just didn’t realize барышня had been revived that way. Отсталый я человек!
I know, the phenomenon is hardly new for you, but I do not know a good name for it, while “ironically” could imply more irony than what I mean here. The distance from “neutral” is hardly greater than for “dude”.
A reference by description rather than an explanation:)
“revived” – I suspect if has always been around, moving up and down in waves. And yes, it brings about an image of someone in a 19th century dress (so I think D.O.’s female classmates are underlyingly young ladies – a beast less common (at the surface level) in gender-equal worker-peasant USSR. It is somewhat more gentle word, and genteel indeed)
The usual newspaper-Russian word is devushka of course.
While I would look forward to reading either of Dr. Eddyshaw’s proposed theses, in the U.S. the D.D. is universally an honorary degree (with thus no thesis submitted). I had thought the same was true in the U.K. but perhaps I am mistaken or perhaps Dr. Eddyshaw is being jocular.
Well, when I say thesis, I was really referring to my series of groundbreaking published studies what I have now got assembled ready for vetting, like. Sort of Lifetime Achievement Award, it’ll be.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_Divinity
Disappearing down the rabbit-hole of the girl in Isaiah 7:14, I’ve just come across a suggestion that was entirely new to me, viz that the Classical Greek word παρθένος itself did not (yet) necessary imply virginity, but meant simply “young unmarried/marriageable woman.”
I thought this is well-travelled ground(?) Already in the 1970’s my school Classics master said the Greek word means no more than ‘young girl’.
Matthew — indeed the whole Virgin birth propaganda — is merely mythologising to tie up tendentious readings of the Scriptures with Roman myth-making. As per that link, Romulus/Remus, Alexander the Great, even Caesar Augustus/Octavian are claimed to be Virgin births. So lining up Jesus to be celestial ruler of the Romans.
Zeus went about impregnating all sorts/shower of gold/etc. Sarah miraculously conceiving a son at a preposterous age. Call me Ishmael.
For publicising this critical exegesis of the scriptures, by the way, we chiefly thank atheists, especially Christopher Hitchens. So-called bible scholars knew all this, but kept it a dark secret for fear of scaring off the masses. After all, the rest of the scriptures are so plausible.
@DE, perhaps you need to read more footnotes.
Meanwhile, in the Land of Opportunism:
Billy Graham, who received honorary Doctor of Divinity degrees from The King’s College and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, was regularly addressed as “Dr. Graham”, though his highest earned degree was a Bachelor of Arts degree in anthropology from Wheaton College.[8][9]
I am puzzled by AntC’s phrase “Already in the 1970’s.” Surely there is no theory and/or proposed lifestyle so radical, transgressive, and/or debauched that it was not publicly aired in the 1970’s. Biorhythms, pyramid power, ley lines, cultish adulation of the Manson family, modern Biblical scholarship, pet rocks, disco … it was all out there and in your face back then.
@Stu: there is or at least was in polite American society a well-recognized clergyman exception to the “people with merely honorary doctorates don’t get addressed as Dr. SURNAME” norm. Worlds away from Billy Graham, class-snobbery-wise, there were plenty of posh Episcopalians/Presbyterians who got referred to as the Rev’d Dr. So-and-So w/o having defended a dissertation or learned how to set a broken leg.
For publicising this critical exegesis of the scriptures, by the way, we chiefly thank atheists
What, Rudy Bultmann did all his work in secret? I Did Not Know That.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demythologization
That retiring fellow Schweitzer published his stuff in samizdat, sure …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quest_of_the_Historical_Jesus
That’s why I’ve never heard of him.
Footnotes, eh?
Actually Wheaton College looks like good clean fun. A maturant for our times.
@David E.: Clearly better as a tactical matter to let Team Atheist get all the credit for Bultmann and Schweitzer, innit? Their self-understanding may have been otherwise, but it is well-established that many people are Unreliable Narrators of their own lives, innit?
@JWB:
Why should the devil have all the best demythologisers?
Incidentally, I wish I had a BA in Anthropology. I wonder if I’ve left it too late …
Wheaton was a really progressive place by the standards of the mid-nineteenth century. Today, it is startlingly retrograde.
I also know one joke about Wheaton College. It actually seems at odds with the starkly conservative Christian reputation of the college today, but I heard it from somebody who grew up in Chicagoland in the mid-twentieth century, so it presumably represents some really existing stereotype about the place from that time:
FWIW the U.S. has two different institutions of higher learning with confusingly similar names, which wikipedia disambiguates as “Wheaton College (Illinois)” [the reputedly evangelical-subculture-aligned one] and “Wheaton College (Massachusetts)” [yeah, which not so much]. One of my mother’s good friends from college, now deceased, ended up serving as president of the latter, so I assume she spent more of her time than she would have preferred in dealing with people under the misimpression that she was president of the former.
@J.W. Brewer: Yeah, I knew that, actually, and I should have mentioned it. I’m pretty sure that the person I heard the joke from was thinking of the Wheaton in Illinois, however—although maybe he had the wrong end of the stick himself. The Wheaton in Massachusetts is probably a better fit for the joke, but not phenomenally better. Apparently the King of Bhutan went to the Massachusetts Wheaton; make of that what you will.
Surely there is no theory and/or proposed lifestyle so radical, transgressive, and/or debauched that it was not publicly aired in the 1970’s.
@JWB you missed the attribution: ” my school Classics master”. He was at least the age of Abraham when Sarah miraculously conceived. (Him being the last teacher of Latin and Greek, he called himself ‘the ancient monument’.) There was nothing whatsoever cultish about him. This intelligence was whispered to us in Greek Lit. lest the headmaster overhear. (He a lay preacher.) Who would think that in a Grammar School, actual language could be so subversive?
@DE you said a suggestion that was entirely new to me. If that was irony, I missed the footnote telling me.
As for Bultmann and Schweizer: at said Grammar school I suffered 4 years of Religious so-called ‘Education’. Not a word about those geezers. 4 years of feckin gobshitery.
Don’t say “discloses the truth of the kerygma as kerygma for those who do not think mythologically.” Do say “end-to-end total bollocks” [Hitchens — specifically of the Nativity myths].
The king of Bhutan is, from what I’ve seen of his actions, one of those unobtrusive authoritarians that don’t go on the radar of most people because he does not have the resources to invade a neighboring country, but is none the less extremely creepy.
you said a suggestion that was entirely new to me. If that was irony, I missed the footnote telling me
It was not irony; I was well aware that the Hebrew text does not say “virgin”, but I did not, in fact, know that the Greek word need not imply virginity either: hence my earlier comments about “mistranslation.” It seems I was mistaken, though I would in fact be interested to hear from an actual classicist on the point (we have some amongst us.) Nor is the matter quite as simple as all that, even so: even if the word παρθένος need not entail virginity, the choice of that word over enough in a particular (textual or cultural) context might strongly imply it. This is linguistics, not theology. I don’t know the answer. I welcome actual information on the subject.
Please note that I have not been discussing the doctrine of the Virgin Birth at all, and have no intention of doing so; nor have I at any point vouchsafed to you my own beliefs on the matter.
Your “Religious Education” lessons seem indeed to have lacked much substance. Pity. It is good if atheists have some grasp of the basics of what it is they don’t believe in, exactly.
“end-to-end total bollocks”
This is in accordance with the tenets of Orthodox Dawkinsism, of which the Prime Radiant is “Christians only disagree with me because they’re fucking stupid.”
So-called bible scholars knew all this, but kept it a dark secret for fear of scaring off the masses
This is just a fantasy. Bultmann was simply the first name that came to mind. There is a whole tradition of such scholarship, among Christians, long since dominant not only in academic theology departments but among the actual clergy of many mainstream denominations, and it has issued in some very high-profile popular works aimed squarely at Christian non-academics. Actual atheists generally feel that there is little actual point in close study of the Bible, and who can blame them?
Describing the Bultmanns and the Schweitzers as non-Christian (apart from being essentially a Fundamentalist stance) is simply the One True Scotsman fallacy. To call them “so-called” scholars is mere Dawkinsism.
@Brett: the Massachusetts Wheaton was historically a women’s college, not admitting its first male applicants until the late 1980’s. Not a problem for a Bhutanese crown prince born in 1980, but you would have thought Santa Claus would have been in too early a generational cohort.
As a Bodhisattva, Santa Claus can of course assume any gender they please at will.
(I refer you to the account of the Daughter of the Dragon King in the Lotus Sutra.)
Orthodox Dawkinsism, of which the Prime Radiant is “Christians only disagree with me because they’re fucking stupid.”
Yes, Dawkins is or should be an embarrassment to atheists everywhere.
Regarding the “people with merely honorary doctorates don’t get addressed as Dr. SURNAME” norm, there’s also the case of the bluegrass musician Ralph Stanley, who put “Dr.” on his autobiography, as well as his banjo. And I have a BA in anthropology.
And I have a BA in anthropology.
Respect!
And I’m not at all sure of the degree status of Doctor Wu. (Although “Are you really just a shadow/ Of the man that I once knew” would suggest that he had been through a significant amount of grad school.)
There seem to be more BAnthropologists out there than I would have expected. I never got past a passing familiarity with philosophische Anthropologie. You don’t need a degree to do it, according to the WiPe:
# Die philosophische Anthropologie sucht vom einzelnen Menschen zu abstrahieren und zielt auf Allgemeingültigkeit. #
A cinch for blog comment practitioners !
the degree status of Doctor Wu
This is probably analogous to the phenomenon noted by George Mikes in “How to Be an Alien”; Mikes (a Hungarian) explains that even if you have three advanced postgraduate degrees, you should never style yourself (say) “Dr Mikes”, because all Brits will know that the “Dr” simply means that you are a Central European.
IIRC, Dr Fu Manchu (quite rightly) insisted on his proper academic style, however. He worked for those degrees …
“I am a doctor of philosophy from Edinburgh, a doctor of law from Christ’s College, a doctor of medicine from Harvard. My friends, out of courtesy, call me ‘Doctor.'”
No Anthropology, I note. His fatal weakness …
Dr. Ralph Stanley was a few years younger than the equally notable bluegrass picker Doc Watson (formally Arthel L. Watson), who AFAIK did not technically have even an honorary doctorate. Nor did Doc Gooden (formally Dwight …) or many other ballplayers known thusly. Nor did (I assume) the proverbial/generic figure who is featured in the proverb “Never play cards with a man named Doc.”
There are multiple theories on the internet about real-life medical professionals surnamed Wu that the members of Steely Dan might have had personal dealings with, but even if the character is purely fictional (and perhaps a Big Metaphor of some sort) it’s plausible to think the character fictitiously possesses the same sort of doctorate as the fictitious Holmes’ fictitious sidekick Dr. Watson.
As probably was already discussed by Hattery many times, Italians have an annoying habit to call “dottore” anyone with a university degree. This sometimes leads to confusion. I knew one such “dottore” who secured a postdoc position in US on the strength of their “dottorat”, completed it succesfully, after which decided that they need a proper Ph.D. and went to a grad school, in Europe.
Defining “atheism” can be less trivial than I thought. I thought (as a child) that it is the basic state of mind, compared to an adherent of a religion.
But that was USSR where “everyone” says that she’s an atheist (to turn out to be a believer later when USSR falls apart). In a society where everyone is a believer and God is frequently discussed the basic state can be different.
It’s not trivial by any means; not least because what people actually mean (or understand) by “God” (or “god”) varies enormously. This is even more striking once you leave the Jewish-Christian-Muslim zone, with its host of common assumptions, so pervasive that most believers (and unbeiievers) never notice them at all. *
Does Kusaal win mean “god”? The Bible translators use it for (pagan) “god”, but it’s pretty hard** to square its range of meanings with the use of “god” in English, or the equivalent words in SAE languages. Apples and oranges …
“Religion” is an even more culture-bound concept, as anyone with a BA in anthropology could surely confirm …
* One of the Great Truths of Buddhism is “there is no God.” (or at any rate, “no soul.”)
https://www.britannica.com/topic/anatta
** Brit for “outright impossible.”
Yes, back when I stopped believing in the god of my Lutheran forebears I called myself an atheist because (in my simple-minded way) I thought that’s what not believing in god made you; now that “atheist” in practice seems to mean “someone who has contempt for religion and thinks all believers are credulous fools,” I just say “I’m not a believer” when the subject comes up.
I just say “I’m not a believer” when the subject comes up.
You want to be polite. You remained a Lutheran.
…what people actually mean (or understand) by “God” (or “god”) varies enormously.
Then, is it reasonable to require that atheists know exactly what they don’t believe in?
Interesting position is occupied by Bart Ehrman. He calls himself agnostic-atheist because he doesn’t know whether God exists, but doesn’t believe in them (is it a good pronoun to use with God?).
“(is it a good pronoun to use with God?).”
!!!
Then, is it reasonable to require that atheists know exactly what they don’t believe in?
By no means, unless they take to lecturing believers about what they wrongly imagine the believers to believe in …
(I am, myself, temperamentally opposed to apathy in such things, but I have to admit to being thoroughly outnumbered. Same with politics … normal people just don’t care …)
(is it a good pronoun to use with God?)
Kusaal Win “God” (in the sense of the Creator) belongs to a noun class which predominantly consists of non-persons; there are some human-reference words in it, but they seem to have got transferred from the exclusively human-reference a/ba noun class for identifiable morphophonological reasons which would not apply to win. As a common noun, win “god” is inanimate-gender, though the distinction is tending to break down these days, so it’s hard to be dogmatic about the usage.
I mean, that made me laugh a lot.
Because lā ʾilāha ʾillā -llāhu, and as we are speaking about neighbours,
BTW, a stupid question: what’s the earliest examle of this? In the OT / Torah? Elsewhere?
I mean, newest advancements in the theory of gender neutrality ruin the [result of] millenia of most careful elaboration of oneness …
Well, in Hebrew (and Arabic) you only get to choose between masculine and feminine …
(and you still have to, even if you make it plural, at least in the Classical languages.)
The orthodox Christian position is that God the “Father” is neither male nor female, or course. There’s nothing heretical about calling God “she” or (“Mother”); any reasons for not doing so are entirely culture-bound (and don’t bear much scrutiny sub specie aeternitatis.)
If “they” catches on for real as a gender-neutral English pronoun you could make a very good case for using it for God the Parent. That‘d give some of my US co-religionists something to think about (the ones who got their knickers in a twist about gender-neutral language applied to people even where the original texts plainly don’t presuppose any gender …)
BTW, a stupid question: what’s the earliest examle of this? In the OT / Torah? Elsewhere?
As it happens, I was trying to look into that the other day. The earliest I could find was Deuteronomy 32:39: “See now that I am He; there is no God besides Me (w-ʔeyn ʔĕlohim ʕimmɔḏi).” But note that “beside” is not quite the same as “except”; Isaiah 45:22 is more unambiguous: “For I am God, and there is no other. (ki ʔăni ʔel w-ʔeyn ʕoḏ)”
There is a Qere perpetuum in the Pentateuch which means that “he” and “she” are in fact written identically in the consonantal text …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qere_and_Ketiv#Qere_perpetuum
Interesting position is occupied by Bart Ehrman. He calls himself agnostic-atheist because he doesn’t know whether God exists, but doesn’t believe in them
Yes: it’s rather too readily supposed in these discussions that belief in the existence of God would inevitably lead to believing in God (in the usual Christian sense of trusting in God.) Obviously this does not follow in the least. (This is in fact a familiar Christian trope: James 2:19 “Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.”)
Does the second Commandment in Exodus 20:3 count, viz. “thou shalt not have other gods before me”?
(“Before me”, ‘al pānai, is even more ambiguous than “beside me”. Does that mean other gods are acceptable, but only in subsidiary roles?)
It’s a step from “don’t have any other gods but me” to “there aren’t any other gods but me” (though I suppose you could argue that the second is – or began as – just a more rhetorically forceful way of expressing the first.)
Apparently, the Great Hymn to the Aten has another near-miss: WP quotes it as “O sole god, like whom there is no other!” Have to try and track down the original wording…
@Lameen, thank you. It is remarkable, though, that it never occured to me before to ask about something as basic as this:/ I won’t be surprised if similar wordings are found outside of Judaism (monotheism does not equals to Judaism/Christianity/Islam and it seems it was a thing). I tried to use biblehub, it suggested:
Deuteronomy 4:35,36 Unto thee it was shewed, that thou mightest know that the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him
Deuteronomy 4:39 Know therefore this day, and consider it in thine heart, that the LORD he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath: there is none else.
Deuteronomy 5:6, 5:7 I am the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods before me.
and Deuteronomy 6:4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.
(interlinear is obtained by clicking “Interlin” (horizonal arrangment) or “Hebrew” (vertical arrangement) above) A slightly different set.
@Lameen:
I haven’t so far managed to find it, but FWIW James Allen, in his Middle Egyptian (p239) says that although in the earlier part of his reign, Akhenaten’s regime was content with just proclaiming the supremacy of the Sun, with the worship of traditional gods like Amun still permitted, in about the tenth year of the reign the name of the supreme Sun deity was changed from the traditional Re-Harakhti, which Allen attributes to a desire to make the god not only the supreme god but the only god, and a campaign of active persecution was begun against worship of the traditional gods, with erasure of their names on temples, closure of the temples and disbandment of the priesthoods; Allen also says that the plural nṯrw “gods” was altered on monuments to the singular nṯr “god.”
monotheism does not equals to Judaism/Christianity/Islam
Traditional African religions very often have a single Creator god, but in general there is no question of the Creator being the sole object of religious devotion, or indeed of any religious devotion at all; I think I’ve previously cited this Kusaal proverb, which expresses the traditional stance quite well:
DIm nɛ Win, da tu’as nɛ Winnɛ!
“Eat with God, don’t talk to God!”
(i.e. be grateful to God, but don’t bother him with prayers)
I’ve often wondered whether these Creator gods may not have diffused from Islam, too. There are “pagan” groups in West Africa who nevertheless call the creator Allah …
The favoured Kusaal term for (the Christian) “God”, Wina’am, has a form not possible for a native Agolle Kusaal word (though the components are easy enough to parse: “divine authority”), and it must be a loan from somewhere; it seems reasonable to wonder if the concept is a loan too.
I’ve got a copy of Evans-Pritchard’s classic Nuer Religion somewhere (according to which the Creator is very much the supreme god among the Nuer) but I can’t put my hand on it just now. E-P came in for some criticism along the lines that he had interpreted his data too much through Western categories, too; in fact, I seem to recall that we had a thread on that a while back.
Ah yes: it was Rodney Needham, mentioned in this thread
https://languagehat.com/talking-to-aliens/
Well, Gen. 1 is pretty clear on there being one creator God (except 1 verse) and this is the earliest it can be in the text. If we think about the earliest by the time of composition, it is obviously hard to tell, though poetry probably comes before prose.
Addendum: drasvi, as far as I understand (which is not much) “Shema” indeed is the most important proclamation of monotheism, though context clearly shows that at the time it was establishing the only God for Israel.
I spoke too hastily before when I suggested that Bultmann et al. be left to Team Atheist, because the situation is certainly not binary and it’s not a two-team league. The world is full of a wide range of theists whose beliefs are at irreconcilable variance with small-o orthodox Christianity,* some of whom do claim to have a quite favorable impression of Jesus as they understand him. So maybe they can be put on Team Bahai or something.
*The “No True Scotsman” analogy doesn’t fully work IMHO because there is absolutely no bare-minimum level of specific belief or praxis that is constitutive of Scottishness, but IMHO there needs to be some such bare-minimum (although that’s not inconsistent with a category of bad or hypocritical Christians who only pay lip service to that bare minimum), although one can certainly argue about where the line should be drawn, for “Christian” to be an even vaguely coherent description of anything. The alternative is to make “Christian” a tribal identity whereby any religious practice or belief arising among descendants of Christians and/or in a historically Christian society is deemed to be Christian, and I trust Dr. Eddyshaw will see the potential difficulty with that.
My own views are no-enemies-to-the-left of a hardlininess to delight the hardliniest, but I am very wary of drawing the boundaries of Christianity too narrow. In particular, I think doctrine, though a convenient way of boundary-drawing (on account of its relatively objective character as a criterion) is not a great way of telling the wheat from the tares. You do not need me to tell you that there is Dominical support for this proposition of mine …
I strongly suspect that our views on this are in reality fairly compatible.
I have (I must admit) something of a soft spot for the demythologisers (related to my soft spot for the builders of other beautiful systems that I myself don’t subscribe to one bit.) If you accept (as I do not) their premise (viz, that no intellectually honest person can nowadays accept any of the “supernatural” elements of Christianity at all), then their determination to save something from the wreckage is quite admirable.
@D.O. thank you. I am reading Shema Yisrael now.
As for the creator, I do not feel that creation is “religion par excellence” (cf. WP: “Theism is also difficult to use as a unifying doctrine for Hinduism, because while some Hindu philosophies postulate a theistic ontology of creation, other Hindus are or have been atheists.”) and the arguments between darwinists and theists are perplexing to me.
One possibility is that it is an archetype on its own. Are there creation myths where a Greek/Norse-style tribe of gods create the world (with a scandal)?
with a scandal
Well, the Egyptian creation story involves cosmic self-abuse …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasadiya_Sukta
iyáṃ vísr̥ṣṭir yáta ābabhū́va
yádi vā dadhé yádi vā ná
yó asyā́dhyakṣaḥ paramé vyoman
só aṅgá veda yádi vā ná véda
Whether God’s will created it, or whether He was mute; Perhaps it formed itself, or perhaps it did not; Only He who is its overseer in highest heaven knows, Only He knows, or perhaps He does not know.
Whence all creation had its origin, the creator, whether he fashioned it or whether he did not, the creator, who surveys it all from highest heaven, he knows — or maybe even he does not know.
Ouch. https://www.hse.ru/mirror/pubs/share/224190671, p 13: dadhé • passive: ‘has been established’ • non-passive / reflexive: ‘has established itself’ • absolute transitive: ‘has established [it]’
And in Gnostic systems, creation is a regrettable lapse (if not a positively malevolent one):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demiurge#Gnosticism
And ouch once again:
1 Kings 18:20-22
20 So Ahab sent unto all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto mount Carmel.
21 And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.
22 Then said Elijah unto the people, I, even I only, remain a prophet of the LORD; but Baal’s prophets are four hundred and fifty men.
“LORD” is Yahweh, “God” is elohim, Baal is הַבַּ֖עַל the Baal. And that’s when “Baal” means “Lord” (or is not far from it) and I am not sure how they analized elohim.
That is, I know that the latter “ouch” is not new for anyone here. But ouch nevertheless. I mean, it is getting complicated:/ And one more quote, form WP : “Hinduism spans a wide range of beliefs such as henotheism, monotheism, polytheism, panentheism, pantheism, pandeism, monism, agnosticism, atheism and nontheism.” (all -ism are links:) the link)
Baal certainly “means” Lord, Master (and Owner, and Husband, come to that), but that doesn’t have any direct bearing on the use of the word as the title of a particular Canaanite god.
He seems to have been a resurrection god, presumably associated with fertility and the seasons; he’s the hero of the
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baal_Cycle
(but I expect you knew that.)
On such titles: the Kusaal Bible translates LORD (and the its Greek rendering κύριος) as zugsɔb “boss.” In the 1976 and 1996 Bible versions, zugsɔb is used for “master, boss” in general, but the 2016 revisers evidently felt this wouldn’t do, and have substituted zugdaan in every case* where it doesn’t refer to “the Lord.”
* Oops. Not quite every case. Some have slipped under their guard (like 1 Samuel 16:16.) Bad translator …
But ouch nevertheless. I mean, it is getting complicated:/
Yes, all this stuff is incredibly (and probably inevitably) complicated, and one of the tensions in a lot of religions is between the people who try to simplify it so the Common People can understand it (or feel like they do) and the people who are enraged by any simplification and insist on all the complexity: “the whole of the law can be boiled down to This One Thing” versus “you’d better not violate even one of these hundreds of commandments.”
Hinduism spans a wide range of beliefs such as henotheism, monotheism, polytheism, panentheism, pantheism, pandeism, monism, agnosticism, atheism and nontheism
This looks like a confusion of thought to me. It’s not that Hinduism “spans” all these things; it’s that none of these concepts is strictly applicable. The formulation is an artefact of trying to force “Hinduism” into alien philosophical and religious categories. But then, so is the word “Hinduism” … (and yet more so, its calque “Hindutva” …)
The Shema,* which Rabbi Yeshua quotes, is traditionally taken to be a statement of absolute monotheism (that only one god exists), although interpreted literally, it is not quite that. I think the scholarly consensus is that absolute monotheism (and thus Genesis 1) does not appear until the Second Temple period, after the “discovery” of (proto-)Deuteronomy.
” Having become the most important prayer in Rabbinical Judaism,** the Shema is one of the handful of parts of the Torah that has a special orthography (with extra-majuscule letters).
** It is traditional for Jews to pronounce the Shema as their last utterances before death.
I was restricting my remarks to the myths surrounding the Virgin birth; not (Abrahamic) religions in general — based on linguistic exegesis, since this site is ‘Language Hat’, not ‘Religion Hat’.
Then you could believe in God and the historicity of some parts of the New Testament without having to subscribe to the Nativity myths or take the whole Bible literally. My purpose there was not to advocate for atheism, only against Biblical literalism.
And I quoted only Hitchens/didn’t mention Dawkins. Indeed I’m not sure the anti-“Dawkinsism” above is even aiming at the right target. I’m not aware of either of them mentioning Bultmann nor Schweitzer. (But then I haven’t made a close study.) Hitchens is reasonably diligent in chasing down his sources in biblical scholarship; I suspect Dawkins cribs that from Hitchens or Dennett.
Dawkins is a microbiologist/accumulates DNA evidence for Darwin’s Theory. He got into the ‘atheist business’ because he kept encountering the pseudo-science ‘intelligent design’.
I have no doubt that anybody claiming ‘intelligent design’ as evidence for God is a “credulous fool”. How did they get to be so credulous? By taking the Bible literally — even by taking literally a (generally dubious) translation into English, with no understanding of a whole series of poor translations/tendentious readings/semantic drift/etc.
Hitchens got into the ‘atheist business’ as a reaction against the dominance of biblical literalists and associated “fucking stupid[ity]” in (especially) American Politics. If you’ll take the Bible literally, you’ll believe anything about Jewish space lasers/Bill Gates’ microchips 5G/stolen election/etc. I’ll readily call out the religion-fuelled idiocy of Mike Pence, Marjorie T-G, Ted Cruz, etc. They enabled Trump, whose idiocy is not religion-based AFAICT.
Dawkins is or should be an embarrassment to atheists everywhere.
I’m an atheist (although that wasn’t my point). I don’t entirely agree with Dawkins/I agree a lot less with Hitchens. I don’t find Dawkins an embarrassment. Hitchens (even when I agree with him) is/was an embarrassment, because he’s an intellectual thug.
I have not seen Dawkins call believers-in-general idiots. Only people who present idiotic (literalist/intelligent design) arguments. (Again I think you might be confusing with Hitchens.) I challenge you for your evidence why Dawkins should be considered an embarrassment.
The Shema appears at a climactic* point in the much-underrated long poem of Auden’s: The Age of Anxiety (in the mouth of Rosetta, who is Jewish. Though not dying.)
(OK, irrelevant. I just like to plug great poetry.)
* Kinda. Anti-climactic might be nearer the mark. But that’s almost the point. The critics who laid into this poem were not unlike those who thought that Picasso painted like that because he couldn’t do it “properly.”
If you’ll take the Bible literally, you’ll believe anything about Jewish space lasers/Bill Gates’ microchips 5G/stolen election/etc
This statement appears to be empirically untrue …
I’m sure you would characterise my own view of the Bible as “literal.” Perhaps I will start believing in the Jewish space lasers real soon now … (perhaps you’re right, and I actually do believe in them, but I just never realised it … wow …)
Bill Gates’ microchips are a Totally Real thing though. I’ve got three of them under my skin now. I know.
I liked “The Blind Watchmaker” BTW. Shooting fish in a barrel, sure, but that can be fun …
I think proponents of intelligent design could have made a useful contribution to science if they had put their efforts into actally proving it and not into pushing half-baked ideas into school biology. If they claim that some or other organ/system are too complicated to evolve randomly, they should construct some models defining complexity, defining how it can increase and decrease evolutionarily, testing it on known facts etc.
I’m sure you would characterise my own view of the Bible as “literal.”
I have no evidence for that. (You way above explicitly avoided committing to an opinion on the Virgin Birth.) What possible evidence could _you_ point to that I have so characterised your views?
This continues to be Language Hat, not Religion Hat; so I expect to continue not knowing the specifics of your beliefs.
I think proponents of intelligent design could have made a useful contribution to science if they had put their efforts into actually proving it
Apart from the minor point that the actual work doesn’t – er, work – the whole supposed rationale of it is misguided. Even if it was all done perfectly rigorously, it would still be a terrible argument for believing in God. I can’t see any logical way of deducing the existence of any kind of Creator from any observed properties of the universe.
It’s not a Biblical doctrine (the Bible assumes the existence of God, and nowhere sets out to demonstrate it.)
What is a Biblical doctrine is that you can deduce the beneficence of God from creation. This strikes me as a pretty difficult doctrine, personally … as I’ve said before, I’d find it a lot easier to go with the Gnostic idea that the state of the universe argues for a Creator (again, assumed to exist) who is malevolent, or (if we’re lucky) merely incompetent. Preferable to go with a Creator who is indifferent, or better yet, nonexistent …
, that doesn’t have any direct bearing on the use of the word as the title of a particular Canaanite (and Babylonian) god.
I think the affinity between “baal” and “baal” was felt, I just do not know how.
Yet [unanalizable] Yahweh vs. [transparent] “the Lord/Baal”
become [transparent] κύριος vs. [???] ὁ Βααλ
In LXX. It is a bit strange. I do not know to what extent Βααλ was transparent to the original audience of LXX, though.
If they [proponents of ‘intelligent design’] claim that some or other organ/system are too complicated to evolve randomly, they should construct some models …
Their problem would appear to be there are no microbiologists/evolutionary biologists volunteering to help them with the specifics.
Each example they come up with, Dawkins can readily bring forward contrary evidence ‘like shooting fish in a barrel’.
I think the affinity between “baal” and “baal” was felt, I just do not know how.
I’m sure you’re right; it’s a perfectly ordinary Hebrew noun, after all. I think I was overstating the case a bit.
On the other hand, even transparent ordinary nouns, once they get transmuted into proper names, get a transparency demotion. (Who thinks of glass panes when using Windows©?)
Traditional Kusaasi personal names are mostly based on common nouns; still, I don’t get the feeling that someone called Anaba (Ana’ab) thinks of himself as a chief (na’ab) or even that someone called Atiga (Atiig) is regarded by his friends and relations as a tree (tiig.)
Creator (again, assumed to exist) who is malevolent …
Then bzzzt you are not a Biblical literalist.
“God saw that it was good” appears 7 times in Genesis. Or does your incompetence argument extend to His inability to tell Good from otherwise?
BTW how is believing in a malevolent/incompetent single God different from not believing in any god? The polytheistic religions can account for the state of the world as a clash of many Gods, some good, some evil, some indifferent, most simply caring for themselves more than humanity. If I was going to believe (Eddington concession), polytheism looks far more defensible.
I can’t see any logical way of deducing the existence of any kind of Creator from any observed properties of the universe.
Existence, no. Inordinate fondness for beetles, definitely. Though how one might have such a fondness while being non-existent rather escapes me. Indeed, I think Kant might have made his point more clearly by saying that non-existence is not a predicate.
God saw that it was good
If the text had read God saw that God was good, your argument would have some merit.
Inordinate fondness for beetles
One of my very favourite Attributes of God. (There may, after all, be some evidence for the beneficence of God in the observable creation, now that you have pointed that out …)
@DE, yes. I just do not know where they were in this range between “polysemy” and “the same word”.
