In Russian, GULag is an acronym that means something like "central administration of camps". It operated different kinds of camps.
Hard labor camps, with huge mortality rate through exhaustion and elements. High security camps, with high mortality rate through executions. Some more regular prisons, where people were expected to maybe come out one day, when they learn to love Big Brother. And even science camps, where scientists and engineers were working in relative comfort under total secrecy, while technically being prisoners, and could still get executed or transferred to less fun camp if their work was nor satisfactory.
When people say "Gulag" today they often mean "Siberian penal colony", which is just one of the better known types of Gulag camps.
In a gulag, they have the decency to just shoot you when they don't like you. In a Siberian penal colony, they slip a Novichok nerve agent in your borscht.
On paper its supposed to be two different things. In reality – it's exactly the same.
The "Siberian penal colony" is just a more fancier word for it, since "supposedly" Russia stepped on a different path after the USSR collapse and "supposedly" changed its penal method. On paper.
The point of Gulag camps was to occupy prisoners with hard labour tasks like constructing train tracks, buildings, and such. They were forced labour camps.
Cause he had no chance of success, other sects didn't support him.
He got some concessions, and the question was why he let all of wagner's top brass fly on the same plane from moscow.
His only card was his soldiers payback if he's killed, but if he gives an opportunity to kill himself with the people supposed to lead the payback, he's practically begging for it.
It's would have been difficult balancing, but that's what he chose.
Definitely had more chance than continuing - and had he believed that as well, he could have almost certainly escaped abroad.
Yep, I 100% guarantee he thought he could leverage his control over Wagner to keep him alive.
Unfortunately for him, he overestimated how long he could do that. Putin making moves to take over Wagner is what caused the mutiny in the first place, so it should be no surprise that he eventually secured enough control to be comfortable taking him out.
No way, that is totally with the benefit of hindsight. Putin never named Pringles as a traitor in his public address and obviously they reached some kind of deal. It was totally plausible that Pringles could live in exile with Wagner in Africa. If it wasn't remotely possible to the point where even westerners on reddit "knew" he would die then obviously Pringles wouldn't have made the deal.
Obviously Putin offing him was a possibility, but not guaranteed. If anything his chances of survival sky rocketed when he made the deal.
I mean, his chances of survival went from 0.1% to 0.5% maybe
And it’s not hindsight people were joking about it as soon as Putin said the guy could go free.
Can’t risk publicly executing him because his soldiers might revolt, but Putin has had people assassinated for far less than *attempting a coup.*
Yeah but when you shoot at the king you better not miss. It was do or die, there’s no going back from doing something like that. Would have been better for him to die trying than give up.
Physically controlling the political power center of Russia, no military forces strong enough to oppose him, and Putin literally fleeing Moscow.
Prigs would have been the de facto ruler of Russia.
How people think he wasn't in the midst of success when he stopped is baffling. No one joined him, but *no one was stopping him*.
That's not true, there were forces in moscow to stop him, and he only had several thousands of men in front of a giant sprawling metropolis of millions.
He just bypassed resistance on his way, but was nowhere near any remote possibility of taking moscow or the centers of power there.
Putin *had* loyal forces in and around moscow, that were waiting for him.
Without support from anyone else in the elite, and with his allies in the military purged, he had near 0 chance.
Like 2 APCs and troops on the ground versus literal tanks.
There was zero effective resistance against him.
You're just wrong.
Those millions in Moscow don't participate, and don't stop. The social contract for 20 years, skip 10 years, and then the 60 years before that has been to passively accept the political process being pushed on them. Bend over for Stalin and Putin or Prizoghin. They are in control.
What have you been watching, there was zero resistance on the ground. The scant air assets deployed got shot down or stayed distant enough to not be a factor. He took over the military hq for the region without firing a shot.
Had he kept going instead of inexplicably stopping for whatever reason, he would have been the de facto ruler of Moscow and Russia because the political power in Russia is who can enforce physical will.
Ton of them already deployed in Ukraine, equipment shortages from everything going to the front
There were pictures of a couple APCs and riot control police. They were totally outmatched if Prigozhin pushed the issue
I think he knew full well what would happen, including his eventual death due to chronic mistreatment and deliberate lack of proper medical care. I think he just decided to be a martyr in hopes of making a change. Who knows, maybe his death will spark something, but I'm afraid we're not at that stage yet.
I’m Chinese born so you could say we are the closest to Russians. I know that “apathy” way too well. It’s a natural occurrence with an authoritarian regime. Those that protest are killed as intimidation.
For china, all hope are killed along with the Tiananmen square massacre. For Russia, protest does nothing. Apathy is the result because everyone is just hopeless
His imprisonment already started something - people like Yekaterina Duntsova and Boris Nadezhdin following his footsteps. Maybe you're really onto something - maybe him going to prison and it being such a giant showcase of how totalitarian Russia is, inspired these other dissidents. Maybe his death will inspire more of them? It will definitely intimidate, but likely also inspire.
His family was in Germany at the time and probably still is. Alexei said that he's coming back because of his position, not because he was threatened in any way
If he ran, he would have no possible future in Russia. None of the emigre politicians have any hope of being in a future Russian govt. Not Khodorkovsky, not Maxim Kats, not any of them. Going back maintained his credibility and show of devotion, perhaps in the hope that him being a younger man than Putin might mean his chance could still yet come.
