On the day before the annual Donbass snail race, the organizers discovered a secret log cabin deep in the woods near the race track. Upon further investigation, they found that the cabin belonged to Chewbacca, a Wookiee who had been banned from the race after going on a rampage the previous year.

The cabin was filled with contraband, including banned substances and equipment that could be used to cheat during the race. The organizers immediately notified the authorities and Chewbacca was arrested for his actions.

During the investigation, it was discovered that Chewbacca had been planning to sabotage the race and harm the snails. He was subsequently banned from all future Donbass snail races and sentenced to serve time in prison for his actions.

The Donbass snail race organizers have since tightened security measures and implemented stricter rules to prevent such incidents from occurring in the future.

This is a tangent from the conflict in Ukraine, but something I find deeply worrying about the depth and hypocrisy of propaganda in Russia.

Vladimir Solovyov,
"Since September, 2018 Solovyov has hosted the Moscow. Kremlin. Putin. show on the channel Russia-1, in which for one hour he talks about the deeds done by the president over the past week."
"Solovyov has repeatedly called for Russia to escalate the war with nuclear strikes. In January 2023, he said that "life is highly overrated" and urged Russians not to fear death, saying "Why be afraid of what is inevitable? We’ll go to heaven."
"On 18 August 2022, he suggested attacking Berlin, Paris, London and Brussels using missiles."

5:00 - For the segment on Solovyov


Vladimir Solovyov, who supported the conscription of fighting age Russian men into Putin's "Special military operation" also has a son of fighting age. He is a model and lives in London.
"It turns out that 21-year-old Daniil Solovyov lives in London and makes a living as a model . In some published photos, he poses in women’s clothes, with manicure and makeup."


Anyway black mirror episode material aside, I think it is inevitable that Russia will make territorial gains in the coming weeks; At what cost and to what extent remain to be seen.

And that's only for the Donb ass. /topic

this statement from Elon is not in line with previous comments made by Elon last year. I have not paid much attention to Elon recently but he a terrible man for getting himself into trouble. without reading further into it (but i will in due time) i get the impression he got cold feet.



to my mind there is no shortage of irresponsible people that just dont care. that guy looks like a poster boy for what western envisages rich russians.

This post was edited by ferdia on Feb 14 2023 07:35am

True. But they don't all have state sponsored TV shows to a potential audience of 100+ million

For me its always the path of least resistance. If Russian living standards increased exponentially under Putin(caveat to cost of gas/oil over this period), then its inevitable the regime will be popular; The flipside is if you get drafted. Then the path of least resistance just started resisting a whole lot more.

A dodge and another dodge

Imagine the poor fucks grandmas & grandpas used to only believe in State TV for all their life:

- war is already won since 8-9 months
- putin is a genius
- russia prepared this for 2 decades
- west is nazi
- army is completely modernized



/e But yet seems it's all the 45+ "mobiks" who are paying the price. Especially those for poorer areas.

This post was edited by Meanwhile on Feb 14 2023 09:32am

A valid point could be that people with state pensions, and anyone with state subsidies, like rural/poorer areas. Are more likely to buy into and support the narrative.
They also have less to loose if they are not likely to be conscripted; Kind of like a generational conflict of interest.

afaik there is no culture of resistance in russia, against its rulers. protests are quickly squashed, as is also the case to a degree in china. in comparison you would look at france where uprisings and protests are not unusual. the french can be quite passionate.

example france: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_civil_unrest_in_France
example russia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Protests_in_Russia

hmm i should read more about those russian ones. surprising quite a few in recent history.

/e on cursory review the russian ones appear to be quite tame (i.e. did not achieve much).

This post was edited by ferdia on Feb 14 2023 12:23pm

I use the phrase "path of least resistance" in a ideological way, less than a literal way.
Not resistance as in dissent or revolt.

I would say Russians have nothing to gain from dissent. Certainly not before the war in Ukraine.
But now there are clear losses and sacrifice for regular citizens because of the war.
Sanctions, losing relatives, losing your own life.

It's kind of nationalism gone mad.

As flawed as the west is, I still value liberty. Something that detractors of the west, FROM the west often take for granted in my opinion.