There are female names like Grace in English (and Russian: Faith, Hope and Love usually) and when we use then we usually do not think about the meaning. But deities are commonly and consciously referred to by their function or properties and are epithet-generators…. For this reason I would expect that ba’ál when applied to Baal was still taken to mean Master. But then it would have made it inappropriate for God (Yahweh) and then κύριος is suspiciously similar in meaning.
LXX also has ταῗς Βααλιμ, with Hebrew plural:/
Kusaal neatly solves this problem unequivocally by sticking a proclitic particle A in front of a noun when it’s used as a personal name (it’s written solid with the next word in standard Agolle Kusaal orthography, but it can be attached to whole phrases and even complete clauses, so it’s not really a prefix.)
The Mooré and the Toende Kusaal Bible versions do this for foreign names too: Toende a Pɩyɛɛt ne a Zak ne a Zã ne a Ãndre “Peter, James, John and Andrew”, but for some reason this doesn’t happen in the Agolle Kusaal Bible; I think this is basically a sanctified traditional mistake, as foreign names do get their initial A in actual speech: Asimɔɔn “Simon.”
The particle is surprising (is it insired by noun classes?).
But the problem is usually solved by context: Grace, I think, does not sounds as grace, and I often want to say “the Putin” or ‘a Putin” of Russian Federation (cf. caesar)…
In Lojban (and Loglan) it’s la which always appears before a name. Names can be meaningless or meaningful in the language; if they end in a consonant, like la djan ‘John [in AmE pronunciation]’, they are meaningless, because all other types of words end in vowels. But the converse is not true: bredi ‘(is) red’, la bredi ‘Red’, la gredi ‘Gredi’.
@drasvi:
No: Kusaal, like “Gur” in general, has noun class suffixes rather than prefixes. It’s probably actually best taken as a kind of 3rd person pronoun in apposition to the following noun: the rationale for this analysis becomes clearer when you look at other uses of the particle, where it acts as a kind of clause nominaliser, playing the role of a subject (or sometimes of a possessor) in the nominalised clause, as in the proverb
Adaa yɛl ka’ tiimm.
“Did-say has no medicine.”
(i.e. It’s no use crying over spilt milk.)
Cf O daa yɛl … “He/she said …”
Conceivably this a is related to the Dagaare proclitic definite article a; the languages of the Dagaare/Dagara dialect chain are unique in Western Oti-Volta in having an article which precedes its noun rather than following like a respectable definite article should. It’s also not of a clear origin, whereas the definite articles of other WOV languages are transparently derived from deictics/demonstratives in the cross-linguistically common way.
Tagalog, IIRC, has special “articles” for proper names of people.
“God saw that it was good” appears 7 times in Genesis
David Eddyshaw is being rather forbearing by not pointing out that, on the most literal reading imaginable, that line refers to the initial state of creation, and does not entail anything one way or another about its later or current state.
(Also, “good” is such a denatured semantically bleached term in English. “Sublime”, in Burke’s sense, seems more relevant, if one wants to appreciate the universe as it is.)
The story goes that a young Doc Watson was appearing on a radio show, with a live audience, when the announcer asked him his name. “Arthel,” he replied. The announcer thought he needed a catchy nickname. “Call him Doc!” someone in the audience shouted. A good way to get an honorary doctorate. Beats a BA in anthropology. Perhaps Ralph Stanley was envious. I once saw Doc play “Blue Suede Shoes” on the electric guitar.
Yona Sabar, A Jewish Neo-Aramaic dictionary: dialects of Amidya, Dihok, Nerwa and Zakho, northwestern Iraq. Semitica viva, 28. Harrassowitz, 2002, p. 283:
Inordinate fondness for beetles
Really? I see inordinate fondness for destroying beetles — as 99% of all species that have ever lived, in extinction events. And of course that other species that has a special place in His Creation (allegedly) is busy destroying beetles as we speak.
on the most literal reading imaginable, that line refers to the initial state of creation, and does not entail anything one way or another about its later or current state.
Ok. So if humanity (and beetles) must continue to suffer under this veil of tears, I ask again, how belief in this God is different from not believing in any god.
I note no-one has come here to defend the literal truth of the Nativity myths — which is where we came in.
Also couldn’t the biblical literalists who are not credulous fools put their energies into something more helpful for His Creation than nit-picking and lawyering their way round the text? (Like atoning for the evil done in His Name by those claiming to be His Vicars on earth; or even rescuing beetle habitats.) It reminds of nothing so much as Generativists arguing themselves into positions as impregnable as they are vacuous.
@AntC
You may be digging a hole for yourself when you leave the solid ground of literal truth of various miracles (I personally find the Sun standing still to be less believable than parthenogenesis). By asserting that certain activities would be “more helpful for his Creation” you would seem to be placing your not inconsiderable reasoning powers (or Gnostic wisdom) against those of the Creator. A similar pissing contest (one which the eponymous protagonist could probably be said to have lost) can be found in the book of Job.
Also couldn’t the biblical literalists who are not credulous fools put their energies into something more helpful for His Creation than nit-picking and lawyering their way round the text?
I used to work for an organisation which consisted pretty largely of biblical literalists putting their energies into something more helpful than nit-picking and lawyering their way around the text. I expect that they were not, however, True Biblical Literalists Putting their Energies into Something more Helpful than Nit-picking and Lawyering Their way around the text.*
Incidentally, in suggesting that you have no evidence that I am a biblical literalist, you would appear to be discounting my own assertions on the point …. presumably I am not a reliable witness. It may be so.
* One of them believed, based on the description in Revelation, that paradise will be a cube a thousand miles on a side. He was taken aback at my wet liberal doubts on this point. This man was a highly capable medical director of a hospital who on a regular basis dealt with a very difficult administrative role and had faced down (real) death threats to keep on doing it. He was an extremely capable surgeon who had done more objective good for people than I ever will. More than you, too, even, perhaps. He was also a hell of a lot nicer than I am.
AntC, the world is more complicated than you think it is.
in suggesting that you have no evidence that I am a biblical literalist, you would appear to be discounting my own assertions on the point
Assertions alone are not evidence (we all know how misleading can be intuitions on matters of language): I want particulars. Biblical literalism comes in a variety of shades. The variety that I’ve seen Dawkins treat as credulous fools are the ones saying (for example) Jesus was born of a virgin — with that meaning in contemporary English, not merely a young unmarried woman. You haven’t made a response on that particular.
Do you still hold those wet liberal doubts about Revelation? How is that doubting consistent with literalism?
When @Hat snorted the “credulous fools” perhaps he thinks Dawkins says that of a different variety of literalist. (I haven’t seen Dawkins do so.)
(Talking of lawyers, I’ve just been watching a lecture of Philip E Johnson supposedly repudiating “The Blind Watchmaker”, and quoting Michael Behe in evidence. Ok not so credulous: more clever fools.)
Your assertions might be, for example, nit-picking and lawyering your way around “literalism”. I’ll check a few sources to see whether ‘God is malevolent and/or incompetent’ counts within literalism — prima facie I think you’re putting a weird interpretation.
I wouldn’t expect to take my assertions alone that I’m an atheist without particulars — which I’m providing by and by.
the world is more complicated than you think it is.
Uh, the Sphinxlike retreat into mysticism tactic. I can just see the patronising smugness on your face. If you’ve got something to say, come out and say it. I don’t think I’ve given a skerrick of evidence I think the world is less than complicated.
Ok. So if humanity (and beetles) must continue to suffer under this veil of tears, I ask again, how belief in this God is different from not believing in any god.
I note no-one has come here to defend the literal truth of the Nativity myths — which is where we came in.
This is precisely the kind of childish argument (“Can God make a stone so big that he can’t throw it?”) that I find so tedious in the Hitchens/Dawkins camp of simple-minded atheists. You clearly have no idea what religion is, what religious people believe, or why they believe it; you simply enjoy feeling superior to the credulous fools. Surely you can find better uses for your time than engaging in endless and pointless arguments? The rest of us are enjoying actually discussing these matters.
And refusing to take DE’s word for it that he’s a literalist is just silly.
the world is more complicated than you think it is.
Exactly.
against those [powers] of the Creator. A similar pissing contest …
There is no Creator. There’s nothing to have a pissing contest against. Saying “credulous fools” doesn’t entail the existence of anything behind their beliefs. I’m putting all those terms in fake capitals as scare quotes/tongue in cheek.
There is no Creator. There’s nothing to have a pissing contest against.
Now that you’ve staked out your brave position, and proved to your own satisfaction that you are the Smartest Guy in the Room, perhaps you can let it go. You are not going to convince anyone and no one is going to convince you, and there are plenty of other places on the internet to indulge in competitive chest-pounding. Here we value conversation.
[Extended rant deleted after seeing Hat’s post, via the miracle of LH time travel]
(Though I am no mystic: I meant the world of people. They don’t fit in their neat boxes; no, not a bit.)
* One of them believed, based on the description in Revelation, that paradise will be a cube a thousand miles on a side…
In the days when libraries had stacks I once passed the collected works of Isaac Newton, opened a volume at random to find a calculation of the volume of the New Jerusalem. I don’t have a precise reference but wonder what he might have thought about Dyson spheres… I know nothing about the historical Newton but read somewhere that he was very close-mouthed about religion (arguably a matter of life and death in those times) and that he was particularly paranoid out of conviction that Christianity had gone off the rails around the time of the Council of Nicaea on the question of the Trinity.
We wonders, yes we wonders, about those three generations of neutrinos…
Well, Newton rejected the Trinity as unsupported by the Bible – which also provides no support for belief in three generations of neutrinos (I keep up-to-date on these little matters at Señal y Ruido).
One of the nice conceits of Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London series is that the “official” magicians base their methods on the lesser-known but equally foundational occult works of Isaac Newton. The magical lowlife criminal community calls the (very small) Metropolitan Police occult department “the Isaacs.”
A bit rowlingesque, is it ?
Dear me, no. Much better than that.
Yer actual Isaac N was apparently well into the alchemical side of things in Real Life, I gather. (People just won’t stay in their boxes …)
I do not know who invented it, but it predates Rowlings. Here Night_Watch_(Lukyanenko_novel) was a success, but I did not read it.
It would be interesting to read a novel writen from the position of a member of an actual community where magic plays an important role (there is a plenty of such communities).
“my darling” of the Song of Songs (raʿyā[ṯi], ἡ πλησίον μου, amica mea) is translated in Peshitta with the same qryb in some places.. or so Thesaurus Syriacus says. (not making any point, just cruous about the root for some reason).
Astrology and alchemy are honorable mythological ancestors of their modern descendants, IMHO they don’t get enough anthropological respeck. Consider, for example, their various struggles over the years with funding agencies…
Rosicrucian alchemsts were classified Christian (and the Rosicrucians were all Protestant) but it was a Christianity unrecognizable today: To quote myself on Rosicrucianism:
The received opinion is that with the appearance of three comets, a planetary conjunction, a nova, and the signifying garfish and herring all in the same year, the seventeenth century Rosicrucians (allied with the Teutonic Knights and the Sword Brothers, working in conjunction with the British poets Spenser and Sidney and the astronomers Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler) relied on occult alchemical, astrological, numerological, Pythagorean and Kabbalistic readings of the book of Enoch, the Gothic runes, Ethiopian, Coptic, Syriac, Greek and Hebrew prophesies, and the biblical books of Ezekiel, Ezra, Daniel, and Revelation (all interpreted in terms of Joachim de Fiore’s three-stage millennial prophecy and the Sabéans’ — not Sabaeans’ — seven-stage millennial prophecy) in order to predict the appearance of the Lion of the North: an English, Scottish, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Brandenburger, or Wittenburger Prince or King who would save Christendom from the Papist Whore of Satan and bring on the Third Elijah, the rebuilding of the Temple, and the millennium.
But it wasn’t as simple as that.
Betty Jo Teeter Dobbs of Arkansas is the go-to author on Newtion’s alchemy.
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/newton-and-the-culture-of-newtonianism-betty-jo-teeter-dobbs/1105127405
PS cf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Incomplete_Enchanter
About delineating Christianity, I think, it depends on why you need it at all.
You need to know who will be saved?
You need to know who are members of a community?
You need a culturological term?
“my darling” of the Song of Songs
Interesting find!
In my copy of the Peshitta, Song of Songs 1:4 (Quam pulchra es, amica mea in Latin) has qarri:bti:, with the “near” derivative that seems to be the standing translation for Greek πλησίος; the original Hebrew does indeed have the feminine form of the rēaʕ word there.
It’s interesting that the LXX has ἡ πλησίον μου; the girl is clearly not merely a girl-next-door in this passage …
It may support the idea that the Greek word had indeed expanded its range from mere geographical closeness, I suppose.
I wonder why it’s got a neuter form? My Greek is not up to much these days (sad; the only language I have an A-Level in …)
[In the Kusaal version, “my darling” is rendered M ya’ambʋnnɛ “My gall-bladder-thing!”]
“My gall-bladder-thing!”
Now, that’s what I call an endearment.
[S of S 4:1, that should be, not 1:4. For all those following along at home …]
Out of pure nerdish curiosity, I looked up Song of Songs 4:1 in the Mooré Bible, and discovered that it goes
Fo yaa neere, m noanga, fo yaa neere. “You are beautiful, my lover, you are beautiful.”
Noanga is (boringly) just “lover” (= Kusaal nɔŋid) but neere is etymologically the same word as Kusaal nɛɛr “empty; useless.” Truly, semantic drift is a fearful thing.
Why? The scariest thing about Engish is that they say it is very useful.
No one will love something useful.
An excellent point.
A friend of mine married a bilingual English-Russian speaker. They live in Montenegro (at the moment a good half of my freinds do, but back then it was just this friend) and she gives English lessons and when we talked he wanted to teach him and he was grumbling “English is useless”.
I disagree, of course:) But I guess what he is protesting against is that ugly set of useful things the English language is getting associated with (absolutely discouraging the healthy human interest… which he is in a perfect position to develop:/)
When I was living in Taiwan I learned enough Mandarin to help me in daily life, but what I really enjoyed was studying Cantonese, which was of no use there. And when I was a math major I hated applied math and only wanted to do the pure stuff, with as little practical use as possible.
“My copy of the Peshitta”
;-(
I am still trying to find a convenient digital version of the OT:( I do not have a paper Peshitta…:(
There are dictionaries here:
https://www.dukhrana.com/lexicon/RPayneSmith/index.php?p=3727 (left colomn bottom, 6th line of the entry, amica) but not the OT…
——-
Biblehub includes an entry in Thayer’s Greek Lexicon that has a remark (πλησίον):
“(the Sept. very often for רֵעַ ; sometimes for עָמִית), ”
——
“I wonder why it’s got a neuter form? ”
I found this this (right bottom). Yes, almost all my Greek comes from situations similar to this one. So I just see an article before what dictionaries describe as an adverb (but what looks as a neuter) and raise eyebrows. And then a grammar says that [who is] μου πλησίον [?] in Luke is anomalous in that it does not have an article, and I raise an eyebrow again.
I dunno, Russian никчемный is not a pleasant word to apply to your other half.
For those reader who might be confused by the references to the Almighty’s fondness for beetles: It refers to a probably genuine but difficult to trace quote by the biologist J. B. S. Haldane. The above references to a “gall-bladder-thing” further reminds me that Haldane wrote a poem about his terminal cancer. I am particularly fond of the fact that the poem includes a verse footnote.
useful
It’s actually quite an interesting word family; the words really are cognate, and the semantic shifts involved are still traceable without too much special pleading.
In Kusaal you have
*nɛ:ya -> nɛɩ (stative verb) “be awake”
*nɛ:gɪ -> nie (dynamic verb) “wake up; appear, show oneself” (cf bɛog nieya “morning came”)
*nɛ:lɪ -> nɛɛl (dynamic verb) “reveal” (“bring to light”)
*nɛ:smʊ -> nɛɛsim (m-class noun) “light”
*nɛ:rɪ -> nɛɛr (adjective, here with re/a noun class sg suffix) [“clear” ->] “empty; useless”
*nɛ:mʊ -> nɛɛm (abstract m-class noun derived from the adjective, used adverbially) “for free, gratis”
In Mooré the adjective neere has instead shifted “clear” -> “spotless” -> “beautiful.”
The root has low tone, and is thus not connected with the mid tone (Proto-WOV high tone) root of
*nɛ:mɪ -> nɛɛm (dynamic verb) “grind with a millstone”
*nɛ:rɪ -> nɛɛr (re/a class noun) “millstone”
πλησίον
Good find, drasvi. That’s obviously it. The absent article in Luke is presumably because dropping the article in predicative forms after the copula is a standard thing in Greek. I hadn’t registered that it’s neuter/adverbial there too.
I wonder if the Greek πλησίον used in this way actually had a broader meaning (encompassing social-nearness as well) than the adjective itself used “normally”? (Probably trying too hard …)
Thanks for the Haldane poem, Brett. It’s wonderful.
At the risk of spoiling the delightful weirdness, I should perhaps explain that the ya’am “gall bladder” is the seat of the intellect in the Oti-Volta cultural area*; the word itself is very often used metonymically to mean “common sense, wisdom.” There’s a young girl in one of the Kusaal literacy booklets called Amɔryam “Has common sense/wisdom”, and the extremely recommendable Mooré-language Burkinabé film Yaaba features a traditional healer called A Taryam, which means the same thing. [In what TV Tropes calls Bilingual Bonus, nearly all the characters have notably appropriate names; this is also what TV Tropes calls Truth in Television, in that Mossi and Kusaasi personal names really do have transparent meanings, and all the names in the film are actually quite everyday ones.]
Anyhow, you can say in Kusaal
O ya’am kpɛn’ o (his mind enter her) “He’s taken a liking to her.”
So ya’ambʋn is actually not such a strange way of saying “darling” (for all its literal meaning.)
* Though this actually goes back to a confusion of two originally distinct words; it’s a kind of culturally significant pun.
Another quiote (Winer’s grammar* of NT, p 24-25): Many words which had long been in use received a new form or pronunciation, by which the older was in most cases superseded : …… ὁ πλησίον (ὁ πέλας) …
—
*the link is to another page of the same grammar where Luke 10 is dicussed, but I’ll leave it as is.
Some aggressively non-rhotic rhyming in that Haldane poem, with Homer/carcinoma and Shiva/unbeliever. And maybe some slant rhymes as well, although I guess I don’t know for sure if “pal” and “Pentothal” were true rhymes in Haldane’s idiolect although they’re definitely not in mine.
UK cryptic crosswords now seem to have adopted a universal convention that non-rhotic is the norm. In the Good Old Days, wordplay that depended on unrhoticality would be flagged up with a “some say” or the like. But no moah. O tempora! O mores!
Pal/penthothal works for me. Do you say “pentothahl”?
Pentothal [ pen-tuh-thawl ] (rhymes with “shawl”).
What’s the source of “light of my eyes”? I once tried to figure it out but failed.
In Russian it is used in 1001 nights stilizations. In Arabic it is complicated because they have options for “light” (nuur and ḍawʾ). I think it happens in both variants, but I think it is “light of the eye” usually…
Corral and decal are with ae. Is there some kind of Latinate/French thing going on with pentothal because of the onset? How do you say sodality?
The erroneous spelling “pentothol” seems reasonably common, and indeed is what I myself would surmise from the pronunciation if I couldn’t be bothered to check. Mysterious are the ways of Big Pharma and its drug-namers. Pentothal is supposedly a trademark, with the generic name being thiopental. I can’t recall ever hearing anyone say “thiopental” out loud, but wiktionary claims its RP pronunciation is different from its GenAm pronunciation, albeit with neither rhyming with “pal.”
“The light of my eyes, I said, light of my eyes, light of the world, that’s what you are, light of my life. I didn’t know what light of my eyes meant, and part of me wondered where on earth had I fished out such claptrap, but it was nonsense like this that brought tears now, tears I wished to down in his pillow, soak in his bathing suit, tears I wanted him to touch with the tip of his tongue and make sorrow go away.”
― André Aciman, Call Me by Your Name
I do in fact say “thiopentahl.” No idea why I don’t also say “pentothahl.” Credo, sic mater, sic liber avunculus meus; sic maternus avus dixit atque avia …
OED s.v. light P2.
Huh, the entry was updated in December 2021.
In the second citation, frofor is (in the more modern spelling of the headword) frover (obsolete) “Comfort; a means of comforting”; it was used in the collocations Frover-Ghost [= Old High German fluobargeist] and Frovre Ghost, “the Comforter, the Holy Ghost.” Etymology: Old English frófor, strong feminine and masculine = Old Saxon fróbra, frófra, Old High German fluobara. (That entry is from 1898.)
light of the eye
Proverbs 15:30, perhaps:
The light of the eyes rejoiceth the heart: and a good report maketh the bones fat.
Vulgate: Lux oculorum laetificat animam; fama bona inpinguat ossa.
The original Hebrew seems to be an idiom for looking cheerful.
@David E.: do posher Brits actually reduce the final syllable and say /ˌθʌɪ.əʊˈpɛn.təl/,* or is wiktionary pulling my leg? But as further evidence of the non-intuitiveness of Big-Pharma spellings, it turns out that the Ramones couplet (definitely a slant rhyme rather than true rhyme) “Staring at my goldfish bowl / Popping phenobarbital” is often transcribed on the internet as ending -barbitol.
I’m not sure about the rhymes-with-shawl version of pentothal, though. I do not have the cot-caught merger and I think I have pentothal’s final syllable on the cot side rather than the caught side of the distinction. Rhymes with pol not Paul.
*Yeah, and I don’t know what’s supposed to be going on in the first syllable there if it’s not an IPA typo.
Dunno. I have not heard the word in the mouths of people of poshness greater than my own as far as I can recall. (My own idiolect is generally mistaken for RP by my fellow-Brits, but it isn’t.)
I wonder if “light of the eyes” has got contaminated in meaning from “apple of the eye” (e.g. Deuteronomy 32:10 “He kept him as the apple of his eye”); mind you, the word in the original just means “pupil”, and the Vulgate, too, has the straightforward et custodivit quasi pupillam oculi sui. So it’s not yet another Hebraism.
Do Russians have “apples of the eyes”?
David Eddishaw: In what way is RP posh, if that’s what you’re trying to say? (not that that disagree — I want to get a sense of what people think of a “posh”).
Yay, cdesign proponentsists! Dawkins is an upper-class twit, though.
There’s a more extreme one in Rwanda: a downright deist one – he created the world and hasn’t done anything since; he’s explicitly not omnipresent and doesn’t hear prayers.
Oh no, they’re just ignorant of all the stupid design in nature.
I’m not sure about the rhymes-with-shawl version of pentothal, though.
That’s definitely how I say it, and I just checked with my wife, who also says it that way.
How is RP posh?
Every way. It derives historically from a supraregional standard associated with English public (= private) schools.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation#Characteristics_and_status
I thought RP sounded lower middle class, and there are a variety of upper class accents based on geography that the upper middle class imitate, but don’t dare get too close to. Feel free to correct me.
@LH, Cynewulf !!! That is serious.
there must be some classical source for this…
Unless it is Vandal influence in Arabic which surely exits but oh-so-difficult to catch:)))“mira eagena leoht and mines lifes frofor” looks like some formula…
@DE, thank you. Must be related! But
– needs an explanation too:-/
– it does not contain “my”
– it is not clear of it s a cousin or ancestor of other lights…
And there is a question of how it sticked to Arabian-nights-style talk in Russian….
” it is not clear of it s a cousin or ancestor of other lights…”
I do not know how to solve this problem:/ Obviously Russian/English “came to oneself”, for example, is influenced by the parable of the prodigal son. But then the Greek sourse also took this idiom from somewhere. If you find a similar phrase in the ME/East Mediterranean, how do you tell if it is a nephew or grandson of the biblical phrase?
(and with Arabic too it is not easy, because in addition to pre-Islamic Christian and Jewish influences Arabs conquerred a half of Roman empire)
I thought RP sounded lower middle class
By no means. And there aren’t any posherer accents with regional features in UK English; it doesn’t work like that at all.
There is/was something called “Marked RP”, which was particularly associated with very posh people indeed; you can hear it in old recordings of the Queen (Gawd Bless ‘Er), but in fact even she has over the years abandoned most of its more distinctive features. The most striking thing about it acoustically was a very front [ɛ] for [æ]. (Actually, Tim Curry in the Rocky Horror Picture Show does a pretty good job of this kind of RP, especially when he’s amping up the camp …)
Scotland (which is to blame for my idiolect) is rather different. Middle-class Scots speak a fairly standard Standard Scots (quite a different thing from actual Scots dialects in the sense of Lallans, etc.) Some Very Posh Scots Indeed have been so deracinated by being packed off to English public schools that they talk English-style RP, but that is exceptional. By and large Very Posh Scots sound much like RPs speakers, but feel under no obligation to expunge all regional features (like my own rhotacism, and rather unEnglish /ɪ/ sounds.)
The erstwhile status of RP in England is not what it was, and posh English speakers now sometimes retain (or affect) some regional features. There is also a related phenomenon, so-called Estuary English, which involves regional SE England featured being imported into RP (a less striking phenomenon, as RP is itself largely based on erstwhile SE regional speech; but just as Parisian French as spoken by actual Parisians is not the “Standard Parisian” French that foreigners are taught, so too RP has never been the ordinary dialect of any actual region anywhere in England.)
Ruscorpora found this
…about this lady (Qurrat al-ʿAyn). Well, this is another “of eye” phrase (but I am not sure what it means literarally…)
@drasvi:
Mention of the Prodigal Son reminds me (a) of the great Stones track but also (b) of the peculiar expression “fell on his neck” (i.e. “embraced”) which is literally translated from Luke’s Greek (maybe also via the Vulgate cecidit super collum eius.)
I’ve always kinda assumed that this is some sort of Aramaic idiom, but I suspect it isn’t; apparently the distinctively Jewish contribution to the Greek of the New Testament (apart from obvious things like specific religious terminology) has turned out to be much less than people once imagined, once they started looking at evidence for Koine usage more widely.
On the other hand … yup. There it is in the Hebrew in Genesis 45:14. Koine, nothing.
David Eddyshaw: I have in my hands the second volume of the “Papers of the American research center in Sofia”, about Heraclea Sintica: “From a Hellenistic Polis to Roman Civitas”. And did neighbouring towns hate each other as much as they do now. Even at the same places. I grew up next to the excavation of a temple of Appolo that had a basilica built _next_ to it in the fourth century, which were both buried under a hill until about a century ago. Literally a hundred and eighty meters from the house I grew up in.
EDIT: And I did not find that strange growing up but friends who visit (who are not Bulgarian) find it weird.
Yes, “And he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck, and wept; and Benjamin wept upon his neck.”
also
33:4 And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him: and they wept.
46:29 And Joseph made ready his chariot, and went up to meet Israel his father, to Goshen, and presented himself unto him; and he fell on his neck, and wept on his neck a good while.
other falls:
17:17 Then Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born unto him that is an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?
50:1 Then Joseph fell on his father’s face and wept over him, and kissed him.
Numbers 14:5 Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel.
1 Kings 18:7 And as Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him: and he knew him, and fell on his face, and said, Art thou that my lord Elijah?
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/vaiyippol_5307.htm
@V:
True enough.
A kpi’a ought to be a tiraan. But all too often, a kpi’a is a bi’em.
(https://languagehat.com/the-body-is-funny/#comment-4421700)
With Abraham it is a different thing, of course:)
There are two stories though. One is possible influences on the language of Gospels as such.
The other is exchange between Greece, Egypt and the Levant even before Christ – and bilingualism in the hellenized world. Words, phrases and ideas are expected to wander….
@David Eddyshaw : I have an acquantance who is from northern Ghana, but we speak English with one another.
Whereabouts in northern Ghana?
[Responding to a deleted question: if you’re still interested]
If you really want to study one of those languages, I’m not sure where to point you; it partly depends on whether you are (like most Hatters) the kind of person who can pick up things from a technical reference grammar well enough to then make your own way with texts, or are looking for something more paedagogically orientated.
A lot of the better paedagogical stuff I know of is in French; if that’s OK for you, the late Prof Kropp Dakubu’s Parlons Farefari is pretty good (as you’d expect; she was the leading Ghanaian linguist.) For a wonder, it’s actually in print; it’s published by l’Harmattan.
Farefare (Gurenne) is a particularly conservative Western Oti-Volta language; it’s of considerable local importance as the language of Bolgatanga and its hinterland, and has influenced its neighbours Talni and Nabit a fair bit (genetically, they are more closely related to Kusaal.) It’s part of a dialect chain going well up into Burkina Faso. Urs Niggli has done good work on the Burkinabe dialects, including a paedagogical grammar.
I can certainly give some links for dictionaries. The best by a long chalk is Urs Niggli’s one for Mooré, though there is also a good Ninkare one (Ninkare being part of the Farefare/Gurenne dialect continuum.)
The reference grammars are a mixed bunch. Many of them are not all that good.
There is very little available in the way of texts, apart from the Bible versions (most of which you can actually find as Android apps these days, which is handy …)
@DE: mā’ōr is ‘light’ in the causative sense, something that illuminates. It is used in Genesis 1:14–16 and elsewhere for the sun and the moon, and in Exodus to describe oil lamps.
As I see it, the verse has the nominalized causative in the first half, paralleled by a nominalized passive in the second: ‘that which lights up the eyes’ (mǝ’ōr, in the construct case, followed by ‘eyes’), against ‘a good thing that is heard’.
In yǝdaššēn ‘āṣem, the verb often refers to anointing with oil. ‘Bone’ in the singular implies something more general than just the bones. It has a sense of the very core of the body. ‘Anoint the marrow’ would work to parallel ‘rejoice the heart’ in the first part (but it would be weird English).
How is RP posh?
Every way. It derives historically from a supraregional standard associated with English public (= private) schools.
Let’s be careful. Dawkins grew up in Nairobi/parents colonial service, then Public School, then Oxford. He sounds “posh” in a way that is different from what I’d call RP. Hitchens grew up in Portsmouth/naval base, then ‘independent school’, then Oxford. He sounds “Oxford” to me, and closer to RP.
I had school mates (Outer West London suburbs), Grammar School, who spoke RP until they went to Oxford/Cambridge; then they sounded “posh” but not as much as Hitchens.
The Royals are “posh” not RP but not a Public School/Oxford variety of “posh”. Boris is a ‘braying Hooray Henry’ variety of Public School/Oxford “posh”.
I disagree that RP is “posh” — although there is a “posh”-tending end of RP. ‘BBC English’ (if you can find any these days — radio newsreaders rather than TV hosts) is my model of central RP.
Interesting stuff, Y; thanks.
One of the benefits of learning Biblical Hebrew (it seems to me) is that it gives you a better idea of just how much of our understanding of the text is frankly conjectural (especially the poetry.) And there’s probably a whole lot of idiom and nuance there that we can no longer retrieve.
Beautiful language (but then I have yet to come across a natural language that didn’t have its own claim to beauty.)
And I am still continually humbled by the sheer cleverness of the Masoretes. Even if they were a bunch of Karaites …
Meanwhile Roman travellers (or rather: shithole dwellers) were forced to hear, understand and sometimes even speak thoroughly ugly languages all the time….
I recall reading somewhere that Aramaic (specifically) was supposed to have had a reputation for being particularly unharmonious.
The Romans were at least more interested in the strange ways (and languages) of foreigners than the (classical) Greeks had been.* Still not what you might call enlightened, exactly …
* Apart from the ever-wonderful Herodotus, of course. (Goes without saying …)
Well, the beautiful stuff is what got preserved… (but also the begats.) But I agree that BH is beautiful. I wish I knew Arabic too.
A lot of the poetry (as in this case) is actually made easier by the pervasive parallelism. If you can’t figure out a half of a verse, look at the other half.
It’s amazing to me how much there is still being discovered and freshly reinterpreted in the Old Testament. A big part of it is a better understanding of what later editors did.
I just wish it weren’t getting tied so tightly with horrible nationalism and theocracy.
