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Comment by addandsubtract | Hacker News Reader

No control over? Not with that attitude, I guess.

Disclaimer I'm not Russian but watching the roll out of the war, I am again fascinated by westerner's imagination of that an inidividual could achieve in a oppressive regime. People literally get arrested by holding a blank paper as a one-man demonstration on the street. People lose source of income and housing semi-permanently because of speaking out anything against the propaganda. The secret police can force mothers to knee down and beg their children to not being vocal. Tell me what I can do without losing my and my family's fucking lives if you think there's a way out of all this.

I do not deny the possibility of revolution of any form, but there is tons of things one fears worse than death, even a violent one. I really hope you guys get the chances to do the right thing under these circumstances. The wall between daily norm and hell is thinner than a piece of paper.

To all those armchair heroes lecturing the Russians about protesting, I advise to go to Russia (borders are still open) and try to demonstrate on the street. BTW there is currently a law punishing "fake news" with 15 years in gulag.

Or go fight for Ukraine (they accept anyone).

That's an instance of the prisoner's dilemma though. They can't really arrest every single person who is against the war. They can't even arrest 1% of population - detention system can't handle that.

This is always true, and yet dictators have existed since the dawn of humanity. I don't know why people expect Russians to function like a hivemind, rather than humans that disagree and have instincts for self preservation

Sanctions make inaction less and less attractive.

Let me rephrase it for you: sure, even if it's "only" 30% of the population VS the government, the regime is fucked. However, the dilema is that they _will_ arrest some percentage, so, are you willing to be in that bucket, having no idea of whether the protest will turn out to be anything? If you don't, how can you ask (a very large number of) other people to make up their mind and get fucked in your favor? People and crowds do not act as a hivemind. Humans are not built for this.

I was in that 30% before leaving Russia permanently in 2012. Them others not joining for various reasons is the reason we are in that fucked situation in the first place. I have a word or two to say about inaction, and how it is an excuse.

The writing about authoritarianism has already been on the wall by 2010. The anti-ukranian fascism turned out to be a surprise though.

There's more efficient way to silence 1% than arrests. More efficient and permanent. Russians lived through it just a couple generations ago.

>They can't even arrest 1% of population - detention system can't handle that.

Why can't they? In free and democratic USA 5% of the population is incarcerated.

Building more detention facilities will take time. Hiring more people to work there might not be feasible due to dissent.

That'd be one out of twenty? Doesn't sound plausible to me. Do you have any source?

Maybe they meant something else.

Data from the US Department of Justice for 2019: https://bjs.ojp.gov/sites/g/files/xyckuh236/files/media/docu...

> By the end of 2019, the incarceration rate had dropped to the same rate as 1995 (810 per 100,000 adult U.S. residents).

Which is about 1 in 123.

> About 1 in 40 adult U.S. residents (2.5%) were under some form of correctional supervision at the end of 2019. This represented a drop from 1 in 32 (3.1%) a decade earlier.

The above includes people on probation or parole.

Let's say 2 million people are on the streets protesting. What's next?

a bit of extrene violence, then nothing. after that the police starts imprisoning active people, threatening them via families etc. belarus scenario

That's easy - block highways, train tracks, etc. Anything that is used to wage the war.

So you suggest we keep the economy of Russia going? That way the common Russians don't feel any consequences. Too bad we will all still fund the bombs that are dropping on Ukrainian houses and apartments.

Ukrainians can also end a lot of suffering by just agreeing with what Russia is requesting. It seems they decided not to.

You're suggesting that common Russians feeling "consequences" will change the war and I would like to disagree. They can do next to nothing, with a high stake. Most of the sanctions, especially the ones that certainly would not affect oligarchs or government personels, are purely psyops and a political gesture of the west.

> You're suggesting that common Russians feeling "consequences" will change the war and I would like to disagree

You misread my comment: I said that you want to save the impact on normal Russian and keep feeding the war economy. I suggest to stop feeding them money for their army, and the consequences on the common Russian is something that can't be avoided.

It's especially funny because when pressed on war crimes committed by their governments with their tax dollars, they will day "well listen it's not my fault our army did that, I'm not in charge! There's nothing I can do to stop our (democratically elected) leaders". But then they'll turn around and insist people in a dictatorship should be able to oust their dictator. I'm totally against Russia, but it's insane to me how people can think this way. It borders on cruel to have such unrealistic demands from people who aren't responsible

Russians have a shared responsibility. If my country would do something like that, I would also feel responsible.

Let's say you feel responsible. I believe a lot of Russians feel awful to their stomach, too. What now? Are you willing to risk your job, housing, wellbeing and the wellbeing of your families to protest, knowing that protesting will not change anything at all? IIRC in this round the Russian government are drafting the people who were arrested in the anti-war protests.

Why would they be able to arrest them? Have you ever seen riots where people throw rocks at the police? For 10 years in jail, you better make sure you give them a reason for 10 years.

When you see those Russian protesters, they are all so compliant it blows my mind.

Throw rocks and get the fuck out. It ain't a crime if you don't get caught.

Arrest? Arrests are still mild. For more, they could be entitled to arrest their families as well. Let's say you throw a rock. All of a sudden, there is a possibility that the riot police are entitled to shot you or something - they will cite that they were attacked.

People throw stuff in riots where they have somehow figured out that the police won't open fire, or intentionally shot a rubber bullet in a way so that it'll do permanent damage (e.g. aiming the eyes), or use water canon with the intention of permanent damage (e.g. aiming at head & neck). If a crowd appear to be calm and compliant, or if people are enraged but can't bring themselves onto the street to protest - that is because of fear and really nothing else.

Protesting and rioting is absolutely different under dictatorships. It might be a right or a minor misdemeanor in the western world. I can assure you that it is a crime, worse than felony because this enters the lawless realm, in a lot of places.

Seen protests in Belarus?

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