Tucker Carlson to interview Putin

[Karmadhi]

2 hours ago, Consept said:

Theres no absolute freedom of speech of course as a society couldnt really function but there are levels to it. If you speak up against the Ukraine war in Russia you will be sentanced to 15 years in prison, I dont think any country comes anywhere near that level of punishment. I live in the UK and have many muslim friends who post daily with extremely violent imagery against Israel and as far as i know none of them have had facebook or instagram accounts even banned let alone being prosecuted for it. There are near weekly marches and protests in support of palestine and nothing has happened. This is similar in other countries which is in fact why a lot of far right ideologies can even get in power i

Then why did they threaten to revoke Benzema citizenship?

https://www.politico.eu/article/france-senator-gerard-darmanin-demand-karim-benzema-stripped-citizenship-muslim-brotherhood-accusation/

Also this video shows freedom of speech can be abused heavily in the West.

2 hours ago, Consept said:

You can post whatever you want, you might be mistaking social persecution for state persecution. Social just means people will disagree with you on social media maybe some acquaintances will judge you or something, but no ones going to come and arrest you because you say Ukraine should make peace. Whereas if you said Russia was wrong in Russia you would literally get arrested. 

 

 

You could loose your job. That is very problematic. Also this 15 year of jail thing is if you go on a protest or something. Not if you post a facebook post. In Russia journalists and political activists get jailed. 99.999% of people are neither of those. So that heavy oppression does not happen to them. Or am i wrong here?

I am not saying that freedom of speech is as bad in the West as in Russia. In Russia it is definetly worse. You go to jail and all. However, the West having this freedom of speech and stuff to me seems a bit over the top. There is just LESS oppression regarding freedom of speech, not NONE.

2 hours ago, Consept said:

They dont invade other countries and work with other nations. Theyre not perfect by any stretch and there are issues with human rights etc it helps that theyre very rich nations as well. But essentially they dont create problems with other nations, whereas Russia constantly does. 

Invading other countries and freedom of speech are independent variables. 

USA has invaded the most countries in the world in the last decades and they have quite decent freedom of speech (according to your definition of it). 

Therefore it is true that the rich gulf countries foreign policy is far less toxic and problematic than Russia. However USA foreign policy is probably more problematic than Russia's and USA does not suffer from the speech repression. So you are comparing apples and oranges.

2 hours ago, Consept said:

Heres where there seems to be a blind spot, if i hate gay people and move to a country where they hate gay people and then talk about how i hate gay people and everyone in that country agrees with me, it doesnt mean that theres free speech it just means that everyone agrees with me. If i had the opinion gay people were great then i wouldnt feel comfortable to express that opinion. So in this case Russia definitely doesnt have more free speech, your friend just feels like that because he agrees with everything Putin says. The real test is if you say something against the government how would they react, in Russia you get 15 years in prison and in the west you may but probably wont get your facebook account restricted. 

You got a point here. I did not think of it like that. Thank you for bringing it up. I stand corrected.

Edited February 14 by Karmadhi

[Consept]

@Karmadhi I will say that i respect your open to considering my points of view and also open to changing your mind, that is a great quality. 

34 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Then why did they threaten to revoke Benzema citizenship?

So this issue i have is that your equating incidents that are not even close to comparable. This Benzema example is literally one conservative French Senator saying that Benzemas citizenship should be revoked, which it wasnt. Its one mans opinion that has no legal bearing, in fact it should even prove that freedom of speech is allowed in France because hes being allowed to say potentially anti-muslim things even with a fairly liberal government. This is in no way comparable to Putin has done for those speaking out. 

 

39 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

You could loose your job. That is very problematic. Also this 15 year of jail thing is if you go on a protest or something. Not if you post a facebook post. In Russia journalists and political activists get jailed. 99.999% of people are neither of those. So that heavy oppression does not happen to them. Or am i wrong here?

Freedom to protest and freedom of the press are not just nice things for a society to have, they are essential for a society. Reason being the press and protests can act as a mouthpiece for people, if both these outlets are shutdown the society is completely oppressed. In that situation they have no choice but to go along with their leader or leave the country. So im not presenting it as just a fun thing that you can say what you want freely, without it as a society you do not have individual liberty or even collective liberty. This means that your leader can send you to war for whatever reason he sees fit without any repercussions. You may say that the USA has invaded loads of countries in the past, which is true but for most of them there was heavy backlash which even contributed to presidents being voted out, this is not something that can happen in Russia. 