“I recall reading somewhere that Aramaic” – I did not know this. But this “Nunc cum vestris litteris fabulor, illas amplexor, illae mecum loquuntur, illae hic tantum Latine sciunt. hic enim aut barbarus seni sermo discendus est aut tacendum est. ” refers to Aramaic…
David G. K. Taylor, Bilingualism and Diglossia in Late Antique Syria and Mesopotamia, in: Bilingualism in Ancient Society: Language Contact and the Written Text. J. N. Adams, Mark Janse, and Simon Swain (eds), 2002:
“Again, in a sermon of the late fourth century John Chrysostom encourages his congregation to give a generous welcome to the peasants from the city territory who would soon be streaming into the town for a great festival, for, he says, ‘they seem a backwards people to us in language, but in faith we are united’.[14] Also of interest is the testimony of Jerome, who in 374/5 retreated to a cell in the region of Chalcis for two or three years. Writing to friends at Aquileia (Ep. 7. 2), he grumbles that the only Latin conversation he could now have was in correspondence with them since he was surrounded by Aramaic speakers, and he further complains: ‘either I must learn the barbarous gibberish or I must keep my mouth shut’.[15]
There would at first sight appear here to be a simple division between the Aramaic-speaking chora and the Greek-speaking polls, but the situation was certainly more complicated than this.
…
[14] De statuis ad populum Antiochenum, 19 (PG 49. 188). [15] Kelly (1975: 49) comments on this: ‘Since this latter alternative was scarcely compatible with Jerome’s temperament, we may conjecture that he picked up at least a smattering of Syriac’!” (link)
I have always liked that Jacob and Esau are eventually reconciled in Genesis 33. It’s kind of gross that Esau was later retconned to be the ancestor of a bunch of hostile Canaanite peoples.
On the other hand, if you view everything in strictly patri[matri]lineal terms as trees, if you propose the most recent common male [female] ancestor for “us”, his relatives must be the ancestors of the ugly “them”. Unless your relations with neighbours are peaceful, but if every people loves its neighbours, there won’t be any wars at all, other than by pirates…:/ Who needs a world without wars?
A scary plot illustrating the increaced competition among males or their groups in the Neolithic…
17:17 Then Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed.
A faceplant taken in good humor. There must be more coarse levity in the Bible if you know how to read for it. It wouldn’t have sold so well over the years if it were all edification, murder and wimpiness.
Indeed …
It’s not a faceplant (cf. 17:3). He drops to his knees and touches his face down to the ground when God tells him things. Unlike in :3, he doesn’t take God seriously despite doing the fancy genuflection.
Sousé ! Sousé ! With an accent grave over the “e” !
Things are rarely what they seem. Enter exegesis, pursued by a bear.
if you view everything in strictly patri[matri]lineal terms as trees, if you propose the most recent common male [female] ancestor for “us”, his relatives must be the ancestors of the ugly “them”.
Cain and Abel weren’t able to go back that far.
There’s your ugly “them”. Tricky to explain how lone outcast Cain became a tribe of “them”s enough to need a city.
@AntC : A close friend of mine’s accent didn’t change after Cambridge, but I know what you mean — Alexander and Oxford.
In one and a half hours I will have to pretend to be friendly with people that are mostly strangers to me at my grandmother’s grave; she died 40 days ago. It’s also my birthday. I’m not joking.
i’m much more used to running into “light of my life” than “light of my eyes” in (ornate-to-camp-to-fake-islamicate) english.
and the shvartsapl of any yiddish eye is just the pupil.
the question of cain’s in-laws seems to me to be parallel to issue of those other gods behind (beside, above, below, &c – quite a lot of options in ‘not before’) the four-letter deity – there’s just a whole lot of non-exclusivity happening in that text once you look at the words rather than the summaries premised on exclusivity.
editing to add: be well, V – i hope there’s some rest and warmth in the day for you as well.
@AntC
‘Posh’ clearly means different things to different people. In my experience, it often means ‘one step posher than my own accent’. So for you it clearly means something approaching what Wells termed U-RP, rather than mainstream RP. However to others even mainstream RP is posh. And finally, to people with broad local accents even a non-RP accent, but with subtler local overtones, will be posh. For instance, I’ve heard Jimmy Carr describe himself as posh.
“Light of my eyes” brings to mind an Egyptian pop song (apparently by Amr Diab): حبيبي يا نور العين…
The Phoenicians’ Ba’al [first millennium BC] in the news.
Some interesting stuff on the alleged Passivum Divinum.
I feel like you could recycle the subtitle “The Rise and Future Fall of an Imaginary Linguistic Phenomenon” for articles on many alleged phenomena other than the passivum divinum.
Just got round to reading the second paper drasvi links to above
https://www.academia.edu/366735/Bilingualism_and_Diglossia_in_Late_Antique_Syria_and_Mesopotamia
which is actually very much concerned with Greek influence on Aramaic (and vice versa.) Many interesting points.
Among other things, there’s a nice table which demonstrates quite well that even in the Old Testament parts of the Peshitta, the degree of influence from Greek varies quite a bit, including in ways which can’t be accounted for as straightforward over-literal translation; rather, Syriac itself had become more Greek-influenced over the period.
Not so sure about this, though (from p16):
T + K are certainly names to conjure with in this context (and know vastly more on the topic than I ever will), but I have to say that It Ain’t Necessarily So. In Kusaal (you knew that was coming), although nouns are much the largest category of borrowed words, as is indeed normal cross-linguistically, extremely common loanwords also include amaa “but”, kʋʋ “or”, asɛɛ “except”, hali “until”, baa “not one …”, tɔ “OK” and at the very least the verbs daam “bother, trouble”, bʋg “get drunk”, probably zam “cheat” (thanks, Lameen!) and maybe even labi “lurk in hiding”, which belongs to a minor verb conjugation with only 60 or so members, and has a whole regular set of morphologically-derived inchoatives and causatives to go with it. (There’s also the fun English-loanword verb pɔɔtim “denounce to the authorities.” Gotta love those colonialists.)
Many of these loans are actually Wanderwörter found all over the West African savanna zone (and beyond: I just found the hali “until” word in Mani, a Mel language of coastal Sierra Leone and Guinea.) But by no stretch of the imagination has Kusaal borrowed “heavily” even from Hausa; it’s nothing like the degree of Greek borrowing seen in Syriac, even (much less the degree of borrowing seen in English or Persian or Coptic …)
Just goes to show: All generalisations are wrong (including, of course, this one …)
There’s also the point that borrowing of verbs is actually quite common, if you count under this heading constructions using a light verb plus a loanword treated as a deverbal noun; Kusaal is very fond of doing this. For example “I’ve believed in you” in Kusaal is
M niŋif yadda
I do.you trust
where yadda is yet another word found all over the Savanna, and is probably (believe it or not) ultimately from the Arabic finite verb form yarḍá “he is satisfied.”
There’s also the fun English-loanword verb pɔɔtim “denounce to the authorities.”
OK, I’ll bite. What’s the source word?
“Report.” Many loanwords from English have undergone substantial changes of form … (my own favourite is alɔpir “aeroplane”, borrowed from Kusaal by Moba as the even better luopil.)
ya’am “gall bladder”
For comparison purposes:
膽
Chinese
Phono-semantic compound (形聲, OC *taːmʔ): semantic ⺼ (“body part”) + phonetic 詹 (OC *tjam).
Etymology
Austroasiatic (Schuessler, 2007); compare Proto-Vietic *lɔːm, Proto-Katuic *lɔɔm, Proto-Bahnaric *kləːm, etc. from Proto-Mon-Khmer *t₁ləəm ~ *t₁luəm “liver”.
Definitions
膽
1. (anatomy) gallbladder
膽囊 / 胆囊 ― dǎnnáng ― gall bladder
2. (figuratively) guts; courage; bravery; strength; nerve
大膽 / 大胆 ― dàdǎn ― bold
冇膽鬼 / 冇胆鬼 [Cantonese] ― mou5 daam2 gwai2 [Jyutping] ― coward
3. inner container; liner (of a thermos); bladder (of a ball)
大胆
Japanese
Adjective
胆 • (daitan) -na (adnominal 大胆な (daitan na), adverbial 大胆に (daitan ni), kyūjitai 大膽)
1. bold, daring
Noun
大胆 • (daitan) (kyūjitai 大膽)
1. boldness, intrepidity, defiance
度肝
Japanese
Pronunciation
(Tokyo) どぎも [dògímó] (Heiban – [0])[1]
(Tokyo) どぎも [dògímóꜜ] (Odaka – [3])[1]
IPA(key): [do̞ɡʲimo̞]
Noun
1. 度肝 • (dogimo)
guts; pluck; nerve; spirit
Derived terms
度肝を抜く (dogimo o nuku)
きも【肝】 ﾛｰﾏ(kimo)
1 〔肝臓〕 the liver; 〔胆嚢〕 the gall bladder; 〔内臓〕 innards; viscera; 《口》 guts.
▲ウナギの肝 the liver of an eel; eel liver
･鳥の肝 the giblets of a chicken; chicken giblets.
2 〔心･精神力･度胸〕 pluck; mettle; courage. [=きもったま]
3 〔本質〕 the essence 《of…》; the secret 《to…》.
I am not sure that Bible is very big on “birds of the feather flock together” (though it is a Bible-inspired ditty). Jacob’s (aka Israel) sons seem to be close (with the big exception of Joseph, of course), but it’s not like relatives behave nice to each other in general. On the other hand, maybe closeness of the relatives was so ingrained that it didn’t call for any comment, but rivalries were so out of character that needed careful record.
An English loanword in Kusaal that I prefer to believe is not obvious (on the grounds that I never realised its origin myself until Tony Naden kindly pointed it out to me) is the first component of the compound noun wadtis “lawgiver”, found in the older Bible versions (tis is “giver.”)
Word?
Quoth wikipedia: “Later, Galen explicitly used Plato’s description of the corporeal soul to physical locations in the body. The logical (λογιστικός) in the brain, the spirited (θυμοειδές) in the heart, and the appetitive (ἐπιθυμητικόν) in the liver.”
@juha:
Proto-Vietic *lɔːm “liver”
Interestingly, one of the two words which have fallen together in Kusaal as yam/ya’am “common sense/gall bladder” probably began with /l/ or /ʎ/ in Proto-Oti-Volta.
The matter is complicated by the fact that the two have fallen together altogether by regular phonological changes in some languages, whereas in others what seems to have happened is that the words have been altered by analogy with one another.
The first problem is that in Agolle Kusaal, short vowels in closed syllables before /m/ or /ŋ/ sometimes appear as glottalised, even in cases where other WOV languages that preserve vowel glottalisation have modal vowels: even the other Kusaal dialect, Toende. (Not all Agolle speakers have glottalisation in such cases, even.) Furthermore, the standard orthography writes such vowels long even when they are unequivocally short. Thus as far as Agolle Kusaal itself goes, yam and ya’am could simply be variant forms of the same word, and the curious double meaning taken as simply metonymic; this is given support by the fact that people do indeed explain it by the gall bladder being the seat of intelligence.
However …
The words are definitely distinct in Farefare, which is the only WOV language to retain vowel glottalisation outside the Kusaal-Nabit-Talni subgroup: yɛm “sense”, ya’am “gall bladder.”
They are also distinct in Buli, a non-WOV language from the Oti-Volta branch most closely related to WOV:
yam “sense”, yaam “gall bladder.”
Where it starts to get more interesting (and more difficult) is with Nawdm (less closely related but still part of an Oti-Volta subgrouping along with WOV and Buli marked off by clear common innovations): Nawdm rarm “sense”, raɦm “gall bladder.”
Starting with the easy bit: Nawdm /Vɦ/ regularly corresponds to WOV glottalised vowels (the feature is absent everywhere else in Oti-Volta, but independent loss of such a cross-linguistically unusual feature as contrastive vowel glottalisation is not such a stretch.) So that works out fine (and confirms that we’re dealing with two distinct etyma here.)
But what about the initial /r/?
Nawdm obligingly preserves as /r/ in all positions a Proto-OV consonant to which I’ve provisionally given the symbol *ʎ. In Moba it consistently surfaces as /l/, and in Waama as /r/; in WOV, however it has become /j/ after short root vowels (with the Vj sequences subsequently monophthongised or reduced simply to V); in Buli it has undergone similar changes. In a nutshell, the second /r/ in Nawdm rarm “sense” is not a problem.
Unfortunately I have few good cognate sets for initial *ʎ. The most widespread are the numbers “six” and “seven”, from which it looks like WOV and Buli show *ʎ -> j: cf Kusaal nyuob “six”, Moba nluob “six”; here the n- is a fossilised noun class agreement prefix. However, Oti-Volta numbers nearly always do occur with class prefixes, so they’re not a good way of proving the outcomes of initial *ʎ. Still, there is supporting evidence for this change in WOV, for example in the very ancient loanword for “camel”, Kusaal yʋgʋm, which goes back ultimately to a Berber form in /l/.
But: in the “gall bladder” word, virtually all other Oti-Volta languages other than Nawdm show initial /j/.
I suspect that what has happened is that the two etyma originally differed, not only in whether they had *aʎ or *aʔ, but in the initial consonant, perhaps *ʎaʔmʊ “gall bladder” vs *jaʎmʊ “sense”; as the non-initial parts of the words frequently ended up becoming identical through regular sound changes, and the initial consonants fell together in many Oti-Volta branches, the potential for simply conflating the two words altogether would presumably have been very high.
Word?
No (good thought, though.)
It’s “order”, borrowed via the Hausa oda (with long o, as always) as wada.
The “law” sense is borrowed for European-style “law” as opposed to the kind that appears in the first component of sariakat “judge” (“sharia-driver.”)
Wada was then fitted into the Kusaal noun class system by analogy (as loans usually are, if possible) as a re/a class noun: sg wadir, pl wada, combining form (bare stem used as the first part of a compound) wad-. Et voilà …
I do not see that anyone has mentioned English “He has a lot of gall” . It basically means effrontery or pushiness, which are sort of like courage but in a bad sense.
OED (entry unfortunately from 1898):
I must say, I like the newspaper name Cambridge Frozen Truth.
I like the newspaper name Cambridge Frozen Truth.
Indeed. It cries out to be used as a template for generating journal names:
The London Reheated Insights
The Pembrokeshire Deep-Fried News
The Zamboanga Julienned Courier?
I regret to advise you that despite its intriguing name the (Cambridge Mass.) Frozen Truth was apparently a factional and prohibitionist publication, part of a propaganda campaign aimed at denuding that city of its taverns and saloons, as can be seen by the copycat Frozen Truth published in Ann Arbor a bit later the same decade: https://www.google.com/books/edition/Frozen_Truth/XdNKdFjXE7UC
Pity, but it’s still a great name. The thing would be to buy it and reformat it as a frozen-drinks publication, with features on margaritas, daiquiris, pina coladas, etc. In vino gelido veritas!
There was a verse recited by biology students, based on a children poem (“Уронили мишку на пол, Оторвали мишке лапу. Все равно его не брошу – Потому что он хороший.”)
“……
….
Даже если спирт замёрзнет,
все равно его не брошу.
Буду грызть его зубами,
потому что он хороший.”
Хороший (“good”) as in ты хороший is a specifically childish compliment.
If that applies to English “good”, then Lameen’s “semantically bleached” is not quite right:) “Good glass beads from China 95% spherical float in xylene refractive index *.**” is a particularly memorable spam letter….
Or was it some balh-blah-blah-benzene (like ethyl- or trimethylbenzene) and not xylene?
Anyway, the point is that they are good glass beads from China, o.
@David Eddyshaw: I now find myself thinking that it would be wonderful if there were a language in which the word meaning “denounce to the authorities” was derived from a borrowing of English drop a dime on.
Chamorro would be the place to look …
(Oops. Just ended up on a 404 page on the CIA site when googling “Guam.” That’s me on the no-fly list, then …)
@DE, Haspelmath and Tadmor have a table (for noun/verb borrowing ratio).
“Report.” Many loanwords from English have undergone substantial changes of form
… and a good report maketh the bones fat.
Oh. Has it been already discussed here? Or where I can read about it?
Thanks, drasvi. Interesting stuff, once again.
I certainly wouldn’t dispute that nouns are more borrowable than verbs cross-linguistically; usually much more …
This sort of thing often induces in me the same sort of disquiet that WALS can do, though. When I’m in a position to check, the primary data are often wrong, sometimes bizarrely so, and (perhaps more to the point) the actual linguistic facts have often been forced into a one-size-fits-all mould which they don’t really fit. It’s possible that the languages I’m most familiar with just happen to be particularly aberrant, but it makes me uneasy about the stuff I can’t check. Inevitably (at this stage of the game) they are very reliant on a tiny subset of the world’s languages for their data*, though they deserve great praise for doing as much as possible to get round this problem; still, sweeping generalisations seem to get made which don’t always seem justified.
Even so, I don’t want to get too sniffy about it. You have to start somewhere; and at least (being undoubtedly of the Party of the Good Guys) they are approaching the issues by saying “Let’s see what’s actually out there, guys!”
Unlike Some People …
* I think there is a more subtle problem, too; the kind of studies that are thorough enough to be useful to them, particularly in syntax, are often written with a particular theoretical stance in mind**, and sometimes commit the Unforgivable Sin of looking for the data which will best confirm the theory …
** Which is not bad; it’s inevitable. You must have a Theory; but you also have to be prepared to junk it when it fails. Which it eventually will; that’s the life cycle of theories.
Has it [yadda] been already discussed here?
I don’t think so –
The immediate source of the word in Kusaal is almost certainly Hausa yarda, which is in fact a verb; but the word turns up all over, including in languages where it seems very unlikely to have been borrowed from Hausa, like yɛrrɛ in Tondi Songway Kiini, a Songhay language which I just happen to have a grammar of next to me …
The suggestion that it’s from Arabic yarḍá I think I got from Jeffrey Heath; but we have a true expert amongst us in the form of Lameen, who probably knows more about this than anybody.
@DE, the ratio of course depends on the size and character of their sample.
n. 905 v. 334 adj. 120 adv. 4 function 97 (content 1,363 function 97 total 1,460) in their list of meanings.
31.2% nouns 14% verbs, 15.2 adjectives are borrowed (it’s surprising that adjectives are ahead).
In the middle of the table the ratio is 3.4 (while 31.2/14 is more like Swahili with its 2.1). That means, the languages with lower ratio are the most enthusiastic borrowers. That in turn does not necesarily mean that enthusiastic borrowers have some special mechanisms that enable borrowing of verbs… I mean, obviously, the ratio will be exactly 1 in the extreme case of a language-that-has-borrowed-everything, so the table must be skewed to a least some extent towards more borrowing languages even without those mechanisms.
Swahili has a surprising number of verbs borrowed from Arabic …
I was about to say that Swahili is a bit of a special case, but then I suppose my position rather leads to the conclusion that every language is a special case. I guess that that really is my view, but I have to concede that that is not a very helpful foundation for the study of language typology …
@DE, I already mentioned anouther issue (with WOLD): see Wiktionary. Wictionary is huge, it is made by thousands or tens of thousands or hundreds thousands amateurs and specialists, and it is getting better. It is already often usable. As for WOLD… they got funding, they published it, and it is not going to ever improve.
Their authors are great but their data is messy.
What I mean is that a good model is one that allows for continous growth…
Good point: though there can always be second editions …
I wonder how much useful feedback/criticism WALS gets?
(as opposed to random moaners on the Intertubes …)
Are you serious? Malevolent god vs. incompetent god vs. no god is having an enemy vs. having an extra hazard vs. total absence of such additional factors.
An impressive eggcorn, BTW, for “in this vale [ = valley] of tears”!
Yay, rhinoglottophilia.
light of eyes:
delight and joy (of the eye). And a sight for sore eyes.
Joy also appears in translations from Arabic. E.g. Quran about Moses:
“And Pharaoh’s wife said: A refreshment of the eye to me and to thee – slay him not; maybe he will be useful to us, or we may take him for a son. And they perceived not.”
“(Here is) joy of the eye, for me and for thee: slay him not. It may be that he will be of use to us, or we may adopt him as a son.” And they perceived not (what they were doing)” (قُرَّتُ عَيْنٍ)
Or https://www.abuaminaelias.com/dailyhadithonline/2021/06/06/children-qurrat-ayn/
It is not “qurrat al-‘ayn”, though. And there is also enlish “eye candy”:-)
and back to light
Psalms 38:10 is a nearly exact match.
pro: Psalms is an expecically well known book among medieval Christians.
con: no one is compared to it (the light of speaker’s eyes) here. (and no obvious connections to 1001 nights…)
Yay, rhinoglottophilia
Yup.
As it happens, I was just thinking about rhinoglottophilia in the context of Proto-Oti-Volta, though from the other end, as it were; there are a number of noun class suffixes which have the pattern CV, where C is a velar and the vowel is nasalised in the (very few) languages where emic nasalisation is not confined to root vowels. The obvious way of reconstructing them would be with initial /ŋ/, but the corresponding pronouns sometimes begin with voiceless consonants; but again, a lot of the evidence comes from the Atakora Sprachbund, with its rooted insensate hostility to voiced stops and fricatives everywhere … but there are some morphophonological alternations in Kusaal where things would seem to work out neatly if the initial consonant of the suffix had originally been voiceless …
I wondered about /h/, but that wouldn’t fit into the existing reconstructions of the Proto-OV consonant system at all well. I need a Theory, with testable consequences …
I’m beginning to wonder if some of the bizarre phonological habits of the Atakora are not, in fact, due to conservation rather than innovation … I may be guilty of Western-Oti-Voltacentrism. We’ve all been there …
Yes. The idiom is berech’ kak zenitsu oka, I guess it comes from the Bible. The word zenitsa only occurs in this idiom.
—-
But there is vulgar cho zenki vylupil?🙂 “why [you] opened [your] eyes so widely [at me/at what I am doing]?” with the same zen-.
(-lup- in vylupit’ is a funny root. Chicken vyluplyayutsya [hatch] from eggs.
Paint, putty and similar substances obluplyayutsya [pile] off a surface.
zalupa is vulgar for penis head/foreskin
and vylupit’ eyes is to open them widely, when staring at something.
Also lupit’ is “to beat” – which of course can make paint pile off:)).
My daughter discovered at the distressingly early age of 18 months that she is violently allergic to phenobarbital, at which time her parents learned to pronounce it with a reduced vowel in the last syllable; consequently, so does she.
Haspelmath and Tadmor
Re Japanese, I wonder if they count verbal nouns as verbs. AFAIK, Japanese is resistant to borrowing verbs, but freely turns verbal nouns—準備 /junbi/ ‘preparation’, or キス /kisu/ ‘kiss’, eg—into verbs by compounding them with the light verb する /suru/ ‘do’. Such compounds number in the thousands.
On the other hand, verbs such as
告る
Japanese
Pronunciation
IPA(key): [ko̞kɯ̟ᵝɾɯ̟ᵝ]
Verb
告る • (kokuru) godan (stem 告り (kokuri), past 告った (kokutta))
1. (slang) Synonym of 告白する (kokuhaku suru): to profess one’s love
かぐや様は告らせたい
Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai
Kaguya-sama wants to make someone profess love for her.
or コピる /kopiru/ ‘make copies’ have a slangy or in-group flavour.
I once read my youngest brother the Physician’s Desk Reference* entry for phenobarbital** as a bedtime “story.” (This was part of a long-running series of jokes we had about the PDR.) Mostly, I used my default pronunciation of the drug name, with [ɒ] in the final syllable. However, having grown up around doctors, I was familiar with a wide range of vowel qualities in barbiturate names. So I felt comfortable varying the pronunciation to build tension as the story got more exciting—especially as I got to the array of possible side effects and contraindications.
* The name of the work, as seen on the linked Wed site, is now the “Prescriber’s Digital Reference.” The need for a massive desktop reference book (updated and reissued every year) no longer exists; the modern Web interface is probably a great improvement. More interestingly, the range of health care providers who are permitted to write prescriptions for medication has also expanded quite a bit over the last few decades, and so the old label “Physician’s” was no longer apt.
** I picked that particular drug completely at random. Phenobarbital was just what the book fell open to, and it was a coincidence that it was such a commonplace medication—although I suppose that there is some correlation between how frequently medications are prescribed and the lengths of their PDR entries.
Another type of verb formation in Japanese is a noun suffixed with a verb (noun incorporation?), such as
いみづける【意味付ける】 ﾛｰﾏ(imizukeru)
〔意味や理由を与える〕 give [attach] a meaning [significance] 《to…》; give a reason for…; 〔価値を持たせる〕 give meaning 《to life》; make [《文》 render] 《one’s life》 ┌meaningful [worthwhile, significant].
▲この事件を歴史上どのように意味付けるかは後世の史家の判断に任せたい. I shall leave it to a later generation of historians to decide on the historical significance of this incident.
where imi means ‘meaning, significance, etc’ and tsukeru ‘attach (tr.)
or
たむける【手向ける】 ﾛｰﾏ(tamukeru)
offer 《sth》.
▲花を手向ける offer flowers 《to sb’s spirit, before a grave》
･香華を手向ける offer incense and flowers 《to sb’s spirit》; burn incense and place flowers 《before a grave》
･旅立つ人に別れの言葉を手向ける pay a farewell tribute to a person setting out on a trip.
where te means ‘hand’ and mukeru ‘direct; face; turn (towards), point (at), etc’.
Japanese, I wonder if they count verbal nouns as verbs
Indeed, that is exactly the kind of issue that bothers me. From the point of view of Japanese itself, you could (I imagine) make some sensible arguments either way; then, if you’re doing typology across a whole lot of languages, it’s going to be hard to resist the temptation of picking the analysis which fits your “universal” best.
My impression is that with many of the issues WALS deals with (though a minority, to be sure) there could well be competing yet perfectly justifiable analyses of what’s going on in an individual language. Phonology provides lots of examples of this (I think I moaned elsewhere about the analysis of Kusaal phonology in some WALS-like database, which was based on a theoretically-possible but frankly silly analysis which, for example, analysed the glottalised vowels as VCV or VC sequences throughout. I mean, it’s not wrong, in the sense that some real world fact could ever disprove it*: it just introduces a whole lot of completely unnecessary complications into the description. And only came about because the original analysts, good as they were in many ways, had evidently never come across the concept of glottalisation as a possible vowel feature. This was the 1970’s …)
* Moreover, glottalisation in Kusaal vowels can be realised phonetically as a glottal constriction after the first vowel mora, though it isn’t always.
@juha, ai, kisu, kanjiru, shinjiru, sekkusu make me think that he included them as verbs.*
https://wold.clld.org/vocabulary/21 , and in the “meaning” type in “to “.
Nouns (Chinese) 32.3 (English) 9.3 (Dutch) 0.5 (Portuguese) 0.3 (French) 0.2 (Korean) 0.2 (Ainu) 0.1 (Spanish) 0.1 (Ryukyuan) 0.1 (German) 0.1 (Total) 43.2%
Verbs (Chinese) 19.0 (English) 0.9
–
*love, love me do, you know, I love you, so plee-e-e-e-ase, love me do!
**I’ll always be true
yes, when the author writes
“While Chinese loans are present in all semantic word classes except for adverbs, English loans are predominantly – and the miniscule number of loans from other languages exclusively – nouns. This fact is interesting in itself, since we have seen in the previous section that the means for morphosyntactic integration of Chinese and non-Chinese lexical material are identical. The same trend also obtains for a larger number of words: Ozawa (1976), in his study of 7,045 English loans taken from a dictionary, concludes that 85% of them were borrowed as nouns.”
it is not clear what “borrowed as nouns” means.
Noun was borrowed from Old Normand as a noun, but nounified/nounized are adjectives created from this noun in native fashion (though with borrowed affixes).
That’s very illuminating, drasvi.
It certainly demonstrates that things like counting how commonly verbs are borrowed compared with nouns depends crucially on how you analyse the grammar of the borrowing language (in principle, it could depend on how you analyse the grammar of the lending language too, especially in a case like Chinese); moreover, there is often no single unproblematic canonical analysis, just competing analyses, each with its own pros and cons.
It wouldn’t actually have occurred to me to analyse Kusaal yadda as a case of a borrowed verb, but in fact it seems very much parallel to these Japanese forms with -su. Moreover, the Hausa yarda is certainly itself a verb, and although yadda in M niŋif yadda “I trust you” (“I do.you trust”) is used in Kusaal just like the (unequivocal) noun dabiem “fear” in (say)
M zɔtif dabiem. “I’m afraid of you.”
I run.IPFV.you fear
it’s actually a funny, defective kind of noun; you can, for example, say dabiemtita’ar “great fear”, but you can’t say *yaddatita’ar “great trust”; you’d have to say yaddaniŋir tita’ar “great trust-doing”; yadda can only occur either as the object of niŋ “do”, or compounded with its gerund niŋir “doing.”
None of this would be apparent from merely looking at the extant dictionaries of Kusaal.
Cf. “blowjob”, “Axel jump” or even “sociolinguistics” – words that can appear at positions of nouns or with light verbs (and many of them appear with light verbs very often and even take a dative argument).
Based on exactly what they are nouns?
Russian has головомойка “dressing-down”, literally “head-washery”.
Unlike dressing-down, it is used with a verb устроить “to organize” and dative “to him/her”. Russian could instead invent a verbal construction, but it chose to add a nominal -ka to make головомойка a noun suitable for using with устроить.
Устроить with dative is semantically loaded – it is often used with words like “scandal”
I don’t think your particular English examples there are actually problematic: they can be pluralised, or take noun modifiers (“exciting sociolinguistics”), can be verb subjects, and so forth. I’m not sure that “light verb” is exactly a thing in English, unlike some languages, but in any case, just because something can be the complement of such a verb, it doesn’t automatically follow that it’s not a respectable noun. In my Kusaal specimen above, dabiem “fear” is certainly a noun; it doesn’t even have a related verb (although you could analyse it as an abstract noun derived from dabɛog “coward.”)
In really any language, though, such things rarely work as absolute neat dichotomies; there are certainly English “nouns” (for want of a better word) with oddly limited syntactic functions (though I can’t come up with any nice examples offhand.)
There are languages in which the great majority of locutions equivalent to SAE verbs actually consist of a light verb (which takes all the inflections and so forth) and another component which carries pretty much all the lexical content. For example, this is an areal phenomenon in parts of Australia: Bilinarra (say) has only 23 “verbs” altogether, with the rest of the content delegated to a “coverb”; Garrwa has taken this to its logical ultimate conclusion, and all the verbs in the language now come from former “coverbs” (if you wanted to be cutesy about it, you could claim that it has “no verbs” at all any more.) Once you get to that degree, of course, the “coverbs” are no longer very noun-like at all.
Japanese has a sort of subsystem like this for its many Chinese-derived verbs (or “verbs.”)
Kusaal has a lot of idioms of the form
subject + verb + indirect object + noun
where the indirect object is the “real” object, as in
Ti nwɛ’ef nu’ug “We beseech you”
we strike.you hand
As here, the noun part is usually straightforwardly a noun, although when used in this way it can’t take any modifiers, or pluralise; it’s not being used like an ordinary noun, and I’m not sure that you could claim that it heads a noun phrase at all: it’s just a “bare” noun. This is the role that yadda has been borrowed into, without being borrowed into any of the roles of a normal noun.
Coptic has borrowed a lot of Greek verbs; in some dialects they can be used “as is”, but in others they have to be preceded by a proclitic form of the verb ire “do”; in other words, the borrowing strategy is (in a sense) quite different between dialects of one and the same language.
Persian borrows Arabic verbs (a lot) in a Japanese-like way, too: Arabic deverbal noun + a colourless verb like kardan “do.”
It’s just occurred to me, reading my own comment, that what I’m describing in Kusaal is actually a kind of (limited) noun incorporation.* Never thought of that before …
* Of the kind that’s sometimes called “noun stripping”; it turns up a lot in Fijian and Tongan for example, and there’s a whole cottage industry of describing the phenomenon in Niuean (which as far as I can make out, is essentially a dialect of Tongan.)
[Incautiously googling “noun stripping”, I find a Youtube link labelled “Nun Stripping”; truly, the Internet is for porn]
@DE, I think “performed” in “performed a triple Axel” is absolutely a light verb (bookish rather than childish).
Yes, it is important that Axel can be modified here.