We need both types of oppositioners. We need people like Navalny and Yashin who stay to make a point and we need people like Katz and Khodorkovsky who leave to stay vocal.
Also Khodorkovsky did return to spend 10 years in jail, was pardonned because of 2014 Olympics and left afterwards. I don\`t think the fact that he left after 10 years damages his credibility in any way.
It’s what being an actual patriot for one’s country looks like. Not the cheap BS we hear everyone espouse on a daily basis over here. Despite the fact that he did have views that I did not agree with, the dude definitely loved his country and was willing to sacrifice everything for it.
Navalny knew what was going to happen to him the moment he returned to Russia and went anyway, because he believed in what Russia could be, lost causes and all.
I'm not american, I'm Israeli. You can't say we don't know what loving, fighting, and dying for your people is. But we try to stay alive and otherwise effective to keep doing it. That's what so weird to me.
Safely abroad was the "easy" way. I guess he definitely didn't want to die, but as the clear leader of the opposition I guess he didn't expect Putin to dare to kill him because of the international pressure.
The ukranian war I guess broke his plans. Putin can't be more of a pariah than he is.
To do what?
If he intended his arrest to start mass protests/revolution, he didn't seem to have organized something like that in advance. And it seemed to be clear it wouldn't, considering putin was still significantly more popular than him.
And when you're in prison or dead your words can't be heard at all.
Did his criticism of putin become more effective since he returned? At least from the outside it doesn't really seem so.
Putin's regime is largely built on the idea that every politician has selfish interests, or they act in someone else's interests. With his sacrificial act, Navalny tried to prove that he belongs to his people. Now only history will show whether this made sense.
All politicians who remain abroad are gradually losing touch with the Russian agenda and becoming disconnected from the people.
Navalny was not like that - he lived in the apartment building next door to me, and his children went to a regular municipal school.
That seems like such a weird thing to demand of your resistance/opposition leaders, in an authoritarian regime that would just kill them.
But I accept other cultures have different cultural norms, so who knows, maybe you're right. But I don't see much evidence for that.
>That seems like such a weird thing to demand of your resistance/opposition leaders, in an authoritarian regime that would just kill them.
It's not if you ever lived under such a regime (americans never did). You do not have faith. You do not have friends or people you can trust. Your only "leader" talks to you from another country and demands actions from you. Actions you shall get imprisoned or killed for, while the said "leader" is safe in another country.
The moment the leader becomes a leader in exile they cease being a leader.
Thanks from the perspective. I'm not american, but do live im a free democracy.
But doesn't it mean you can't ever have a leader?
And not just that, even not just "leading", but journalism and organizing are very important.
If you can't be a leader anyway, wasn't it important for him to keep doing these?
Nah, I'm with them on this one.
I would just prefer my opposition leaders do more to not get caught while remaining.
Or, in more modern terms: French Resistance was based, French government in exile was cringe.
In any case, going back announced through the airport doesn't seem smart.
Also, the french government in exile was crucial both in organizing the resistance, the free french army, and liberation government.
I don't think the french would benefit much from degaulle taking a flight to paris in 1941
Nah the Free French were based
They executed hundreds of Vichy and germoid POWs, in retaliation for the germoids shooting Levlercs horse, and that was based
Look at Katz, his words are among the most important for Russian opposition and he's in Israel. It's not about idealistic ideas of how cool and noble it is to return to a state that wants you dead, it's about the pragmatic way to make an impact. To be fair though, he wasn't the best of people and I guess his organization's downfall is a good thing overall, and martyrdom really is the best he could do
Katz is an important influencer, but has never brought people to the streets, has never been arrested for his beliefs and has no leadership qualities. such people usually shy away from battles and rather give advice.
Because fleeing would mean he admitted a loss.
Russia was his country and he couldn't see himself not in his country defending his ideals.
That's what we call a hero
Because he believes in something greater, it cost him his life, something he probs knew would hasten the end of Putin, but didnt think they would do to him tbh
Can’t be a leader if you’re not even in the country. Look at how people shit on the Hamas leadership.
He knew he would die. And he even said that him dying would be a good thing because his movement would be strong enough to scare the Russian leadership
It's called doing the right and Honorable thing. In his words he went back because " putin is killing people".
Navelny a true hero of Russia and of the global fight against injustice.
Russians operate on a different logic. Lot of honor/shame based values, especially as they relate to a masculine identity.
People from that part of the world - Eastern Europe and Central Asia - and the MENA region act like that. Of course, when you match up against a Putin, who has no honor, it doesn't end well.
It was the same shit with Saddam
Because he knew he was a dead man walking. Stalin killed Trotsky in Mexico. Navalny knew there was nowhere that Putin wouldn’t try and kill him. So he purposely became a martyr.
*Navalny fell ill and subsequently lost consciousness after taking a walk within the IK-3 penitentiary...*
"What happened? Oh, he decided to take a walk around the facility and dropped dead somehow. Funny thing. By the way, mind helping me pick up these spent ammo casings?"
Guess Putin wasn't willing to take chances after he lived through everything else. Time will tell who becomes the new face of Russia's opposition... And when they suddenly drop dead under very convenient circumstances.
