Linus Torvalds affirms expulsion of Russian maintainers

https://feddit.nl/post/22918080

Linus Torvalds affirms expulsion of Russian maintainers - feddit.nl

"Ok, lots of Russian trolls out and about.

It's entirely clear why the change was done, it's not getting reverted, and using multiple random anonymous accounts to try to "grass root" it by Russian troll factories isn't going to change anything.

And FYI for the actual innocent bystanders who aren't troll farm accounts - the "various compliance requirements" are not just a US thing.

If you haven't heard of Russian sanctions yet, you should try to read the news some day. And by "news", I don't mean Russian state-sponsored spam.

As to sending me a revert patch - please use whatever mush you call brains. I'm Finnish. Did you think I'd be supporting Russian aggression? Apparently it's not just lack of real news, it's lack of history knowledge too."

fuck yes. fuck russia. fuck russians.

You should approach the same fuck first approach to Israel and the us with what they are doing in Gaza and Lebanon while you are at it. That would show your adherence to standard behaviour in the light of current genocides going on.

Sure Russia is bad so fuck Russia but do you have the balls or boobs to say fuck Israel ?

Uhh…what are we talking about again?
Whataboutism 😂

Wow they really ran out of shit to say huh?

Not much left on the bottom of that barrel but some world salad with Russian dressing.

Yes, fuck Israel and fuck Russia. Not sure why I’m responding to this dumb bait, but here we are

It’s even funnier when we realize Russia is possibly the reason there even is an Israel-Palestine conflict.

Jews fled Russia between 1880 and 1920. While a large majority emigrated to the United States, some turned to Zionism. In 1882, members of Bilu and Hovevei Zion made what came to be known the First Aliyah to Palestine, then a part of the Ottoman Empire.

The Tsarist government sporadically encouraged Jewish emigration. In 1890, it approved the establishment of “The Society for the Support of Jewish Farmers and Artisans in Syria and Palestine”[51] (known as the “Odessa Committee” headed by Leon Pinsker) dedicated to practical aspects in establishing agricultural Jewish settlements in Palestine.

Source

So they encouraged and supported those settlements.

History of the Jews in Russia - Wikipedia

And I’m pretty sure they indirectly triggered the ongoing conflict, where hamas attacked israel in 2023 october.

You should approach the same fuck first approach to Israel

Why should they do that in the comments section under a post about Russia?

If you think caring about one tragedy means ignoring another, that’s a ‘you’ problem.

People who actually care about human suffering don’t play the ‘whataboutism’ game—because it’s not a contest, it’s a crisis. Your deflection isn’t advocacy; it’s just lazy, performative outrage disguised as moral high ground.

Go on and show us these “innocents” being targeted.

You’re inventing fear and disinformation because you don’t like Russian troll farms being shut down.

Freedom of speech has consequences. Say hello.

Those were words, yes.

How the fuck you were able to mash them together like that is beyond me.

I’m Finnish. Did you think I’d be supporting Russian aggression? Apparently it’s not just lack of real news, it’s lack of history knowledge too."

Man, it’s like you spend centuries brutalizing all your neighbors, if not outright conquering them and enforcing holocausts, and this is the thanks you get!

Putin:

Russian culture is so underappreciated 🥺

No, it is appreciated. Just not in the way you want it to be.

No. Not fuck Russians as a blanket policy. The Russian government is full of corrupt and evil bastards, but it's certain that most Russians are the same as most other citizens; They just want to go about their business.

I'm in favor of blocking the Russian accounts, they're probably mostly state actors. The ones that aren't actively sabotaging the codebase are unfortunate causalities, but it's better than the alternative.

I’m really sad about this. There is a lot of computer science talent in Russia, and I’m very very upset that It Has Come To This.

But it very clearly has.

I think it wouldn’t be bad to have the Russian devs back once the war is over, bar any other circumstances.
Most russians support the genocide. Fuck russians.
Citation needed.

It’s not difficult to find if you try just a little bit.

norc.org/…/new-survey-finds-most-russians-see-ukr…

New Survey Finds Most Russians See Ukrainian War as Defense Against West | NORC at the University of Chicago

A new survey of Russians highlights sentiment towards Putin's leadership, the country’s global standing, and domestic concerns amid the war in Ukraine.