As for that it can be modified and pluralized in other situations, so does “jump”. My jump, I jumped. We usually interpret it as “two words”, a verb and a noun.
What makes Axel different is that rather than “axeled 3 times” you say “performed a triple Axel”. What makes it similar is its affinity with action, presence of a semantical agent (but not patient in this case…), frequent occurence of such words in predictate positon and that in other languages “performed X” may correspond to a verb. I am not sure if (lexicalized) “make love” and “wage war” are the same, but “give birth” is similar..
I did not mean exactly English examples.
I think in English -job compounds, sexual and not (nose job, rhynoplasty) are created exactly to be used this way, with agent and patient and everything. People need to describe such things, and the model is convenient.
But what they want to express is often “an agent did it to the patient”.
Russian is different: it has borrowed a French word (minette which in French means a different thing). It often occurs with “do” and has a dative addressee (just as a “letter”, though).
Also “massage”: in Russian A did massage to B.
The problem is that sometimes “performed X” is the only (or the most common) way to say it.
And it is absolutely a construction meant to express verbal semantics. The verb can be mroe or less empty (do) or more loaded (give), then the semantics is distributed.
P.S.rhinoplasti
ダブる daburu, verb meaning ‘double, duplicate’, from English ‘double’.
ダブっている dabutte iru means ‘there is duplication, overlap’.
トラブっている torabutte iru, ‘be having trouble’, from トラブる toraburu, from English ‘trouble’.
It may be significant that the Axel jump is an eponym*. Or not. I guess other elements like the toe-loop** are treated the same way. Or still. Salchow and Lutz are eponyms too, so maybe that set the template.
* Named after the early Norwegian figure skater Axel Paulsen, as the figure skating commentator in my days of indiscriminate sports watching (about the age of 10) never failed to mention when an Axel was performed.
** I imagined for a long time that this too was an eponym, from a French Touloupe or something. Then I had a revelation and parsed it as two-loop. Such was the Norwegian pronunciation.
@de
In English (I think Germanic in general), certain nouns get “sucked into” verbs in special or obsolete senses (lose face, haul/weigh anchor, Ger. Fuß fassen). This would fit better with noun incorporation. Also look at “give someone a helping hand”–helping is probably the only adjective that can go there and has therefore itself been incorporated.
@Trond, of course.
An obvious example in Russian is baby talk, where “do” can turn an onomatopoeia into a predicate (for exactly animal sounds, ducks usually say krya-krya rather than do it, but they can do it as well). Then it is also a normal way of incorporating foreign words (minette, massage, Axel). Just the simplest available way of doing so.
For English -job compounds the situation is that people need to coin a name, just out of nothing, no baby talk no anything. And it appears that coining a noun based on nothing is easier than coining a verb, and so people coin rhinoplasty or nose job. One can argue that surgeons need nouns, but I am quite confident that those who coin all those sexual -jobs are people of action.
but I am quite confident – Or not. Actually, there are must be ways to describe any of those actions (including more exotic ones) with normal verbs.
Sure. “Blew” is much more concise than “gave a blowjob to,” and you could in theory say “triple-axeled” instead of “performed a triple axel,” though I don’t know if anyone does.
@Brett: “However, having grown up around doctors, I was familiar with a wide range of vowel qualities in barbiturate names.”
A bedtime story about a bedtime drug! Speaking of barbiturate, what’s the most common medical pronunciation, in your experience? I remember Leonard Cohen singing bar-bee-chew-it in Who by Fire, dropping the second r.
Пропагандон (Propagandon)
кремлядь
Russian
Etymology
Blend of Кремль (Kremlʹ, “Kremlin”) + блядь (bljadʹ, “whore (vulgar)”). First used by a rock group “Телеви́зор (Televízor)” (Televízor) (i. e. “TV set”) in a song called “Заколоти́те подва́л” (Board up the basement).
Pronunciation
IPA(key): [ˈkrʲemlʲɪtʲ]
Noun
кре́млядь • (krémljadʹ) f anim (genitive кре́мляди, nominative plural кре́мляди, genitive plural кремляде́й)
1. (politics, vulgar, derogatory, collective) A term used to describe officials serving the needs of the Kremlin, not the people, and doing so blindly and inconsiderately.
2008, “Board up the basement”, in Televizor:
Свяще́нным сою́зом царя́ и Совка́ бре́дит кре́млядь! Заколоти́те подва́л!
Svjaščénnym sojúzom carjá i Sovká brédit krémljadʹ! Zakolotíte podvál!
The “Kremlyad” is dreaming of the sacred union of the tsar and the USSR! Board up the basement!
“Blew” is much more concise – and give head etc. My initial idea was that it is a productive model, there are other similar for sexual (and not only) activities.
But possibly they appear not because people need to discuss it but do not know how, but because some people love to classify everything or as a way to reduce embarrassed and other-than-linguistical awkwardness. Names provide a greater level of abstraction. “It is a thing!” Verbs are more immediate and personal.
Verbs are more immediate and personal.
Chthonic. In Russian at least:)
toe-loop … I had a revelation and parsed it as two-loop. Such was the Norwegian pronunciation.
Still not as funny as wondering what тулуп has to do with it.
verbs are more immediate and personal
Dunno about that. I can think of some pretty immediate and personal nouns …
At least Russian:)
In English you have a headache (though we too receive a shower in Russian…), so maybe your relations with nouns are better.
But why else Russian officials write things like “decision about beginning of the process of conducting (of … of… of …) was taken by …”?
Trond Engen: Then I had a revelation and parsed it as two-loop.
This seems ill formed to me. Can one have a “revelation” of a wrong answer?
@Alex K.: I mostly heard “barbiturate” pronounced as bar-BIT-yoo-ate, or, more commonly, with a reduced final vowel, bar-BIT-yoo-it. (The last one might actually have been bar-BIT-chur-it for some speakers, but I didn’t notice the difference if there was one.)
@drasvi:
I think (relative) noun-centredness actually is an identifiable feature of modern English. In the remote days when Brit schoolchildren were actually taught to compose Latin prose, there was a common injunction to “strengthen your verbs”, i.e. shift the information away from noun distinctions into verb distinctions. It wouldn’t surprise me if Russian were closer to the state of Latin in this than English is.
It’s actually something that varies by genre even within English itself; technical prose is much more noun-centred than normal speech, for example.
This seems ill formed to me. Can one have a “revelation” of a wrong answer?
The point is not the details of “two-loop”; it’s the fact that it’s a compound rather than a French name that was a revelation.
@languagehat: I guess that interpretation works.
There are three* toe-pick assisted jumps in figure skating, but only the toe loop has “toe” right there in the name. To someone not native in English or active in skating, I guess the toe pick connection might not be obvious. Presumably the nomenclature is the way it is because only that particular jump style has both toed (toe loop) and untoed (loop) versions. (The flip jumps could conceivably be done without a toe pick kickoff, but they would be much more difficult; doing a Lutz, which rotates the “wrong” direction, without a toe pick is probably impossible with more than one rotation. Conversely, the Salchow and Axel would be impossible to add a toe pick to, the Salchow because it swings one leg around in the air as part of the takeoff, and the Axel because the takeoff is made while going forward.)
* There are six canonical jumps in figure skating, which world-class singles skaters have effectively needed to demonstrate all of since the 1980s. However, there are other jumps possible. After Elaine Zayak did four triple toe loops to win the 1982 world championship,** the rules were changed so that at most two of the same jump (one necessarily in a combination) could count as technical elements in a skater’s long program. Zayak switched some of her jumps to triple toe Walleys, but toe Walleys are now counted as being equivalent to toe loops, so nobody does them, since they are harder. The (toeless) Walley is (like the toeless Lutz) effectively impossible to double or triple, and the single Walley does not count it as a jump at all under current scoring, merely a connecting element.
** That is an impressive achievement for somebody missing multiple toes! She actually took up figure skating as physical therapy in response to her childhood foot injury.
I think “performed” in “performed a triple Axel” is absolutely a light verb.
Well, if so, then verb lightness is a gradient phenomenon: it’s not nearly as light as canonical light verbs like do, give, have, make, get, take. For one thing, perform implicates (implicatures?) an audience, whereas you can do a triple Axel all alone.
I note that in English at least there is lexical variability: AmE take a shit = BrE have a shit.
lose face
That doesn’t really count, as it is a direct calque of either 丟臉／丢脸 (diūliǎn) or 丟面子 (diū miànzi) ‘lose face’. It does not mean lose is a light verb: rather, we have imported a Chinese verb-object compound unchanged..
there was a common injunction to “strengthen your verbs”
I never heard it put that way, but I certainly internalized the superiority of He ate the cheese to He gave the cheese a munch, or more realistically of He was very brave to He had great courage, although it is not the verb which is strengthened in the second example.
See also Steve Yegge’s immortal rant “Execution in the Kingdom of Nouns”, which is about the programming language Java, at least partly, but is worth reading for its linguistic content as well.
Me: revelation
Brett: This seems ill formed to me. Can one have a “revelation” of a wrong answer?
Hat: The point is not the details of “two-loop”; it’s the fact that it’s a compound rather than a French name that was a revelation.
Both, I think. I used ‘revelation’ for irony.
Ut dixit Yegge:
“I’ve really come around to what Perl folks were telling me 8 or 9 years ago: ‘Dude, not everything is an object.'”
@John Cowan: I could never do a triple Axel, but at one point I could “perform” a single Axel without anyone around. (Pragmatically, I’m sure that never happened in fact, but that’s not the point.)
Does “performed an Axel” sound weird when it is just an exercise and no one is watching?
(P.S. I did not see Brett’s comment when I posted this)
Not to me. It needn’t imply a public display.
I usually perform my ablutions unpublicly. Performing Axels has never been part of my skill set, however.
Kremlyad’ is not just kremlin and blyad’.
It is also -jad’, a suffix commonly found in mass nouns (peled, sterlet)
I always prudishly analized it as Kremlin + челядь (domestic serfs + extended meanings)
@Brett: “I mostly heard “barbiturate” pronounced as bar-BIT-yoo-ate, or, more commonly, with a reduced final vowel, bar-BIT-yoo-it. (The last one might actually have been bar-BIT-chur-it for some speakers, but I didn’t notice the difference if there was one.)”
Thanks! Merriam-Webster doesn’t even mention the “yoo-it” pronunciation: \ bär-ˈbi-chə-rət, -ˌrāt; ˌbär-bə-ˈtyu̇r-ət, -ˈtu̇r-, -ˌāt; nonstandard bär-ˈbi-chə-wət \.
D.O.: prudishly analized
That gave me a guilty giggle.
Well, chelyad’ has the same suffix as sterlyad’, even if they have different sources.
Collective/mass noun semantics is here. And in Russian expressive language it is common, cf. всякая (“any, various”, f. sg.) ерунда, поебень, хуйня всякая.
Directed by Robert B. Weide: как появился знаменитый мем о неловких ситуациях и что про него думает сам Роберт Б. Уайде
https://tjournal.ru/internet/114791-directed-by-robert-b-weide-kak-poyavilsya-znamenityy-mem-o-nelovkih-situaciyah-i-chto-pro-nego-dumaet-sam-robert-b-uayde
@lh: you could in theory say “triple-axeled” instead of “performed a triple axel,” though I don’t know if anyone does
Apparently some people do:
Thanks! Not surprising, but it’s nice to have confirmation.
Two of those three examples are arguably deliberate — if not jocular so at least elegantly light-hearted — extensions of an existing phrase, X one’s way into someone’s heart. The middle example is different in being in-your-face informal, but similar in using the verb for effect. Together they show expressive verbing in English, but not really that this is established usage anywhere in Anglophonia.
Said me, the non-native speaker.
I’m not sure I see the relevance. The question wasn’t “is ‘triple-axeled’ an established usage?” but “do people say ‘triple-axeled’?”
Three are people, and establish a usage by using it. There’s no Académie to pee on their leg(s? – Ed.).
Come to think if it, I did hear people use “triple-axel” as a verb
(mostly in the past tense), in reference to Tonya Harding. In 1993, she was one of only two women in the world who did a triple axel in competitions. Her jumps were obviously a huge topic of discussion among her fans and the circle of people* surrounding her.
* I met her a few times, and my father got to know Tonya Harding reasonable well (although not as well as he thought). He had volunteered to treat her exercise-induced asthma for free. She was really in need of competent medical assistance, in part because she hadn’t had a regular physician or medical insurance since her then-husband Jeff Gillooley** quit his job at the Oregon liquor control agency. Once, while she was practicing on the ice at Clackamas Town Center, somebody set off a smoke bomb in one of the adjacent department stores, and the whiffs of it that reached the rink gave her the worst asthma attack I have ever witnessed.
** By the time the really crazy shit went down, Harding and Gillooley had divorced and then gotten back together. Having quit his job, he seemed to have devoted himself to being her premier hanger-on, rather that doing anything useful. On New Years Eve, 1993 (just as the attack was being planned***), my father and I attended her practice, and Gillooley was totally out of control. He was getting in the way of Tonya’s asthma treatment, throwing temper tantrums, and repeatedly changing the schedule for the afternoon. As we were driving home, my father and I discussed that, since the Brady Bill was going into effect the next day, this could be the last chance to buy Jeff a gun and encourage him to use it on himself.
*** My father apparently had an even weirder interaction with Gillooley, which I wasn’t present for, the day after the attack on Nancy Kerrigan took place.
I think what Trond was getting at was that “_____ one’s way (in)to GOAL/RESULT” is a template that can accept nouns, and even add verb inflections to them, even if they’re not otherwise used as verbs. Searching for this template on COCA finds examples such as:
Some of these sound awkward (sound-bite? food-bank?), but I think “Milli Vanilli” is fine there, and I don’t expect it to take the role of verb in other constructions.
In any case, Brett’s comment indicates that people who talk about “triple axel” a lot can also use it as a verb more generally, which is what you’d expect.
Grim situations create jokes. I just read the following:
Putin dies and goes to hell. After five years he gets a few days’ furlough in Moscow. He enters a bar, orders a vodka, and strikes a conversation with the bartender:
— So, is Crimea ours?
— Ours, answers the bartender.
— And Donbass?
— Ours.
— And Kiev?
— Ours.
— Great! How much for the vodka?
— 5 euros, please.
Nice one 🙂
Maria Alyokhina is still fighting from within Russia.
After more than a decade of activism, Maria Alyokhina disguised herself as a food courier to evade the police — and a widening crackdown by President Vladimir Putin.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/10/world/europe/pussy-riot-russia-escape.html
Under the continued threat of imprisonment by Vladimir Putin’s regime for anti-government activism, Pussy Riot’s Maria Alyokhina successfully escaped Russia last month, only able to safely flee Moscow by disguising herself as a food courier.
In an interview with The New York Times, Alyokhina, 33, detailed how she managed to leave the Russian capital despite being under house arrest. The activist had been arrested and jailed a whopping six times in the last year, primarily due to her involvement in anti-government protests, prompting her decision to flee. The food courier disguise was born out of a result of Alyokhina’s movements being tracked by Moscow police, the paper reported. After several failed attempts of crossing into Lithuania at the Belarusian border, the activist was able to procure a special travel document from an unidentified European nation with assistance from an Icelandic performance artist. “I still don’t understand completely what I’ve done,” she said.
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/pussy-riot-maria-alyokhina-moscos-russia-escape-1351601/
Now I want to see that travel document. Is it performance art in Icelandic…?
Interesting. I read another version back in March, I think: Putin goes into a coma, wakes up after 5 years, asks the questions that make more sense in that scenario, and is told the price in hryvnias, which makes considerably less sense.
The white-blue-white flag was amply represented at a protest by ethnic Russians in Latvia a few days ago.
From an interview with Kevin Rudd.
About that “broader question” of structure and agency, I asked Rudd how singularly influential he thought Putin was in the current war in Ukraine. This question may seem obvious. Putin, as the long-reigning Russian leader, declared and is now prosecuting an indescribably brutal and fatuous war. How could his influence be questioned?
But if Putin wasn’t leader, would someone else – compelled or supported by Russia’s czarist instincts, its mystical chauvinism, its memory of humiliation (humiliations arguably compounded by the West’s lack of magnanimity in the 1990s) – have filled Putin’s breach?
It’s a disturbing question, not least because it might suggest some reduction of Putin’s agency – the man ultimately responsible for this obscene war. But is Putin’s violence informed by history or his unique psychopathology? The answer can also be a very complicated mixture of both.
Like the 19th-century historian Thomas Carlyle – who famously wrote that “the history of the world is but the biography of great men” – Rudd stresses the importance of individual leadership. “I object to Thucydides Trap writ large, in that it’s a determinist view of history, which basically says we’re all fucked,” Rudd says. “So, I simply don’t accept that as a proposition, not just at a normative level, which I find objectionable anyway, but at an empirical level. I mean, leaders make choices. Churchill could have chosen to conclude we’re all fucked, because the balance of power of the Nazis was against us, but he didn’t. And Zelensky could have chosen to conclude we’re all fucked, because he’s up against the Russian army. But he chose not to. Agency is a very powerful thing in politics.”
It’s not preordained, in other words.
But if Putin wasn’t leader, would someone else – compelled or supported by Russia’s czarist instincts, its mystical chauvinism, its memory of humiliation (humiliations arguably compounded by the West’s lack of magnanimity in the 1990s) – have filled Putin’s breach?
It’s funny, my wife and I just last night were reading a passage in War and Peace where Tolstoy denies Napoleon’s ability to influence events, just as he would surely have denied Putin’s. It amazes me that some people take this cockamamie idea seriously; I’ve had arguments about it right here in these hallowed hatter-halls. I can understand a lot of things, but I can’t understand how people can seriously believe that had Alexander, Napoleon, Hitler, or now Putin not existed history would have carried on exactly the same regardless.
@hat
Would you accept a weaker version of “the same”? It is difficult for me to believe that Popes and (other) temporal rulers would have successfully combined to prevent some kind of Reformation occurring in parts of Europe, if Luther and/or Calvin had not been born. Equally, I think that post-WWI Europe was politically unstable and ripe for political experiment (populist, Communist, authoritarian, Fascist), so that less charismatic populist etc., leaders than Hitler might well have governed Germany in the absence of Hitler. Such figures held power at least in Austria and Portugal (the latter for an impressively long time).
Would you accept a weaker version of “the same”?
But there is no weaker version; what you’re saying amounts to the obvious fact that events are influenced both by general historical/cultural trends and the actions of particular people. Tolstoy’s attitude was precisely that the latter is irrelevant:
(W&P, Part III, Book II, ch. 28) He goes on in this vein for pages at a time, and for the entirety of the Second Appendix. It was a mania of his. We all have our manias; what surprises me is that other people take it seriously, far more than take, say, Yeats’s gyres or Pound’s economic theories seriously.
I would have to say that I have to some extent been influenced by “geopolitical” narratives, which analyse countries’ policies in terms of their geopolitical interests. In Russia’s case, that concerns its position on a vast continental plain and the scarcity of easily defensible geographical frontiers (open to easy invasion from the West through Poland, which has happened more than once). According to this logic, the extension of outside influence right into Russia’s underbelly in the Ukraine is an existential threat to Russia.
However, I would certainly not extend this kind of analysis to explain how Russia “inevitably” had to invade Ukraine. Putin’s decisions might be shaped by circumstances but they are not irrevocably determined by them.
Just so.
Well, who exactly? Some of his ideologues (Dugin & Co.) likely would, if they got into power – but how would that happen? They’re academics with no power base in politics or the mafia.
I haven’t looked up how Salazar did it, though.
It’s not preordained, in other words. etc.
Of course not, but. I imagine that Putin is an example of a KGB officer who thought that SU in the 70s-80s was doing everything basically right, but was run by the senile Politburo and that things would be much better if they listened to the KGB at every turn. He is now trying to put this vision into practice. If Yeltsin have selected anyone else from the same crop, the things wouldn’t go exactly the same way, but in a similar direction.
I don’t follow Ukrainian politics, but whatever little I know is that Zelensky was considered a “dove”. He tried to run Minsk agreements through the parliment and consistently wanted to deescalate and find some compromise. After Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk were effectively lost, the center of gravity of Ukrainian politics, which before was halfway between pro- and anti-Russian positions, went so far in the anti direction that even mild Zelensky couldn’t do much.
Brett: I’m from Oregon and was a fan of Harding before she bacame infamous. To me it’s a very sad story and I can’t feel the glee so many people do about seeing white trash humiliated. I didn’t know that Gillooly was as bad as that but it explains a lot.
Russia looking to fast-track Chinese product replacement alternatives
It struck me that in the space of six years a possibly far-reaching realignment seems to be taking place at the two ends of Europe.
In the West, Britain, the greatest of the maritime colonial powers, still dreaming of its glory days, decided to withdraw from the European project and go it alone. Perhaps it thought that what turned out to be the greatest ex-colony in history, the United States, would help it along. The British have shot themselves in the foot.
In the East, in a delusory attempt to reassert its dominance and push back the European tide, Russia decided to launch an invasion of Ukraine. Now Russia looks increasingly like becoming a client state of China. The Russians have shot themselves in the foot.
You are tacitly assuming that the current rulers of Britain and Russia are concerned with the welfare of their fellow-citizens. This is not the case; failure to ensure such welfare therefore tells you nothing about whether those rulers are competent or not. The objectives to which their competence is directed are quite different, and their criteria for success quite otherwise.
I have not shot myself in the foot. Boris, his plutocrat paymasters and his xenophobe claque have shot me and my country in the foot, the bastards. They are not likely to be losing any sleep over it at all.
Russian Hatters may well feel similarly, given that no Hatter is a plutocrat or a xenophobe.
Quite so. It depresses me that people are so ready to identify with their leaders, and even readier to identify citizens of other countries with their leaders. I am not a number, I am a free man!
Perfectly valid observations. I was using the terms “the British” and “the Russians” in a very loose but time-honoured sense.
It would indeed have been more accurate to say (using another time-honoured locution) that “Britain has shot itself in the foot” and “Russia has shot itself in the foot”.
It would perhaps be even more accurate to say that the British leadership has betrayed its people for its own stupid and selfish ends, and the Russian leadership has betrayed its people for its own stupid and selfish ends.
Because of Putin people like you and me will never take power. What not to like about him?
You are tacitly assuming that the current rulers of Britain and Russia are concerned with the welfare of their fellow-citizens. This is not the case […]
That is not altogether true. The evidence is that civil unrest and armed rebellion are inversely proportional to public welfare spending. However, it is unlikely that U.S. or UK public welfare spending will in fact drop that low.
On one of Russian WP pages someone renamed ДНР to бомбас (and then to бонбас). Obviously it is Донбасс > Бомбас (I don’t know why бонбас, though… ).
Can anybody explain the sticker I saw here in Berlin yesterday?
ПТН
ПТХ
The first line is most likely Putin, but I can’t guess the second.
Путин — хуйло! Cf. ПТН ПНХ = Путин, пошёл на хуй!
Looks to me like an onomatopoeia of spitting, expressing disgust: /ptəx/, with anaptyctic vowel.
Nope.
And here …
… is comment #1000!
Oh, I think it was ПНХ actually, not ПТХ. Thanks!
That has a conventional spelling in Russian: тьфу.
It really is! Wow!
A related imitation of spitting starts with your tongue on the upper lip. It does not result in actual spitting, but tiny drops fly off your tongue, so it is used for both expressive and practical (moistening) purposes.
/Tf-/ where T is a stop made with the tongue tip is a rather accurate transcription. But you let more pressure to build up than you would normally do while speaking. And it makes /Tfu/ very convenient for abrupt expression of abrupt frustration.
тьфу with a palatalized ть is a milder variant (and nothing flies:)), but again. more pressure.
“Spit” in Kusaal is tʋbis, thereby proving your complete rightness.
ПНХ confirmed.
Hope you don’t mind me inserting this trenchant little piece:
Silencing the lambs: How propaganda works in the West
He is left-wing, but is he wrong?
This one is also rather instructive:
Eva Bartlett: The West is silent as Ukraine targets civilians in Donetsk using banned butterfly mines
He is left-wing, but is he wrong?
Yes. This is flat-out lies:
And the rest is standard-issue Tankie apologetics: “Those poor Russians, everybody hates them because the mean US clouds their minds! They’re just defending themselves! Listen to Putin, he’ll tell you…”
Please don’t burden the thread with such tripe. The US has many sins on its conscience, but defending Ukraine against unprovoked Russian aggression is not one. In fact, this moment in history, horrible though it is, provides a useful sieve by means of which the genuine progressive left, which opposes all aggression, can be separated out from the crazies.
The problem with Pilger is that he doesn’t let inconvenient facts get in the way of whatever story he wants to tell. I agree, mostly, with his politics, but wish very much that he wasn’t on my side. His cavalier approach to the truth* is a free gift to the bad guys.
Yup. NATO is just like the Nazis.
There really is no excuse for this sort of thing. It is contemptible in itself, and by its evident stupidity it undermines his actual valid points, of which he makes several.
* I recall watching a television programme by the man about poverty in the UK. I was in Ghana at the time. Poverty in the UK is indeed a serious issue. He did the cause no good at all by representing it as on a level with famines in Africa. But then, I don’t think his motivation is actually to benefit the causes he trumpets. He’s a narcissist.
Almost eight years. How interesting. What happened almost eight years earlier?
Putin cashiering Crimea and not-officially-invading small parts of the Russian-speaking region of Donbass, setting up puppet “National Republics” there. That started a war that simply never ended.
Wikipedia: “On Friday 21 February 2014, an agreement between president Yanukovych and the leaders of the parliamentary opposition was signed that called for early elections and the formation of an interim unity government. The following day, Yanukovych fled from the capital ahead of an impeachment vote.”
In other words, he resigned.
Further: “On 22 February 2014, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove him from his post and schedule new elections on the grounds that he “has restrained himself from performing his constitutional duties” and effectively resigned,[15] rather than by following the impeachment process for criminal acts under Article 108 of the Ukrainian constitution.[16]”
Unlike the previous time, the US very visibly held back, seeing full well that it neither should be seen as involved nor had any reason to get involved.
And you know what? None of that even matters. Poroshenko was elected democratically, and so was Zelensky. Pilger sounds like the Reichsbürger who say Imperial Germany was somehow never correctly dissolved in legal terms and therefore the Federal Republic doesn’t actually exist. Why should anyone care? Steinmeier and Scholz got to where they are by means of democratic elections. 😐
On top of that, once Yanukovych had fled, it was discovered (very spectacularly) that he was a kleptocrat. Don’t you agree that kleptocrats are ipso facto illegitimate? Doesn’t Pilger, supposedly a loud & proud leftist!?!
…Oh, BTW, in late February Yanukovych (in Russian exile) loudly protested against Putin’s invasion. He hasn’t been heard from since.
@dm
Whilst not agreeing with Pilger that US/NATO/EU bears any real responsibility for or provoked Putin’s senseless war / “special military action”, I would say that, as with the breakup of former Yugoslavia, Sadaam Husein’s invasion of Kuwait, Argentina’s Falkland invasion, etc., loss of life could have been prevented by communicating red lines and limits of effective US/NATO/EU support more clearly to some of the (admittedly unrealistic and sometimes unstable, so maybe it would not have mattered) protagonists. Also the sad thing about some countries (70s Lebanon and Northern Ireland, 90s Yugoslavia) is that if a delicate balance or set of interlocking compromises is upset, it may take a long time and many lives to find a new equilibrium. Also, you seem to believe that since democracy has worked in Germany, it works the same way in a divided country, which is not always the case.
I do agree about the lack of communication, which was caused by general confusion within NATO about what to do and where to go. Ukraine was neither told “no” nor given a plan with a timeframe for joining, for example. I think that’s already hashed out in this thread somewhere.
Ukraine was never divided into exactly two factions along any simple, clear lines. And indeed, all the top politicians, including Yanukovych, and most non-top politicians tried to navigate some sort of middle course between EU/NATO and Russia/Putin from 1991 to February 2022 – there’s just a lot of space in that middle.
Whatever kind of journalist Pilger wants to be, he should be valuing the facts and the ability to report them. Writing under “Silencing the lambs” (of course that might be the publishers hed rather than his, although it’s syndicated plenty of places) I would expect to be about the large numbers of journalists in Putin’s Russia that have disappeared. Also the industrialist who’d criticised Putin’s war in Ukraine, who this week allegedly jumped out of a hospital balcony.
And the other article @Bathrobe links, on butterfly mines, dated a week after Update 9th August: The UK Ministry of Defence Intelligence Update appears to blame Russia for the attacks, …
Of course the facts are almost impossible to verify on the ground; there’s accusations from both sides. The article entirely fails to mention these mines were developed by Soviet/Russia and used widely when it invaded Afghanistan.
Bartlett describes herself as an “independent writer and rights activist.”[4] She writes commentary pieces for Russian state-controlled RT’s website. … Her posts on social media have been tagged with the disclaimer that her writings “may be partially or wholly under the editorial control of the Russian government.” [wp] So not a journalist/no respecter of facts.
I agree with @Hat’s “Please don’t burden the thread with such tripe”.
@Bathrobe: Pilger is channeling Putin’s propaganda. He’s been doing so for ages. It’s amazing how he swallows and re-broadcasts it as if it were the gospel truth.
Russia invaded Ukraine as a response to almost eight years of killing and criminal destruction in the Russian-speaking region of Donbass on their border.
Y’know, one of the rules of post-1948, and certainly post-1989, “Europe” is that just because people who speak the same language you do, but live in a neighboring country, don’t have all the rights you think they should have, you do not have the “natural right and duty” to invade that country supposedly in their defense. Ethnic Graustarks in Ruritania are Ruritanian citizens, and the most Graustark can do is issue stiffly worded demarches threatening to break off diplomatic relations (which is often self-defeating) and perhaps issue refugee passports. I grant that my country has the evil habit of ignoring variants of this principle, but that doesn’t make the principle wrong. If the Canadian Navy sailed up the Mississippi in force (not that they would!) to preserve the language rights of Cajuns, I well believe that Americans, including Cajuns, would be rather resentful.
By the way, I have never seen tankie applied before to people who uphold right-wing authoritarian dictatorships. I agree that it makes sense to do so, it just startled me.
Tankies love Russian aggression whether it flies the hammer and sickle or the tricolor. It’s not about “right-wing authoritarian dictatorships.” Pro-Pinochet people are not tankies.
But Maoists, Pol-Pot-ists, and supporters of the Korean monarchy (as opposed to the Korean Empire) are.
“Enemy of my enemy” people who hate US/West searching for other people who hate US/West. They probably have their limits. I never saw someone praising Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi or Assad. There is probably a Middle East exception.
In the Middle East, broadly speaking, everyone is bad, whatever their alliances.
(Yes, a few not so much. “Broadly speaking”.)
I never saw someone praising Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi or Assad.
Oh, there were definitely fans of Saddam and Assad, seen as the kind of modernizing strongman so necessary to their benighted lands; I’m not sure about Gaddafi — he may have been too ostentatiously wacky to attract academic/bureaucratic fanboys.
Hussein, Gaddafi or Assad
you just have to look in the right places: there are plenty! mainly in the marcyite and other very specifically tankie* ends of the leninist world, but also in the more maoist sects. some u.s. examples (current and recent (some lines have changed in the last 5-10 years)): Workers World Party, Party for Socialism & Liberation, Revolutionary Communist Party, and all their respective front groups, plus various segments and factions of the DSA. you can find their writing in damn near any u.s. left-liberal publication from the early 1990s to the present, usually with no mention of their sectarian affiliation (though often a telltale front group shows up in the bio).
.
* “tankie” is a very specific term. the core reference is to [soi-disant] marxists who defend the u.s.s.r.’s invasion of hungary, but it’s not about the u.s.s.r. or stalinism per se. it’s about folks (1) from the marxist left who (2) support or defend invasions and occupations (3) by supposedly socialist or anti-imperialist regimes (very much including ba’athists** and their ilk***). it doesn’t particularly apply to folks who defend only these regimes’ internal atrocities, though i don’t think i’ve met anyone who did one and not the other. and it certainly doesn’t apply to defenders of similar actions by right-wing, or even liberal regimes.
in the semantic space of the u.s. left, “tankie” is basically an exonym, though it overlaps with self-identifications like “anti-revisionist”, through their shared rejection of marxist and other left critiques of stalin, lenin, and mao. it has (only extremely recently) become an occasional self-identification among young leninist and maoist edgelord types – pretty much the same gesture as the far right’s helicopter t-shirts.