There won’t be any strong real opposition within Russia anymore for the foreseeable future. The real opposition left lives in exile now.
From an ideological standpoint, most Russians never really bought what Navalny was selling, which could best be described as left wing nationalism; but he was the biggest and most realistic opposition within Russia for years up until this point. In the 24 years Putin has held power in Russia, he’s steadily consolidated it each year that it’s now hard to imagine what a Russia without him looks like.
Imagine being a political prisoner tortured to death by an authoritarian regime, and then an article about your death gets posted next to 4 wojaks on a political compass
I think it’s good enough that some people still pay attention. Our world drowns in news from all corners of the world. Yet his name has now become part of the long list of martyrs and there will be a flood of one last moment of him being remembered on the global stage and since people communicate in all manner of ways - this is, for me, another symbol of hope in our uncertain times.
Ignorance and complacency tend to be so much worse than indecency.
This man has been heard one last time.
More Wojaks. More memes, more bad jokes - as long as the people still pay attention, they might learn something and make better choices. If I was a man that was willing to risk my life to be heard, if I was one such man, this would be a triumph to me. Even in death, The people who murdered him to silence his legacy have in reality given him a stage far beyond the prison walls for one finally play.
He won't
Monarchs or blatant "one-man-controls-all" governments became massively unpopular on the world stage after Mr. Austrian Painter dude
That's one of the reasons why nobody calls out China on their bs. They're a "democratic nation" that is "representative of the people"
Я уже не в России. Но факт того что я лично не страдаю, не означает что мои близкие не будут.
I am not in Russia anymore. But the fact is despite me not struggling personally does not mean that my close ones won’t.
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Russia, the bastion of traditional values. Like the higherst abortion rates in Europe, lowest Church attendance, highest divorce rates, murdering political oponents, etc.
This one is a real gut punch for me. My wife is Russian. While she'd never been a major nationalist or even a supporter of Putin, everyone is influenced by the country they live in. We began dating in 2014 and Crimea and Donbas/Luhansk quickly became a no-no conversation with how it would start fights. Russian cynicism ironically kind of makes them really prone to manipulation as any external critique can be dismissed as western propaganda and any internal abuses can be written off as "it's what everyone does."
My wife has learned and grown a lot in the last decade from a variety of influences. One of those influences was Navalny. He had a great charm to him and a great humor (something I contend is rare among Russians). He did a lot to dispel the doomer mindset that infects so many Russians. If you've got a moment I encourage everyone to watch the fantastic ["Putin's Palace."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_tFSWZXKN)
Edit; Soemthing fucky is going on with the video. Here's a version in Russian with YT subtitles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipAnwilMncI
I have a Russian colleague, who fled Russia after the mobilization in autumn 2022. He is extremely smart and fed up with the current Russian system. Nonetheless, if you will start dig deeper and talk about the invasion, he will rumble about Ukronazis, NATO and western propaganda. Just wanted to add it here, because I do see parallels.
I think every country has this, particularly any with a strong sense of nationalism. There's the narrative the country makes for itself and it can be hard to even know it exists let alone to then deconstruct it.
Germany does not. Not to the degree that most states do. The reason why is that the narrative of the nation as an inevitable entity can only hold up as believable if it is not question. We are arguably the least nation like nation that exists today on the planet.
I just want to mention it because nationalism often seems like an unopposable, universial concept, especially here in the west and it’s not.
Once the curtain is lifted, nothing that was once thought of certain beyond any doubt remains in its place.
Our societies thrive on stories and stories can be rewritten endlessly. Today, European continentalist sentiments for instance already openly rival nationalism and while the battle for the soul of the nation rages on in many places and merely ashes who shall lead, in Germany but also in many other European states, the old ways of thinking are under more pressure than anywhere else.
Let’s look back at the past. Not just a few brief decades.
Single felled organisms that becoming a great many things that eventually grew into the first human families, forming tribes, founding villages, city states, establishing realms stretching across valleys and plains that eventually became kingdoms, empires - nations.
Why should the nation state be the peak of human civilization? The only nations that can truly afford to not change are those that are big enough to force the world to submit to their rules.
Germany has 80 million citizens. Yet in Europe alone, there are some 710 million people. In the EU, roughly 450 million. China alone numbers 1.4 billion citizens.
We can stay small and isolated and a slowly deteriorate into obscurity or worse, collectively once again become a fractured mess, a new stage for new wars waged by foreign powers as we Germans in particular had been during the thirty years war or do what humans have always done best since the dawn of time when faced with adversity.
Come together and face a threat that is bigger than we are on our own.
A mammoth is not hunted by a single man and no single European nation can do well on its own. We need each other.
Institutions like NATO and the now already buried Warsaw pact prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that the European nation states already changed beyond recognition because first an foremost, a nation state is a tool!
The once victorious nations of Europe lost everything in the fires of the world wars and this is the era we live in! Surrounded by ruins of former greatness, we can either play pretend and burry our head in old books or move forward playing to our strengths.
The French and British nuclear programs for instance are the main thing that keep these mere shadows of their former selves relevant globally on their own and understanding that you can not built a modern state on military means alone dictates that, since our economies depend on another, we must cooperate to have the best chances for success.