Basically freedom of speech and invading countries are not independent variables. 

But you can make the argument that Putin is a great leader which is fine, maybe some countries need a strongman leader, but you cant simultaneously make the argument that the people in Russia are more free than democratic countries.   

[Leo Gura]

Putting oligarchs in order is what dictators do. Hehe.

Edited February 14 by Leo Gura

[Karmadhi]

56 minutes ago, Consept said:

So this issue i have is that your equating incidents that are not even close to comparable. This Benzema example is literally one conservative French Senator saying that Benzemas citizenship should be revoked, which it wasnt. Its one mans opinion that has no legal bearing, in fact it should even prove that freedom of speech is allowed in France because hes being allowed to say potentially anti-muslim things even with a fairly liberal government. This is in no way comparable to Putin has done for those speaking out. 

I did not say that in France you have as much/or little freedom of speech as in Russia.

I said that in France you do not have proper freedom of speech either. But they have more than in Russia.

56 minutes ago, Consept said:

Freedom to protest and freedom of the press are not just nice things for a society to have, they are essential for a society. Reason being the press and protests can act as a mouthpiece for people, if both these outlets are shutdown the society is completely oppressed. In that situation they have no choice but to go along with their leader or leave the country. So im not presenting it as just a fun thing that you can say what you want freely, without it as a society you do not have individual liberty or even collective liberty. This means that your leader can send you to war for whatever reason he sees fit without any repercussions. You may say that the USA has invaded loads of countries in the past, which is true but for most of them there was heavy backlash which even contributed to presidents being voted out, this is not something that can happen in Russia. 

Basically freedom of speech and invading countries are not independent variables. 

But you can make the argument that Putin is a great leader which is fine, maybe some countries need a strongman leader, but you cant simultaneously make the argument that the people in Russia are more free than democratic countries.   

Yes as a society freedom of press is necessary. I was talking mostly on the individual level (and to be more precise, for myself), not for the collective.

Now, regarding USA. You can say whatever you want but USA has invaded and bombed far more countries than dictatorships like Russia, China, Iran etc so in the end of the day their foreign policy is the most damaging.

You cannot say "people can protest and a war will end" after a country has been destroyed and tens of thousands dead.

Also look at Palestine, USA is still supporting Israel genocide without any remorse. Despite growing protesting from the people. 

In the UK, one of the biggest protests in the country's history was about a ceasefire which has not come yet. 

The difference with dictatorships is that the democratic country cannot send its own people to war to die as they please. So for the people living there, it is a better deal.

But when it comes to bombing civilians of other countries it can do so pretty freely. Ask the Middle East or south east asia the shit they had to go through because of USA. 

 

Edited February 15 by Karmadhi

[Karmadhi]

42 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Putting oligarchs in order is what dictators do. Hehe.

Asking for a country that has never been a democracy and spans dozens of diverse groups and is bigger than multiple continents together is not realistic. At least Putin is competent and cares for Russia.

Imagine a fool like Trump starting to rule Russia. Or a sell out that will let other countries fuck his own.

I would assume the ruler of Russia will be a ruthless leader, at least until the country becomes wealthy enough to sustain some democracy.

Or perhaps it has to break apart for a democracy to govern it. I feel like it is too vast and has 0 democratic culture.

USA has like 300 years of it.

As bad as Putin is, he is still far more humane than Stalin or the Soviet dictators. So perhaps this is the evolution that Russia society has to go through.

Maybe his natural successor might be more gentile.

[rnd]

On 12/2/2024 at 11:15 AM, _Archangel_ said:

Don't fall into the trap of thinking every country has the same level of developement.
Authoritarian is a step back of Democracy. Here in Italy we had what Russia is having a hundred yers ago.

And no, Democracy doesn't mean heaven. it can be pretty corrupt. But is better then whatever Russia is today.

And no, Covid wasn't just a little flu virus.

Don't fall into the trap of thinking that repeting Leo's words and phrases word by world makes you smarter.