Most Russians don’t have easy access to non-state propaganda media outlets. If they only have false information, they can’t be expected to form an educated opinion.

If you haven’t seen it, I recommend taking a look at a recent post from the NYT Magazine about a Russian defector. They also made a 5 part podcast miniseries told from his perspective. NYT recently put old podcast episodes behind the paywall, not sure how to access them elsewhere, but I’ll include a link to reference if you want to look it up.

nytimes.com/…/ukraine-russia-war-deserter.html

open.spotify.com/episode/7JhUrPv08azSKIXqSvkPIV

Deserting Putin's Army and the Russia-Ukraine War

He didn’t want to fight in Putin’s war — he just wanted to survive. But to make it back to his family and live in peace, he would have to run.

The New York Times

This is actually completely false.

Until very recently, both Youtube and telegram have been available censorship free. Almost every russian was able to access “non-state propaganda media outlets” in under ~10 seconds on their smartphones.

NYT times is bad source on russia. They routinely whitewash russian crimes. They often leverage russian opposition sources without any critical analysis.

YouTube and Telegram are not sources of authoritative or factual information either, if anything they are even less reliable.

The fact you’re even suggesting them as some sort of alternative for reliable info shows you don’t intend to have a real discussion.

You are either ignorant or you have an agenda (or perhaps you don’t want to consider that you were wrong).

You were able to access authoritative russian-langauge “non-state propaganda media outlets” on YT at least as far back as the early 2010s.

TV Rain , a generally well regarding Russian opposition channel opened their YT account on Apr 13, 2010, with the oldest listed video being with some of the first clips appearing in May 2010.

DW on Russian (DW на русском) also started their YT channel in 2010 with clips appearing in the same year.

Telegram did longer to get authoritative sources, but you can get BBC on it. And I am willing to be you good money that the BBC Russian service YT account appeared closer to 2010.

I am sorry but you are wrong and you don’t understand what you are talking about.

TV Rain - Wikipedia

There must be quite a few Russians who have watched independent media from YouTube etc, and who don’t want the invasion of Ukraine to be happening. But if they speak up, they get sentenced to years in prison, or worse.

Some might say “but most Russians are still voting for Putin”, but I wouldn’t assume that to be true. Russian votes are rigged (that’s a video of ballot boxes being stuffed in the 2018 Russian presidential election). Also, genuine opposition candidates to Putin, including anti-war candidates, aren’t allowed to stand for election.

Marina Ovsyannikova: Anti-war Russian journalist sentenced in absentia

Maria Ovsyannikova, who protested live on air against the invasion of Ukraine, gets more than 8 years in jail.

BBC News

So, basically it’s enough to say “Fuck Russia, Fuck Russians” here and it gains you massive support.

Seriously?

First, how does this fuck Russia the state?

Second, what everyday Russians have to do with it? What justifies sneaking in hate messaged to a diverse ethnic group with no single ideology?

Saying “Fuck Russians” is about the same as “Fuck Jews” because Israel has done bad things. This is not okay.

It’s just people can’t do anything to stop Russia or at least help Ukraine. Although the latter is possible, but it’d require some effort. Writing and upvoting “fuck Russia” is easy and that makes them feel better.
You feel good typing all that schlock out?
You have no arguments and you are angry because of that. No, I don’t feel anything in particular about it. Maybe you do, you wrote an aggressive comment, you “defended” yourself, you must be very proud!
Strawman from a child.
Are you… proud that you write nonsense that triggers people? Is that what provides you with a sense of pride and accomplishment? Are you trying to humiliate me for your behavior? That’s fucked up, mate.
The important thing is that you feel superior to everyone. that’s all that matters.
I’m sorry you feel that way, but I think there’s been a misunderstanding. I’m not trying to feel superior to anyone, I’m just expressing my frustration with how some people seem to be more focused on making empty statements online rather than actually doing something to help. I don’t think one needs to be superior to feel frustrated.
Yes. Fuck Russia and fuck Russians. Slava Ukraini!
Propaganda goes both ways

Well, if your state is breaching international law, deporting children, using artillery to reduce cities to ashes, sending hundreds of thousands of your own citizens to their death and allying yourself with fucking north korea to “denazify” a country while swinging its nuclear dick around…

then maybe it’s time to leave the country or accept that people with a russian mail address are persona non grata in the rest of the world. It’s not their first war of aggression, and enough is enough.

fuck russia. fuck russians.

and fuck hospital- and refugee camp bombing zionists btw. (not all jews are zionists!)