** if i thought ba’ath was part of the left, i’d say “ba’athites”, but it just ain’t so.
*** the “supposedly anti-imperialist” part is where tankie garbage and its associated flavor of ostalgie meets enemy-of-my-enemy garbage and ends up backing putin’s ostentatiously far-right regime specifically because of its irredentism.
I managed to forget to comment on the butterfly mines! I’ve seen them attributed to Russia several times at separate occasions in this war, months apart. I don’t know if Ukraine has inherited any from Soviet storage, and I don’t really know if nobody in the entire Ukrainian army would use blatant anti-civilian mines, but it all looks like just another blatant case of Putin borrowing the First Rule of the Republican Party: Always accuse your opponent of being you.
That’s why Putin’s propaganda has deemed it necessary to go further and claim painful suppression well beyond “don’t have all the rights you think they should have”. None of it rises above the level of quarter-truth, but the 21st century is still young – not everyone is used to looking things up in Wikipedia or on Google before just believing them.
Not just any such dictatorships, but specifically Putin: they’re literally the same people as before. They try to agree with Putin’s propaganda that he’s in some continuity with Lenin and Stalin because that allows them to praise Putin for bravely standing up to the West in general and the US in particular.
In doing so they end up in the same choir as those on the extreme right who praise Putin for manfully standing up to the decadent West. They don’t seem to mind.
Oh yes. In that world, Putin is on the defense from Ukrainian/EU/US imperialism, justifying everything and then some – exactly as Pilger wrote.
” I never saw someone praising Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi or Assad. ”
@D.O. 3 heroes (Russia). A hero, an idiot, an asshole (Sunni Arab world*).
—
* I do not mean that all Sunni Arabs are of this opinion (any more than that all Russians consider those three heroes. I just don’t know how else I can define the region where this view is common…).
Not just any such dictatorships, but specifically Putin: they’re literally the same people as before.
Exactly. And I defer to rozele’s expertise on the wonderful world of Leninist/Leninoid sects.
I just came across some mockery, with screenshots, of a pro-Putin Twitter account named AltTankie – last seen tweeting that the current Ukrainian counteroffensive both doesn’t exist and is about to fail. So there’s “Tankie” as a self-designation.
expertise
/sigh/
They try to agree with Putin’s propaganda that he’s in some continuity with Lenin and Stalin because that allows them to praise Putin for bravely standing up to the West in general and the US in particular. […] same choir as those on the extreme right who praise Putin for manfully standing up to the decadent West.
i think that’s part of it, but another part is a more classical irredentism, rather than historical rewriting. for the u.s.s.r. to rise again, its entire territory must be under the control of a single state – after all, you can’t have ‘socialism in [stalin’s] one country’ if there’s a meaningful border between moscow and kyiv (or tblisi or grozny).
and the ‘decadence’ bit is sometimes a point of ideological commonality: stalin, after all, reversed almost every aspect of the social revolution that took place during and after 1917, from reproductive rights and sexual freedom to meaningful cultural rights or political autonomy for inarodtsy. quite a few u.s. sects (RCP and the now-defunct MIM maybe most loudly, but PLP and the Sparts have had their moments too, as did parts of the now defunct ISO) are explicitly opposed to any kind of countercultural anything*, and basically indistinguishable from the far right in their homophobia (these days with a layer of tokenizing lipservice over unchanged practice). oddly, some of the biggest tankie groups (WWP and PSL) are exceptions to that general trend.
.
* by their boring outfits and dull graphic design shall ye know them
That’s why Putin’s propaganda has deemed it necessary to go further and claim painful suppression well beyond “don’t have all the rights you think they should have”.
That phrase was, as Artemus Ward had it, “wrote Sarcastikul”.
ends up backing putin’s ostentatiously far-right regime specifically because of its irredentism
I think I shall call the regime a “deformed capitalists’ state” from now on.
The Syrian civil war brought out a small but still surprising number of pro-Assad commentators in America and the West. A lot of them seemed to be Putin apologists as well, which is not surprising, given the long history of Syria as a Soviet-Russian client state.
With Assad vs ISIS, there were still those who insisted that since one was bad, the other was good.
Well, I did pollute the thread with Pilger (yes, it was so over-the-top it almost seemed convincing!), but I’m glad to read the rebuttals it provoked.
Incidentally, it’s now exactly 21 years since WTC. So Bush’s anti-terrorist war has finally come of age.
@rozele, DM,
Putin and political developments in Russia are not the same thing.
Putin is anti-Soviet.
Bathrobe: Incidentally, it’s now exactly 21 years since WTC. So Bush’s anti-terrorist war has finally come of age.
Yeah, well, it was probably conceived in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, but the Iraq war had very little to do with actual war on terror.
Except of course as a massive disturbance to the real efforts against terrorism (from a Western point of view) and a confirmation that the west is all power and propaganda and that (forced, grumbling) adherence to international law is no guarantee (from an anti-Western point of view).
It’s no excuse for Russia, but it can’t be said often enough that the West owns the new era of lawless aggressive powers for not having even its most blatant crimes against international law prosecuted.
Well, he’s not a communist. Instead, he views the USSR as just another Russian empire and has been trying to spread nostalgia for that aspect.
Yeah, well, it was probably conceived in the immediate aftermath of 9/11
No, it was conceived years before; Wolfowitz & Co. were itching to take out Saddam in a splendid little war, and 9/11 simply provided the excuse they’d been waiting for.
Agreed. But seeds of war need a fertile womb — or at at least a casus belli. And that was contrived immediately after 9/11.
a fertile womb
Some “sexing up” was spoken of in the UK.
Curious that we have ended up in a polity where Alistair Campbell seems almost truthful by contrast. He was a mere amateur in shamelessness compared with his successors in both the UK and the US. One feels almost nostalgic …
Yes, every time I think “We can’t do worse than this” (starting with LBJ, who now seems like a model of statesmanship and virtue) I’ve been proved wrong, so I’ve stopped thinking that.
From a cartooning point of view, BoJo was sort of a once-in-a-lifetime peak. Thatcher was a remote second.
Maybe that’s how British political cartoonists get so good: they have to work with such meager materials, whereas US presidents have been a non-stop cartoon bounty at least since LBJ.
“The Republicans hit rock bottom months ago, but never fear! They’re bringing out the blasting caps and are fracking America’s moral bedrock.”
– Stephen Colbert, I think in late 2018
@dravsi, DM:
yes, clearly! but some of his soi-disant marxist backers elsewhere do manage to contort themselves into thinking of his regime as a legitimate heir to the u.s.s.r. like i said above, though, i think that’s more because his irrendentism matches their need for the [second coming of the son of (soviet) man] [
southeast? to rise again] [your analogy here] than it is about a serious claim of ideological continuity.From a cartooning point of view, BoJo was sort of a once-in-a-lifetime peak.
We must be observing a different Britain. I don’t remember any lack of cartooning targets. Didn’t the cartoonists have a whale of a time with Blair as Bush’s lap-dog?
‘Dave’ with the boiled head/like a jolly butcher. (Or the Steve Bell version.)
Brexit was already a gift to cartoonists before BoJo.
Theresa May’s frog-in-her-throat was entirely in line with how the cartoonists were already representing her.
See, that’s why British cartoonists are so good. They can work with meager material. In real life, every British PM after Thatcher and before BoJo has been a bland-looking individual, most of all of John Major, whose own mother probably didn’t notice him. Blair was probably the most cartoon-ready one, but not at the level of LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II and Trump, each one a cartoonist’s dream. Obama is the only challenging recent president, whose features are far too regular, other than the jug-ears.
Obama’s ears and smile have been emphasized a lot.
Google now is very different when I don’t use VPN. E.g. some search request with a word “ajam”, page 2, Russia:
Discover max_manuel ‘s popular videos – TikTok
My beautiful raider by OL6K on DeviantArt – Pinterest
…
Некоторые результаты поиска могли быть удалены в соответствии с местным законодательством. Подробнее…
Предыдущая 1 2 3 4 Следующая
The same, page 2, Netherlands:
Justifying Christianity in the Islamic Middle Ages
The Maghrib in the Mashriq – OAPEN
….
Предыдущая 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Следующая
Interesting. I knew Google takes your location and your search history into account, but that it would be that drastic – for a search I can’t imagine getting censored…
MOAR
It is a random outcome of our military maneuvers. And it is difficult to tell what of this is Russian censorship, and what is sanctions and what is what. I guess, mostly not Russian censorship (Wikipedia is still accessible, just with a warning).
Random Indian government sites only work with VPN, https://digital.csic.es (el repositorio institucional del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas.) says “Web Page Blocked! The page cannot be displayed. Please contact the administrator for additional information. URL: digital.csic.es/handle/ Client IP: ********** Attack ID: 20000018, Message ID: 000108968566” etc.
Weird.
Wikipedia is still accessible, just with a warning
…but not editable, or at least not on my IP – 85.140.0.0/16 got globally blocked until December.
Don’t you have a dynamic ID?
And, I forgot to add: great many of university repositories (and presumably also university sites) are so as well. And perseus.tufts.edu: “The requested URL was rejected. Please consult with your administrator.”
Now I wonder what part of the Great Chinese Firewall and crappy Iranian firewall has little to do with China and Iran:)
@J1M, at least for me nothing has changed: I want to edit somethign once in a few months. Sometimes I can do it, sometimes I can’t do it (since the February it has been “I can”). Some admins are just too tired of fighting with vandalism from dynamic IPs and ban ranges (which destroys the purpose).
Well, it’s encouraging to know that at least somebody other than UK Tories and US Republicans evidently thinks that universities are hotbeds of dangerous thinking. Perhaps they may yet actually become hotbeds of dangerous thinking.
Perhaps they’ll become venues for any sort of thinking at all — as opposed to their current rôle as tyrannies of ‘woke’ conformity.
@DE: I have the impression that the interest groups to which you refer feel that any kind of thinking is dangerous. Their remit is rabble-rousing.
The thoughts I encounter are usually in books. If asked to clarify what I mean by “thoughts”, I would say they are statements that give me pause. They do not “trigger” any emotional reaction other than a fleeting wow. What happens next, if anything, is up to me.
Edit: and what AntC says, regarding the faculties of squawk. “Queer studies” etc.
tyrannies of ‘woke’ conformity
Oh dear.
I wouldn’t say “tyrannies”. Rather hotbeds of censorious piety. Like the lairs of their opponents.
No big problem. Just leave the television turned off
@David, universities just reflect my interests, similarly, an Indian ministry is in the list just because once I needed somethign from their site. But I imagine commercial services must be accessible (unless owned by Ukrainians or blocked by Russia).
I don’t know why India. Our censors are not interested in blocking them, they are not interested in this too. Either thier provider blacklisted Russia or there is a general issue with traffic. Perseus and CSIC generate a “rejected” message of their own, so it can be the software they are using or an administrative decision.
Oh, Austria’s conservatives started that right at the beginning of their orbánizáció in 1999.
Exactly.
Come the fuck on.
@Bathrobe, DM, the story about mines seems real. A reliable source is urban forums and chats, but I don’t have the energy. Local not very political media kept posting pictures and videos for a dozen days. Amateurish, numerous and plausible. If you believe that Ukrainian soldiers are better people than Russian soldiers consider an option that it was a misfired Russian missile.
1. Russia started the war. Russia can stop it. It is evil.
2. Ukrainians and Russians are not different.
>The Syrian civil war brought out a small but still surprising number of pro-Assad commentators in America and the West.
Indeed.
The two that seemed strangest to me were the people behind the Moon of Alabama and Turcopolier blogs, the former developing around a group of Dem anti-Iraq war folks and the latter written by an ex military and spook who voted for Obama in 2008 and 2012. They veered rapidly by 2015 into bizarre anti-Obama Assadist Putinism in ways that I found hard to believe were genuine, and I began to wonder about corruption of their owners. But maybe that’s too cynical on my part, and too unwilling to accept how people’s views can evolve in ways beyond my ken.
Both served as middlebrow intellectual bridges to Trumpism via a shared hatred of the “new” American elite expressed in a tone of unmitigated disgust, though I may overestimate the degree that the individuals in the audience evolved vs. the audience changing over.
Scenes from right after the liberation of Kupyansk. I don’t understand most of it, but it’s interesting who speaks which language when. Contains the famous southern Russian [ɣ], and Russian word-final ть sometimes comes out downright Polish, i.e. as [tɕ].
More about mines:
https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/1556513928116670467 is crazy.
But not new; I first read about the butterfly mines back in April or May, I think.
One more collection of interviews with people about the war, rather wonderful (in Russian):
https://meduza.io/feature/2022/04/24/voyti-vo-mrak-i-naschupat-v-nem-lyudey
Yes, it’s grimly funny reading:
@DM, one of early episodes of the war mentioned in the text above is when a Russian missile with an inscription “за детей” (“for children”: that is, our revenge for killing children) hit a train station (obviously killing some children too). Propaganda played a large role in this, so I am quite sensitive to media coverage of wars.
Also I do not enjoy this style: “X is shelling their cities in order to accuse Y”. It is your “always accuse your opponent in being you” used against Putin. And a very ugly variety.
Not terribly interesting collection of interviews with Dagestani women protesting against mobilization (in Russian on meduza). A similar collection on a local (North-Caucasian?) feminist resource. Significalntly but not completely overlapping: at least 4 of the last 6 excerpts in the former article are absent from the latter, but some lines and paragraphs in the latter are absent from [or emended or clarified in] the [more edited] former. I say “not terribly interesting” because… well, the women in question are not much different from any other women. Feminism seems to be one of recurrent topics of this blog so maybe local feminist readers of Russia will want to check the feminist resource itself when they are in the mood for bad news.
Two ladies use a word нефорки. I didn’t know that it is current in Dagestan. I mentioned it before: in around 80s jounralists adopted a designation “informal youth unions” for groups like hippie, punks etc. And youth allied to these groups in turn adopted a name неформалы (stressed a) for themselves, which some shorteded to нефоры (stressed e).
I haven’t heard it for ages, but I also haven’t travelled на собаках and haven’t lived на вписках for ages as well (when I was a teenager it was considered a good tone for educated teenagers to hang with hippies, punks and similar people:))
but I also haven’t travelled на собаках and haven’t lived на вписках for ages as well
IIRC на собаках [literally “on dogs”] is (a slang term for) suburban rail – is that correct?
I’m familiar with both of the terms in the quoted line from Anton Krotov’s writing (especially his Practice of Free Travels), but I don’t think he ever talks of неформалы [literally “informals”] except disparagingly. AFAICT as far as he is concerned a hitch-hiker (автостопщик) should not behave especially informally unless it is a necessity, which it unfortunately often is at least as far as those particular cases are concerned.
It used to be possible to get from Moscow to Vladivostok on suburban trains alone, though it was an impractically ridiculous journey. Since the mid-2010s there are several gaps with no suburban trains, mostly on district boundaries (Mariinsk-Bogotol – has an unofficial train, Reshoty-Tayshet, Vydrino-Mysovaya, Shimanovskaya-Arkhara, and one or two more past Blagoveshchensk that I don’t recall offhand).
Moscow to Kazakhstan (Petropavlovsk) is still doable, though you’d miss your transfer in Petukhovo if you’re not very quick with the border guards.
haven’t lived на вписках for ages
For those who don’t know, this means crashing with people. (I did that myself for a bit in my late twenties; it develops an acute awareness of exactly when friendly tolerance starts curdling into teeth-gritting forced politeness barely covering a fervent desire for you to find other lodgings.)
I roomed with a few underclassmen my senior year in college and went back for their graduation, staying for several days at the parental home of one of them. The morning after his graduation party, he explained that his dad had been fine with having me there, but considered me part of the party, the rest of which was being cleaned up that day…
Not quite the gritting stage, but his teeth were likely clenched. I don’t know whether the fact that I had to be told is a sign of general early-20s obtuseness or my own.
Frisk fisk og liggende gæster holder kun tre dage, as they say.
Attributed to Ben Franklin in English, of course.
Which, in case anyone needs to be told, is ridiculous; back in 1580 Lyly wrote “as we say in Athens, ‘fish and guests in three days are stale,'” and in 1648 Herrick’s Hesperides included these pungent lines:
Needless to say, the sentiment goes much farther back; Plautus in Miles Gloriosus:
There are probably similar sentiments on Sumerian tablets.
That’s one of the most universal constants, then. Though my latinity is too feeble to be sure, I don’t see the fish in Plautus.
As Kid Creole And The Coconuts said, “No fish today.” But the basic sentiment is there.
The archaic 3p sing. subj. adequately compensates no fish.
But it butters no parsnips.
Which GT renders into Latin as “Sed id butyri nulla parsnips.”
BUTYRI NULLA PARSNIPS was, of course, the motto engraved above the entrance to the Miskatonic U. cafeteria.
I say “engraved,” though it may still be… but I’ve said too much already.
Huh, they’ve certainly got an impressive website.
Franklin, of course, did not claim that he had originated the aphorisms published in Poor Richard’s Almanack. (This is, in fact, doubly true: There was no claim, implied or otherwise, that the adages were original to the Almanack; nor did Franklin claim to be the author of the work—although it was relatively well known that “Poor Richard”/”Richard Saunders” was a pseudonym for Franklin, who was named as the publisher on most editions of the Almanack.) Most of them were sayings in circulation that Franklin put in writing, and the Almanack‘s popularity meant that Franklin’s versions often became the fixed forms that remain in known today. Some of the aphorisms are identifiable as variants of earlier published quotes. However, some of them may not have been written down before Franklin; for example, “Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead,” is probably not original to Franklin, but I have never seen it antedated to a source older than its July 1735 appearance in the Almanack. And some of them he probably really did invent himself.
@J1M I googled it (антон кротов “неформалы” Google books), but it is invariably something like “Среди них есть и туристы, альпинисты, путешественники, автостопщики, есть и музыканты, и неформалы, и учёные, …”
Maybe it is logical that the word is in use in Makhachkala: people who look funny (like hippies) stand out there and likely break local social norms.
But I only heard this word from members of subcultures. Like when a former punk says that they fought with Nazi-punks but never would attack a hippie even though they used to make fun of those, for those are our brothers-нефоры.
I crashed with friends the first weeks after I got my first job (in Oslo), while waiting for my first paycheck to arrive and for the employer to help me find a bedsit. How difficult everything was even in those very last … months … of life without a cellphone and no widespread internet in private households.
Having very clearly stayed out the hospitality of one couple, I was moving over to the next, who had just moved to a bigger apartment and had room for me. For some reason I had their new adress wrong, and I had no way to contact them (How difficult etc.). Going back to the apartment I left a few hours earlier and begging for another night’s stay is one of the most embarrassing things I’ve done in my life.
I had no way to contact them
What, no payphones?
There were payphones but I had no number to call. I think the landline came with their new (rented) apartment, and I couldn’t get the number from the number information without the right adress.
A hippie вписка is not exactly what Trond just described.
It is secondary to a verb вписаться (“to write onself in”) which is, I think, just youth slang of the time. Not necessarily hippie slang but possibly close to it. If an old freind of mine asks me if he/she can вписаться ко мне на недельку I won’t be too surprised (I mean, about words: I will be surpised that he/she is homeless).
But вписка is a hippie word also used by other subcultures. They are (were) essentially nomads. And they would have a little notebook with some 100 phone numbers in 70 towns of people willing to host random hippies. It can be used differnetly as a “place to stay” as in “I found a вписка [place to stay] in that town” or “I found где вписаться” – but a vpiska that you found is not the same as “a vpiska” (just as “my woman” is not the same as “a woman”). Your house is a вписка when you are known among a subculture’s members to be willing to let them stay in your house.
When my friend’s friends who were looking for a job in Moscow stayed in my place, it was different.
Your house is a вписка when you are known among a subculture’s members to be willing to let them stay in your house.
“Crash pad” in English. (I don’t know if the term is still in use.)
“Crash pad” in English. (I don’t know if the term is still in use.)
It’s still in use amongst my generation — though I fear more as a distant memory/ our lifestyles are such that the inconveniences would outweigh the cost-saving. Talking of which …
Having very clearly stayed out the hospitality of one couple, …
Trond, farbeit for me to comment on your English, but that sounds unidiomatic to me; I’d say “Having very clearly outstayed the hospitality …”
“Having stayed out all night, I returned and woke them at 6:00 am …” might be a reason you’d outstayed their hospitality. (And I wish I could claim merely something like that as the most embarrassing of my life.)
I’ve done my share of very embarrassing things, but for some reason this is one of the few that stay with me unmitigated by time. It probably has less to do with embarrassment itself than with how far I tested their patience before moving, how obviously releaved they were when I left, how they had already tidied up and invited other people over when I returned, and how the whole thing made me feel revealed as … manipulative. And cheap. And also creepy.
The term crash pad is definitely still in use. I know it’s a pretty common term among people working the airline industry, for example The OED dates the relevant sense of the verb crash* to the 1960s, and it seems like that sense was actually becoming more and more widespread over much of my lifetime. (This, however, may have been an ecological fallacy. Between the ages of 15 and 25, at least, the likelihood of the activity of crashing on somebody’s couch grew greater and greater among my peer group.) However, the near-synonyms flop-house and (even more) doss-house are definitely much less common than they once were.
* I was surprised to learn that the vehicular sense of crash was first applied to aircraft, before it was extended to cars, boats, and other vehicles.
@brett
Not sure if this is true for UK. The British newspaper archive has articles with “tram car crash” from 1890. What did they call this in US cities? Train car crashes are cited from 1864.
the near-synonyms flop-house and (even more) doss-house
Those are not near-synonyms at all — they’re places you can stay in very cheaply (“a cheap lodging house for homeless people and tramps”), one step up from the street. That has nothing to do with staying with friends for free.
Not sure if this is true for UK. The British newspaper archive has articles with “tram car crash” from 1890.
You missed the vital phrase “the relevant sense.” He’s talking about the sense ‘lodging for free,’ not the smash-bang sense.
I don’t remember what Doctor Englebert Eszterhazy’s seven doctorates were in (Google snippets view reveals only the predictable Medicine and Philosophy), but I feel confident they were all earned (some, perhaps, by examination).
not the smash-bang sense
No, Brett said “the vehicular sense of crash”, that’s what PP was replying to. But Brett was referring to an unrevised and misleading OED entry. Sense 6a of the verb crash, “intransitive. Of an aircraft or its pilot: to fall or come down violently with the machine out of control. Also of a motor car, motor cycle, or train…”, was added in the 1972 supplement; at that time they were concentrating on recent usage rather than searching for antedates. (The first edition didn’t have a specific sense for vehicles, even though by 1893 they could have; I guess they just missed it.) No doubt when they do the full revision they’ll antedate the vehicle sense with citations for trains and trams.
Ah. Confusing!
Yes I was misled by the OED‘s erroneous entry for crash.
As to flop-house versus crash pad, I agree that most commonly you have to pay to sleep at a flop-house (except sometimes you don’t), and most commonly you don’t have to pay to sleep at a crash pad (except sometimes you do). For an example of the last case, there is the usage I mentioned in the airline industry (discussed here, for example, along with some other titbits of related jargon).
Ah well, I’m not familiar with airline industry jargon. I’ve never heard anyone use “crash pad” in a context of paid accommodation, but of course (unlike Johnny Cash) I haven’t been everywhere.
trying to imagine a Russian hippie who managed to нааскать (< ask) 70 Euro for a night in a hotel…
askát’
нааскать — насрать
I just read this essay, by Timothy Snyder, a sketch of Crimea’s history as it applies to Russia’s claims. It’s a nice piece of writing. Much of it is probably not new to many readers here.
A good piece, thanks; he certainly demolishes a lot of nonsense.
a sketch of Crimea’s history as it applies to Russia’s claims.
Em, I doubt Putin believes all that cultural destiny flim-flam any more than anyone else.
As a good Marxist he’ll be much more worried about economic base. Look at a map. The sea of Azov Max depth 14m [wp]. Sevastopol “strategic location … navigability … Black Sea Fleet” [wp].
So he didn’t build a bridge because he held Crimea; he took Crimea so he could build a bridge to Sevastopol. (And wishing to hold Ukraine’s Azov littoral as an alternative.) Then control the Black Sea/defend Novorossiysk and its industry/squeeze Ukraine by threatening Odessa.
There remains the difficulty of access through the Turkish straits. At least he can deal as strongman to strongman, without pesky democratic aspirations getting in the way.
I was not able to force myself to click Bathrobe’s first link, and I was not able to force myself to read this article as well. I heard our TV today (does not happen often).
A journalist, commenting on videos where people on streets of Ukrainian cities tell what they feel about the bombing (presumably repurposed Western news), happly: “but everyone knows why it is happening!”
Is this Timothy different? They are not hawks. They are professionals who don’t care, but are sending the right message. And I am fed up with “professionals who are sending the right message”.
Actually, right before Y posted it I was about to complain here that war rhetorics is tiresome. Ukrainians damaged the bridge, then Kremlin would do that Trump-Iran thing and our journalists would comment… and your journalists would comment.
Em, I doubt Putin believes all that cultural destiny flim-flam any more than anyone else.
Of course he doesn’t, nobody’s saying he does. The article isn’t written for him, it’s written for all the people who might believe the official line, or even take it seriously.
Is this Timothy different? They are not hawks. They are professionals who don’t care, but are sending the right message.
This Timothy is a historian of Eastern Europe, and a very good one. (See, for example, this 2012 LH post.) It’s certainly your privilege not to read the link, but in that case it’s beneath you to sneer at it.
According to one commentator I read, the sharp escalation of attacks on civilian target may reflect the apparent recent appointment of Gen. Sergei Surovikin to direct the war against Ukraine. Surovikin has had a long reputation for violence and cruelty, including directing the bombing of hospitals and schools in Syria. He also participated in the murder of protesters against the failed coup of 1991 (for which he was sentenced to 6 months but served much less.)
It’s probably best that I didn’t realize this had become a wide-ranging Ukraine-Russia war thread. It seems reasonably civil. I’m going to try to forget that it exists.
Wonderfully both Western and some Russian sources adopted Nazi names for Russian army groups.
Nazi army groups: группа армий «Центр», группа армий «Юг»
Russian groups in Ukraine: центральная and южная группировки.
Some Russian media (e.g.) abour Russian groups in Ukraine: группировка «Центр», группировка «Юг».
WP about Russian groups: Army Group South etc.
I guess it’s a case of слышал звон, но не знает где он. Boys grew up (like me) watching films about WWII and reading stories about WWII and listening to Vysotsky’s song.
Seeing it in Russian news is absolutny pizdetz.
(“… почему… ты взял в песню всё-таки «Центр»? Ведь в основном шла всё же группа «Юг»? А он отвечает: «Ты пойми, „Центр“ — слово намного лучше. Это как затвор щёлкает!»….”)
P.S. though, wait. The article above is written by >В. Баранец. He MUST remember what is “группа Центр”.
P.P.S. “В мае 2022 года жительницу Санкт-Петербурга Ирину Кустову оштрафовали на 50 тысяч рублей за прослушивание песни 9 мая 2022 года. “. Not unexpectedly.
So now army formations shouldn’t be named after compass points because Nazi Germany did that? Isn’t that taking it a bit too far?
@Hans, you are right but compare “южная/центральная группировка” and “группировка «Центр»”.
It is an entirely normal to call a new party “National Socialist” and the swastika was just a symbol popular much the same way as the star until Nazi and anti-fascists made it Nazi own symbol.
Yes, it is a natural way to call it, but the problem is “how many times we heard a phrase группа армий «Центр»”. Listen to Vysotsky song (…идут по Украине солдаты группы Центр…) and guess how many times I heard it. And he was singing about an entity familiar to Soviet people.
Центральная группировка already does not has the same effect. The same with Z. This letter is absewnt from our alphabet and its Zigzag actually reminds the runes/lightning bolts of ᛋᛋ .
Of course Z does not feel so other than in military context – but the shape is instinctively aggressive (and that’s why ᛋᛋ) and in military context it immediately reminds ᛋᛋ.
Also we were taught in school that Hitler’s popularity was partly caused by “the humiliation of Versailles”.
Now count the time from the treaty to Hitler and from the fall of USSR to 2014 when numerous people began to speak about uniting Russian-speaking lands.
I used to say back then that the state mind of our society is similar to that of German society in 30s. By which I don’t mean that people are evil, I mean, the society in this state is succeptible to a certain sort of bullshit.
But even if we have Goebbels, Putin is definitetly not Hitler.
A quote from Alex Foreman on FB:
Putin is definitetly not Hitler.
That’s a vacuous statement. Nobody is Hitler but Hitler; so what? Putin’s actions are shockingly reminiscent of Hitler’s, and it’s perfectly reasonable for people to point that out.
Nobody was Hitler apart from Hitler. For that matter, nobody was Louisa May Alcott apart from her.
But reminiscences abound, as you say. Putin does certain things that one can imagine Hitler doing, had he been Putin.
He shits?
Shicklgruber shat without having been Putin. He must have, since Putin was born after S. kicked the bucket. No reminiscence is involved on this head.
Everybody shits, but there’s only one Putin.
lā Putin ʾillā Putin, but who is his messenger?
“Shicklgruber shat without having been Putin”
Гениальное предвидение.
They must add it to role-playing games.
Гениальное предвидение вождя, -2 to intellect of all allied and enemy creatures. Does not affect neutral creatures and dragons.
@LH, Putin is not Hitleroid.
Is Czechoslovakia your only problem with Hitler (and the only thing that makes him differetn from other dictators)?
And why Putin did not take Kiev in 2014 when it was easy? Many demanded it.
I said “I used to say back then” – “Putin not Hitler” also is a part of what I used to say in 2014. But I can’t say much about his present actions. They are strange.
He is a Mussolinoid.
@D.O. yes, it is close to what I too was saying, but not back then but a couple of years ago.
Namely I discovered that we became a fascist country. A freind of mine (a human rights activist and absolutely anti-Putin) disagreed with me first, because he thought it is an emotional epithet. Our regime are not Nazi.
But no. When I was a schoolboy I came up with some idea of what is “fascism” and what it is that we don’t like about Mussolini. I don’t mean a “historically accurate” description of what is Italian fascism as opposed to Spanish fascism or Nazism. Just a set of criteria I formed when I was a boy, and mostly it is about why we don’t like it. But this set has never changed sicne then. What I discovered is that we match it:(
I am really not sure it is about Putin, though. At least I was commenting on the state ideology – I don’t know who’s responsible for the recent change.
Mussolini had pretensions to totalitarianism. Putin doesn’t seem to have those. He seems more like Admiral Horthy, just on a colossal scale.
And he did not build a golden statue rotating with the sun:( I think from Turkmenistan he must look miserable…
A man must raise a son and build a golden statue of himself. If you have invented electricity it must rotate. If you have diesel, it must rotate and fart black smoke.
But he’s a father of daughters which in civilized lands south of Turkmenistan is a serious insult.
Putin’s approach to foreign policy resembles Hitler’s –
make moves on neighbouring countries, see what you get away with, and then try some more; also the sudden flip to all-out war. But Putin took more time; Hitler went from the first slicing to all-out war in four years, Putin took over a decade.
Internally, Putin is more a traditional authoritarian ruler; he only has become more totalitarian and ideologically rabid because he is running out of options to keep power without that. Hitler started out that way.
Putin’s approach to foreign policy resembles Hitler’s –
make moves on neighbouring countries, see what you get away with, and then try some more; also the sudden flip to all-out war. But Putin took more time; Hitler went from the first slicing to all-out war in four years, Putin took over a decade.
Internally, Putin is more a traditional authoritarian ruler; he only has become more totalitarian and ideologically rabid because he is running out of options to keep power without that. Hitler started out that way. I also don’t think that Putin has a program that demands killing off millions in concentration camps – he is obviously ready to commit mass killings in order to reach his goals, but he doesn’t seem to believe that certain races or classes of people need to be eliminated wholesale on principle.