As if you knew what "Russia today is", to be able to claim "better".

And yes, the little flu turned out to be little flu. As you can see, I've died from it 27 times already.

Edited February 15 by rnd

[rnd]

On 13/2/2024 at 9:43 PM, Leo Gura said:

It can and it will, but that takes a long time and Putin is pumping the breaks.

Firstly, you can't know what the level of corruption in Russia is. You could estimate it. But based on what sources? On the Western ones. How accurate will your estimate be then? The West haven't  even been able to accurately estimate the level of Russian economy. Meanwhile, the Russian economy has surpised the German's and has become the biggest in Europe. And it's just sliiiiightly below the one of Japan. And this has happened whilst Putin has been in power. Not bad, huh?

 

Secondly, you don't speak russian, despite being russian. Or do you? I do and I read news and articles. Of course, they're corrupt and fakes ones, one might say, sent directly from Putin to my brain. If you read them in russian, and from the right sources, you'd be able to estimate how much of progress has been made in combating corruption, oligarchs and other kind of shit for the last decade and even for the last couple of years. You Leo, perhaps, are stuck in the year 2010 or so, in your assessments of the country.

Has the US under consious and democratic, or so-called, Biden improved or gotten worse off for the last years? Especially the last 2. Economically and geo-politicly-wise. How about Europe? 

 

Moreover, the level of corruption in US and EU may be higher. Why? Because it takes place on the higher levels. What's lobbying of politicians  if not official corruption? This exist in the US and EU and is official. I don't know much about this, though.

Edited February 15 by rnd

[rnd]

1 hour ago, Karmadhi said:

As bad as Putin is, he is still far more humane than Stalin or the Soviet dictators. So perhaps this is the evolution that Russia society has to go through.

One more black and white expert who won't even be able to locate ex-soviet countries on the map But he already knows that "Stalin was bad. Putin is too but a little better". Very simple.

Under Stalin, USSR  won WW2. Thus USSR was saved and remained united and strong.

Edited February 15 by rnd

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, rnd said:

Firstly, you can't know what the level of corruption in Russia is. You could estimate it. But based what sources?

https://www.transparency.org/en/countries/russia

1 hour ago, rnd said:

Secondly, you don't speak russian, despite being russian. Or do you?

I do. Not that it matters.

[Yimpa]

5 hours ago, rnd said:

Firstly, you can't know what the level of corruption in Russia is. You could estimate it. But based what sources?

Myself. I’m LGBT and my ass would  go to jail just for expressing myself authentically in Russia.

Edited February 15 by Yimpa

[Nivsch]

1 hour ago, Yimpa said:

Myself. I’m LGBT and my ass would  go to jail just for expressing myself authentically in Russia.

Do you live in Russia?

[Yimpa]

7 minutes ago, Nivsch said:

Do you live in Russia?

Nope, I’ve never been there before. I am a huge fan of Tetris, though.

[Leo Gura]

Putin is masterful at his job.

[Yimpa]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

Putin is masterful at his job.

If the rumors are true of Putin being on the autism spectrum, then it’s no surprise why he is masterful. Autistic people tend to think in black and white and cut out the bs.

Of course, there are very successful autistic people who live outside of an authoritarian system and use their black and white thinking in more holistic and creative ways.

Rumor has it that Einstein was autistic. Black and white can also mean yinyang.

Edited February 15 by Yimpa

[Leo Gura]

Putin doesn't think in black and white.

[erik8lrl]