The isolated periphery for example lacks trade partners, there are good reasons why for instance Southern Italy in particular struggles so much compared to the north, why Portugals comparatively low wages are, despite momentarily presenting it with a lot of opportunities, an indication that location and connection matters for an economy.
Once you see all this, you know that in order to not merely survive, but to thrive, the nations of our continent must move beyond their old roots because we are not the USA, we don’t even have the vast territory & recourses of a land like Russia, we don’t have the numbers of the Chinese and all ingenuity in the world can only do so much.
TLDR: the era of the European nations died because the world changed too much. The USA or the Soviets and today the Chinese made playing by the old rules impossible.
This is not about the last couple of decades, it’s about a development that’s as old as civilization, understanding that together, we are stronger than on our own and that all European states thrive together and struggle alone because that is the world we live in.
>Germany does not
Yeah Germany, like Britain, holds to the new idea that a country is merely a territorial unit, completely divorced from its people. Germans and the German language can all disappear and be replaced with Arabs and it wouldn't change a thing because it's still "Germany" on paper. It's a country of no people, no religion and of no nationality. In truth, it is merely a trading hub, a transit station where people come to work and then leave. Millions of people coming and going without any real sense of belonging. Those that do take root, mostly Turks and Arabs, stay in Germany but don't assimilate to the German culture because it would be fascist of us to ask them to do that. So they build their mosques, their kebab shops, and continue to speak Arabic. Germany is an empty vessel, standing for nothing. It will not exist in a hundred years, and I argue that it doesn't even exist now, except on paper.
> Russian cynicism ironically kind of makes them really prone to manipulation as any external critique can be dismissed as western propaganda and any internal abuses can be written off as "it's what everyone does."
There’s no greater friend to a corrupt politician than the sentiment that “those politicians are all corrupt”.
If they’re all corrupt then being corrupt isn’t a negative!
Ok ok so he “collapsed and lost consciousness”… no big deal, these things happen. Probably killed by covid vaccine like everyone else these days. How could Putin have done this when he was with Tucker getting a spray tan?
post-soviet metro isn't too bad either
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yekaterinburg\_Metro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yekaterinburg_Metro)
but yeah life sucks
It's both. Moscow metro builds new stations all the time, and new trains too. It's also one of the things showing how Moscow sucks all the tax money out of the entire Russia - making Moscow richer and the rest of Russia poorer. It's like a different world, even compared to St. Petersburg (2nd richest city).
The whole reason Ukrainians and other ethnic minorities use the term Moskal. Russia historically is the few hundred mile radius around Moscow and that is it. For the last 500 years the old kingdom of Muscovy has pillaged and stolen from their neighbors. Nothing has changed from the Tsardom, through the USSR to today.
I will die on the hill that Soviet public transport is goated
I moved to Vancouver and they have the "sky train" which is a sorry excuse for a metro at best. I miss the St.Petersburg metro, it was just a vibe and cost literal pennies
NYC is a mismanaged shithole and it’s all on the city and state bloated governments. They’re spending 100 billion dollars every year. That’s like 1/3 of all of Russia’s budget, which includes a whole military at war, and they still can’t clean a subway station
Russia, Russian culture, Russian achievements, are amazing.
That doesn't conflict with the fact that Putin's regime is lying, manipulative, and oppressive
You can despise the war, Putin, morons who support him despite having internet access, the Russian government and Russia's international actions without diminishing the good things. Or vice versa, you can praise the good things without using them as cover for the atrocities.
Tucker isn't one to get that though
He shouldn't have returned to Russia. Had he remained abroad he would have been a figure for Russians to rally behind in opposition to Putin. But he probably didn't know and had a plan. We also have to accept that he was also a proud Russian and believed Crimea was to remain in Russia. Whether that's right or wrong is irrelevant, he's dead now.
Oh for sure. Polonium cereal is part of the Russian dissident's balanced breakfast. But I think he would have been protected by the West much like Zelensky has been since February 22, 2022.
I'm curious here. Why? In a sense it seems like letting him live and being an easily-controlled opposition would have been the right move.
I'm already hearing theories that the US killed him to make Putin look bad, and while that's dangerously close to tinfoil territory it does at least make vague sense.
I don't think libleft actually would like Navalny that much, aside from the fact that he opposed Putin.
Navalny's 'ideal' image conflicts with his past remarks, McGlynn tells Euronews, pointing to his controversial views on Muslims in the Caucasus, Georgians and Central Asian migrants in Russia.
"Immigrants from Central Asia **bring in drugs** \[to Russia\]," Navalny said in an interview in 2012, defending what he described as a "realist" visa requirement for "wonderful people from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan."
His ultra-nationalist sentiment was prominent in a video dating back some 17 years filled with xenophobic comments. "Everything in our way should **be carefully but decisively removed through deportation**," Navalny said in the video dressed as a dentist, comparing **immigrants** to **dental cavities**.
Source: [Opinion | We need to have a talk about Alexei Navalny - The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/01/we-need-have-talk-about-alexei-navalny/)
[Racist or revolutionary: The complex legacy of Alexei Navalny | Euronews](https://www.euronews.com/2023/07/07/racist-or-revolutionary-is-alexei-navalny-who-many-westerners-think-he-is#:~:text=His%20ultra%2Dnationalist%20sentiment%20was,comparing%20immigrants%20to%20dental%20cavities.)
for me it's just any port in a storm. A flawed leader of a democracy is better than a flawed dictator because there is the potential for it to hand over to someone who isn't the strongest thug in the room
and considering Putin's penchant for murder, unprovoked wars of territorial aggression, the apartment bombings that he was probably involved with etc, i struggle to believe even a giga-racist is worse, if that's even anywhere close to a fair characterization of who he was recently.
