Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Have a look at the Real Life Lore video on YouTube.

This war was always going to happen. It’s about oil/gas and water for Crimea.

Nobody would be suggesting hurting the children but they should be sent home.

Surely if the West was that evil. himself and his Oligarchs would be delighted to have their children educated in Russia instead

If I had children in Kiev, I'd probably be calling for Putin's kids to be sent to Kiev and strapped to the front of a hospital.......not to hurt them of course, but the let them experience what their day is doing to the Ukrainian kids .. educational like.

In reality that should never be done. But it's easy for me to say that from here

Curious as to know what the state of mind of Putin and how he has not been challenged. Today a former Russian foreign affairs minister called on all diplomats to resign en masse, a noble call but hollow gesture to say the least. Just read an article that looked at the psychology behind Putin. The article drew a conclusion to Nixon during the war in Vietnam in that Nixon threatened nuclear war in the vain attempt to believe that the Viet Cong would come to the negotiation table. Putin has come to epitomize evil a friend opined to me this eve over coffee. I want to think that there are no evil men in the world however seeing that cold dead eyes of Putin mixed with his frosty rhetoric I firmly believe the man is well and truly unhinged beyond any sort of rationalization or sensible reasoning that diplomats might do. Another thing - his body language, look at how he nearly practically sat on the lap of Lukashenko of Belarus, the two looking very cosy. Lukashenko at one point wanted to usurp Putin as president in an attempt to unify the two countries. Contrast this with Zelensky who is fiery but level headed. Whomever is advising Zelensky is doing a marvellous job - he has called on all legal and diplomatic solutions to be used, its extraordinary how it is working. The Russian troops morale is battered with them not having fuel or food and lack of orders. That starts with the top down and drips feed into the lower echelons through the corporals etc.

Media outlets are blocking RT from all their platforms, the main source of disinformation for the propaganda that the Russian state wants to share along with the Sputnik newspaper. Given that there is vast amounts of bots on Facebook or teams of 'hackers' or (like the Israeli hasbra) teams of Russians who spread propganda - the social media companies have done an excellent job. Google removed a lot of the search results for RT today from their search results. Stems the tide of nonsense that Moscow are prepared to spout and curbs their ability to tell outright lies to the world.

Worldwide Russia is now taking a battering in the cultural and sporting arenas - Eurovision, Formula 1, World Cup, Champions League, Olympics etc etc. Even our own theatres banning the ballet companies touring. None of these seem like anything of significance in the bigger picture yet collectively you look at all of these things together and its isolates them from the pursuits enjoyed by most of the ordinary Russians, people who want to cheer their country from the sidelines. They see the world not standing for their antics and they then question - are we right in what our president is doing? That sparks a cascade of unhappiness joined up by a demoralised army and then you finally come to see the piece de resistance - the economic sanctions.

In an earlier post I put that the rouble had fallen by about 20% - a huge drop in the savings for most and the Russians responded with banning the selling of foreigh currency in large amounts and raised interest rates by 10% to 20%. Any goods that Russians want to buy online are now going to be significantly more expensive and the value of wages is going to be less giving less purchasing power to the ordinary Russians. The Russian state banks have a couple of billion to keep them afloat for the moment but cant keep going on the basis of what they currently have, something is going to have to give. Eliminating them from the Swift pay system pushes them to the brink,sparking a run on the banks that will diminish the amount of money available. Oridinary Russians will sit up thinking "we have to get rid of this mad man", 90 people were arrested today in St Petersburg for protesting the war . Russian pop stars condemned the war too.

Audentes fortuna iuvat - Fortune favours the brave (in this case the Ukranians and the Russian working classes)...

Spot on. How many of the Russian football team to give one example have come out with criticism of this. And they'd be well aware of exactly what's going on so the excuse of "the Russian people don't know there's a war/invasion" doesnt apply to them.

Never said that. Please don’t put words in my mouth. There’s plenty of agricultural production capacity (corruption and lazy attitude of the locals aside) to more than produce enough to avoid starvation for their shrinking population.

I don't think I suggested hugs. I am merely suggesting that the only difference between them and us is that we respect the rule of law and nobody is above the law. We do not bend the law when it suits us for political means (or at least less so). If we start to expell people based on circumstances beyond their control and where they have not committed any crimes, then we are no different than they are and we might as well give up because we will be just one tyrannical culture fighting another.

I thought this was an incredible read, heartbreaking but really paints a real picture (for want of a better phrase).

I think it's easy to feel powerless to help here in Ireland. I donated some blankets for a pickup in Dublin and some money to the Red Cross...I am not sure what else we can do? Bar writing to TDs etc?

You said food and medicine deliveries to Russia should be stopped.

You also said:

Yes. I’d have no issue with it whatsoever. That’s war and their government has chosen. Hopefully all covered under the bulk of the sanctions in any case.

Are you 100% sure they are self sufficient and stopping deliveries won’t cause famine or suffering due to lack of medicine?

Protest= immediate arrest

Vote=ignored

Organize= death

I am not saying they shouldn't do one of these three things but I don't blame them for choosing not to.

I certainly wouldn't call them cowards, I think most Irish people would do the same in the same situation.

I didn’t see this. I’m not too much into music so I was not aware. Fair play to them. Still, nothing from, let’s say, the Russian football or basketball players in Europe/USA. They’re people that could set an example.

I’m glad to hear from other comments that some ordinary Russians are protesting through Europe, but I would expect more. Instead I’ve seen in this thread what I believe are Russian people defending the war and accusing Ukraine of intimidating Russia.

Maybe I have a different mentality, but if my country was doing this, I’d be ashamed