The complexity of the information/political landscape is in direct relationship to the size/complexity of the population due to the differences in the survival agenda of different races, classes, and cultures. In a small country, this is not a problem since most of the population shares the same worldview, culture, and survival agenda. However as the size of the population increases, the information landscape increases in size as well. When you have a nation full of different people with different values wanting different policies, the difficulty of reaching a deep understanding of the political whole of society increases dramatically as well. At a certain point, if the information landscape is not limited in any way, it will become so chaotic that no individual person can make sense of the whole anymore. The power of a Western democracy lies in the ideal that people understand and care for the greater good of a nation as a whole, to have the power to decide what is good for society and themselves. However, when the information landscape becomes chaotic, this power then becomes divided, confused, and ultimately corrupt. When people can't figure out what is truly good, and when the process of sense-making becomes so difficult that they stop trying, that's when they start to simply choose a belief that aligns with their own individual survival needs, even if it's at the cost of the survival needs of others.  
Those who seek power in a democratic system understand this, so they employ tactics to obtain this power from the people. By gaining control of the information landscape/media itself. By diluting the information landscape with endless perspectives and opinions of their agenda, they can control the bias of the power of speech. Yes, everyone has freedom of speech in the West, but a level of self-censorship will be applied whenever you speak due to the bias of the society at large and often the bias of those in power. Even if you don't self-censor, if what you say is in the opposing view of the masses and of those in power, your view will likely be censored/de-ranked through algorithms, and removed of power.  (This is generally speaking, since the situation of those in power is also complicated when the population is large. The US, for example, likely doesn't have an individual group of people who have all the control, but it's likely a complex mix of different powerful people with slightly different agendas, and not all of them are equally corrupt. Elon Musk's push to make X/Twitter a free speech platform is a good example of this complexity, since he's business benefits from a multipolar world)  
This chaos in the information landscape will lead to instability and conflict since it's driven by survival conflict of different classes of people. This is inevitable in large and complex nations like the US for example. This division will lead to a number of problems politically and socially. To counter this division in democracy, one of the best methods that people in power developed is to create a common enemy. When you always have some threat looming around, it's easier for people to unite and work together (hence so much fearmongering on Russia and China in Western news). However, this method is not limitless or sustainable, if no such threat exists yet the media keeps selling you its existence, eventually people will realize they are being manipulated. Even if they never realize it, continuing to vote for leaders who don't have the best interest of the nation or the people will lead to more and more degradation of governance and society at large. Ultimately, for a democratic nation with a large population to achieve a healthy democracy, the people would need to be able to make sense of the chaos, which is extremely difficult if not almost impossible for any individual alone.    
Non-western-democratic nations with large/complex populations when faced with this problem choose to solve it through censorship/information control. China, for example, mainly uses censorship as a stabilization tool. Most people don't realize just how diverse China's population is culturally. There are 56 major ethnic groups in China all with different languages, cultures, climates, and different survival needs. If information is unlimited, it's likely that it will create hate speech, conflict, destabilization, and division between different parts of China (as it has throughout history). Division and destabilization is the enemy of progress and development. One of the reasons why China developed so fast in recent decades is because the people are united and society at large is very stable, which they were able to maintain due to censorship. The censorship is more like a filtering system that filters people of lower development/education from the complex nature of the global information landscape. Even though by law it is illegal to use a VPN to bypass censorship, no one will get arrested just by simply using a VPN in China. Hundreds of thousands of people access uncensored internet daily. In fact, most VPNs that Chinese people use are built and hosted by Chinese people, and approved by the government. The main purpose of censorship is to limit/protect the size of the information landscape for underdeveloped/uneducated people, which is a fair amount of the population. People who are educated and more developed can access VPN freely if they want to. The government doesn't censor criticism from the public as long as it's constructive and reasonable. There are even government phone lines that people can call at any time to give feedback or try to solve problems regarding government and policies.  
Western democracy functions on the ideal that the people are developed and wise enough to vote and do what's best for a nation/society. Which in reality is rare and difficult depending on the size and development of the population. Eastern democracy/Authoritarian meritocracy functions on the belief that most people are not wise/developed enough to vote or understand what's best for the nation/society thus more power should be given to those who are wise enough to do so. Ultimately, it comes down to one's perspective of human nature. People in Western democracy fear authoritarian government because most believe that people in power are prone to evil and corruption, they want to believe that normal people are good and wise enough to vote for the betterment of society and for each other. People in Eastern democracy believe that everyday people are by nature more prone to evil and corruption due to the lack of wisdom and education, thus they believe it's better for someone good with merit to hold power and lead the masses. This difference is the result of the causality of history. In reality, everyone is prone to corruption the less developed they are, but generally speaking, the more population you have, the more underdeveloped people you have, the more selfish/corrupt the people are, the harder it is for Western democracy to succeed due to the complexity in the information landscape and the differences in survival agenda. Eastern democracy/authoritarian meritocracy can be good for the collective development of large populations but is not sustainable if the people in power become corrupt and start to act in their self-interest.  
In the best-case scenario, you achieve a balance. Western democracy will increase government regulations and policies like media control and education to help people develop and sense make better and vote for good leaders and policies, and Eastern democracy will decrease government regulations and control as more people become developed and educated.

