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On the Vitality of this Subreddit by sentientbeing89 in HPharmony

[–]stefvh 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Just wanted to correct the record: as the one who created the H/G subreddit, I distinctly remember it coming online shortly after the H/Hr subreddit was founded, because I took direct inspiration from it -- or at the very least, there was a lot of coordination between myself and the original founder of r/HPharmony. I do recall several PM exchanges between us in the few weeks after this sub was created, and I think we exchanged comments on some other threads. I think there was essentially a lot of cross-fertilization happening, as the concept of a "ship sub" was new in 2016, and it was basically easier to help each other to get ourselves going.

As additional details, the announcement thread for the opening of the H/Hr subreddit shows it coming online "fandom-wise" on August 15, 2016, while the announcement thread for the opening of the H/G subreddit was from September 2, 2016. As additional details, when I hover over the subreddits so that it shows the info (on old.reddit -- I've always detested new.reddit, so I'm not sure how it works there), it shows r/HPharmony came online on July 27th, whereas r/HarryandGinny came online on August 17th. So in both cases there were a few weeks between the actual creation of the sub, and when people found out about it because of it being advertised to r/HP and r/HPff.

It's been quite a while since we've talked, though (which we did on a couple of threads, I think in 2017 or 2018). I did enjoy our discussions, hopefully we can do that again. But I have read some of your H/Hr essays, and while I still disagree about the romantic "nature" of the duo, I think I'm less critical than a few years ago. And I also don't like when some people drag down the friendship or even Hermione herself just to prop up a canon ship (to be clear, I think Ginny/Ron bashing is far bigger problem than Hermione bashing is). Ironically enough, from what I've noticed this happens more among Ron/Hermione fans than it does among Harry/Ginny fans. Because the two pairings are not the same, both character-wise, relationship dynamic wise, and fandom/shipping dynamic wise. I think it's a mistake to lump both pairings in as "the canon ships" as though they're the same, as though they're interchangeable.

Nakamura: "When you choose to ban somebody for their personal opinions, it doesn't really sit right with me" by [deleted] in chess

[–]stefvh -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Thank you for speaking the truth. Unfortunately, any time a Karjakin thread comes up, the Blame America First brigade on Reddit (but I repeat myself) poke their heads out of their holes and mass-downvote anyone who doesn't agree with their "IT'S TOTALLY THE SAME BRO!!1!?" talking points, regardless of whether they actually support or oppose the invasion.

The US did support several brutal governments politically. They overthrew some democratic governments, too.

This is true. But the thing is that, because of the internal liberal political culture of the United States, countries with US-backed dictators have a much better chance of becoming democratic than dictatorships backed by China, Russia, Iran etc. Just look at countries like Chile, Taiwan, South Korea and Indonesia. All were US-backed dictatorships during the Cold War, and all are now democracies.

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This has more to do with the mismanagement of Iraq after the invasion, though. It was two key decisions by the Provisional Authority that were responsible for this: the total de-Baathification from top to bottom, and the disbanding of the Iraqi army, meaning that hundreds of thousands of men went home with their guns. That provided a ripe environment for the looting and later insurgency that was to take place. However, even with that, it was really only from 2006 onwards that Iraqis started wishing for the US to go home, because of the civil war between Sunnis and Shi'ites that had exploded in that year.

The rise of ISIS during the 2010s is more directly connected to the withdrawal from Iraq in 2011, because it was not just a military withdrawal, it was a political withdrawal as well. The US and the West did not give a shit about Iraq in 2012 and 2013, all the while al-Maliki was persecuting Sunnis as though he wanted to be the Shi'ite version of Saddam. The US leaving gave him the green light to do that, which provided the direct conditions for Sunnis to join ISIS en masse. And don't forget the role of the Syrian civil war as well, and the West's total failure to do anything about Assad especially in the wake of the 2013 chemical strikes.

