What does being a *neighbor* have to do with the ethics of invading another country?

[Patriotic Voter]

No, it wasn't. The confederacy HAD racism. (For that matter, the north had almost as much racism, but no slavery). What it was about, was their wanting to be independent of the rest of the US and have their own government. Whether it was abolitionist or pro-slave or unrelated to race as irrelevant to that being the basic issue.

All 13 Confederate states had chosen to be "slave states" when they were founded. Slavery was the basis of their desire to make a new government headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. The Union was racist to a lesser extent, but supported freeing slaves.

Whatever the final straw was to declare war in 1860, it had everything to do with slavery. Ukraine OTOH did not have any racist reasons to secede the USSR. It was all about communism vs. democracy.

 

[Craig234]

I just watched up to 3:10 of the "Stop THINKING The USA is WORSE Than CHINA!!!" video and I stopped because he just said "America has a transparent society."

Earlier, I watched up to 5:59 of "China wants WAR and is preparing Chinese people a fight against the USA!" and I stopped watching. The title alone is very one-sided, seeing as the USG has China surrounded and has nuclear weapons at the ready. The part about China saying the US is waging biological war isn't correct (as far as I know), if that's what the Chinese document really says.

I don't know what these guys' deal is, but it seems like there's a hidden agenda and the videos seem quite propagandist. I'll try watching a little more, tonight, but I'm thinking I'd rather get political analysis from more reputable sources.

Thanks for watching it. There's no hidden agenda, but there is a strong point of view that's quite understandable the more you learn about what they experienced. I fully shared your wariness, but seeing hundreds of hours, I now see them as very fair and accurate commentators under heavy attack by a powerful, radical dishonest force.

I wonder if I should have linked you less intense videos to get started with them. It does sound like you might have overreacted a bit to little things. Hopefully you see some more and let me know what you think.

 

[Craig234]

All 13 Confederate states had chosen to be "slave states" when they were founded. Slavery was the basis of their desire to make a new government headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. The Union was racist to a lesser extent, but not enough to support slavery - hence the decision to declare war in 1860,

Sigh. The fundamental issue was their desire for independence. To repeat myself, that doesn't change whether they were the ones for abolition escaping slavery in the north, or they were the ones with slavery, or it was because they didn't like the national anthem. The issue is they wanted independence. The reason the north didn't have slavery was less about their being less racist than other factors IMO. Recall Lincoln said he'd keep slavery to preserve the union.

 

[Craig234]

I just watched up to 3:10 of the "Stop THINKING The USA is WORSE Than CHINA!!!" video and I stopped because he just said "America has a transparent society."

Earlier, I watched up to 5:59 of "China wants WAR and is preparing Chinese people a fight against the USA!" and I stopped watching. The title alone is very one-sided, seeing as the USG has China surrounded and has nuclear weapons at the ready. The part about China saying the US is waging biological war isn't correct (as far as I know), if that's what the Chinese document really says.

I don't know what these guys' deal is, but it seems like there's a hidden agenda and the videos seem quite propagandist. I'll try watching a little more, tonight, but I'm thinking I'd rather get political analysis from more reputable sources.

For what it's worth, here's the first video about China I saw from him, about his experience working for a monstrous figure who raped hundreds of employees. I expected it to be some sort of outrageous, sensationalized not credible video, and found it very different than that. Maybe it will be a better introduction for you.

 

[Mithrae]

There is some amount of analogy between Lincoln's invading the southern states to reclaim them, and Putin's desire to invade former Soviet states to reclaim them. The confederacy felt a lot like Ukraine feels. We do need to explain the difference why independence is right in some situations and not others and recognize how there's some gray area - while we strongly condemn Putin's war and support Ukranian independence.

This is ridiculous. Ukraine was never part of the Russian Federation, its sovereignty has been recognized for thirty years and over that period held bilateral diplomacy with Russia under successive governments including Putin's, and is now victimized by unilateral Russian aggression. By contrast in its brief existence the Confederacy never had a government or sovereignty recognized by the US, and war broke out only after they attacked US federal holdings. You're comparing naked imperialism based on distant historical romanticism with a genuine desire for maintaining/reinstating longstanding egalitarian unity.

Next why not compare Lincoln's invasion of the South with Hitler's would-be 'restoration' of the Holy Roman Empire ('first reich') and German Empire? Dignifying the propaganda narratives of would-be conquerors with that kind of recognition or comparison seems like pretty weak sauce, at best.

 

[Simpletruther]

I agree - the US is mostly oblivious to the huge danger China's government poses.

Just built in countries with better governments is important, as well as bringing some back to the US, where people will need to pay more and it's worth it.

One of the few things I have ever agreed with you on.