People are worried because sentiments like yours enable hate. You've literally just carte-blanche declared all Russians guilty. Even the protestors? The newborn babies? Call me hyperbolic but you were the one who said "all". Do I even need to go on about why such absolutism can lead to tragedy?

They think that I and my people shouldn't exist, that my country shouldn't exist.

We already have a tragedy on our hands -- humanitarian crisis, my people being exterminated, etc. This is no time for equivocation, a vast majority (>70%) support Putin and be extension the war.

And protesting does not absolve your guilt. Ukraine has been at war since 2014.

War in Georgia was in 2008, so lets not mince words. They have supported this regime for decades.

Who is they? Do you believe that Putin's regime is a democratic expression of the will of the Russian people?

> my people being exterminated

What the Ukrainian people are going through is absolutely horrible. But it is by no means an extermination.

> They have supported this regime for decades.

Ukraine were part of the Soviet Union for 7 decades. During this time, the Soviet Union invaded Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan. I would still consider Ukrainians victims of the Soviet Union and not supporters.

You've just described the USA for the past 100 years here. The level of double standard here is reaching levels I've never expected before.

It’s all about strategic interests. The US commits war crimes when it suits our agenda…just like the Russians. It’s kind of scary how much power the USG has over the world. We’ll destroy the economies of our adversaries with almost ZERO resistance. Using the term “whataboutism” doesn’t make OPs argument untrue.

Nobody in the US actually gives a shit about the Ukraine. It’s purely a strategic interest. We’re using the country as a pawn in our global political game. It’s fucked.

If we really cared about war crimes we wouldn’t constantly commit them. Why aren’t US citizens outraged by the horrific warfare that occurs on a daily basis in our world?

The funny thing is that Ukraine is actually pretty low as far as american interests are concerned... That's why the USA will absolutely not fight in Ukraine, as it has said repeatedly before and after the war started. Which makes the whole reason for this conflict to have developed into a full scale war - Ukraine's prospect of joining NATO, causing Russia to feel itself existentially threatened as it couldn't defend itself against NATO if that happened - extremely futile. America would gain nothing by Ukraine joining NATO (assuming no desire to actually launch an attack on Russia), but Russia had a lot to lose as they absolutely expected NATO aggression (if we wanted them to believe we didn't mean to attack them, perhaps we shouldn't have continued to expand to their borders in the first place despite their extremely strongly worded protests?!).

The entire phrase "expanding to their border" betrays a defective world view. Ukraine was considering joining a defensive pact to deter Russian aggression with obvious justification. The usage of "their border" somehow manages to imply ownership and violation. Nobody has a right to tell their neighbor they can't just a defensive pact or indeed any agreement whatsoever because of adjacency. Such deals don't take place by both parties standing on the dividing line and spitting onto Russian territory together. They take place within the respective countries capitals by their respective lawmakers.

The murderer doesn't have a right to stop his victims from conspiring to resist him.

I've never read a sentence that so clearly ignores the meaning of the words it is rejecting. When NATO includes another country, it's expanding. This is the meaning of the word "expand", to grow - adding a new country to your territory makes you grow - or expand!!

As Ukraine (as well as the Baltic states, which are already NATO) borders Russia, "expanding to the Russian borders" describes physically what it is that NATO is doing.

I use words with their current meaning without trying to spin their meaning to express something that's occurring... if you think that's a "deffective world view" then you're way too far into the play of words of politics to be able to have a serious discussion about the topic.

There wouldn't be any Baltic states if they weren't members allready

Tell that to people in Iraq... Or other countries NATO been fucking with for a while now.

During cold war for example NATO-aligned countries happily went around doing coups, sometimes backed with force (for example a US aircraft carrier threatening to bomb Rio de Janeiro in case of Brazil), replacing democratically elected presidents with dictators that would do whatever NATO wanted, how that is NOT unilateral aggression? Libya is a special case even, they were doing everything NATO wanted for most part, trying to make amends and create a good relationship, and got fucked anyway, NATO even gave air cover to people commiting black genocide there, what Tawergha people did to NATO to justify its "defense"?

Democratic systems get it wrong sometimes. No doubt.

I'm a UK citizen and disagreed with the war in Iraq waged in my name. But at least I was permitted to go out on the street and protest it. And eventually Blair was gone. And soon, so will Blowjo. But Putin has been around for long enough now, that he's starting to cause a bad smell in the world.

And it might seem unjust that Tony Blair and the rest never saw the Hague. I live in hope. But I see that what Russia is doing now is completely unacceptable regardless of how it sees the world evolving. It's democracy vs autocracy and democracy will win because if it doesn't, then what's the fucking point.

It was highlighting the differences in the systems of government that allows for course correction when the government starts making poor decisions.

The Russian government has set itself on a course, and then shut down the processes by which that course can be altered by (restricting information, disseminating false information, arresting protestors, opposition politicians)

If you drink the kool aid and choose to believe that, sure.

You being a democracy makes no difference whatsoever.

Compare US victims of war to Russias over the last 2 decades. Tell me which seems more egregious.

This isn’t to say what russia is doing is good. But I just don’t understand how you can cast stones when your house is made of glass.