“make moves on neighbouring countries, see what you get away with, and then try some more; also the sudden flip to all-out war.”
1 of them. Not “countries”.
And “get away” sounds like narcissism. We are sooooo… mighty!
Surely Putin wanted more but was afraid of mighty US.
He got sanctions back then, he got a whole cold war. What do you think would have stopped him? Nukes?
And what do you think DID stop him in 2014?
Sorry, I think I misread “see what you get away with” as “see if you can get away with it”:(
1 of them. Not “countries”.
You forgot Georgia.
More bad news. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahsa_Amini_protests
I did not notice:( I have friends in Tehran but haven’t talked to them for ages:(
@Hans,
“On 1 August 2008, the Russian-backed South Ossetian forces started shelling Georgian villages, with a sporadic response from Georgian peacekeepers in the area.[32][33][34] Intensifying artillery attacks by the South Ossetians broke a 1992 ceasefire agreement.[35][36][37][38] To put an end to these, the Georgian army units were sent in to the South Ossetian conflict zone ”
This is from Wikipedia. Can you see that if we substitute
– “South Ossetian forces” with “Ukrainian”
– “Russian-backed” with “Nazists”
– “Georgian villages” with Donbass
– “South Ossetian conflict zone” with Ukraine
– “the Georgian army ” with somethin else
you have word-for-word correspondence to Kremlin’s description of our special military operation (not war at all)?
Even this канцелярит – “special military operation” (itself calqued from Ukrainian “anti-terroristic operation” just like “denazification” stands for “decommunisation”) and “South Ossetian conflict zone” – to avoid offending “war” and “South Ossetia” respectively.
No, I don’t like what Putin did.
But it was different. If we compare these two very different shits, then we should talk about Syria and Chechnya too.
And yes, I think it is a good idea to start from Chechnya. But in that case it is WE who are Hitlers, not Putin.
All comparisons can be stretched only so far. The trying out what he can get away followed by escalation to full-blown war is there, but, of course, the details are different.
“Война как социално-политическое явление – это такое всеобщее бедствие, что трудно определить точно, кому больше всего оно выгодно.”
(Time to disband the UN Security Council as a failed joke in any case. The unfunniest of bodies.)
Looks like the Security Council is being bypassed with resolutions being voted on by the General Assembly directly. Which I suppose is how it was always intended to be if the SC was deadlocked–I’m just surprised it didn’t happen on earlier occasions. But maybe there would have been too many abstentions to pass anything then and the SC (lack of) result was actually representative.
(I wonder if the GA could actually suspend Russia from the SC; in the current climate there might be enough votes for a 2/3 majority).
@Hans, you’re mixing up an instance of Russian imperialism with an instance of Western and Georgian imperialism – and Putin’s very ugly responce to this imperialism.
I don’t see where the situations are parallel apart of that both times it is Russia against the West.
Yes, both times it is a war, but the war began before USSR fell apart.
What Putin did is: he too escalated it intead of preventing it. But he did not try to take Tbilisi and install a comfortable government.
@Lars: my understanding is that only the SC can authorize actions, so GA resolutions are only publicity stunts. And any changes to the SC that would be done without the approval of China and India (who abstained in the GA resolution, but would probably vote against excluding Russia) would break the UN.
@drasvi: Putin moved from (1) using force inside his own country (Chechnya, and yes, that also had been done before him, but he turned a simmering conflict back into war), to (2) supporting separatists in Georgia (if Putin insists on Russia’s right to keep Chechnya inside Russia by force, he should also have acknowledged Georgia’s right to keep Abkhazia and South Ossetia inside Georgia by force, but he preferred to keep them as Russian client states), to (3) supporting separatists in Ukraine and annexing Crimea, to finally invading Ukraine with the goal to turn it into a vassal state. That’s a clear line of escalation. Whether that was his plan from the beginning (Hitler’s goal seems to have been a re-match of WW I from the start) or a case of the appetite growing while eating, maybe historians will be able to clarify when his reign will be over and, hopefully, a different regime will be more open to inquiry.
@drasvi
I am not sure that cases where there is such disproportion between the States make blatant interference in the Government of the conquered State by the conquering neighbour State a good idea, unless there is a specific agenda which would otherwise require long-term military occupation. The British ruling class in C16-early C19 presumably felt that it was under an existential threat from its enemies using an independent Ireland to support direct military or indirect political actions that could result in a successful coup or revolution in Britain. This is not believable for Georgia; I suppose you could make a paper case for justified fear of attacks on Russia launched from or with support from Ukraine, but this ignores a lot of more salient realities (e.g., if Nato is behind these attacks, why not use a neighbouring country in Nato?).
I go back to a much earlier Drasvi comment: Is Czechoslovakia your only problem with Hitler?
The Holocaust sets Hitler apart from Napoleon, Caesar and Henry V. I think Putin is a brutal fascist, but the Hitler analogy seems trivializing.
Of course the disaster is still unfolding so who knows.
For heaven’s sake, the Holocaust isn’t the only thing Hitler ever did. Nobody’s saying Putin is like Hitler in that respect (not that I’d put it past him if he thought he’d profit from it), but the obvious model in living memory for a guy just blatantly invading a neighboring country while claiming he’s doing it for the defense of his people is Hitler. Napoleon, Caesar, and Henry V are not only long-dead history, they’re not comparable in that way. I don’t see why it should be forbidden to mention the obvious similarity, especially since Putin (like Soviet rulers before him) waves the Nazi invasion like a bloody flag to drum up support. Would Hitler have been OK if he hadn’t perpetrated the Holocaust?
I find Putin’s position on international relations well expressed and understandable, though mistaken (in my humble). He wants to be given a “sphere of interests” where Russia is the ultimate arbiter and may enforce its will by any means necessary, and which includes all of the former USSR as well as some sort of veto power when Eastern Europe is concerned. There are probably more things to it, but those are the main ones. And if he had sufficient military and economic power that is what would have happened and everyone would have acquiesced. Everyone apart from local people in the countries that he plans to dominate, who could resist as usual in these colonial relations. But “the West” is denying his wishes to him. Before 24 February Putin was shrewd enough to act in a manner that incurred only a very limited response from “the West”, which took away his seat at G7+1, applied sanctions for Crimea and so forth. And picked only on disproportionatly weaker enemies. Why a shrewd, crafty, and experienced politician put himself now in such a pickle, I don’t know. Getting old and senile, covid isolation, or just being lucky before and now running out of luck, I don’t know.
Where he really went off the rails is absolutely hitlerian view that Ukrainians are not really a people, that today’s Russia is in some way a direct descendant of Kievan Rus (and that it has any bearing on practical politics) and some religion-blood-and-soil and history-as-destiny compost that he doesn’t articulate well, but clearly believes in.
I find Putin’s position on international relations well expressed and understandable, though mistaken
Well, sure. Hitler’s was equally understandable. Realpolitik is about as understandable as a political theory can be: “Might makes right, now shut up and do as I say because I have a bigger club.”
Where he really went off the rails is absolutely hitlerian view that Ukrainians are not really a people, that today’s Russia is in some way a direct descendant of Kievan Rus (and that it has any bearing on practical politics) and some religion-blood-and-soil and history-as-destiny compost that he doesn’t articulate well, but clearly believes in.
Yes, he turned out to be crazier and more out of touch with reality than anyone guessed.
Where he really went off the rails
all three of these are absolutely standard elements of every nation-state’s self-understanding, which get said louder the more active the state’s colonial projects are. here in the u.s., you can hear the first stated explicitly across the electoral spectrum about boriquas, kanaka maoli, and chamorros* (not to mention the indigenous peoples of the mainland), the second is taught in every elementary school classroom in the country (substituting anglo-saxon england for rus’), and the most common term of art for the third is “american civil [sic] religion”, now that it’s unfashionable to call “manifest destiny” by its name.
i don’t disagree that putin is off the rails in a number of ways – but in his ideology, he’s perfectly run of the mill.
.
* one sign of this is the fact that these – their own names** – are not the terms generally used for these peoples in u.s. political discourse.
** i’m not getting into “chamorro” vs “CHamoru”, or “boriqua” vs “borikua” vs “boricua”; i strive for inconsistency since i don’t know enough about the arguments to pick a side.
Not to mention that inconsistency is a good thing in itself.
Yes, [Putin] turned out to be crazier and more out of touch with reality than anyone guessed.
Not without impeccable emulation in the leadership of your own esteemed polity, let us remind ourselves again.
Masha Gessen, of all people, was regretfully compelled to conclude that in one sense Trump is worse than Putin. Putin has delusions of being a savior of his nation. Trump only cares about the graft.
Not without impeccable emulation in the leadership of your own esteemed polity, let us remind ourselves again.
Absolutely. I trust you’re not mistaking anyone here for a jingoist.
in one sense Trump is worse than Putin. Putin has delusions of being a savior of his nation. Trump only cares about the graft.
Nah, my opinion is that delusional people with ideals are worse. They won’t even stop when they see that it’s not working out for them.
He wants to be given a “sphere of interests” where Russia is the ultimate arbiter and may enforce its will by any means necessary, and which includes all of the former USSR as well as some sort of veto power when Eastern Europe is concerned.
Nicely put. Democratic countries like the US have never engaged in despicable behaviour like that.
But rozele has put it better than I could.
What Hans said.
No matter who shares or shared current Putin’s views in which cultural and historical context (he is not an original thinker!), he used to be a normal authoritarian kleptocrat. There were no reasons for him to switch to anything else. The fact that there is a king of Spain doesn’t mean that I can declare myself one and be considered seriously. I am not going to respond to “and you are hanging Negroes” types of argument, but would like to know which political force in UK derives any policy considerations from the fact that at some point in the distant past one corner of British Isles was dominated by some West Germanic tribes.
Just to be clear: the Nazis, the Khmer Rouge, and ISIS all were based on ideologies which described the slaughter and destruction they committed as something for the greater good. Trump certainly does not pretend to have any such motives. In that sense he is worse, though he has inflicted far less misery than those others. It’s a question of how you define your ethics.
Here’s the Gessen 2020 interview:
I don’t know if the current war has made her change her opinion any.
Democratic countries like the US have never engaged in despicable behaviour like that.
Of course they have; I’m not sure what sort of point you think you’re scoring. Despicable behavior is despicable no matter who perpetrates it.
Or rather, “… has made them change their opinion any.”
Heh. Yes, it’s hard to get used to.
@D.O.: i’m rather under the impression that the entire brexit situation (an at least tripartisan effort) comes directly and quite explicitly from the idea that albion can and should stand in glorious isolation as the sole representative of the True Anglo-Saxon Virtues of Liberty and Independence.*
and there are plenty of european monarchies (including the british one) whose current royal houses – whether currently constitutionally acknowledged or not – have been and still are taken strangely seriously despite their legitimacy resting on someone (generally in the 19thC, sometimes in the 18th or 20th), in essence, just claiming to be the king of a place on the basis of there having been (or allegedly been) a king of that place at some previous point (or even at the time).
i’m fond of the greek monarchy as an example of this, since there’s no historical reason for greece to be a monarchy at all (or, strictly speaking, a single freestanding polity of any kind). england, france, and russia just decided it oughta be, and threw a bavarian at it. and that then became the sole justification for the existence of the current (no longer constitutionally recognized) danish dynasty, whose founder’s claim to legitimacy was receiving 6 votes of 240,000 reported (87 less than were cast for having no monarchy at all).
whether you, specifically (as opposed to john charles bourbon, who did establish a certain precedent), could become king of spain simply by declaration is just a matter of context. but you don’t need me to tell you that – j.l. austin covered it almost 70 years back.
.
* i could, but won’t, make an argument that brexit is just an updated version of the whole “norman yoke” thing.
whether you, specifically (as opposed to john charles bourbon, who did establish a certain precedent), could become king of spain simply by declaration is just a matter of context.
See Gogol:
easy come, easy go!
I am rather interested in Brexit, but never heard anything Anglo-Saxon in support of it. Even the term itself is usually bandied about by those people from whom English nationalists try to be in (presumably splendid) isolation. As far as I understand these matters, the mythical prehistory of Britain is based, depending on temperament and level of educaition, on Arthurian legend or on some mixture of druidism with Boudica. Current European monarchies are a joke. The best thing anyone was able to say about the recently departed queen is that she was very masterful in appearing of doing nothing.
That’s a good excuse to mention that favorite ex nihilo royal, King Zog.
the mythical prehistory of Britain is based, …
I think it’s the more proximate history of Britain that motivates the Brexiteers: Churchill … fight them on the beaches … aircraft carrier standing off the coast … deep cultural ties with the Empire … glorious seafarers …
It was preposterous rhetoric that got dusted down: Britain can make trade arrangements with the Empire — like Aus & NZ would forget how they got shat on in 1974, and had to make their own arrangements, and now they’re instead bound to Asia and Europe-in-general.
never heard anything Anglo-Saxon in support of it.
I think you’ll find some of the leading Brexiteers (Johnson, Farage) are not Anglo-Saxon but Johnny-come-lately’s. There’s nowt so vehement as a fresh convert.
the recently departed queen is that she was very masterful in appearing of doing nothing.
Upon being asked what do you _do_? She replied: I reign.
(Since at least Henry VIII monarchs has been preoccupied with continuing the line of succession. She wasn’t so masterful there, methinks.)
Which I suppose is how it was always intended to be if the SC was deadlocked–I’m just surprised it didn’t happen on earlier occasions.
Not always, only since 1950 when the U.S. got fed up with Soviet vetoes in the S.C. and started to push resolutions through the G.A. under the title of “Uniting for Peace”. The tactic mostly stopped working when more and more new Asian and African countries stopped voting the U.S.’s way, but it was called up for the first time since 1982 this year precisely because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Yes. We have a very obvious example in France in the form of Eric Zemmour, son of immigrants from Algeria, who finds the Rassemblement National (Marine Le Pen etc.) too left-wing for his taste.
Zemmour, who is Jewish, is also an anti-Dreyfusard. I didn’t know those still existed.
I used to think about English “Jewish” and “Jew” in context of norms of politeness and syntax, an even thought I noticed absence of a translation for “Jewish” in Russian (we do have the word but it will sound exactly as “he is pertaining to Jews” sounds in English) only now I realized that it is interesting.
Zemmour, who is Jewish, is also an anti-Dreyfusard. I didn’t know those still existed.
And I, for my part, didn’t know that the “anti-Dreyfusard” character tag from French history had survived to be bandied about in current affairs, and in English already !
But what could it mean today ? Conservative, Catholic, pro-military all rolled into one ? Maybe a teeny bit “anti-Semitic” too ? You didn’t know people like that still existed ?
Wave to the woke: the quote marks on “anti-Semitic” are a small homage to Arendt, who wrote at instructive length about the affair in The Origins of Totalitarianism.
Perhaps, for once, a statement means simply what it says, and “anti-Dreyfusard” means someone who thinks Dreyfus was guilty.
Just to be clear: the Nazis, the Khmer Rouge, and ISIS all were based on ideologies which described the slaughter and destruction they committed as something for the greater good. Trump certainly does not pretend to have any such motives. In that sense he is worse, though he has inflicted far less misery than those others. It’s a question of how you define your ethics.
I wouldn’t say that I totally don’t care why people inflict misery on others, but in the end I’d rather prefer less misery inflicted by a greedy selfish bastard to more misery inflicted by an idealist for the greater good. And my takeaway from the 20th century is that indeed those who think that they save the world by murdering those in the way of paradise end up inflicting more misery.
Best would be of course no misery inflicted at all 🙂
Perhaps, for once, a statement means simply what it says, and “anti-Dreyfusard” means someone who thinks Dreyfus was guilty.
It never “simply” meant that. The question of his guilt was only a spark to political and social gunpowder already present in large quantities. In retrospect, whether Dreyfus done it fades into insignificance.
All I know is that Zemmour thinks that the Dreyfus story has not been rightly decided, and should be reexamined (presumably to find eventually that Dreyfus was guilty after all). There are probably conspiracy books that his ilk get such ideas from.
In any case, it’s no contradiction. There are plenty of people for whom the main criterion for being a good Jew is being right-wing, the righter the better, and that can include being an anti-Dreyfusard, a Soros conspiracist, or a Holocaust revisionist.
in the end I’d rather prefer less misery inflicted by a greedy selfish bastard to more misery inflicted by an idealist for the greater good
When Statesmen gravely say ‘We must be realistic’
The chances are they’re weak, and therefore pacifistic:
But when they speak of Principles, look out: perhaps
Their generals are already poring over maps.
Yes, but remember the last refuge of a scoundrel. Mr. Poo seems to be motivated in a small or not-so-small part by it too.
“the Nazis, the Khmer Rouge, and ISIS all were based on ideologies which described the slaughter and destruction they committed as something for the greater good. Trump certainly does not pretend to have any such motives. ”
“Let’s kill all X!!!!” is not greater good:((( I mean, maybe from the perspective of undefined “good”, where we can call absolutely any idea “good”, it is good. But then why don’t call selfishness good?
But I’m a believer. For me “let’s kill all X” is evil:-) It is bad for all X and it is bad for all Y too. As for “ideas”, Brassens’s mourir pour des idées describes what I think about them, but even that song is not about killing for ideas…
For me “let’s kill all X” is evil:-) It is bad for all X and it is bad for all Y too.
Well, I’m inclined to agree that it’s evil, but, that’s not what the Nazis / Khmer Rouge / IS (or, for that matter, the Bolsheviks who killed Kulaki) believed – they thought they were defending the “Aryan Race” / the proletariat / the Muslim community against evil oppressors and parasites, and individual perpetrators of their atrocities were often ready to do this without personal gain and even ready to sacrifice themselves for their cause.
Another complication with all this is that many of these perpetrators could believe that what they did was for the greater good and loot for personal gain at the same time; there are many examples for e.g. that among Nazi leaders.
Still Anti-Dreyfusards? Hey, there are still Americans (?) who say “War of Northern Aggression.”
When I truly love someone “selfless” and “selfish” cease to make sense. It is one of the most surprising things about love for me (I don’t mean just romantic love, I mean any sort of love): I look in my heart and can’t discern any border between these two and I have no idea who I am doing what for.
It seems “selfless” is just not my moral ideal. And obvious selflessness of a kamikaze is another example.
But yes, of course many ISIS fighers are selfless. In our news they and Assad’s opposition (ISIS was anti-Assad, of course, I mean they hated him – but both they and Assad did not fight against each other) were referred to as “mercenaries”. It’s… absurd.
Then in 2015 they promoted them to “terrorists”.
Hey, there are still Americans (?) who say “War of Northern Aggression.”
A Southern friend and I agreed to use the term “The Great Rebellion”.
Shahed 136 is Geranium 2.
Very logical.
By no means [lower middle class]. And there aren’t any posherer accents with regional features in UK English; it doesn’t work like that at all.
Here’s Tolkien’s Letter #83 to Christopher:
“natural…. invention”
invention?
Ukrainians and Latvians are repudiating the Russian language (The Economist, Oct. 20):
True that. (Thanks, Brian!)
very middle-class bourgeois invention
Note that Tolkien is here implying that he is himself a “very middle-class bourgeois.” This is, of course, technically correct (“the best kind of correct”), but he went to
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Edward%27s_School,_Birmingham
and was not what most people nowadays would understand by “very middle class.” Even in those days, I think this self-categorisation would have been a bit disingenuous. He was most certainly “posh.”* This talk of “feudalism” is a great big red herring.
Pre-Thatcher, it was (of course) perfectly possible to be “posh” without having any money to speak of. Social rankings are conceptually much simpler now (though much more fine-grained), as they can be reduced to a single convenient number.
* It occurs to me that the word is actually somewhat ambiguous. In collocations like “the Posh Set” it can indeed imply Relics of Feudalism, or perhaps used to before such Relics were partly usurped by and partly merged with Celebrities. That’s not what people would usually mean to imply by “he’s posh”, though, still less “that’s a posh car”; nor, indeed, by “posh accent.”
(In Wales, of course, the word “posh” merely implies that a person has been unduly influenced by the alien ways of the English, and carries no particular class associations.)
[¡]
One of the weirdnesses of the Dreyfus affair in hindsight is that in those pre-1933 days it seemed perfectly obvious to people (at least French people) inclined to be suspicious of Jews that they would be pro-German.
There are a non-zero number of people in the U.S. who think that Leo Frank did in fact kill Mary Phagan. (Obviously one can and should decry lynching and mob justice even if a particular victim thereof was or may have been in fact a bad person who did a bad thing, but that’s often not how these causes celebres tend to play out …)
In re “posh”, it occurs to me that the apparent variability of its meaning can be accounted for by simply talking the word to mean “of a higher social class than the speaker (in the speaker’s view.)” Nobody regards him/herself as posh …
This sort of viewpoint-sensitivity is a central component of traditional Brit class-consciousness. It’s well expressed in Evelyn Waugh’s surprisingly sensible contribution to Nancy Mitford’s Noblesse Oblige…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Mitford#Noblesse_Oblige
@LH, yes, but Putin does not give a shit:/
Of course not, but it’s an interesting (if predictable) historical irony.
@J.W. Brewer: The cultural association of Jews with Germany prior to the rise of the Nazis shows up subtly in lots of places. The most glaring mistake Fitzgerald makes in The Great Gatsby (except, arguably, reordering the chapters without doing any rewriting) is his association of Jewish gangsters with swastikas. In 1925, he thought Jewish = German = swastika.
That’s hilarious (in a grim way, of course); next time I read Gatsby I’ll have to keep my eyes peeled for it.
In 1925, he thought Jewish = German = swastika
It’s also interesting that the association of swastikas with Germanness existed before the Nazis took over.
Well, there is no shortage of Jews in Russian folk ensembles:-/
Note that Tolkien is here implying that he is himself a “very middle-class bourgeois.”
Indeed, his ancestors in “Saxony and Poland” and then in England were clockmakers, and his father was a bank manager. You can hardly get more bourgeois than a bank manager. Cf. his teacher Joseph Wright, who went from wool-sorter to student at Heidelberg (to which he walked from Antwerp in order to save money); on his return he both studied and taught at the proto-University of Leeds.
Social rankings are conceptually much simpler now (though much more fine-grained), as they can be reduced to a single convenient number.
That is familiar to me as the American (or rather Yankee) class system; in the South they do these things differently. But the accents of the True Relics of Feudalism in the times Tolkien was speaking of were probably not yet RP.
While I’m at it, Gladstone [recte Gladstones] is said to have been the last non-RP Conservative PM; he grew up in Liverpool to Scottish parents, but the Scouse accent did not yet exist, so he spoke urban Lancashire.
Alfred, Lord Denning, Tolkien’s contemporary who went in for law instead of Gothic and rose to become Master of the Rolls, the second most senior judge in England-and-Wales, spoke all his life with a marked, not to say thick, Wiltshire accent; one of his students described him as a “West Country bumpkin — until you heard what he was saying,”
You can hardly get more bourgeois than a bank manager.
Your logic is irrefutable.
Arguably (by appeal to traditional gender roles and Labovian sociolinguistics) a bank manager’s wife.
Unexpectedly, the Novaya Gazeta (whose editor-in-chief won the Nobel Peace Prize) is not blocked here.
If anyone is interested, even my freinds from the Nobel Peace winning (again!) Memorial did not read it, because they did not want to destory their mood. It is that much oppositionary.
Lord Denning, Tolkien’s contemporary who went in for law instead of Gothic and rose to become Master of the Rolls, the second most senior judge in England-and-Wales, spoke all his life with a marked, not to say thick, Wiltshire accent
Indeed.
Private Eye used to depict him as speaking broadest Mummerset. “Arrr! What be Beatles?”
Arguably (by appeal to traditional gender roles and Labovian sociolinguistics) a bank manager’s wife.
Surely that would be a bourgeoise.
Arguably … a bank manager’s wife.
It reminds me of some Philip Roth’s character who was a jewelry salesman and tried to convince his working class (male) clientele that they should buy their wife a diamond ring because then they will become a husband of a woman with a diamond ring.
Diamond jewelry seems to have its magic… on a meeting (about 20 years ago), the head of the Italian subsidiary of the group I am working for told the story of how he, on a Christmas event for salesmen where wives also were invited, promised a diamond collier for the salesman with the most sales next year. He said that the salesmen worked like never before after that and significantly increased sales.
As an adult, I was surprised to learn how inexpensive diamonds were, at least compared to what I had expected. As a child, diamonds (and, too a lesser extent, the other major gems: rubies, sapphires, and emeralds; but not lesser ones like topaz or tourmaline) seemed to be portrayed in the media as fabulously expensive.
De Beers spend a lot of money promoting the uniqueness and mystique of diamonds, thus helping keep their prices high. They are not actually that rare. “A diamond is forever” is their most memorable copy. (Google it and you’ll find out lots more detail.)
I don’t think the industry, from the mining centres to the cutting centres (New York, Antwerp, India), dislike De Beers.
In addition, most people encounter diamond jewelry in the form of engagement rings, where the diamond is 10-15% of the purchase price (all figures are U.S.). What is more, synthetic diamonds are anywhere from 10% to 40% the cost of mined diamonds. There is a theoretically very neat explanation of why engagement rings are up to six times the price of wedding rings: they are a replacement for breach of promise of marriage lawsuits, which were abolished in the early 20C. As the jilted bride can no longer sue in tort the cad who trifled with her affections, she may instead keep the engagement ring he gave her and sell it. This is unromantic, but at least it does not drag the courts and the agents of publicity into the matter.
@John Cowan: Back near the end of the last century, when I was last pricing engagement rings, the price of the diamond was quoted as the vast majority of the cost, not merely 10–15%. In fact, some jewelry stores would throw in a relatively inexpensive (i.e. plain silver) setting for free if you bought the diamond. A friend showed me her new engagement ring this afternoon; however, even if I was going to be so gauche as to ask her how much her fiance had paid for the stone versus the custom setting,* that was before I saw the above comment.
* The band features both Tengwar Elvish script and a Legend of Zelda Triforce symbol. Watch for my friend’s thoughts about their presence on my blog next week!
I’m not altogether up to speed on these things, but isn’t wearing a ring inscribed with Tengwar script potentially rather … hazardous?
https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Ring-inscription
That would depend entirely on the content. The problem with the Ring-inscription is that it was written in the Black Speech; a ring that said “Aragorn loves Arwen” in either Quenya, Sindarin, or the Common Speech (all of which were commonly written using tengwar, though with different letter-assignments, or modes as Tolkien called them) would be entirely harmless and indeed praiseworthy. We don’t even know how the Black Speech was commonly written; Gandalf says only to Frodo that the letters are Elvish, but Isildur’s written description from shortly after he cut the Ring off Sauron’s finger is plainer:
And so in the house of Elrond Gandalf tells the Committee:
wp:
‘In presenting “The opinion and the other opinion” (the station’s motto), it did not take long for Al Jazeera to shock local viewers by presenting[when?] Israelis speaking Hebrew on Arab television for the first time.‘
Does any (Eastern?) language have suffixed -all?
@D.O.: “…some Philip Roth’s character who was a jewelry salesman…” The protagonist’s father in Everyman.
@Bathrobe: “De Beers spend a lot of money promoting the uniqueness and mystique of diamonds, thus helping keep their prices high. They are not actually that rare.”
True. Until a couple of decades ago, De Beers managed to keep the supply of raw diamonds to the market under control. As new producers emerged, De Beers would convince them to join the cartel to everyone’s advantage. But it’s no longer the case, apparently.
On the demand side, indeed their ads became the stuff of textbooks. I wonder if De Beers also invented the rule that an engagement ring should be worth the groom’s salary for two months. Or did they just prop up a dying custom?
Does any (Eastern?) language have suffixed -all?
It’s probably just an imprecise rendering of a pluractional morpheme.
That said, it does look a lot like Kabyle akʷ “all”…
We’ve only got Tolkien’s word for it that the ûk is actually a suffix. Word-division conventions do not settle the matter. It might easily be a clitic, or even just a word which is syntactically bound to the left.* More research is needed, preferably based on texts gathered in Mordor itself from L1 speakers, ideally monolinguals. The Tengwar transcription tells us nothing about suprasegmental features and may well be misleading regarding junctures.
* The nam component of the Agolle Kusaal constrastive pronouns tinam “we/us” and yanam “you (plural)” can be shown to be a bound word by its other plural-forming uses, where it may follow unbound word forms, e.g. daam “beer”, daam nam “beers” (traditionally , but wrongly, written daamnam.)
While Lameen’s suggestion is interesting and well worth exploring, it would be unexpected for a pluractional morpheme to be farther from the root than what appears to be a flexional suffix, -tul; though admittedly such things can be paralleled in some human languages.
Furthermore, it appears that the Black Speech was artificially constructed as an interlanguage, a sort of Evil Esperanto; Sauron may not have been up to speed with the relevant linguistics*, or may have deliberately flouted the normal principles as a Take That to Ilúvatar, or as a proof of concept of Morphosyntactic Evil (Tolkien naively supposes that linguistic depravity is primarily expressed in the phonology**, but modern scholarship has shown that this view is untenable.)
* After all, in the Third Age the dwarves had not yet established the principle of the One that Merges All.
** An unwarranted assumption based on overhasty generalisation from Irish and German.
More research is needed, preferably based on texts gathered in Mordor itself from L1 speakers, ideally monolinguals.
Unfortunately, field linguists have so far been prevented from doing in situ fieldwork, due to niggling institutional security concerns and the difficulty of obtaining research visas. However, media reporting suggests that the local government has recorded a Big Data corpus of high-quality naturalistic speech in the course of some sort of remote video surveillance program; computational linguists are therefore optimistic about the prospects for automatic translation.
Oh, yes. Peter Thiel was involved with that, IIRC.
How could I have been so blind? Thiel, Thuringwethil, both of them vampires…
field linguists have so far been prevented from doing in situ fieldwork
As we all know, a field linguist doesn’t simply walk into Mordor.
@Brett: German comedian Jan Böhmermann thinks Thiel would make a great Bond villain.
a field linguist doesn’t simply walk into Mordor
You’d probably have to combine the linguistics with some role acceptable to the local government. Evil geneticists or microbiologists could probably get visas, for example, and of course IT people. If all else failed, you could claim that you had come to return lost state property.
“Kindly do not apply for research visas, as incineration often offends.”
With typical ethnocentrism, this thread has so far neglected Mordor’s own linguistic traditions and their relevance to the analysis of the Black Speech. The sociolinguists of Barad-dûr can hardly be accused of living in an ivory tower; they have broken new ground in the quest for more authentic elicitation of spontaneous speech through danger-of-death questions. And their semanticists were Ages ahead of their time with their empirically grounded analyses of the distinction between KILL and CAUSE TO DIE.
Too true… But in my defense (and I imagine the same is true for others), journals from Mordor were kept in a special locked room of Sterling Library that could be accessed only with special permission from a dean who was somehow never available.
(Needless to say, interlibrary loan from Miskatonic U was even less available, and those intrepid scholars who made the difficult journey tended not to return.)
But is not Government and Binding a reference to the inscription?
Significantly, Khoms-Kai is now known to be the equivalent of “Sauron” in the Black Speech.
Indeed, L1 speakers are rare, if not quite as rare as L1 Esperantists. The Nazgûl were L1 speakers of an archaic version of the Númenorian dialect of Adunaic, and the Olog-hai, Sauron’s Trolls, are the only group specifically mentioned as monolingual in the Black Speech. Unlike Morgoth’s Trolls, they were Sun-resistant and highly intelligent (though not talkative), and were more or less analogous to the Urûk-hai, Sauron’s Orcs.
The urûk-hai were Saruman‘s orcs.
His orcs were referred to so, but the exact scope of the term is unclear.
Saruman was running a Sauron franchise at that point. I expect that, legally, it is therefore correct to refer to Sauron’s Orcs™ (though JWB will know much more about this.)
the Olog-hai, Sauron’s Trolls, are the only group specifically mentioned as monolingual in the Black Speech. Unlike Morgoth’s Trolls, they were Sun-resistant and highly intelligent (though not talkative)
“Not talkative” is a bit of a bummer. I can see that causing problems with the text collection project. Maybe they could be encouraged to recount specimens of Trollish folktales? Otherwise we may have to rely primarily on elicitation. Not ideal.
