Ukraine needs all the help they can get. And that Germany managed to send a couple of thousand helmets is a disgrace (Germany has no problems selling arms to Saudi Arabia or the UAE so). NATO should be on the forefront of sending arms and equipment to Ukraine, and they should have started months ago. That Patreon isn't offering its platform to fund weapon purchases for an active war is good.
I remember a controversy on a now-defunct crowdfounding platform that was intended to support open source software where one of the top recipients was someone who was raising money for a divorce lawsuit.
On one hand I can understand that somebody might not do that but from working at a mediation center that did a lot of parenting plans I learned to be very skeptical of what anybody says about a divorce. That is, frequently both partners are going to tell a story that is full of half-truths. People in a situation like that can go to a mediation and often make decisions they are happy with in the long term, but if you try to put together a consistent story of what happened you usually can't. Some people might be inclined to believe the person they are closer to, or some people might tend to sympathize with a man or with a women (though it might be two of the same these days), but I learned not to even try to make a model of "what happened" because its inevitably going to be distorted.
Some people might see a relationship between the personal and political and believe they are supporting some wider cause by crowdfunding a divorce but I don't feel entirely comfortable with people crowdfunding personal antagonisms any more than I am with people crowdfunding armed conflicts.
> While they are in fact receiving lots of BTC, one transaction sticks out (80 BTC, 2022-02-25 09:55:18 [3,067,846.41 USD]), I wonder who has that much BTC to give away like that. It is impressive, but raises a lot of questions.
Something is off with that tactic, unless it expects Russian economy to crash via integer overflow.
Ukranian government is very much pro-crypto. https://www.kmu.gov.ua/en/news/parlament-uhvaliv-zakon-pro-v...
[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/t0jpbw/ukraine_mil...
The same users praising Signal about protecting the privacy of activists are also protecting the privacy of terrorists, criminals and extremists and with the introduction of a privacy coin called MobileCoin which makes funding invasions, scams and terrorist activities even more untraceable.
But at least Bitcoin is traceable. MobileCoin, Monero on the other hand...
Freedom does not mean people, or countries, must do what one deems right or wrong.
That is the reality of no restrictions on a thing.
As an aside, maybe, fighting a physical invasion with harsh words, wagging fingers, and paper thin "we won't talk to you any more" restrictions isn't the answer?
It's never worked before. It only hurts innocent civilians in the end. Dictators and tyrants, sadly, will only stop when you use force.
First, Ukraine is fighting a physical invasion into their territory with their army. The rest of NATO or Europe is not under attack and not at war with Russia. That isn't harsh words.
Second, this is an oversimplification to the point of ignorance. How long would you last if access to a bank was denied? How long do you think wherever you live would be okay?
This isn’t strictly true. Qadaffi warmed up to the west, and even stopped torturing people. And look at how he ended up.
Not only they rule with an iron fist, they can’t rule in any other way, because the very instant they’ll show any sign of weakness, it’s game over.
Russia is held in an iron grip. The public can not, and will not successfully rise up. Any threat to Putin is either dead, or jailed.
Now, with these restrictions and sanctions, another country, a long time friend of Russia, China, also undergoing trade restrictions, will clearly work with Russia even more closely.
Do people really think that China and Russia do not have the resources, and industry, to not care about sanctions?!
And again historically, when chaos reigns, people take advantage of opportunities. I fully expect China to finally take Taiwan very soon.
Literally, this is the best time for them to do so.
Ukraine is just the match, people. The real flames are not even visible yet.
This was unnecessary. Remember, that they are a business and they have no obligation to care about what's happening in Ukraine, and they probably made a business decision on this. It's probably some Risk Management decision or something of the sort.
>fuck their employees for not blocking offices and protesting this decision
I think the idea is that silence is tantamount to agreement.
Fuck the CEO is fine.
But fuck the employees who appear to be complicit is too much?
I genuinely don't see the difference. I'm not trying to be difficult, but it does absolutely make sense to me.
You removed almost the whole sentence.
Fuck Patreon and anyone who contributed to Come Back Alive being removed after 8 years with no issue.
Patreon seems to realize that donations are needed and direct people to alternative ways to help. This seems like a totally reasonable course of action given their existing terms of service.
Oh, well, if it's a violation of their Terms of Service, then everything is perfectly OK. /s
Notions like this are what makes it so easy for the real world to hate people in the tech bubble.
Protip: Terms of Service !>= Doing the right thing
For one, credit card companies would no longer deal with Patreon if they find out they were passing money to fund a military.
Are Ukrainians terrorists? No. Ukraine is a sovereign nation under attack. Do you not understand that?
Inventing completely unrelated hypothetical situations and edge cases doesn't make what Patreon did right.
… but funding freedom fighters is encouraged.
George Carlin: “If crime fighters fight crime and fire fighters fight fires, what do freedom fighters fight?”
Facts are:
1. Patreon is a private company.
2. I don't think their policy around the whole funding military stuff has changed recently. If they changed the policy when this happened or to specifically target this. That would be quite terrible.
3. The page was against the rules of the company. It's perfectly reasonable for a company to remove a page against its rules. It's technically on the organizers, why did they create a page on a website that explicitly does not allow military funding.
I am guessing we wouldn't be this supportive of a private company funding the Iraqi Army fighting against the illegal occupation of their nation by the US.
At this moment war is happening mostly outside of the cities. Soon it will be there and urban warfare is cruel. 100BTC or Patreon donations will not stop it. The best you can do for those children is to help them to evacuate to Europe, to get proper accommodation, medical help and education. Pointing towards charities which do that is morally right thing.
I don't believe you're as economically liberal in all cases. At some point you would draw a line.
These kinds of conflicts cannot be won by any amount of BTC/USD. May be helping refugees is one option but its still too little too late.
Wait, the Russians are Fascist now? When did that happen?