As an Armenian I want to hear what you have to say to me, directly, about Azerbaijan which is not sanctioned, is not punished and is treated as a normal country. And by extension Turkey, which has been a NATO member since 3 years after NATO inception, and has only become less genocidal and less Nazi since then!

But since you are using “international law” as something good while it has been successfully used to justify many genocides, I guess I won’t be satisfied by your answer.

put your strawman argument back where it belongs. Putin and his henchmen belong in front of the IOC, and the russians with their apathetic stance towards their government which enables this garbage behavior need to turn their state around; that is something noone else can do for them.

as long as there is no resistance movement that has strong support in the russian population, i will say “fuck russians” all day long.

Talking about Putin and apathetic stances right after talking about strawmen. Good job, you dumb fuck.
wow, a personal insult is all you got? sorry, but that is definitly not a discourse i wish to continue, it’s simply not worth my time.
Your time is not worth shit.

Leave it to a Russian to resort to personal insults once their argument falls apart:

At the very least, a strong majority of russians are supporters of genocidal imperialism, however a solid argument could be made that it’s more like an overwhelming majority.

This holds true across all demographic segments; income, education, age, region, rural vs urban. You may have a situation where the support for genocidal imperialism is a mere majority (e.g. younger cohorts), while others approach an almost absolute majority (older cohorts), but the majority always holds no matter how you slice and dice it.

This is backed by almost all quantitative and qualitative research conducted over past ~35 years. I can share a pretty funny anecdote about how an allegedly opposition minded russian (who gets quoted in the NYT) had to twist his own quantitative findings to present a better picture of russian society.

Even recent qualitative research run by opposition minded russian researchers shows a damning picture among of even allegedly moderate russians (in russian, I can share it).

A strong majority of everyday russian support the extermination of Ukrainian culture and sending everyone who disagrees to a torture camp. And this is not limited to Ukraine, they have a similar attitude to all nations that freed themselves from cancer that was the USSR.

Unfortunately many are ignorant of the nature of russian society or prefer to reject difficult information (it’s just social media hate).

Torvalds is a Finn and he understand these things and he doesn’t have the liberty of shying away from reality.

When compare “Fuck Russians” to “Fuck Jews”; what exactly are you referring to? Russian as in the ethnicity or Russian as in the nationality. This is actually a pretty important point.

So what you are saying is we should nuke Russia because they are all cartoonishly evil fanatics of genocide.

I never said cartoonishly evil.

The term I used was “genocidal imperialist”. Supporting extermination of Ukrainiain culture, language and identity with the goal of territorial expansion. A belief in ethno-national hierarchy system that sees certain ethnicities/nationalities as inferior and not having the right to self-determination.

Such beliefs have a strong majority support among the russian population (if not overwhelming majority support).

I guess cartoons for adults then. What’s your solution? To me it sounds like dehumanising propaganda that push for indiscriminate extermination…

For you these are cartoons for adults. For those who have deal with russian imperialism, it’s reality.

A tangent of sorts; do you think you would be able to guess the number genocides conducted by the russians since just in the last 100 years? Without doing a web search.

You might be able to count the big ones, but I am curious what do you think your chance of guessing correctly would be?

Note: I don’t know the exact number (I can name a list of course). I am just curious what you think about this thought experiment.

To get to a solution, you need to at least recognize the problem. Things like not engaging in historical revisionism. Not rejecting any and all research findings unless they paint russian society in a way that reflects how you want the world to be.

No I don’t think I would. Other than my ignorance about the facts themselves, there’s the issue that I don’t have a precise definition of genocide in mind.

I’d probably have the best chance by saying 0 and hoping the definition of Genocide is so narrow it doesn’t really apply to shit.

And I’d give me a 30% chance.