It is implied that the Variags of Khand may have intebred with the olog-hai, in the same way that the Saruman’s agents appear to have included crossbreeds of urûk-hai and men. So Khand would probably be the best place to look for evidence of olog-hai culture.
Nordstream.
So it was the Americans.
https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/how-america-took-out-the-nord-stream
Several factual errors in this article have been known for months.
Yes, Hersh is one of a long list of people who should have gotten out while he was ahead. His “reporting” has been largely worthless for decades now.
“Kindly do not apply for research visas, as incineration often offends.”
This is the second time I have seen an instance of this snowclone, but I have not been able to find out what the origin is: Dr. Google not helpful.
I’ve mostly encountered it in pubs (with subtle differences in phrasing.)
“Several factual errors in this article have been known for months.”
But is not it a recent article?
(and does it matter who did that? Will anyone be surprised if Bathrobe is right?)
and does it matter who did that?
Yes, of course it does. Do you really read everything as if it were anonymous? Do you read a Putin speech with the same seriousness and expectation of truth as you would read a text by [insert name of someone you respect]? Do you eagerly follow up every posting by every crank on the internet? Only fools treat fools seriously. Hersh has lost all grounds for being taken seriously.
EDIT: Or did you mean “does it matter who blew it up”? In that case, I guess we have to make our own judgments about what matters. History will decide…
I’ve mostly encountered it in pubs
Presumably the version seen in a pub did not say “research visa” or “incineration”, though. What sort of thing did it say?
What I’ve seen is “Please do not ask for credit as a refusal may offend”, or similar.
Ah. Thank you.
Yes. Hersh repeats, in blissful ignorance, a number of claims that have been known to be wrong for months.
EDIT: Or did you mean “does it matter who blew it up”? In that case, I guess we have to make our own judgments about what matters. History will decide…
Yes (perhaps “that” was misleading).
No, I don’t mean that I trust the article. I’m speaking about a priori expectations. It seems, the only country who does not seem to be interested in blowing up the pipeline is Germany… No matter who did it, it is not going to be the worst stain on that country’s reputation in my eyes.
It seems everyone took sides in some argument (like DE and I), now Bathrobe posts links (vaguely anti-Western), others object.
I remain completely open-minded. The only thing I know for sure that it wasn’t me who blew the pipeline.
Same here.
That’s what you say. Besides, you could have done it, as they say, in your sleep.
But if Putin wasn’t leader, would someone else
It might also be that Putin is replaceable not by mysterious Historical Forces but by mysterious puppet masters, who could (obviously) have replaced him with some other puppet. In the end, one gets the Lensman series, in which the manifestation of Cosmic Evil is replaced at the end of each book by a power behind the scenes. (You have to leave out First Lensman, which is set first but written last, and which blows the whole gaff.)
The Dread Pirate Putin.
I have a feeling that I’ve seen the … incineration often offends ending to the snowclone in a fantasy setting involving dragons. And China is a dragon innit?
I dunno. D.O.’s preemptive denial of responsibility without (AFAIK) any D.O.-adjacent accusation to rebut seems Highly Suspicious. “The wicked flee when no man pursueth,” etc.
General unfocused chaos could also be a motivation for blowing up the pipes: to wit, we are still talking about it! Similar thinking motivated Russian-based spreading of misinformation on Covid, I think. If the pipeline was not going to be of use to them anymore, it might as well be scrapped for a bit of psychological warfare.
Quite, though each Dread Pirate chooses his replacement in a simple chain. in the Lens series, each baddie is employed by a superior baddie (up to the last), who starts to operate openly when the inferior baddie that has hitherto screened them is defeated. In fact, they are a series of matryoshka dolls, or as we now say, 🪆. I did not know that political instances of such dolls may have the current leader on either the outside or the inside.
I think that’s more straightforward: “Sputnik V may be bad, but all others are even worse!” Compare: “Putin-model authoritarianism may be bad, but democracy is even worse! Russia can’t do any better, resistance is futile.”
Yup.
A couple other factors are capacity to carry out these twin attacks — I don’t think activists could have pulled that off, so I believe this had to be a state actor — and then risk of being discovered and the cost of discovery.
The factor that most differentiates Russia and western powers is the cost of discovery, which is why I doubt a western security agency would have done so. For the US to have done so would in my mind require arrangements with relevant Baltic security agencies to ensure that evidence wouldn’t come out. The risks are too high to rely on nothing but a mutual, unexpressed cynicism and community of interest.
I understand that’s far from definitive. I don’t criticize anyone for disagreeing. For me it’s sufficient unless I see new evidence.
Also interesting, perhaps, is that one pipe remains undamaged (at least one of the Nord Stream numbers was double-stranded).
Ryan, the cost of discovery is of course, low for Russia. It is also low for western powers. Russia is different from most other countries in that it IS massively blowing things up. In terms of psychology and organisation it makes blowing up one more thing easier.
The cost of any real evidence that a western power did this would likely be the collapse of political support for Ukraine at minimum in Germany, where support has been weak throughout. It would threaten the international support for the coalition the US has built, for instance, in the UN, where Russia has repeatedly lost votes by vast margins, and the loss of such support would encourage evasion of sanctions that have had an effect on the Russian economy. It might well push the majority of the American GOP across a threshold, since many of their voters are already skeptical of the Ukrainian cause.
The cost of cynically destroying one’s own resources and getting caught is simply much higher in a democracy. I’m surprised you would make the assertion without offering any backing for it.
Russia is used to saying, “a Russian dissident poisoned with Novichok? We know nothing about it,” and everyone is used to the charade.
The CIA’s glory days of getting away with dirty tricks are over, even in Republican administrations. Not that some wouldn’t like them to continue, but the political costs are much higher than they used to be.
Note the subtle yet almost unbridgeable difference between:
1. The most plausible scenario is X, so X probably happened although we can’t on the current state of evidence completely rule out alternatives; and
2. The most plausible scenario is X, therefore X happened.
“the most plausible scenario” covers situations
1.1 : scenario A 5%, scenario B 2%, ….
1.2 : scenario A 45%, scenario B 25%, …
1.3 : scenario A 76%, scenario B …
@drasvi: presumably part of what’s going on here is that if scenario A (“Russia did it”) gets to some level of greater-than-76% probability, it becomes awkward for the nations adversely affected by the sabotage to explain why they are not formally at war with Russia. So they would prefer ambiguity.
@JWB: I doubt that the West would go to war even if Putin would hop around on Russian TV singing and shouting “We blew up Nordstream, nah nah nah nah nah”. It’s simply not important enough. If America would have wanted to declare war on Russia, it could have done so several times in the last year by laying down red lines in Ukraine or setting ultimatums which Russia couldn’t obey, like withdrawing from Ukraine or else. In my opinion, it would take a provocation so big that it couldn’t be ignored or downplayed, like a terror attack with massive casualties or Russia driving tanks into the Baltic states.
So it was Russian-German conspiracy!
Germany covers Russian tracks because she was adversely affected.
>The CIA’s glory days of getting away with dirty tricks are over, even in Republican administrations.
I’m aware of many sins of the CIA, but remind me of a time when such tricks were directed against significant geopolitical resources of an allied European power, even if intended to create a small community of interest between said ally and a rival?
@Ryan: the CIA may have focused its efforts on things like the CCF, but it did get its hands dirty, most notably with the French Connection and Operation Gladio
Those are problematic, but I don’t think they provide parallels with the Nordstream allegation.
Whatever you think of the legitimacy of the European governments established in the wake of WWII as American allies, the efforts you mention were undertaken to ensure the stability of those governments, for the most part as perceived by the European leaders themselves. Not to attack their geopolitical assets. For instance, Operation Gladio was a cooperative effort with the relevant European intelligence agencies.
A comparable action to the purported American involvement in Nordstream sabotage would be the 1950 CIA blowing up the docks at a French port in Algeria or sabotaging a German petroleum refinery.
I’m not trying to make the argument “US good – RUSSIA evil.” Merely, “US interests have understandable relationship to interests of its own voters and of its allied governments and their voters”, a constraint not imposed on Russia. So maybe the schematic is
US – evil constrained weakly by democratic politics
—-
Russia – evil constrained even more weakly by consciences of President and oligarchs”
@Ryan, invasions of Iraq and Ukraine then must have much more dramatic consequences for western powers (Iraq) and Russia (Ukraine) than some stupid pipe.
No, I understand that the pipe costed billions (to Russia particularly) but still compared to the two invasions it is nothing.
– the cost of the invasion of Iraq was enormous. It was supposed to be a constraint… but it did not stop anyone.
– Bush was re-elected
– participants did not have to face unprecedented sanctions.
– How did it (and associated reputation losses) affect their ability to created coalitions in the UN?
Perhaps, positively.
I opposed the Iraq war. Protested, though not much. Have a paid, published piece of fierce satire against it in a metropolitan periodical.
But anyone who can’t tell the difference between invading Hussein’s Iraq and Zelensky’s Ukraine… What was it Lincoln said – confusing a horse chestnut with a chestnut horse.
“But anyone who can’t tell the difference between invading Hussein’s Iraq and Zelensky’s Ukraine”
Ryan, I compared it to blowing up the pipe.
P.S. It was a blunder (that also involved faking the excuse/reason for the war) that costed a lot, but did NOT trigger all those mechanisms that you say exist in “democracies” and are supposed to prevent blunders.
But I don’t understand you here.
The Iraq war is a much greater catastrophe. Then Chechnya. Then Ukraine. This order. If you are so sensitive about Iraq (I am speaking as a barbarian to a barbarian – but maybe in your imagination it is a barbarian to a civilised man?) – you can look at Chechnya, it matters. It is what made Putin popular. It is what made everyone here trust him and like him.
WP estimates of civilian casualties in first battle of Grozny (not Putin, Yeltsin, a good guy) are highter than WP estimates for the entire war in Ukraine. One battle in a one-million country. But it is the sort of warfare that makes the war in this tiny region a much larger catastrophe than the war in Ukraine.
I guess it does not look so, because who cares? Yes, I udnerstand, Ukraine is not some stupid middle east. White lives matter, we think the same. But for me personally it is an issue. I learned about our war from worried North Africans.
Yes, Hussein was an asshole, and he fought against Kurds and not only.
So is our overall assessment that the invasion made the situation better? It was a peace-keeping mission?
@ryan, drasvi
Ryan asked a specific question about “dirty tricks” employed against an ally, which I started to answer but felt the answer was too long for the intention of the question 😊. My answer would be that before the mid-1970s European “allies” (I put the word in inverted commas because, like Soviet “satellites”, these allies had an unsolicited foreign military presence on their territory) were thought of by US strategists as countries at risk of succumbing to Communist ideology or Russian invasion. However, these countries provided no essential exports to the US economy. This meant in practice that dirty tricks were limited to propaganda and sabotage directed against people or organisations viewed by strategists as having pro-Soviet or anti-American tendencies, and capable of mobilising others. Sabotaging the economy would presumably increase pro-Soviet (or if discovered, anti-American) feelings.
A grouchy but essentially correct Facebook comment by Alex Foreman:
If the Opus Dei controlled any special forces, we would have found the fuck out.
The hard way.
Well of course Op. Dei knows that. So they control the U.S. special forces but never actually make them do anything, because that would be an intelligence leak. (Cf. the U.S. breaking almost all Japanese codes during WWII but then keeping the intelligence out of the hands of those who could use it, because that would endanger the collection of more useless intelligence. You know, just in case.)
“I opposed the Iraq war. ” – @Ryan, I understand. And there is no need to compare them. The Ukrainian war is happening right now and must (ideally) be stopped. The Iraq war happened years ago. All you can do with it is to learn from mistakes. But I don’t know HOW I’m supposed to compare them. Yes, Hussein’s Iraq was not peaceful. Yes, it changes something. I simply look at casualties, but you can use many different measures with different results, the situations are different.
My opinion of putinoids who started it won’t change, because their motives are ugly.
What Russian politicians learned from the Iraq was that “war is how gentelemen resolve their differences in the modern world”.
I disagree on some things but would rather not argue about an ongoing war here in Hat’s yard. Coming back just to acknowledge your replies and say I’m thinking about them.
@Ryan, as I said, I compared the Iraq war to blowing up the pipe, not to the Ukrainian war (though yes, I am shocked that someone may think that the Iraq war was somehow less ugly). My opinion about the invasion of Ukraine is hardly better than yours. Likely it is worse. My sudden anger at your political system is an echo of my anger at mine. I hope this is understood.
But I am exactly taking effort NOT to think that “Austria is a nice country and South Sudan is problematic, so invading South Sudan is fine”. I do understand the difference between insulting a lady and insulting a milkmaid.
The initial point was not that the war was immoral, just that it was also shooting themselves in the foot, fooling public and allies, accordingly potentially undermining trust among allies – and yet.
The metaphor I would use is not insulting a milkmaid vs. insulting a lady, but cutting out a cancer vs. cutting out a pimple on someone’s face because it offends you.
There are horrendous things humans have tried in the name of fighting cancer, sometimes killing a patient the cancer would not have killed.
I would not carry the metaphor so far as to say we’ll get better at wars waged against oppressive regimes through science and practice.
But to get closer to the original point, the yellowcake lie definitely hurt the Atlantic alliance. I don’t get the sense that Putin pays a price with Belarus or North Korea for Flight 17. To the degree he has paid a price with China, it’s the price of failure, not of cynicism.
Alas, given my low opinion of both Bush and Putin I am not at the position to support invasions:-)
If it were a Vulcan captain (who does not follow the first directive), I would listen to his ideas regarding Iraq. But Bush looks to me like production of the same Chinese factory as Hussein.
@drasvi: Do you generally watch Star Trek in translation? The (never-obeyed) rule is called the “prime directive,” a name which which seems to me to have a somewhat different valance from “first directive.” But I’m curious how it seems to you, as a non-native speaker.
@Brett, yes, but I simply didn’t remember what it was in Russian. I thought I am using a phrase that I learned from DE…. So it is more complicated: apparently DE reminded me about the Russian name (or one of the Russian names), and it was mislabeled in my memory as the original name.
Yes, “prime” sounds differently and more appropriate. Apart of the word that simply means 1st, Russian has longer words for “primary”, “initial” etc. and unrelated words that mean “chief, main”.
“Prime numbers” are “simple”, “prime minister” is premjer.
Possible options in Russian are “the first directive” and “the main directive”. I don’t remember which one was used in translations (likely both…) and more importantly in conversations with my freind who’ve watched a lot more of Star Trek than I (it was me who once recommended it to him).
—
And of course, “in a position”, and something strange happened with my generic “she” (I tried to remember a female Vulcan captain, remembered T’Pol, but she was not a captain, so I began remembering other Vulcans, but they were men.. ).
—
Anyway, what I mean is that we all can be invaded then.
What unites the Ukrainian and Iraq wars is generals expecting that locals will treat them as liberators:/
And many other wars as well. (Napoleon thought the same.) I don’t know why we can’t quit our addiction to wars and generals.
If Russia wins, does anyone foresee them granting autonomy to whatever Ukrainian regime they prop up, if indeed the area is not simply incorporated?
It doesn’t matter; any “autonomy” would be that of Vichy France.
Agreed. My point was that Iraq has by contrast seemed more independent than Vichy.
That’s because the US doesn’t give a shit about Iraq as long as it’s not terrorizing us.
Incorporate Iraq and grant them citizenship?
That’s Iran’s ambition, not ours.
” Merde je ne joue plus pour tous ces pauvres types. ”
🙁
@languagehat: Napoleon at least had the excuse that during his early successful campaigns in Italy, the French were largely greeted as liberators. Northern Italy had three hundred years of experience hating Austrian imperialism by that point. That hatred wasn’t something that dispersed easily either. Whoever thought that an alliance between Italy and Austria-Hungary could be workable in 1882 (less than a generation after the Austrians had finally been driven out of most of northern Italy, and when there were still territorial disputes over Italian-speaking areas of Trento and Istria) really misunderstood popular Italian feeling. Three decades later, at the outbreak of the First World War, the Italian government was ecstatic that the Austrian aggression against Serbia did not invoke the Triple Alliance’s casus foederis, and they happily reneged on what obligations supposedly did exist by negotiating with and then joining the Allies.
I don’t think there are any Vulcans in Starfleet on the command track (yellow), only the science/medicine track (blue). Deuterocanon says that the Intrepid had an all-Vulcan crew, but we don’t know its ship class.
Napoleon thought the same.
So did the Nazis, and they were actually right until they demonstrated that they were even worse to the Ukrainians than the Soviets.
@Brett: And you’ll find great minds in Germany who think that Napoleon’s contribution to bringing down the old feudal order in Germany outweighs the fact that he was an invader – Heine, for example, or an impeccable defender of German democracy like Kurt Tucholsky, who memorably said that Napoleon has done more for German liberty than all German meeting hall revolutions (Saalrevolutionen) taken together.
@Hans: That doesn’t surprise me at all.* In fact, after I wrote that comment, I soon found myself wondering how the French takeover was perceived in the (largely Catholic) Rhineland, but I know far less about Rhenish history than about Italian history. Things would no doubt be further complicated by the fact that France had been periodically interfering in the Rhineland since at least the Thirty Years War.
* The part about Heine seemed particularly unsurprising, given his antagonistic interactions with the pre-1848 Austrian regime. See here and ff, for some examples.
@hans
The Great Plague was arguably a major contributor to the end of serfdom…in all of these cases one should probably still ask whether the end justifies the means.
@LH, what do you mean by “terrorising”?
I’m familiar with the reasons given by the invaders, I don’t know which of them make sense to you.
I mean “aiding and abetting evil Islamic terrorists who send planes into our buildings.” (Of course Iraq had nothing with that, but the warmongers who had access to our president had been wanting to do something about Saddam for a long time, and this was the excuse.)
In case it’s not clear from that, none of the reasons given make sense to me. It was all bullshit militarism, like most wars.
“Of course Iraq had nothing with that, ”
Thank you. I know that you were against the war, but I thought you meant that Iraq was a threat (maybe not serious enough to kill that many people, but a threat) and I wanted to know which way. I misunderstood you.
To me Iraq of 2003 looks ugly in various ways but not really as a threat to the West (and even its allies in the ME). Not more than many other countries who in this or that way sponsored terrorist groups and I don’t think everyone who did that is going to commit collective seppuku. Also back then it seemed willing to comply and behaved nicer…
As for 9/11 I am not confident, but I find Juergensmeyer’s* opinion that they wanted to provoke a response sensible. Whether it is true or not, they clearly succeeded.
—
*Not only his, I think, he is just a scholar of religious violence whose articles I read.
To me Iraq of 2003 looks ugly in various ways but not really as a threat to the West
Yes. And it boggles my mind that when you bring up the ruinous (in every sense) results of the war to (usually former) supporters, they say “But at least we got rid of Saddam!” As if that justified all the deaths and trillions of dollars in wasted money, and as if it were America’s job to go around the world deposing all the Bad Guys. (And as if the people presently running Iraq were all Jeffersonian democrats doing good for their people.)
DS9 is deuterocanon to you? Heretic.
@LH, the siege of Mariupol, when they would not let Azov out, when they gave interviews in the spirit of “they fight fiercely because they know they can expect no mercy”, when they would shot down a helicopter not on the way in (with supplies) but on the way out with wounded fighters and as they hoped foreign advisors.
They openly spoke about murdering so many people because they wanted so badly to murder some other people.
All of this because some in Azov are Nazi and Nazi are bad guys: they kinda kill people. It is fucking NOBLE to murder Nazi, no problem if you ruin a city.
Yes, that’s what war is like. “War is hell.”
I understand why that quote typically gets abridged down to its last pithy sentence, but I think the full version is much more evocation.
Mention of Sherman reminded me of something else I thought about recently: What were the effective criteria for promotion to general* of the army in the post-Civil-War era. Upon taking over the position of commanding general of the United States Army, Sherman and subsequently Sheridan were each promoted to full general rank. However, after Sheridan, the next commanding general, John Schofield (who had previously also served as secretary of war, although unlike the modern secretary of defense, that was not a position in the chain of command between the president and the generals), was not promoted to four stars. The difference may be that while Schofield had been a major general in the Civil War, he had never commanded any entire separate formation the size of a field army. The promotion thus would be effectively recognizing both appointment as commanding general and the successful Civil War commands of Sherman (the Army of the Tennessee, then the Military Division of the Mississippi) and Sheridan (the Army of the Shenandoah). Analogously, many decades later, Omar Bradley was promoted to (five-star) general of the army upon becoming the first chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but subsequent chairmen were not, because unlike Bradley, they had not commanded formations at the fleet or army group level in wartime.
* In this case, “of the army” appears to be s purely descriptive part of the official rank identifier. Unmodified “general” was taken to mean a true captain-general, an officer with general authority over all others in the army. Prior to the First World War, there was felt to be no need for a higher rank than four-star general. Indeed, that rank was not conferred until it was given to Grant. Prior to the Civil War, the commanding general of the United States Army had never been of higher rank than a lieutenant general. That itself was an artifact of the fact that the senior in-theater** British officer during the Revolutionary War, Cornwallis, was s lieutenant general, and Washington was promoted to be of equal rank. When Pershing was made general of the armies in the First World War, it was never explicitly specified how many tiers above lieutenant general that was supposed to be, just that Pershing should be equal in precedence to his European peers, many of whom were marshalls.
** Are there opinions about how this sense of theater (presumably essentially the same one as in “operating theater,” although you definitely don’t want to confuse an “operating theater” with a “theater of operations”)?***
*** Is the phrasing similarity there in what seem to be the two most common uses for this sense of theater just, as it appears to be, a coincidence?
Actually, just to clarify: During the Revolutionary War, George Washington’s rank was not precisely specified, except that he was a “general” and the top land military commander. Only later was this interpreted as having been specifically a lieutenant general rank, to match the then ranks of his highest-ranking adversaries. (Besides Cornwallis, Burgoyne had been promoted to lieutenant general during the Saratoga campaign, in response to his early success. However, I believe that by the time Burgoyne received word of his elevation, he had already ignominiously surrendered to the Americans. I don’t think, although I am not certain, that any of the other British commanders were lieutenant generals at the times they were active in North America. A number of the other British commanders did rise to three- and four-star ranks during the wars of the French Revolution. Moreover, all this has to be considered in the context of the horrendous British system of patronage and buying and selling army ranks.)
DS9 is deuterocanon to you? Heretic.
No, no. The Intrepid I had in mind appeared in My Enemy, My Ally, the first of Diane Duane’s fine novels of the Romulans, the Rihannsu series, which are outside Star Trek continuity. The crew were kidnapped by Imperial forces in an attempt to use their brain tissue to restore to Romulans the Vulcan touch-telepathy, which had been lost during their flight to the twin planets.
Duane also introduces us to Lieutenant Janice Kerasus, the Enterprise’s linguistics officer, who gives us the view of the Romulans’ Ruling Passion:
Etymologically, it is a compound of words for ‘love’ and ‘hate’. The Romulan take on it is:
Daisemi’in rhhaensuriuu
meillunsiateve
rh’e Mnhei’sahe yie ahr’en:
Mnahe afw’ein qiuu;
rh’e hweithnaef
mrht Heis’he ehl’ein qiuu. —V. Raiuhes Ahaefvthe
‘Of the chief parts of the Ruling Passion, only this can be truly said: Hate has a reason for everything. But love is unreasonable.’
It’s clear that Duane learned her linguistics somewhere, though it’s not on her public record. When Kirk refers to the U.S.S. Intrepid being “in mothballs” in the East River (I’ve visited it), his Romulan counterpart replies bemusedly: “The translator is having problems. You have little round flying insects on Earth eating a ship named Intrepid? And you ask me about the danger of names?” Kirk explains to her that he means ‘honorable retirement’.
Lastly (for it’s hard for me to know where to stop quoting), from Kirk’s log (probably his personal log rather than the official captain’s log) at the beginning of the book:
Ensign Naraht, child of the Horta, from the same book. In the next book he is promoted to Lieutenant and has a rank-stripe painted on his carapace, right next to the communicator/translator.
The Great Plague was arguably a major contributor to the end of serfdom…in all of these cases one should probably still ask whether the end justifies the means.
Not what I meant. My point was rather that in an age when war and conquest were usually waged to increase the glory and possessions of kings, Napoleon’s conquests had ad least some positive side effects, which some German thinkers hold to have outweighed the fact that he was an invader. If you live in an age of oppression and war, a war that reduces the oppression can be a partial blessing, even if it would be better if the oppression ended without a war.
A surprising amount of European social history ends in: “Then finally Napoleon came in and ended this nonsense.” The royal restorations after him generally didn’t try to bring it back.
Ah, sorry. In one DS9 episode there’s a ship with an all-Vulcan crew, but I can’t even remember what it’s named, and so many ships seem to be named Intrepid…
A surprising amount of European social history ends in: “Then finally Napoleon came in and ended this nonsense.”
That’s like the claim that the Bolshevik Revolution (and especially Stalin) modernized Russia. Yes, but Russia would have modernized without the Bolsheviks, and thus without all the horrors of their rule. Similarly, the nonsense would have been ended without Boney; it might have taken longer, but it would have happened. Modernization never justifies brutality.
Three other cases involving Napoleon come to mind: he was personally anti-Semitic but massively upgraded the civil status of the Jews throughout Europe; he made everyone in the Empire drive on the same side of the road; and, of course, he once shot a publisher.
Modernity certainly doesn’t justify brutality. The question is whether the brutality of the anciens regimes across Europe does so, and under whose terms modernity would enter. I don’t have an answer. But it seems narrow to ignore actual support from Italians, Germans and Austrians for Napoleon with a mere principle. (It may also be facile to imply that support was widespread.)
Nor am I convinced that le revolution est un bloc. Was the invasion of Egypt part of that unit of progress and savagery? Maybe. There is surely truth to the idea that some aspects of the French revolution are inseparable from others. I don’t think you can have a rational opinion about it without judging the ancien regime. Was the revolution itself wrong because modernity would have come in all events?
And do we add to the scales of our judgment of Napoleon the number of future napoleons he inspired? Was the Civil War unnecesary because abolition would have come? And how did American victory in the Civil War and World War II create the liberating myth that invigorated our disastrous wars in Vietnam and Iraq? I don’t think these are simple questions, but they’re surely related questions. Focusing on the trauma pushes the oppression it challenged into a blurry margin.
Discussions of How much death, destruction, and suffering are acceptable to bring old, wicked ways to an end? always make me think of “Genesis of the Daleks.” Davros convinces the enemy Thals that he is willing to do anything to end the eternal war with his own Kaled people—even to assist them in the virtually complete extermination of the Kaleds.
@LH, partly so. Women rights for example.
Yes, I agree with what you said about “double burden” [not your words, just the common term]. But then we need to find a Western country that actually has solved this issue: employers make sure than dedicating your time to children does not damage your career and husbands willingly do laundry.
Instead you invented washing machines, which is Great but not a victory of feminism.
Also when women can choose (career or housewife) it is Great too (in the sense: two options is better than one option), but again, not a victory of feminism.
But (1) it is not a reason to kill people (2) there was regress too.
I’m not making value judgments here. I’m just saying that’s how it happened, and that explains (to various extents in different cases) why there was support for it at the time.
But it seems narrow to ignore actual support from Italians, Germans and Austrians for Napoleon with a mere principle.
There are always people who support dictators. There were Jews who supported Hitler. That proves nothing. My point was that invaders use the prospect of such support to justify their invasion, which is vile. And it was just as vile when we did it in Iraq (cheered on by pillars of the establishment like the NY Times: “ordinary Iraqis took to the streets in their thousands […] to give a cheering, often tearful welcome to advancing American troops”) as when those other bad guys did it.
@drasvi: The usual term in American discourse would be intersectionality. Moreover, unlike “double burden,” it is not restricted to being part of just two affected populations.
1. It should be unsurprising when inhabitants of a particular country who heartily dislike its current rulers but lack the immediate capacity to remove them (by revolution or otherwise) nonetheless rally around the flag out of patriotism when a foreign invader arrives, even if that invader promises to alleviate their specific grievances about the current rulers.
2. It should be equally unsurprising when inhabitants of a particular country who heartily dislike its current rulers but lack the immediate capacity to remove them (by revolution or otherwise) decide that the arrival of a particular invader who wants to remove the current rulers from power is a useful, perhaps even providential, development from a hoped-for ally.
You can find plenty of historical instances of both. Sometimes those in group #2 turn out to have been quite naive about the invader’s motives and future plans. If the invasion fails to prosper they may end up being condemned as collaborators or what have you. If the invasion does prosper they may have a different set of problems.
And even people who were consistently anti-invasion may be pragmatic and/or unwilling to invest the energy necessary to reverse certain consequences of the invasion. It would have been a great anti-Jacobin/anti-Napoleonic gesture if all the countries of Europe en masse had repudiated the wicked metric system, but it didn’t happen.
Lincoln certainly justified his war and invasion based on the support of one faction of Southerners.
I think he did the right thing. Others do think it was “vile”. But anyone who agrees with me must admit that it’s a question of degree and details, not principle.
I for certain don’t know enough about the people whose existing dictators (oh, sorry, “princes and kings”) were overthrown by Napoleon to judge his conquests. The amazement in the linked thread from Hatters who hadn’t even understood *British* opinions of Napoleon suggests that others may not know enough either.
@Brett, I mean this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_burden
Lincoln certainly justified his war and invasion based on the support of one faction of Southerners.
You mean he mentioned such support. That may have been a useful pretext, but it wouldn’t have made any difference if not a single Southerner had supported him — the actual reason for the war was the reestablishment of a united country, and he would have gone to war for that reason no matter what.
The question is whether the brutality of the anciens regimes across Europe does so, and under whose terms modernity would enter. I don’t have an answer. But it seems narrow to sweep away actual support from Italians, Germans and Austrians for Napoleon with a mere principle.
Here’s Mark Twain on the subject, from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court:
Now granted, this is not M.T. in propria persona, it is the C.Y., who is going to become a Napoleon himself later, complete with brutality. But however melodramatic, it is indicative.
Was the Civil War unnecessary because abolition would have come?
I am far from convinced of that. In Le Guin’s story-suite Four/Five Ways to Forgiveness, we have the nation of Voe Deo, which is divided into a slave-owning and an enslaved caste very like the U.S. prewar South. However, it is a modern capitalist state. Many of the assets, as they are called, work in factories and offices. Rather than being free labor, they are rented out by their owners, in the same way that the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel rented out its conscripted soldiers as mercenaries, notably to the British during the American War. There are also house slaves, including sexual slaves, and of course traditional agricultural slaves. On the other side of the line, there are gareots, members of the slave-owning caste who own either no assets or just one; manumitted slaves become gareots. Things are changing, changing, fearfully changing. But without the revolutionary violence, nothing would have changed; with just the revolutionary violence, nothing would have changed.
@Brett, in brief, the situation was really terrible, particularly during the crisis in 80s (but not that it was better after the war: e.g. in Armenia about a half of able men were killed) and Soviet woman was totally the nigger of the world.
The we heard about feminism (its modern version) and it was the worst advertising campaign in human history:
it promised to give them what they were fed up with (many of them wanted the right to be housewives…) and take away what they did not have but were dreaming about (compliments and generally being treated like fragile princess)….
>the actual reason for the war was the reestablishment of a united country, and he would have gone to war for that reason no matter what.
It most certainly was not. Lincoln was offered reestablishment of the country during the transition. He insisted that reestablishment must be predicated on acceptance that he would implement the Republican platform, which was almost entirely devoted to anti-slavery planks. He described union without the Republican anti-slavery planks as “repenting for the crime of having been elected.”
It is striking and strange the conjuncture of confederates and radicals who insist on bleaching slavery and abolition out of the causes of the Civil War. Lincoln fought the war for the right of the northern majority to begin the process of liberation.