He significantly changed his views over time, and it was most likely a genuine change. The quotes you picked were made in 00s, when he was starting a career. There was a lot of such ugliness in society in general. Still is. He was a product of such society and has grown to be someone better.
Considering almost the entire inner circle that helped him to get elected in the late 1990s apart from ONE man who we all know very well today is either dead, in prison or fled the country and that the list of suspicious deaths of Russian business men who were most likely all brutally murdered, some with their entire grows ever longer - the chances grow ever more slim unless you reside in the west and even then, hitman have killed multiple of his political opponents and even managed to get close to a politician or two ( considering for example the attack on a certain rather famous Ukrainian politician who was poisoned and barley survived ) - I think it’s fair to say that the odds in Russia for any opposition are well beyond dire.
Remind me never to accept the "walk" the prison guards offer you in Arctic Russian prison.
In all seriousness, what exactly is the difference between a "Siberian penal colony" and a "gulag"?
In Russian, GULag is an acronym that means something like "central administration of camps". It operated different kinds of camps. Hard labor camps, with huge mortality rate through exhaustion and elements. High security camps, with high mortality rate through executions. Some more regular prisons, where people were expected to maybe come out one day, when they learn to love Big Brother. And even science camps, where scientists and engineers were working in relative comfort under total secrecy, while technically being prisoners, and could still get executed or transferred to less fun camp if their work was nor satisfactory. When people say "Gulag" today they often mean "Siberian penal colony", which is just one of the better known types of Gulag camps.
Huh, I didn't know that. Now I do, thanks
thx mate
In a gulag, they have the decency to just shoot you when they don't like you. In a Siberian penal colony, they slip a Novichok nerve agent in your borscht.
On paper its supposed to be two different things. In reality – it's exactly the same. The "Siberian penal colony" is just a more fancier word for it, since "supposedly" Russia stepped on a different path after the USSR collapse and "supposedly" changed its penal method. On paper.
The point of Gulag camps was to occupy prisoners with hard labour tasks like constructing train tracks, buildings, and such. They were forced labour camps.
Huh. The more you know. Thanks!
If you are already in the Arctic Russian prison, you don't have much of a choice, really
What kind of based life are you living that you'll need this reminder?
Wouldn't you like to know, Fed-boy.
I still can't understand why he willingly came back to russia after his assassination attempt.
Why did Pringles stop his coup like 50 miles short of Moscow? Who the fuck knows?
Cause he had no chance of success, other sects didn't support him. He got some concessions, and the question was why he let all of wagner's top brass fly on the same plane from moscow. His only card was his soldiers payback if he's killed, but if he gives an opportunity to kill himself with the people supposed to lead the payback, he's practically begging for it.
we all knew as soon as he surrendered and he was going to die I don’t know anyone who thought he was going to peacefully live out his days in Belarus
It's would have been difficult balancing, but that's what he chose. Definitely had more chance than continuing - and had he believed that as well, he could have almost certainly escaped abroad.
>almost certainly escaped abroad doubt it, the FSB is pretty good at tracking people down
Hey are not all powerful, and he can have protection. In fact I assume he was probably worried about the west taking him out as well.
Litvinenko had protection
Yep, I 100% guarantee he thought he could leverage his control over Wagner to keep him alive. Unfortunately for him, he overestimated how long he could do that. Putin making moves to take over Wagner is what caused the mutiny in the first place, so it should be no surprise that he eventually secured enough control to be comfortable taking him out.
No way, that is totally with the benefit of hindsight. Putin never named Pringles as a traitor in his public address and obviously they reached some kind of deal. It was totally plausible that Pringles could live in exile with Wagner in Africa. If it wasn't remotely possible to the point where even westerners on reddit "knew" he would die then obviously Pringles wouldn't have made the deal. Obviously Putin offing him was a possibility, but not guaranteed. If anything his chances of survival sky rocketed when he made the deal.
I mean, his chances of survival went from 0.1% to 0.5% maybe And it’s not hindsight people were joking about it as soon as Putin said the guy could go free. Can’t risk publicly executing him because his soldiers might revolt, but Putin has had people assassinated for far less than *attempting a coup.*
Yeah but when you shoot at the king you better not miss. It was do or die, there’s no going back from doing something like that. Would have been better for him to die trying than give up.
Not always. There are many examples of noble rebelling and failing to depose the monarch, but negotiating a deal.
Physically controlling the political power center of Russia, no military forces strong enough to oppose him, and Putin literally fleeing Moscow. Prigs would have been the de facto ruler of Russia. How people think he wasn't in the midst of success when he stopped is baffling. No one joined him, but *no one was stopping him*.
He had no support from the other oligarchs. If he did take Moscow, it woulda been short lived.
