Police brutality in the US is a problem. It doesn't compare to the slaughter of millions under the former USSR, or the complete shut-down of all freedom of speech and freedom of the press under Putin.

If the US were anything like Russia, we couldn't be having this conversation on a heavily trafficked web site like HN located within the US. The US still has the greatest level of freedom of speech of any nation on earth, and the strongest speech protections, even after some of the recent erosion.

It is just ignorant to compare US police brutality to, say, Holodomor, and not see connections between Putin and Stalin.