It most certainly was not. Lincoln was offered reestablishment of the country during the transition.
Fair enough, I’d forgotten that.
What the Connecticut Yankee is doing here reminds me rather too much of Verbrechen gegeneinander aufrechnen, adding up the crimes of two or more sides and comparing the sums, the very thing my generation (and probably all following ones) were told throughout our youth to never do. It leads to bothsiderism, tu quoque arguments and slippery slopes toward the claim that somebody* wasn’t all that bad after all.
* Godwin’s law applies as always.
Russia and Belarus are a union state since 90s, and it was Lukashenko who wanted integration and Putin who did not want it (on L’s conditions, I assume) until the recent events.
Most of people here won’t tolerate slavery at their home, but if they do something to incorporate a territory in their home, the reason for this will be anything but abolition of slavery in that territory. And there is a million of conditions that are simply inacceptable: “you can have it if you convert to another religion, you can have it together with slavery, you can have it… “.
Which is not to say that abolition was not one of the reasons.
A “reestablishment” of the Union in which the winners of the 1860 election promised not to seek to implement the proposed policies on which they had successfully campaigned would not really have been a full return to the status quo ante, would it? Now, it seems likely to me that absent secession the Republican majorities in Congress would have been too narrow and too internally fractious to actually enact all that many radical changes, but the secessionists apparently did not wish to run the experiment.
@jwb
Countries with inhomogeneities in geography, local economy or population makeup are perhaps “bad fits” for strong central governments staffed by members chosen in representative democratic elections. Although slavery (or its expansion in new territories) was the dominant and most emotive issue, there were other ones (e.g., territorial expansion, tariffs and other instruments intended to support regional industry or agriculture, Federal vs. State juridiction and powers). What Lincoln intended to do after the Civil War (besides ending slavery, the Republican Party was really a single-issue party, and this was a red line) is not clear; even if he had written something down, he would have had to review it in the light of what his allies and supporters (even opponents with a popular base) wanted and how any measures played out in reality.
Lincoln was most famously explicit about his goals and intentions in his August 22, 1862 letter to Horace Greeley—to preserve the Union at any cost:
The South seceded preemptively, before Lincoln took office, and any offers they may have tendered to rescind the secession were with the understanding that if they felt conditions were unfavorable to them and their peculiar institution, they would be free to secede again. This whole strategy was, as Lincoln had correctly observed in his earlier Cooper Union Address, a way to shift blame for the breakup of the Union onto the Republicans:
Oh, the legendary predecessor of now international “cool”!
Brett, a public letter to one of the loudest media voices of one’s time is not where you find the most explicit statement of a politician’s actual baseline intentions. It’s where you find the policy for public consumption. A rallying cry of “No slavery in the territories!” would not have carried the war forward, so he chose the basis that was broadly popular.
But again, influential Southerners offered him Union, conditional on backing away from his commitment to ending slavery in federal territories. He rejected it. Politicians are better measured by what they do than what they say.
And it should be stressed that he understood the territorial issue as putting slavery “on the course of ultimate extinction.” As did his pro-slavery adversaries.
This is the first time in this soundbite world that I encounter more than the sentence with the dramatic examples. *wail* *lament*
It means the opposite, though: “stunningly cold-hearted”, “sociopathic” – today it would be expressed as “that’s cold”.
>Genteel word for an unmarried (like in never married) woman is барышня
This has me wondering what Baryshnikov means.
Oh, the legendary predecessor of now international “cool”!
Not even close. This is OED definition 2d: ‘of a person, an action, or a person’s behaviour: assured and unabashed where diffidence and hesitation would be expected; composedly and deliberately audacious or impudent in making a proposal, demand, or assumption’. An 1874 quotation, “the cool way in which Plato in his Republic speaks of exposing children”, was not praise. But there are quotes from 1723 to 2005.
@Ryan,
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/барыш
The root of барышня is bar-, a contraction of boyar-, шня is a sequence of suffixes (барич is a son of barin, cf. -ich in Russian patronimics,, and this -ch is the source of -sh- here. For -nya … I guess related to -na in patronymics too, but I don’t know the story of this palatalisation)
Thanks.
PlasticP: Here’s one of the more radical non-slavery-related (at least overtly …) policy positions in the 1860 Republican platform, and by gosh they went ahead and did it:
“That a railroad to the Pacific Ocean is imperatively demanded by the interests of the whole country; that the federal government ought to render immediate and efficient aid in its construction; and that, as preliminary thereto, a daily overland mail should be promptly established.”
I was thinking it meant the same as cold too, but not quite, as the OED shows. ‘Audacious’ is not the same as ‘unemotional’ or even ‘ruthless’. Reading the OED article, I found the phrase cold hart ‘unwounded deer’.
@jwb
The line bypassed Arkansas and went through Indian territory instead of taking a Southern route via, say, Paris, Texas. There were various competing rail and canal projects, but I am ignorant of the full context for “fast-tracking” the U.S. Atlantic-Pacific rail connection. Do you know of any source book?
@PlasticPaddy: there are lots of books but I haven’t read any recently enough to make a specific recommendation. To be fair, it may be that the actual Congressional action in 1862 (see wikipedia or other references on “Pacific Railway Act(s)”) getting the project rolling was facilitated by the withdrawal from Congress of most representatives of the rebel states, since that broke the deadlock over which of many potential routes should be pursued by eliminating supporters of a more southern route.
The platforms of both the Douglas and Breckenridge factions of the Democrats in 1860 were likewise pro-transcontinental-railway in principle, but both of them had vague limiting language about promising “such constitutional power of the [national] Government” in support or offering support “to the extent of the constitutional authority of Congress.” Route selection aside, how many supporters of such platforms would have considered the actual nature and extent of financial support ultimately offered by the GOP-dominated Congress to exceed what they considered those constitutional limits (the allegedly limited authority of the federal government for such projects having been one of the positions that had divided the Andrew-Jackson-et-seq. Democrats from the Whigs before the Whigs collapsed over the slavery issue) is not clear to me.
FWIW I believe there were some comparable government subsidies involved in the construction of the *second* and more southerly complete trans-continental route (from Los Angeles to New Orleans via El Paso), which was completed in 1883. Several additional trans-continental lines were completed before 1900, with the standard claim being that the Great Northern (from St. Paul, Minn. to Seattle, with an eastern spur to Superior, Wis. where cargo could be loaded onto ships traveling the Great Lakes) was the only one build without direct/overt federal financial subsidy.
Although the southern railroad line was not finished until 1883, the last bit of land for the southern route was purchased from Mexico all the way back in 1854 (the Gadsden Purchase), after it became clear that the territory conquered in the Mexican War ended slightly to the north of the optimal southern route. The Americans probably over-payed for the Gadsden Purchase land itself (a mere 29,670 square miles), but after having taken the northern half of Mexico by force, Congress and the negotiators were feeling relatively magnanimous. Prior to the Civil War, Southern politicians (including President Pierce’s secretary of war, Jefferson Davis) definitely favored building the first transcontinental railway along the southern border route and influenced the decision to buy the land.
One advantage of the more northern route eventually chosen (Omaha-Sacramento, essentially) was that it all ran through territory likely to remain under U.S. control regardless of the outcome of the conflict with the secessionists then underway. But another factor was that in those days (and until the mid-20th-century) the population and economic activity of California was more clustered in the north around the S.F. Bay than the south around L.A. So (modulo the rather major variable of where getting through the mountains seemed least daunting) starting closer to the latitude of San Francisco made more sense. Perhaps (again modulo the route-through-mountains issue) a starting point a bit south of Omaha like Kansas City (just south of St. Joseph, where the Pony Express route to Sacramento had started) would have been better on that criterion, but I suppose in 1862 whether Missouri would absolutely definitely remain part of the U.S. remained up in the air.
Although Omaha was in any event a more direct route to the comparatively unchallenging “South Pass” through the Rockies. In order to find a lower-elevation crossing of the Continental Divide than the South Pass, you had to go all the way south to … the area in Southern New Mexico where the Gadsden-Purchase-transversing route did it.
whether Missouri would absolutely definitely remain part of the U.S. remained up in the air
Very much so, and the same was true of Kansas and the Indian Territory.
>it all ran through territory likely to remain under U.S. control regardless of the outcome of the conflict with the secessionists
Perhaps. But other Eastern termini were still in play. Did anyone believe in 1863 that a Missouri terminus could possibly be at risk of Southern conquest, or even sabotage? (edited to answer – maybe.) I’d guess the biggest factor was the triumph of New York/Chicago economic interests in a Congress where the natural eastern allies of St. Louis were no longer around to vote. I think without the war, you’d see the present-day populations of Chicago and St. Louis reversed, and New York somewhat diminished as well.
@Ryan: part of the uncertainty would have been the potential effect of an ultimately successful secession on the remaining slave states that had officially (often with serious internal divisions) adhered to the Union, who would now be overwhelmingly outnumbered by free states in the rump U.S. The usual story re Chicago v. St. Louis is that as rail transport became more important than river-borne transport, the former boomed at the (at least relative) expense of the latter, but obviously that’s at least in part a result of how and where the rail network ended up getting built and structured, which involves lots of contingencies and in principle could have worked out differently than it did.
@LH (using this thread as a general off-topic thread):
I asked elsewhere how come that Hugo and Nebula went girl-only.
You gave a political explanation, which I predictably dislike (reaction to Sad Puppies).
Still there is a more optimistic (from my point of view) explanation. Cf. https://litnet.com/ru/top/fantastika – a more or less random site where an author can upload her novel for free or for money. As you can see, both female authors (and I suppose readers) and the genre любовная фантастика are well represented, though in “science fiction” there are male authors too.
I still hope that what we are seeing is a major shift in readership and not politics.
Re the Nordstream thing
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/07/us/politics/nord-stream-pipeline-sabotage-ukraine.html
“WASHINGTON — New intelligence reviewed by U.S. officials suggests that a pro-Ukrainian group carried out the attack on the Nord Stream pipelines last year, a step toward determining responsibility for an act of sabotage that has confounded investigators on both sides of the Atlantic for months.”
More precisely… or rather less precisely…
The plot thickens:
Like… there is at least one anti-Putin group in Russia that is psychologically capable of doing such a thing. (I forgot its name, but it took credit for blowing up Darya Dugina.) But where would it get access to very well trained divers, and how did it get them just outside Swedish waters off Bornholm?
It “might” constitute a “lead”…
Did the prices actually rise after the explosions? Because Germany hasn’t imported gas from Russia since August, before the explosions.
At least they’re not claiming a single anonymous omniscient source like Hersh (…who apparently just said 1972 was 21 years ago). Though it’s kind of funny how the NYT bothsides even its anonymous sources.
That one is easy to explain: somehow, the news of Britain’s slippage out of superpower status never reached Russia. Britain remains a favorite scapegoat for anything.
Whuuuut? These things were celebrated among European allies.
(Also, I still don’t think that was a truck bomb. In the videos, the explosion comes from somewhere to the right/north of the bridge, and the truck seems to drive into the fireball. I think a Tu-141 drone, as used in Ryazan & Engels, is most likely, followed by a Neptune anti-ship missile.)
So half of the article up to there was just speculation serving as filler…
How do you get that much of that stuff through the Schengen area? If it’s true, it pretty much narrows the suspects down to one of the governments whose countries have direct access to the Baltic Sea.
Insert predictable groaning about the, sorry, The WSJ here.
@dm
Re how do you get…
“The physical concept of a “diplomatic bag” is flexible and it can take many forms (e.g., a cardboard box, briefcase, duffel bag, large suitcase, crate or even a shipping container)….During the 1982 Falklands War, the Argentine government used a diplomatic bag to smuggle several limpet mines to their embassy in Spain, to be used in the covert Operation Algeciras, in which Argentine agents were to blow up a British warship in the Royal Navy Dockyard at Gibraltar. The plot was uncovered and stopped by the Spanish police before the explosives could be set.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomatic_bag
There was a suggestion that the Russians sent a repair vehicle/robot, which travels inside the pipeline, to deliver the explosives.
That’s all just flapdoodle and smoke-blowing. Speculation is fun and everything, but I’ll be surprised if the truth comes out unambiguously during my lifetime.
I’m surprised at you, Hat. Are you suggesting that I Think I Read It On The Internet Somewhere is not the final authoritative answer to anything and everything?
Oh! I didn’t know diplomatic bags could be shipping containers.
Yes, except that Sweden says the damage was done from the outside. Also, I don’t think it can travel when the gas isn’t moving; and the gas wasn’t moving.
To be fair, The New York Times doesn’t consider itself to be On The Internet Somewhere, and sometimes it really isn’t…
Are you suggesting that I Think I Read It On The Internet Somewhere is not the final authoritative answer to anything and everything?
It used to be, when I was a kid. Back in the ’50s, I Think I Read It On The Internet Somewhere was an unimpeachable source of unbiased information! Now everything’s gone all to hell…
@David Marjanović: The construction of the Israeli nuclear reactors at Dimona involved a lot of manufactured components from America and France. To get around export restrictions, much of the equipment was shipped in scores of diplomatic ‘pouches” the size small shipping containers (although this was largely before the container era).
Back in 1970, “I Read It in One of Those Little Vignettes between Stories in Reader’s Digest” was my unimpeachable source of unbiased information. But Danish Det Bedste fra Reader’s Digest folded in 2005 — where will young people find such a credible source of truth now?
Sadly, I mainly was reading novels. Novels don’t offer reliable information about… about… how do you call it?
They do offer information about people and the world:-/
Ooh, I read a lot of those. (Somehow we had boxes of the stuff lying around in the 90s. No idea who might ever have had a subscription, and how many decades earlier that might have been.)
My father subscribed to Det Beste at least through the eighties. I read them all. And I read all those old ones that filled up the bookshelves of just about every basement and summerhouse I ever set my foot into. Or I did until I stopped sometime in my teens.
But the best thing about Det Beste was its world atlas, which my father must have ordered sometime in the late sixties. I track my interest in linguistics back to its map of the language families of the world.
We didn’t have them at home, but they were a frequent staple of doctors’ waiting rooms when I grew up. I found them quite interesting, especially compared to the other stuff on offer (like yellow press and “Jagd und Hund” magazine).
My laundromat once had lying around an old issue of Modern Ferret.
@DM, I think mine mostly had publication dates in the 50s, and they were stored in my paternal grandmother’s garden shed. (Which my dad and uncles burned down with great relish in preparation for building a typehus on the lot for her retirement . That was in 1972, so a firm terminus ante quam). My grandfather died in 1966, so possibly he was the subscribing party).
(A house built from prefabricated wall elements with fittings for roof beams and so on that ostensibly make it safe for non-professionals to assemble it. Myresjö was the largest producer. The house was still standing last I looked).
I’m pretty sure my grandmother had a World Atlas like that as well.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has dismissed as “sheer nonsense” allegations that Ukrainians could be behind the explosions
…
The Ukrainian government denied involvement.
…
…Boris Pistorius saying last week the blasts could have been a “false-flag operation to blame Ukraine”.
(Russian politics, language): I think many here know that the Russian term closest to (but maybe not equivalent to) “native speaker” is literally “language carrier”. I just discovered that it was adopted by Putin in 2014: it easier for “Russian language carriers” to become Russian citizens.
I learned this when reading about repatriated Circassians from Syria (some of whom succeed in obtaining this status, and some do not).
I think I mentioned it elsewhere (but maybe in Russian): in a speech delivered to either Tatar or “minorities” before language was made casus belli he said 1. no one should force anyone to learn a language which is not his native 2. everyone in Russia must know Russian. (I would add* that we are also required to learn two foreign languages in school).
Both claims “sound reasonable”, so it seems Putin does not really care (or else he would have noticed the contradiction).
—
And even more: I would add that no one should be forced to learn mathematics.
So there is a race for Africa associated with our war. Hope we will do without proxi wars in Africa.
(the context)
I checked news (which I don’t do often) and found that seven (here) or six (there) African presidents are going to visit Moscow and Kiev with an African peace mission. And, accordingly, found lots of other publications about Africa in this war.
Mission: I guess for the Ukrainian coalition many of those presidents look pro-Russian*. On the other hand, Zelensky agreed to accept them. Anyway, presumably when African presidents visit Russia and Ukraine with a peace mission and not vice versa it is good for Africa**.
It reminds me of the Chinese peace plan (quite reasonable – not in that it can bring peace, just in that the claims sound reasonable, say, a new Cold War would indeed be bad). Do such things – delegations from all over the world arriving with their peace plans – only happen when peace is impossible?
Other publications: this is what I found disturbing. It seems we compete for Africa, and fuck, the previous competition was bloody: Africa offered way too many opportunities for supporting different factions in local conflicts.
*kyivpost, same text in dailymaverick.co.za – both times I need VPN for my government does not want me to read the former, and dailymaverick does not want me to read the latter.
** a more optimistic (and pro-African) view in the conversation.
I guess, “the African peace plan” is not some comprehensive peace plan, but some sort of agreement that Ukrainian and Russian grains could get to the world market.
Rest assured, Prigozhin’s wars in Africa are not proxies for anyone. They’re the first “Supervillain seizes East Coast”-type wars.
The Chinese peace plan has one little flaw: it’s not a plan. It is far too vague to even form a starting point for negotiations. As Pelosi once said to Trump: “Mr. President, that’s not a plan, that’s a goal.”
I watched a documentary about 1973 Arab-Israeli war (aka Yom Kippur, aka war in October) and was surprised to see a “V” marking on an Israeli tank. But there is an easy explanation:
Prigozhin’s wars – neo-feudalism:) Duke Prigozha vs Count Kadyr. I suppose, we need a cardinal and his guard too:-) And then l’état, c’est moi and hopefully madame de Pompadour.
Gascony is Dagestan.
@DM, yes, that is what I meant about China.
And yes, Wagner Group is not a proxi.
“Khartoum is Being Destroyed. What Does that Mean for Sudan?”
Wow! That’s what I call an optimistic title!
(Was just googling for Wagner. The title is from here.)
I like that.
What do y’all mean by denying proxy status to Prigozhin/Wagner? Not challenging you, just trying to understand.
Are you charactering Wagner more like the British East India Company? Working as an independent player sharing many but not all the foreign policy interests of the associated state?
Ryan, what bothers me is that Russia and the West (and possibly China) will start arming opposing factions in (sadly numerous) African conflicts. This is what I call a “proxy war”.
Wagner Group is a more complex situation, but what I mean is that it is Russia, not a Russian proxy (I’m ignoring all complications of what it is within Russia, for CAR it is “Russians” and to get them fighting for CAR they I think must reach an argreement with Russian government). I don’t think they can act independently.
That makes sense to me. Thanks. I had thought you guys were trying to show more distance between Wagner and Russia rather than less.
Actually, I’m interested here not “proxy” as in “who’s working for whom” but in “proxy war” as a familiar element of Cold War dynamics.
It was North Korea who started the Korean war and the aerial bombardment of North Korea was a nightmare. Anyone who wants to blame “commies” or “capitalists” can do it.
But it was the split of the world in two blocks that ruined the country of Korea and created this ugly situation. And i’m somewhat fed up with it.
Funnily, in Russian news ISIS and other factions distinct from Assad – back then it indeed often was ISIS – were referred to as “mercenaries” before 2015.
The Swiss Guard are mercenaries, not them! As if people – I mean foreign volunteers (as opposed to numeroius locals who fought for whatever reason) – went there to earn 200$ a month (can be inaccurate, I saw this sum in an interview with a former ISIS fighter back then. Later I saw somewhat larger sums, but maybe in the early days of the caliphate they paid less). Ideologised idiots, not mercenaries.
Actually, my freind’s classmate was even kidnapped to fight there.
Journalists just believed that m…ries is a bad word. Then Russia joined in and immediately they were “terrorists”
Sorry, I believe I already complained. But these labels that don’t mean what they mean annoy me infinitely.
Unless journalists add them in order to make it obvious they are bulshitting us.
I am, actually. Wagner is not so much, nowadays, a mercenary company as a mining company with its own army and its own income.
Of course a large part of Prigozhin’s business model, since before he (“Putin’s chef”) bought Wagner, has been to do what Putin wants, and so Wagner has received various weaponry and vehicles including tanks, allegedly even aircraft with pilots, from the Russian military, and for a few months was allowed to recruit in Russian prisons, while Central Africa started teaching the Russian language in schools in 2019. But it seems clear that Prigozhin is not dependent on Putin anymore.
It’s imaginable (if increasingly unlikely IMHO) that the recent public disagreements are all a game of good cop/bad cop. But if Prigozhin were to wage his wars from Mali to Sudan without Putin’s consent, I really don’t think Putin could do anything against that.
German-speaking journalists created the word Terrormiliz just for ISIS and have been using it pretty much without exception: die Terrormiliz “Islamischer Staat”.
All right.
Both Russian mercenaries that do what the goverment wants and Russian mercenaries that don’t do what the government wants are not foreign (and thus can’t be a proxy).
I don’t believe that Wagner Group can operate abroad without state support.
David Marjanović: But it seems clear that Prigozhin is not dependent on Putin anymore.
Machiavelli, among others, thought that Cesare Borgia was no longer dependent on Pope Alexander VI. However, in spite of all appearances, they were wrong.
@DM, as I’m reading now about Prigozhin (and as you seem to be interested in Prigozhin), here and in subsequent two posts is a partial transcript of his May interview (in Russian, but anyone interested can try GT). Just in case it is not accessible in English.
The interview itself on Russian “RuTube” (the author of the transcript says Youtube deleted it).
Sorry if it is somewhat dated news.
Funnily, the next post by the guy who took the interview (in Telegram: it was published in Telegram) is that he was fired (1 2).
If the US/France/Rebels/Whoever decided they wanted to uproot Wagner from the CAR, would Russia care enough to aid Wagner with money or materiel?
I think I watched that interview on Twitter, with English subtitles.
Right now that’s actually irrelevant – 97% of the Russian military is currently engaged with Ukraine in one way or another, there’s nothing to spare.
Must depend on how much Russia needs CAR, no?
Which in turn is not merely a function of ennumerable benefits of connections to unrecognised economic and cultiral leaders of the galaxy such as Central African Republic and Zimbabwe, but also of how much people we are obsessed with (the West) want us to quit.
WP, “There have been an estimated 1,000 Wagner mercenaries stationed in CAR since 2018, protecting the government of Faustin-Archange Touadéra against rebels amid the Central African Republic Civil War, and seeking to control and extract valuable natural resources. ”
1000 men, when well armed, supplied and having support for logistics is a force, but. About “engaged” Russian military… what we can give to CAR? Personnel and air support.
We need a “victory”. The imagined enemy is the West.
So yes, it is possible that Russia will gladly enter the competition. If we can’t win in Ukraine…
I guess the question is, if Prigozhin fell out with Putin and lost access to his Russian base, would he have sufficient resources to keep up his engagements in other parts of the world? I doubt it, but then I’m not really in the know about his secret stashes.
Hans, I would rather consider starting a little Imjin War after the Ukrainian war.
(No, it is not a prediction)
I must say, DM was right – not in what he said, maybe, but in what I thought he thinks.
I thought that western media describe the situation as Ukrainian media do, and accordingly tend to present the situation in Russia as somewhat more chaotic than it is (and that DM shares this view).
It is pretty much chaotic.
Also what is weird is that I leanred the news from the same pregnant friend that I mentioned recently, and…
The fact that a column of armed people is moving towards Moscow (where we live) and apparently has already destroyed several attack helicopters and took a couple fo cities did not seem to impress either side of conversation. Indeed, there are more seious issues.
P.S. “imjin war” – what I meant is that one possible motivation for that war were “too many” samurai in Japan. So sending Wagner back to Africa looked like a natural decision.
But both sides were more decisive: Putin tried to subordinate them to the ministry of defence (which they were already in a conflict with) and they did not merely refused (which was per se impressive) but even organised this … demonstration of force?
Western media are a step or two farther removed from it than Ukrainian media (which they sometimes, but not often, use as a source). They tend to interpret chaos as a lack of information, or as the existence of conflicting sources of information, rather than as actual chaos on the ground.
For now I won’t comment on what just happened, because I have yet to read up on the last few hours.
I have a hard time expressing anything other than disgust for the three truly horrible people in this drama, but: in the end, Lukashenka looks to have gained something. Moscow has affirmed that Belarus is an independent country. The two P’s damaged each other, one more, one less.
Maybe Ukraine has gained something. If Prigozhin were in charge, maybe the Russian army would have been less demoralized and better run.
I think Prigozhin exiled is perhaps the best possible outcome for Ukraine other than a long Russian civil war. The most respected competent commander is leaving the battlefield tarnished by the appearance of backing down to save his business interests, some/many of his men are heading home and the profiteers have consolidated their power. Russian troop morale must be about 12,000 feet deep and in danger of imploding.
Though I’d probably be wiser following David M’s lead and not commenting till the fog clears.
I’m afraid, if our army were more competent, the situation would be worse for Russia. It’s interested in self-destruction. I too don’t have many smart things to say. In the morning it was funny, because someone was heading to Moscow to take it, and all I felt was “i’m tired of this crap” (and it seems Muscovites did not care).
Here’s a good comment (by DutchLemming on Daily Kos) on comparative mediology:
Compare and contrast the reaction in Rostov: 1, 2.
Most are supposedly being integrated into the regular army instead.
Perhaps not so much intuition as moles. (This is purely speculative; I have no evidence.)
So:
1. a decision to let a private company to play an improtant role is problematic.
2. it proved to be efficient. (Partly because our army is not so much. Which in this case also partly due to the lack of desire to throw it into heaviest fighting. )
3. they managed to turn it into a political catastrophe within a year.
As I said, “problematic”. Obedience to orders and to civilian authority is central to army philosophy… (different in Egypt). But they let it became a problem super fast.
WP
“Civilian oversight over militaries, mainly used in democratic governments, puts the power to take military action in the hands of a civilian leader or legislative agency. Allowing the civilian component of government to retain control over the military or state security shows a healthy respect for democratic values and good governance”
There is a plenty of regimes which are not democratic where the army obeys the civilian leader.
Monarchies, theocracies, USSR, tribes,…. even the “world ruled by evil corpoations”.
“how they were much less carried away by events”
During wars people are like this. Well, maybe you are right.
Duplication of potential power bases is a classic method used by people who want to stay in power for as long as possible. If your army gets too strong, it may become capable of replacing you, so you let it compete with your other army. Hitler created the Waffen-SS for this purpose, Putin tried to do it with Wagner. Likewise intelligence agencies – the Soviet Union had both the NKVD/KGB and the GRU, and Putin, coming from the former, found that wasn’t enough duplication, so he split it into the FSB and the SVR.
Duplication leads to inefficiency; the best-case scenario is that it leads to nothing more than inefficiency.
@DM, it does not look like this from inside Russia.
1. Putin built a system where loyality to him is seen as the sceleton which does not let Russia fall apart.
2. Our army consistently stays out of politics.
3. Wagner was just 8000 people in Africa, WP says.
It was good for hiding from public that the Syrian war was not so easy (and same for Ukraine), it is good for unofficial military presence in Libya.
Past performance is no guarantee of future behavior, especially not to someone as paranoid as Putin.
Then the war happened. I have no idea if Prigozhin’s figure of 25000 is just bragging, but I’m sure it’s more than 8000 now.
Absolutely. Duplication wasn’t the only purpose.
The objection is that the conventional explanation suffices.
I know the story of early involvement of mercenary groups from this article by meduza: ru, GT. Sounds logical.
Sometimes, however, proliferation of mercenary forces is just a consequence of people close to a regime’s leaders cashing in on their connections. When I heard the claim that Blackwater was going to be George W. Bush’s SS corps in the coming coup, I knew that at least one political commentators had gone totally off the deep end.
“future behavior, ”
A war with Ukraine was impossible for many reasons. The laws of nature have been broken. I don’t know if it has stabilised since then but i can’t learn the new laws from this period of observation. I can predict nothing:)
Marx’s inversion of Hegel on the laws of history turned out to be broken, even though lots of people still believe in them. If the future were foreseeable, it would be the present.
Good point on Blackwater.
Урааааа!!!!! Good news!
БГ- иноагент!!!!
Я ЗНАЛ!!!!!
(in English: they gave the status of a “foreign agent” to the most famous Russian rock singer – with reputation of an exceptionally enlightened and spritual guy. I don’t know why but this is really good news, it makes me happier!)
Makarevich is also in, got there much earlier. I expect Shevchuk to be “awarded” the status any day now. Though I don’t think it is something to be happy about. Just makes lives of these people harder… We don’t need the government to tell us who they are. More generally, there is an absurd number of performers on the list.
“I don’t think it is something to be happy about” – As I said, I don’t know why.
Maybe if they ban the Beatles I’ll react similarly (or even start mumbling “ban the beatles!” to some tune:-))
http://www.antimult.ru/old/post/137
Even The Intercept is piling in to show how, by telling the truth, Prigozhin exposed the hollowness of Russian justifications for invading Ukraine.
If Russia sipports the Mali government, it means she is fighting against speakers of various languages often mentioned here, like Tuareg:(
I don’t know what are their relations with pro-Azawad people specifically (and what were relations of the French with them) but “Islamists” speak the same languages.
And I worry for Burkina Faso. I hope Kusaasi people won’t enter an armed confrontation with local government:(
@Bathrobe, just look at it from Russian perspective.
“We are saving people of Donbass. That’s why we are shelling them”. It is absurd.
In Russian I’d say that our propaganda “has flown out to space” (not an idiom, but I think Russians would understand that I mean “outlandish”)’. They smoke weed. And it took a lot of brainwashing to make people flow to space with them.
On the other hand, there are hawks who don’t smoke this weed (don’t repeat among themselves the same propaganda) and may not even like Putin – and there is a group of people who became massively influential* the day we invaded: people who see the war. They also don’t smoke this weed.
___
*they say Putin personally suppoted war journalists – which is a VERY different group from TV propagandists.
Anyway, our space (not TV mostly, Telegram – but it became VERY influential) has been flooded with more or less realistic pro-war accounts.
consider a scale 0 to 10,
0 “sceintific publications”, 10 “white noice”
before 2008 both our and Western media were 4-5 degrees of bullshit on this scale.
since 2008 it is 10: it is worse than USSR, it is white noice. People who work on TV don’t see themselves as people whose job is informing people, they see themselves as people whose job is entertainment and propaganda.
Now it is 7-8 here and… 7-8 in the West.
In the West because they represent the Ukrianian point of view and Ukraine is at war, they have war-time propaganda. Here because pro-war journalists are not interested in lying. They are just pro-war.
Better? From madness to darkness, hurrah!
The first casualty.
Before it can get its boots on
(in English: they gave the status of a “foreign agent” to the most famous Russian rock singer – with reputation of an exceptionally enlightened and spritual guy. I don’t know why but this is really good news, it makes me happier!)
Many people thought it an honor to be on Nixon’s “enemies list”; Hunter S. Thompson was disappointed to have been omitted.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/05/the-mail-is-stuck-in-the-past-its-sneering-woke-list-is-actually-a-badge-of-honour
Even though I don’t actually know any fervent Mail readers, I somehow doubt that.
@hat
I can’t help comparing your citing the irrational “being against empathy” with the irrational “hating freedom”, which is sometimes cited as responsible for most, if not all anti-Western sentiments among Muslims. I would suppose there might even be a majority of anti-woke Daily Mail readers who would not describe themselves as “against empathy” and a majority of anti-Western Muslims who do not “hate freedom”. Perhaps more dialogue would bring more clarity.
I didn’t say anything about “being against empathy.” I doubted the statement as quoted, which seems to me extremely dubious. It has nothing to do with empathy (good or bad? threat or menace?) but rather has to do with the mental habits of Daily Fail readers, who — if they’re anything like the readers of similar rags on this side of the pond — do not change their minds based on the news as presented by pointy-headed antifa intellectuals.
(from the Wail on Funday)
people sublet their bedrooms when they’re on holiday and terraces are sold for £50K
Perhaps when the price of a terrace goes up to £100K it will be possible to rent the other half of someone’s double bed for a mere £75K. French, music, and molestation — extra.