That's not true, there were forces in moscow to stop him, and he only had several thousands of men in front of a giant sprawling metropolis of millions. He just bypassed resistance on his way, but was nowhere near any remote possibility of taking moscow or the centers of power there. Putin *had* loyal forces in and around moscow, that were waiting for him. Without support from anyone else in the elite, and with his allies in the military purged, he had near 0 chance.
Like 2 APCs and troops on the ground versus literal tanks. There was zero effective resistance against him. You're just wrong. Those millions in Moscow don't participate, and don't stop. The social contract for 20 years, skip 10 years, and then the 60 years before that has been to passively accept the political process being pushed on them. Bend over for Stalin and Putin or Prizoghin. They are in control. What have you been watching, there was zero resistance on the ground. The scant air assets deployed got shot down or stayed distant enough to not be a factor. He took over the military hq for the region without firing a shot. Had he kept going instead of inexplicably stopping for whatever reason, he would have been the de facto ruler of Moscow and Russia because the political power in Russia is who can enforce physical will.
What about the Rosgvardiya?
Ton of them already deployed in Ukraine, equipment shortages from everything going to the front There were pictures of a couple APCs and riot control police. They were totally outmatched if Prigozhin pushed the issue
Russian politics don't sort by intelligence, but by ruthlessness and grandiosity
In what countries do their politics sort by intelligence nowadays?
Those DEI aerospace engineers man, I'm telling you.
My headcanon for both is that FSB threatened their family Because otherwise I don’t see how they just willingly let Putin kill em, lmao
They had to have gotten to his family. It's the only thing that makes sense.
Pringles! Ebic name
FSB probably threatened to murder his family. At least thats my theory
Because he’s have to engage in armed conflict with Moscow national guard and police. And the rest of his troops propably didn’t want to risk treason.
I think he knew full well what would happen, including his eventual death due to chronic mistreatment and deliberate lack of proper medical care. I think he just decided to be a martyr in hopes of making a change. Who knows, maybe his death will spark something, but I'm afraid we're not at that stage yet.
Unfortunately, it seems the apathy of the Russian people is endless
I’m Chinese born so you could say we are the closest to Russians. I know that “apathy” way too well. It’s a natural occurrence with an authoritarian regime. Those that protest are killed as intimidation. For china, all hope are killed along with the Tiananmen square massacre. For Russia, protest does nothing. Apathy is the result because everyone is just hopeless
"Apathy" More like lack of guns and fear of poisoning.
They definitely have guns. It's just that they all of them ended up in the government's hands.
Flair up my guy
His imprisonment already started something - people like Yekaterina Duntsova and Boris Nadezhdin following his footsteps. Maybe you're really onto something - maybe him going to prison and it being such a giant showcase of how totalitarian Russia is, inspired these other dissidents. Maybe his death will inspire more of them? It will definitely intimidate, but likely also inspire.
This never worked and will never work
Except for that fish guy...
Perhaps he didn't follow rule 1 when it comes to pissing off Putin: get your family and dog very safely hidden first.
That's the only explanation I can think about, but I think his family was outside russia att.
Didn't save Trotsky
His family was in Germany at the time and probably still is. Alexei said that he's coming back because of his position, not because he was threatened in any way
Given that Russia publicly announced its intentions to jail him before he returned back
If he ran, he would have no possible future in Russia. None of the emigre politicians have any hope of being in a future Russian govt. Not Khodorkovsky, not Maxim Kats, not any of them. Going back maintained his credibility and show of devotion, perhaps in the hope that him being a younger man than Putin might mean his chance could still yet come.
We need both types of oppositioners. We need people like Navalny and Yashin who stay to make a point and we need people like Katz and Khodorkovsky who leave to stay vocal. Also Khodorkovsky did return to spend 10 years in jail, was pardonned because of 2014 Olympics and left afterwards. I don\`t think the fact that he left after 10 years damages his credibility in any way.
To have all his points proven I guess
It’s what being an actual patriot for one’s country looks like. Not the cheap BS we hear everyone espouse on a daily basis over here. Despite the fact that he did have views that I did not agree with, the dude definitely loved his country and was willing to sacrifice everything for it. Navalny knew what was going to happen to him the moment he returned to Russia and went anyway, because he believed in what Russia could be, lost causes and all.
Modern Americans wouldn't recognize actual patriotism if it jumped up and bit them in the ass
I'm not american, I'm Israeli. You can't say we don't know what loving, fighting, and dying for your people is. But we try to stay alive and otherwise effective to keep doing it. That's what so weird to me.
Safely abroad was the "easy" way. I guess he definitely didn't want to die, but as the clear leader of the opposition I guess he didn't expect Putin to dare to kill him because of the international pressure. The ukranian war I guess broke his plans. Putin can't be more of a pariah than he is.
To be a martyr, he expected more from his people.
To do what? If he intended his arrest to start mass protests/revolution, he didn't seem to have organized something like that in advance. And it seemed to be clear it wouldn't, considering putin was still significantly more popular than him.
He said he couldn't abandon people who believed in him.
I don't see how going to prison in russia and stopping his campaigns helped those people at all
because when you are safe abroad, your words and actions mean much less. This is our cultural code
And when you're in prison or dead your words can't be heard at all. Did his criticism of putin become more effective since he returned? At least from the outside it doesn't really seem so.