Tangent asides, I am under no impression that the Russian Oligarchy now, the Zar before, the URRS in between, has excerted power in oppressive way just like any other country has done and stopped doing only in the face of new ways to accrue power.

And because in all those instances, from China, to the USA, to all of Europe, through history, people were pushed and pulled into believing all sort of crazy stuff, such as “the others” being inferior, evil, a threat or all of the above, I doesn’t really tell me much that the polupation that is subjected to a long lasting propaganda apparatus is affected by such propaganda.

I go as far as doubting I would be able to see past it if myself I was born in that situation.

I wouldn’t be able to answer accurately either.

The definition of genocide is an interesting one. I have a DIY definition that may not be listed in the human rights charts, but has what I would argue a rather lucid quality to it.

“Actions against you specifically, your immediate and extended family and your broader ethno-national group that make you wonder if the russians want to destroy you.”

On some level, I do agree with what you’re saying about the role of oppression and propaganda.

But how do you know this is the primary cause? What if it’s a choice the russians want to make?

It’s unfortunately not unheard of for whole nations (i.e. close to or at overwhelming majority support level) to support and engage in genocidal imperialism. Arguably, one would only continue at this path if they have the benefit of people white-washing their actions, no?

The reason I brought up choice earlier is that I do not believe russians are “inherently” genocidal or that they are not capable of change. This would be a ridiculous argument. I do believe that they do want to change, they like being genocidal imperialists.

And they will continue to do so until there is pushback (they get treated like they treat others) and less people buy into their white-washing propaganda.

This is not a cartoon for adults.

Framed in this way (assuming a population completely corrupted by propaganda) it becomes a matter of responsibility, not unlike what we already faced in germany.

I believe the proper course of action, in this instance and for posterity alike, is focusing and who is knowingly engaging in propaganda, and not who is being fed a false narrative.

It’s a broad answer and it leaves very little room for proportionate retaliation, but it’s the only approach, I believe, that foster progress and rightfully frame the issue of division and conflict in a tangible cause and effect dialectic.

If we now say, “Russian has let themselves be convinced to behave like monsters, therefore we must tread them as ones”, all future wars can and will be framed in this way. If we focus and the root causes, if we condemn manipulation of information, uneven education as among the greatest, most unacceptable, criminal act, I can see a world where at the very least, if you behave like a monster that’s out of your own “disposition”.

This is backed by almost all quantitative and qualitative research conducted over past ~35 years.

I would require some data from a person who likely wouldn’t say the same about countries backing Turkey (and by extension Azerbaijan) and Israel.

journals.sagepub.com/doi/…/20531680221108328 meduza.io/…/a-kogda-uzhe-pobeda-to-nasha-budet www.jiia.or.jp/en/column/…/russia-fy2022-01.html

I specially provided a selection of lesser know research to avoid the usual arguments about “but how can you do polling in a totalitarian state”.

Turns out, you can. And the findings show that preference falsification (e.g. a russian saying that they support the invasion of Ukraine, when they really don’t) is minor and does not change the real picture; that at the very least a strong majority of russians are genocidal imperialists.

I didn’t say a lot of people don’t support it. But that’d be in parity with a lot of Americans supporting invasion of Iraq or Israel’s crimes. Which makes them similar genocidal imperialists. So genocidal imperialism is normal in your “civilized world”, you are doing it.

That injustice would be responsible, by the way, for a certain percentage of people answering something not because they support the war, but because they hate all those virtue-signaling jerks who support many other wars which go unpunished, with those jerks also residing in states where their political position doesn’t cost them fines or jail. I don’t like hypocrisy as well.

And it’s funny, another guy just talked about “apathetic stance”, and you now talk about “totalitarian state”, and both are used to blame Russians, while they are mutually contradictory. If a state is totalitarian, then any stance taken without a suicide belt (and most taken with it) doesn’t give you any immediate results. And it is.

I’m not going to argue that the majority of neurotypical people will support a war their state starts. If you are from the USA, yours did with much bigger euphoria than Russians in 2022.

This is pretty tired whataboutism w.r.t US and Iraq.

The Iraq equivalent would be American annexing Basra state, banned arabic and forcing everyone to speak with a Texan accent and eat pork chops.