[erik8lrl]

https://x.com/TheWakeninq/status/1758097544708538621?s=20

https://x.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1757901280830505037?s=20

[Israfil]

1 hour ago, erik8lrl said:

The complexity of the information/political landscape is in direct relationship to the size/complexity of the population due to the differences in the survival agenda of different races, classes, and cultures. In a small country, this is not a problem since most of the population shares the same worldview, culture, and survival agenda. However as the size of the population increases, the information landscape increases in size as well. When you have a nation full of different people with different values wanting different policies, the difficulty of reaching a deep understanding of the political whole of society increases dramatically as well. At a certain point, if the information landscape is not limited in any way, it will become so chaotic that no individual person can make sense of the whole anymore. The power of a Western democracy lies in the ideal that people understand and care for the greater good of a nation as a whole, to have the power to decide what is good for society and themselves. However, when the information landscape becomes chaotic, this power then becomes divided, confused, and ultimately corrupt. When people can't figure out what is truly good, and when the process of sense-making becomes so difficult that they stop trying, that's when they start to simply choose a belief that aligns with their own individual survival needs, even if it's at the cost of the survival needs of others.  
Those who seek power in a democratic system understand this, so they employ tactics to obtain this power from the people. By gaining control of the information landscape/media itself. By diluting the information landscape with endless perspectives and opinions of their agenda, they can control the bias of the power of speech. Yes, everyone has freedom of speech in the West, but a level of self-censorship will be applied whenever you speak due to the bias of the society at large and often the bias of those in power. Even if you don't self-censor, if what you say is in the opposing view of the masses and of those in power, your view will likely be censored/de-ranked through algorithms, and removed of power.  (This is generally speaking, since the situation of those in power is also complicated when the population is large. The US, for example, likely doesn't have an individual group of people who have all the control, but it's likely a complex mix of different powerful people with slightly different agendas, and not all of them are equally corrupt. Elon Musk's push to make X/Twitter a free speech platform is a good example of this complexity, since he's business benefits from a multipolar world)  
This chaos in the information landscape will lead to instability and conflict since it's driven by survival conflict of different classes of people. This is inevitable in large and complex nations like the US for example. This division will lead to a number of problems politically and socially. To counter this division in democracy, one of the best methods that people in power developed is to create a common enemy. When you always have some threat looming around, it's easier for people to unite and work together (hence so much fearmongering on Russia and China in Western news). However, this method is not limitless or sustainable, if no such threat exists yet the media keeps selling you its existence, eventually people will realize they are being manipulated. Even if they never realize it, continuing to vote for leaders who don't have the best interest of the nation or the people will lead to more and more degradation of governance and society at large. Ultimately, for a democratic nation with a large population to achieve a healthy democracy, the people would need to be able to make sense of the chaos, which is extremely difficult if not almost impossible for any individual alone.    
Non-western-democratic nations with large/complex populations when faced with this problem choose to solve it through censorship/information control. China, for example, mainly uses censorship as a stabilization tool. Most people don't realize just how diverse China's population is culturally. There are 56 major ethnic groups in China all with different languages, cultures, climates, and different survival needs. If information is unlimited, it's likely that it will create hate speech, conflict, destabilization, and division between different parts of China (as it has throughout history). Division and destabilization is the enemy of progress and development. One of the reasons why China developed so fast in recent decades is because the people are united and society at large is very stable, which they were able to maintain due to censorship. The censorship is more like a filtering system that filters people of lower development/education from the complex nature of the global information landscape. Even though by law it is illegal to use a VPN to bypass censorship, no one will get arrested just by simply using a VPN in China. Hundreds of thousands of people access uncensored internet daily. In fact, most VPNs that Chinese people use are built and hosted by Chinese people, and approved by the government. The main purpose of censorship is to limit/protect the size of the information landscape for underdeveloped/uneducated people, which is a fair amount of the population. People who are educated and more developed can access VPN freely if they want to. The government doesn't censor criticism from the public as long as it's constructive and reasonable. There are even government phone lines that people can call at any time to give feedback or try to solve problems regarding government and policies.  
Western democracy functions on the ideal that the people are developed and wise enough to vote and do what's best for a nation/society. Which in reality is rare and difficult depending on the size and development of the population. Eastern democracy/Authoritarian meritocracy functions on the belief that most people are not wise/developed enough to vote or understand what's best for the nation/society thus more power should be given to those who are wise enough to do so. Ultimately, it comes down to one's perspective of human nature. People in Western democracy fear authoritarian government because most believe that people in power are prone to evil and corruption, they want to believe that normal people are good and wise enough to vote for the betterment of society and for each other. People in Eastern democracy believe that everyday people are by nature more prone to evil and corruption due to the lack of wisdom and education, thus they believe it's better for someone good with merit to hold power and lead the masses. This difference is the result of the causality of history. In reality, everyone is prone to corruption the less developed they are, but generally speaking, the more population you have, the more underdeveloped people you have, the more selfish/corrupt the people are, the harder it is for Western democracy to succeed due to the complexity in the information landscape and the differences in survival agenda. Eastern democracy/authoritarian meritocracy can be good for the collective development of large populations but is not sustainable if the people in power become corrupt and start to act in their self-interest.  
In the best-case scenario, you achieve a balance. Western democracy will increase government regulations and policies like media control and education to help people develop and sense make better and vote for good leaders and policies, and Eastern democracy will decrease government regulations and control as more people become developed and educated.