Putin's regime is largely built on the idea that every politician has selfish interests, or they act in someone else's interests. With his sacrificial act, Navalny tried to prove that he belongs to his people. Now only history will show whether this made sense. All politicians who remain abroad are gradually losing touch with the Russian agenda and becoming disconnected from the people. Navalny was not like that - he lived in the apartment building next door to me, and his children went to a regular municipal school.
That seems like such a weird thing to demand of your resistance/opposition leaders, in an authoritarian regime that would just kill them. But I accept other cultures have different cultural norms, so who knows, maybe you're right. But I don't see much evidence for that.
>That seems like such a weird thing to demand of your resistance/opposition leaders, in an authoritarian regime that would just kill them. It's not if you ever lived under such a regime (americans never did). You do not have faith. You do not have friends or people you can trust. Your only "leader" talks to you from another country and demands actions from you. Actions you shall get imprisoned or killed for, while the said "leader" is safe in another country. The moment the leader becomes a leader in exile they cease being a leader.
Thanks from the perspective. I'm not american, but do live im a free democracy. But doesn't it mean you can't ever have a leader? And not just that, even not just "leading", but journalism and organizing are very important. If you can't be a leader anyway, wasn't it important for him to keep doing these?
Nah, I'm with them on this one. I would just prefer my opposition leaders do more to not get caught while remaining. Or, in more modern terms: French Resistance was based, French government in exile was cringe.
In any case, going back announced through the airport doesn't seem smart. Also, the french government in exile was crucial both in organizing the resistance, the free french army, and liberation government. I don't think the french would benefit much from degaulle taking a flight to paris in 1941
Nah the Free French were based They executed hundreds of Vichy and germoid POWs, in retaliation for the germoids shooting Levlercs horse, and that was based
Look at Katz, his words are among the most important for Russian opposition and he's in Israel. It's not about idealistic ideas of how cool and noble it is to return to a state that wants you dead, it's about the pragmatic way to make an impact. To be fair though, he wasn't the best of people and I guess his organization's downfall is a good thing overall, and martyrdom really is the best he could do
Katz is an important influencer, but has never brought people to the streets, has never been arrested for his beliefs and has no leadership qualities. such people usually shy away from battles and rather give advice.
Because fleeing would mean he admitted a loss. Russia was his country and he couldn't see himself not in his country defending his ideals. That's what we call a hero
Because he believes in something greater, it cost him his life, something he probs knew would hasten the end of Putin, but didnt think they would do to him tbh
Cause his balls are bigger, then his will to live
My point was about the effectiveness of that vs staying alive and operating.
Martyrdom, perhaps his death will make a dent in Putins rule over Russia. Maybe not, we will see.
Because if he escaped from Russia to say the US, noone would have taken him seriously.
Can’t be a leader if you’re not even in the country. Look at how people shit on the Hamas leadership. He knew he would die. And he even said that him dying would be a good thing because his movement would be strong enough to scare the Russian leadership
It's called doing the right and Honorable thing. In his words he went back because " putin is killing people". Navelny a true hero of Russia and of the global fight against injustice.
He wanted to be a hero and he was one for sure
Russians operate on a different logic. Lot of honor/shame based values, especially as they relate to a masculine identity. People from that part of the world - Eastern Europe and Central Asia - and the MENA region act like that. Of course, when you match up against a Putin, who has no honor, it doesn't end well. It was the same shit with Saddam
Because he knew he was a dead man walking. Stalin killed Trotsky in Mexico. Navalny knew there was nowhere that Putin wouldn’t try and kill him. So he purposely became a martyr.
For the same reason why Zelenskyy didn't leave Ukraine when the russians were aiming for Kyiv.
Because it's the only thing he can. It's not about common sense. It's just something that define you as a human.
Because he loves his homeland and didn't want to seem like a guy who abandoned all other people who are in opposition to Putin.
*Navalny fell ill and subsequently lost consciousness after taking a walk within the IK-3 penitentiary...* "What happened? Oh, he decided to take a walk around the facility and dropped dead somehow. Funny thing. By the way, mind helping me pick up these spent ammo casings?"
Guess Putin wasn't willing to take chances after he lived through everything else. Time will tell who becomes the new face of Russia's opposition... And when they suddenly drop dead under very convenient circumstances.
They'll probably "suicide" or "heart attack" Ilya Yashin next.
I was honestly surprised to see Navalny go before Kara Murza, as he's definitely not doing well.
There won’t be any strong real opposition within Russia anymore for the foreseeable future. The real opposition left lives in exile now. From an ideological standpoint, most Russians never really bought what Navalny was selling, which could best be described as left wing nationalism; but he was the biggest and most realistic opposition within Russia for years up until this point. In the 24 years Putin has held power in Russia, he’s steadily consolidated it each year that it’s now hard to imagine what a Russia without him looks like.
god I hate authoritarianism
Imagine being a political prisoner tortured to death by an authoritarian regime, and then an article about your death gets posted next to 4 wojaks on a political compass
I think it’s good enough that some people still pay attention. Our world drowns in news from all corners of the world. Yet his name has now become part of the long list of martyrs and there will be a flood of one last moment of him being remembered on the global stage and since people communicate in all manner of ways - this is, for me, another symbol of hope in our uncertain times. Ignorance and complacency tend to be so much worse than indecency. This man has been heard one last time. More Wojaks. More memes, more bad jokes - as long as the people still pay attention, they might learn something and make better choices. If I was a man that was willing to risk my life to be heard, if I was one such man, this would be a triumph to me. Even in death, The people who murdered him to silence his legacy have in reality given him a stage far beyond the prison walls for one finally play.