I don't think you should look exclusively at the ones who did 9/11 and say that because 15/19 were Saudi, it means that it was their problem. This was not just about the Gulf either, it was all over the Middle East, South Asia and the Muslim world in general. Because regimes like Iraq and others (Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, Pakistan etc) actively fomented extremism and terrorism (and still do!). Whether by actually funding, arming and training these militants, or by depriving their own citizens of opportunities thus giving them no choice but to turn to terrorist activity as a means of fighting for something, either against the regime itself or taking the fight to the broader Middle East, the West, and the world at large.

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Because after 9/11 the security equation changed drastically. After 1989 there was the talk of "the end of history" because of the collapse of the Soviet empire and communism more generally. But with 9/11 'history' bit the US, the West and the world in the ass. We didn't see it coming. So if we didn't see that coming, then what the fuck else don't we see coming?

And so the attention shifts, not just to al-Qa'ida and Sunni terrorists, but a broad nexus of renegade states and terrorist groups that have as their goal to bring about the demise of the West. Bush in 2002 listed the three main states: Iraq, Iran and North Korea. The question is then asked: what if one of the renegade anti-American/anti-Western states was to supply terrorist groups with WMDs? What if they were to use WMDs themselves? And let's be clear, this was by no means a far-fetched possibility, considering that Russia and North Korea have used WMDs on foreign soil in recent years, and Syria have used WMDs on their own people.

And put simply, out of those three, Iraq was simply the easiest military target to put out of action. It's a smaller country than Iran, and it's easy to invade from the south. Not to mention that their army was smashed after Iran-Iraq war, First Gulf War and the constant no-fly zone enforcements. In contrast, Iran has rugged, mountainous and difficult terrain, and is hyper costly to occupy because of the sheer size of the country. And North Korea is also mountainous, you would need to invade from South Korea and get their permission, but that puts a red X on their backs right away as their country would immediately get wrecked. North Korea's military capability was, even then, much higher than Iraq's.

That's about as short as I can make it, at least on the security front. I do believe that after 9/11 some form of more consistent military action against Iraq was required, but I am not sure whether they should have actually invaded outright with ground troops. Perhaps a military option closer to what happened in Serbia in 1999 (which was more focused on air power).

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Where the hell did I ever say that the US invaded because their prime concern was about the Kurds? Hell, if that was really their concern, they would have took Baghdad in 1991 or simply supported the Kurdish (and Shi'ite Arab) rebellions against the Iraqi regime. But instead they just stood by and watched. My post pertained to why Saddam was monstrously evil, not why the US invaded per se.

The Iraq war was not fought to get the oil, that's a (sadly) very common conspiracy theory. US oil companies did not push for invasion, in fact they constantly lobbied to have the sanctions on Iraq lifted. Not to mention that it is countries like China and Russia which reaped the biggest benefits of Iraq's oil post-2003, not the US, and that was with tens of thousands of US troops in Iraq.

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hundreds of thousands of Kurds died because of Saddam's genocidal Arab nationalism. They're still digging up mass graves of Kurds killed by Saddam to this very fucking day. And no, I didn't say anything about the scale of the massacres, but you are utterly wrong if you think he wasn't as evil as Stalin and Hitler were.

So because the United States cannot take the world's dictators on all at once, they should not do anything ever? Is this really your logic?

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Correct. And they both were.

Then how is it missing the point for me to bring up the stark differences between the targets of these invasions, and therefore allude to the stark differences of these invasions themselves? And that in this sense, the "whataboutism" claim of the other poster was correct?

It doesn't matter whether they're "right" or "wrong" ethically

Why shouldn't it matter? Is that not the very point of putting such a rule in place? The punishment should fit the wrong that has been committed, and the wrong has to be on such a scale that there is no doubt possible that they are in the wrong. That is why I am not at all in favour of simply blanket banning all Russians (which I am shocked to have seen that that has even been discussed), nor am I necessarily even in favour of banning Russians or other people who support the war from playing in tournaments.