You repeated textbook liberal propaganda.

This western exceptionalism narrative is ironically detrimental to western development in general.

The nations that proclaim themselves to be the most enlightened are the ones committing the most heinous acts worldwide. And history repeats itself by coating it with the narrative that they're civilizing or defending their rights, when in reality they are sustaining the everlasting cycle of destabilization and then suppression of developing competitors of their imperialist system.

The current and previous US and EU-backed conflicts are simply a way to keep western hegemony, coated with "we're saving them from tyranny and authoritarianism and terrorism", when the west is the largest investor in tyrannical dictators and terrorist groups in the world since it provides them with the so desperately needed demand for their military complex. It's the oldest play in the warmonger book.

Putin's invasion is obviously an act of violence with little justification, but it shys away from the more than 30 wars and interventions the US has waged since WW2 and more than 70 coups and political interventions it has promoted across the globe. All in the name of "freedom". That number does not account for the proxy wars they make their "allies" fight for them. 

Those "freed" states were left in a state of utter chaos and almost none have recovered until today.

And much like the colonization process we are barely getting out of, a view of a conscious and developed west "helping" the "underdeveloped" world is disseminated to the general population so the United-Statians can eat big macs watching the super bowl without feeling guilty for financing the market of blood which provides them with the material conditions they enjoy.

As soon as the western population in general understand that the "underdeveloped nations" were underdeveloped on purpose, usually with the use of violence and economic terrorism, and actually pressure their governing elites into surrendering their grip over the lives of those people, we can maybe begin to have the possibility of leaving the world of mere demagogic narratives and enter into the world of factually describing an overarching western political mentality that is not predicated into exploring weaker nations.

  

[Nivsch]

2 hours ago, erik8lrl said:

Ultimately, for a democratic nation with a large population to achieve a healthy democracy, the people would need to be able to make sense of the chaos, which is extremely difficult if not almost impossible for any individual alone.    

Do you mean that the solution is to surrender to the chaos and sort of embrace it in a healthy way?

2 hours ago, erik8lrl said:

Western democracy will increase government regulations and policies like media control and education to help people develop and sense make better and vote for good leaders and policies, and Eastern democracy will decrease government regulations and control as more people become developed and educated.

I agree this is needed. Western media in the future will must be much more regulated and be allowed to be used more freely according to the development level of the user. AI too will must be heavily regulated.

Edited February 15 by Nivsch

[Danioover9000]

   Funny thing is is that Putin apparently complained how soft the questions were from Tucker, wanted them to be a bit more hard hitting. IDK seems like hindsight 20/20 or a self blind spot, but you do realize he's just a guest and you're the more powerful person in that room right?