All the while sending Arabic speaker to dungeons and having state TV with goons laughing about how they caught a local Iraq women speaking Arabic and sent her to a dungeon.

What bloody “equivalent”? I’m talking about literal US invasion of Iraq which has killed more Iraqis than Russia has Ukrainians in the same amount of time.

They don’t call it an invasion in your land of the free? Or they really think that was normal and somehow different from 2022-now?

But we can do Iraq for your analogy too. When Saddam invaded Iran with pretty land-grabbing nationalist goals, they’d do a lot of fucked up shit of this kind, and they were supported by the West. Iranians have fought back, and that’s why despite hating the Islamic regime, they have no illusions about the West too.

I want to ask you another thing - do you realize that the mafia group in control of Russia got to the point of no opposition and ability to invade, for example, Ukraine, because from the very beginning it was supported by the West against democratic forces in Russia?

Yeltsin’s coup in 1993 was supported by the West. Oh, yes, his opponents were very scary, some “red-brown” mix of goosestepping neo-Nazis and Stalinists. But there’s one little problem - those obviously unpleasant people would refrain from violence and try to solve the crisis via peaceful means till the very storming of parliament (where they were, ahem, the majority).

Probably half of the Russian elites have emigrated to Western countries by now with their stolen money ; were that process not as welcome from the receiving countries, maybe it wouldn’t be their main goal, and maybe that would have lead to an environment where Russia’s elites can possibly change.

For you, extermination of Ukrainian identity in the occupied territories is OK. For me it’s not.

And at any rate, I don’t buy your “whataboutism” about Iraq. You don’t care about killed Iraqi civilians just you like you don’t care about Ukrainiains killed by Russians.

I want to ask you another thing - do you realize that the mafia group in control of Russia got to the point of no opposition and ability to invade, for example, Ukraine, because from the very beginning it was supported by the West against democratic forces in Russia?

No, I do not believe in russian victimhood narratives.

For you, extermination of Ukrainian identity in the occupied territories is OK. For me it’s not.

Somebody should have explained it to you long ago that your comments can be a source of information about yourself, and not about me.

And at any rate, I don’t buy your “whataboutism” about Iraq. You don’t care about killed Iraqi civilians just you like you don’t care about Ukrainiains killed by Russians.

I care about them very much, I would prefer cockroach Americans to die instead of them - and instead of Ukrainians.

No, I do not believe in russian victimhood narratives.

You are a cockroach. Pretending to be good and kind where it doesn’t cost you anything. See, when it does, a man becomes more concerned with something he pays for with various things to be correct and true.

If you care about Ukrainian lives, go to war and replace one of those lives with your own. And if you don’t, you should preach for peace because more people die in war than in peace.

Recognizing that laying the blame that your country is authoritarian and genocidal on someone else makes me a cockroach?

Yeah, we’ve seen how well “peace with russia” worked out after 2014.

No, you are a cockroach because you are ignoring everything of matter in my comments, pretending they say something else.

I realize my country is genocidal. You don’t realize your country is genocidal. If you would, it wouldn’t make sense for you to run around with condemnations.

Also my country is authoritarian and yours is not supposed to be that, I agree. That also makes your responsibility for said crimes bigger than mine. But I don’t think you ever thought about that, don’t seem the type.

Yeah, we’ve seen how well “peace with russia” worked out after 2014.

Ukraine should have been the initiator of some kind of compromise after the first 6 months, when Russia looked pathetic.

Instead they used the moment for propaganda targeted at their own population. Probably to keep the current government in power.

Any kind of peace would allow them to make further preparations for a war not limited by Donbass and Crimea.

In Crimea the idea of separating from Ukraine was always popular, it was always treated by many people as some mistake that they are part of Ukraine. So losing Crimea is not really a loss.

And compromise, while involving real losses, should be measured not against some ideal right and law, but against the fact that anything else will be paid with lives and those will not be of Americans, Europeans and other white civilized people telling Ukrainians to fight against Russia instead of them.

I’m telling you, every Armenian and Georgian looking at the war in Ukraine sees how the “alternative” demanded by hawkish protesters works, and finds appreciation for the wisdom of their own governments in that particular regard.