Social media and mainstream media saw it fit to censor dissenting voices --not those of quacks, we can mostly all agree on minimizing the voices of quacks but shutting down medical professionals and medical academics and so on is very concerning.
The only people they allowed to be wrong about the pandemic were govt officials. They could get it wrong and right it as many times as necessary.
Those same social networks are de-ranking and blocking dissenters against the escalation of war against Russia in Ukraine. This is categorically different and a major escalation in censorship that most people are not realizing. It's very scary.
What a bizarre idea.
Even if you're okay with all of that, the US is not trying to help Ukraine win, it's trying to make the war as long and as expensive as possible for Russia. The US is sacrificing Ukrainian lives to harm Russia.
It's never that Ukrainians took to the streets in 2014 because their government was corrupt and undemocratic (literally imprisoning the leader of the opposition party), it's that they took to the streets because the US artificially manufactured dissent.
It's never that Ukraine had an independent desire to increase defense spending after it suffered military humiliation and loss of territory in 2014, it's that the West armed Ukraine to agitate against Russia.
Anything that could be interpreted either as an independent action by Ukraine or a Western intervention is automatically labeled as the latter without any explanation as to why.
The irony, of course, is that the only three things in this story that are unambiguously interventionist are Russia's 2014 invasion, the 'proxy' war between 2014 and 2022, and the 2022 invasion. There is simply no other way to slice it - Ukraine didn't invite foreign troops in to come and start shelling things. That is the elephant in the room that is never brought up in these narratives.
Now, what should happen to Obama for committing the coup in Ukraine? He bragged about negotiating the coup before the previous leaders had to flee and the Assistant Secretary of State and Ukrainian ambassador were caught on tape talking about "midwifing this thing in" and making sure their hand-selected candidate became the leader.
I find there's nothing bad enough I can say about Putin that allows anyone to even consider any nuance.
Let's say for the sake of argument that Euromaidan was 100% manufactured by Obama. (I strongly disagree, but I'll give you that one for now.) A couple of hundred people died in the protests and riots. So far, by the Kremlin's own account, 100x to 200x that number have died in the 2022 invasion. Millions have been displaced. Entire towns and villages have been reduced to rubble. People are dying in Sri Lanka from famines because of the lack of Ukranian grain. How are you going to look anyone straight in the face and them that these evils are comparable?
This is what I mean when I say that every anti-Western narrative I've seen on this war uses different yardsticks for Russia and the West. Putin murdered 100 people? Well Obama killed 1 so it's really not that different is it? It's like asking a judge to give a thief who pocketed a candybar and a thief who robbed into a bank at gunpoint equal sentences because "both of them are thieves." I'd prefer not to have a thief as a roommate, but if my choices were a candybar thief or a bank robber, I know who I'd choose. You don't need a PhD in philosophy to understand this concept.
I'm am not sure if you are to arguing in bad faith or if you are sincere, but the drawing of false equivalencies is a favorite tool of those who argue in bad faith.
Which country, in the last 30 years, has invaded more countries and killed more innocent people in wars of aggression? US or Russia?
Rank these world leaders in order of causing most innocent civilian deaths: Bush Jr, Obama, Trump, Biden, Putin.
Which country is providing the weapons for, providing intelligence, and coordinating strikes for Saudi Arabia's genocide in Yemen? US or Russia? How does the death count in Yemen compare to Ukraine?