top 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] 101 points 4 months ago (3 children)

It's so frustrating that we are living through an active genocide (again) and doing absolutely nothing (again). In my youth, when there wasn't yet a 24 hour news cycle and I learned about the genocide in Rwanda as a teenager, it was my naive belief at the time that a lack of knowledge was the main reason for the general indifference in "the West". A year later the genocide in Bosnia, especially the massacre at Srebrenica, was headline news in my home country of the Netherlands and yet people seemed to collectively just shrug that off just as quickly as it happened. Now, many years later, I've become much more cynical. If you want people to care about unjustified murder you should either make sure to have your country located really really close to "the West", but even that is just of limited use to Ukraine, or make sure that the killing happens to take place at the hands of mostly Jewish people, although most Palestinians can attest to the fact that while media attention is good, action is still lacking.

  • source
  • hideshow 6 child comments
  • [–] 22 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    How willing have you been to go and put your life on the line to stop these atrocities? If you're not willing to, why should others?

    If none of the individuals in a democratic country are eager to go die to prevent the atrocities, then why would you think a democratic country would take action to force individuals to go die to try and prevent a genocide?

    And in this particular case, international trade with Sudan is at like 3% of their GDP -- they don't really trade with anyone, so its not like democratic countries can be all "smarten up, or else no more [x]!"

    The UN at one point in the past had a decent peace keeping force function, that'd go and assist such regions. But the UN has basically been kneecapped by both authoritarian non-democratic countries having veto powers, and by the USA overtly defunding all its programs as of late.

    And the US is now participating eagerly in war crimes / crimes against humanity -- they're the 'supposed' leader of the democratic west, but they actively encourage genocides like in Israel. The people of the USA voted for it. They're 'democratically' in favour of encouraging genocides. Your opinion in the broader democratic environment, if you're American, is in the minority. And part of living in a democracy is accepting the will of the majority, which happens to be in favour of genocides.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 10 points 4 months ago

    But the UN has basically been kneecapped by both authoritarian non-democratic countries having veto powers, and by the USA overtly defunding all its programs as of late.

    Lately the US has been an authoritarian non-democratic country.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (5 children)

    I was in Afghanistan, first serving with the Dutch armed forces and later working for a company that built clinics and schools. After that I worked in eastern Africa for a rural electrification programme. While parts of these efforts may have been fruitless in hindsight, I still stand by these choices.

    What have you done? I feel like I was (and am) willing to work towards putting an end to atrocities, at least within my limited influence. I am willing. Therefore I expect a similar level of caring for the lives of others from others.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • load more comments (5 replies)
  • load more comments (1 reply)
  • [–] 7 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    Keep in mind you're on a site where a solid number of users might downplay or relativise Srebrenica.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 34 points 4 months ago

    I remember people trying to bring awareness about Darfur 20 years ago.

    Not much has changed...

  • source
  • [–] 29 points 4 months ago (18 children)

    What is the world supposed to do? Invade?

  • source
  • hideshow 18 child comments
  • load more comments (18 replies)
    [–] 20 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    There's much less direct military funding and support fueling Sudan so most people have no real outlet or mechanism for addressing it beyond support for humanitarian aid efforts and the UN.

    There's not an easily identified or direct policy that can be pointed at, as if an actor were receiving billions direct military aid and support. Like, even Israel is split on which side they're supporting. Ukraine and Russia alike have supported opposition to the RSF.

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 17 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    Fuck the sponsors of this genocide which is the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that support the so called 'Rapid Support Forces', and fuck the supporters of UAE, Germany. UAE is making shitloads of money from this bestiality as they provide the (partly German) weaponry and get paid in Sudanese blood-gold. Germany is supporting UAE for nodding to everything Israel does.

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 9 points 4 months ago (11 children)

    okay so let me get this straight. it's up to me to sort out the fascism in my home country, stop the genocide in sudan, stop the genocide in gaza, stop the genocide in ukraine, stop the genocide in china, would you also like a pony sir? what ever happened to a people's responsibility of self determination that y'all keep throwing in my face whenever i mention that the orange fuckface has become an international problem and it's time to start employing economic sanctions to try reining in the united states? y'all stop your own genocides.

  • source
  • hideshow 16 child comments
  • [–] 29 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    What!? Do you not even care about climate change? Why do you hate nature?

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 18 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    A duck bit me once and now the world must burn

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 11 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    It's up to you to bite the duck

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    I'm concerned if I bite it back I'll get the runs out something. I hear they have worms

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • load more comments (2 replies)
  • [–] 8 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    okay so let me get this straight. it’s up to me to sort out the fascism in my home country, stop the genocide in sudan, stop the genocide in gaza, stop the genocide in ukraine, stop the genocide in china,

    Not only you but the rest of the population as well. And really, if we all cooperated together on this, these issues could be solved easily in a few years, if not months.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago

    Not only you but the rest of the population as well. And really, if we all cooperated together on this, these issues could be solved easily in a few years, if not months.

    If we really cooperated and agreed on the goals (that's the hard one) we could fucking rebuild our society into a just and benevolent one practically overnight. I don't want to go through eugenics wars to get there or whatever other horror science fiction says we need in order to do what we can intellectually conceptualize. The short version of that is "it works cause everyone who didn't get it is dead!" and that's one hell of a failure

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (6 replies)
    [–] 9 points 4 months ago* (1 child)

    Americans have no power we can’t even get healthcare, family leave, affordable college, food assistance or affordable housing and they’re literally building for profit concentration camps everywhere. Our future is medical bankruptcy, homelessness, mass surveillance, “terrorist watch lists” and a core civic slave labor camps

  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 8 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    What are other African nations doing about it?

  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago

    When has the human race ever cared about a genocide, absent some material reason to do so?

  • source
  • load more comments
    view more: next ›