Comment by spurgu | Hacker News Reader

Comment by spurgu | Hacker News Reader

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Genocide... seems like words don't have the same meaning that they used to. Killing soldiers is not genocide. You had people (probably yourself included) calling Russia's actions "genocide" a year ago already, long before the gloves were off in September (after Daria Dugina was murdered and the truck bomb attack damaged the Crimean bridge). What's it been after that, super-mega-genocidal? Give me a break. Genocide is nothing but a buzzword in this context.

> Here are several hundred instances where Russian politicians and media figures called for genocide

By that account Putin is a humanitarian hero, given that the actions of Russia have largely gone against "the wish of the people".

It also makes the shouts for "regime change" quite ridiculous - what's that supposed to achieve if the alternative regime leaders are among those quoted in the article? A more "true Russian" regime?

Should we make this fair, maybe I should put up a collection of what various Ukrainians have been saying about Russians (long before the 2022 invasion)? There is a lot of material there...

> If the United States invaded and tried to annex... [snip] ...people's tones would be very different.

Funny that you would bring that up. In fact people's tones are very different. I don't remember seeing people calling out "genocide!" in any of the war campaigns of the United States (Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc) that actually killed a lot of civilians, nor have I seen any calls to ban American athletes from any sports events, nor have I seen any suggestions for sanctions. The hypocrisy is mind-blowing.

> In the above link there are several hundred official statements from Russian politicians confirming that they indeed do want this.

And very few of the quotes are by Putin and the ones that are there are quite mellow. So again, if he's the "tyrannical dictator" that the west tries to portray him as he should instead be seen as a hero for moderating Russia's actions the way he does, wouldn't you say?

>I don't remember seeing people calling out "genocide!" in any of the war campaigns of the United States

Genocide isn’t just “killing” people. Look it up.

And I don’t give a god damn about shit that happened 20 years ago.

I care about now, and the future.

I would call you a fucking idiot but that goes against the rules so instead I’ll call you uninformed.

Since you’re obviously lazy, here:

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

a. Killing members of the group;

b. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

c. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

d. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Russia is doing at least four of those.

Russian government officials have publicly, irrefutably, unquestionably admitted to “e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.” on television, in front of the world.

https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2023/02/22/ysph-research-reve...

https://newlinesinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/An-Independ...

You disgust me.

What is the difference between war and genocide then?

This is not rhetorical. I am curious.

With plain old war there are usually end goals like "gain control of this piece of land/and or resource". Which is what's happening in Ukraine. They want Ukraine's land and resources.

However, it's completely possible to achieve those goals without taking any of the actions listed by the other commenter except maybe a and b, but I can see arguments made that they're referring to noncombatants, and I think most of us can agree that them being wholesale slaughtered by the invading army isn't something that shouldn't be happening in any circumstances.

In this case Russia has made very loud and public statements making it distinctly clear that in addition to obtaining Ukraine's land and resources, they also intend to fully wipe out the national identity of Ukraine by taking most if not all of those actions, and in fact have already done some of them. That would be the difference.

Thank you. I accept that explanation. From that perspective, the argument makes sense as well.

> I don't remember seeing people calling out "genocide!" in any of the war campaigns of the United States (Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc)

That proves you weren't paying attention. I don't agree that those wars were genocides, but there absolutely were many anti-war protestors who asserted exactly that.

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