It's a safe bet not to rely on baldandbankrupt for your view on former soviet republics. It's not an entirely illogical point, but the truth is always more complex.From my years watching YouTuber baldandbankrupt, I know that almost everyone of a certain age in the former republics believes life was better under the soviet state. Unfortunately, since gaining independence, the lives of many have not gotten better.
A couple observations of how reality and perception can be wrong IMO.
Mariupol is a majority ethnically Russian city in Ukraine, the Russians had to fight block by block to take the city from what was supposed to be Ukrainians that would side with them.
My dentist is a 20 something Ukrainian woman of Russian ethnicity who was seriously thinking of packing up to go fight for Ukraine, her family is from the Donbas region.
Even back in 2014 when the "separatists" were supposedly amassing resistance against Ukraine, baldandbankrupts observations could look sort of real, but the documentaries I watched on Donbas and Crimea showed sparse gatherings of mostly older ethnically Russian Ukrainians "protesting" with what were very obviously Wagner group style soldiers of fortune from Russia. Nothing like a vast majority, more like a vocal minority.
In other words my conclusion is we're sold a narrative that there is this great longing for "reunification" with Russia primarily by older people in ex Soviet spheres, but I think it's entirely logical to remember that Russia has spent more on it's propaganda arms than any other country since the 40's really. It's cheaper, and they're willing to go to ugly extremes to get what they want, from forcing women into being sex spies to poisoning "enemies of the state".
Statistics: Posted by machinesworking — Fri Jul 19, 2024 3:55 pm