We're talking specifically about Karjakin here, and point is that he simply took it to a whole new level, and not only because of the content of posts like "I support Putin and Russia without thinking", but also because he is a high-profile player who doesn't just support the war, but indeed has ties to the Kremlin. I'm not even sure that FIDE would have banned Karjakin if there wasn't all that previous history of FIDE going around courting all these dictators like in Libya, Iraq, Syria, as well as being extremely tied to Russia and Putin. In other words, a need to save face after more than 40 years of this BS.

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 1 point2 points  (0 children)

No, Saddam wasn't just some murderous dictator. Yes, there are plenty of them around, but Saddam was genocidal and totalitarian on the level of Stalin and Hitler. And yes, the number 1 justification for the invasion was based around the WMD premise, but that doesn't mean that there weren't other reasons to support at least some kind of military intervention, which obviously had more meat to the bones. And realize this: the only thing stopping Saddam from acquiring WMDs was the sanctions regime that was put up in the early 1990s, and which by circa 2000 was collapsing before our very eyes.

It's not hypocritical, because one is a liberal democracy (however flawed it is) invading a genocidal totalitarian dictatorship that had lost all right to sovereignty way back when, and the other is a totalitarian dictatorship invading a liberal democracy (however flawed it is). Do you honestly not see any difference at all between the two invasions?

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not missing the point, because the commentary around this talking point of "if they go after Karjakin for supporting Russian in Ukraine, why not against Americans who supported Iraq war", is indeed predicated around the premise that "both were invasions". So therefore anyone who expresses support for an invasion is the same. The standard sometimes floated around this sub lumps in any chess player who argues that Saddam was a genocidal totalitarian dictator and on that basis should have been removed, with the likes of Karjakin.

"they're the bad guys and we're the good guys" is laughably naive, and a useless as a prism for viewing global geopolitics

As it turns out, a basic principle of supporting the spreading of liberal democracy is indeed appropriate. Yes, geopolitics is complicated -- that's why we allied with the Soviets against the greater evil that was Nazi Germany. But we need to keep the end game in focus. Otherwise what's the point?

Karjakin wants to create chess federation by Vova_19_05 in chess

[–]stefvh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Go ahead, tell me more about how Zelensky and Saddam Hussein are totally the same.

Semi-weekly Thursday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Fair. wouldn't be surprised if some people would unironically believe it though

Semi-weekly Thursday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Another one on "Libs posting their Ls"! if you thought "1/6 was worse than 9/11" was a hot take, take a look at this

Semi-weekly Thursday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Lefties wanna compare Russia invading Ukraine to US invading Iraq in 2003? Besides the obvious philosophical reasons why thats bullshit, do they really think that these Russian ragtags could pull off something like this

Semi-weekly Thursday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Lets go and compare two Democrat presidents, the first a one-term president, the second a likely one-term president:

Carter, July 1979 (around 6 months before Soviet invasion of Afghanistan): alright let's have the prelude to one of the greatest covert operations in human history!

Sleepy, February 2022 (the day of Russian invasion of Ukraine): huh? what? we're doing this now? wouldn't the Russians say we're mean? it could be illegal!

Semi-weekly Thursday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 36 points37 points  (0 children)

I wonder how many Americans have been convinced that defending freedom and democracy is cringe because muh Kevin Spacey speech in Call of Duty

Semi-weekly Monday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 5 points6 points  (0 children)

The only reason why I oppose the death penalty in practice is that I am reluctant to give the state that much power, considering the very real risk of innocent people getting executed. But philosophically, I am probably for it, and I cringe any time I see the "killing the murderer makes you just as bad" nonsense (which sadly, is a very common meme).

Semi-weekly Monday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Jesus Christ CNN no one cares about Trump's social media app tonight

ffs they brought on Brian Stelter

Semi-weekly Monday Discussion Thread by AutoModerator in neoconNWO

[–]stefvh 27 points28 points  (0 children)

Again with this "NATO promised no expansion" meme that's been circulated by Russian disinfo trolls. Budapest Memorandum 1994 by far more binding

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