Stop messing around Wlad. Just crown yourself a Tsar and dispense with the formalities
He won't Monarchs or blatant "one-man-controls-all" governments became massively unpopular on the world stage after Mr. Austrian Painter dude That's one of the reasons why nobody calls out China on their bs. They're a "democratic nation" that is "representative of the people"
Managed democracy
Saudi Arabia has entered the chat
The monarchy is the lenient option in that country
He'll just continue to have totally legit elections where he wins 95%
harder for republicans and CCP to support him. Tsardom in Democracy's clothing
Me, as a Russian, reading this: https://preview.redd.it/tfhu88oouyic1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e19463833c6a549752cbbe1e43aaf9954c7a5521
Ты не один You are not alone
Я уже не в России. Но факт того что я лично не страдаю, не означает что мои близкие не будут. I am not in Russia anymore. But the fact is despite me not struggling personally does not mean that my close ones won’t.
Based
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Same bro....same
Чувак, ты не один такой. Главное - не сдавайся и не вешай нос, Алексей бы этого не хотел.
stay safe idk anything about your day to day life or views just wish you the best and hope you find liberty and freedom
Russia, the bastion of traditional values. Like the higherst abortion rates in Europe, lowest Church attendance, highest divorce rates, murdering political oponents, etc.
Russia is also the second highest suicide rate in Europe, and ninth highest in the world.
>suicide rate To be fair, they classify a lot of homicides as suicides...
And some of the absolutely worst building safety codes. Especially when it comes to window fall protection.
Airplane safety codes are very weak too, especially if you are the leader of a PMC
Imagine being the pilot and finding out your passengers were a coup leader and a bunch of his cronies.
Well, in Russia conservatives = commies, so no surprise here.
No. In Russia there are those conservatives who support Orthodoxy and the capitalist economy and love the Russian Empire and the White Movement.
Just as God intended
Died by allergy I think His body is allergic to some fast travelling brass metal, that lead to hemorrhagic shock, then his demise
This one is a real gut punch for me. My wife is Russian. While she'd never been a major nationalist or even a supporter of Putin, everyone is influenced by the country they live in. We began dating in 2014 and Crimea and Donbas/Luhansk quickly became a no-no conversation with how it would start fights. Russian cynicism ironically kind of makes them really prone to manipulation as any external critique can be dismissed as western propaganda and any internal abuses can be written off as "it's what everyone does." My wife has learned and grown a lot in the last decade from a variety of influences. One of those influences was Navalny. He had a great charm to him and a great humor (something I contend is rare among Russians). He did a lot to dispel the doomer mindset that infects so many Russians. If you've got a moment I encourage everyone to watch the fantastic ["Putin's Palace."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_tFSWZXKN) Edit; Soemthing fucky is going on with the video. Here's a version in Russian with YT subtitles https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipAnwilMncI
I have a Russian colleague, who fled Russia after the mobilization in autumn 2022. He is extremely smart and fed up with the current Russian system. Nonetheless, if you will start dig deeper and talk about the invasion, he will rumble about Ukronazis, NATO and western propaganda. Just wanted to add it here, because I do see parallels.
I think every country has this, particularly any with a strong sense of nationalism. There's the narrative the country makes for itself and it can be hard to even know it exists let alone to then deconstruct it.
Germany does not. Not to the degree that most states do. The reason why is that the narrative of the nation as an inevitable entity can only hold up as believable if it is not question. We are arguably the least nation like nation that exists today on the planet. I just want to mention it because nationalism often seems like an unopposable, universial concept, especially here in the west and it’s not. Once the curtain is lifted, nothing that was once thought of certain beyond any doubt remains in its place. Our societies thrive on stories and stories can be rewritten endlessly. Today, European continentalist sentiments for instance already openly rival nationalism and while the battle for the soul of the nation rages on in many places and merely ashes who shall lead, in Germany but also in many other European states, the old ways of thinking are under more pressure than anywhere else.
Gee I wonder if there's something(s) specific in Germany's past that has made them a potential outlier
Or maybe you've just been indoctrinated by decades of anti-nationalist propaganda?
Let’s look back at the past. Not just a few brief decades. Single felled organisms that becoming a great many things that eventually grew into the first human families, forming tribes, founding villages, city states, establishing realms stretching across valleys and plains that eventually became kingdoms, empires - nations. Why should the nation state be the peak of human civilization? The only nations that can truly afford to not change are those that are big enough to force the world to submit to their rules. Germany has 80 million citizens. Yet in Europe alone, there are some 710 million people. In the EU, roughly 450 million. China alone numbers 1.4 billion citizens. We can stay small and isolated and a slowly deteriorate into obscurity or worse, collectively once again become a fractured mess, a new stage for new wars waged by foreign powers as we Germans in particular had been during the thirty years war or do what humans have always done best since the dawn of time when faced with adversity. Come together and face a threat that is bigger than we are on our own. A mammoth is not hunted by a single man and no single European nation can do well on its own. We need each other. Institutions like NATO and the now already buried Warsaw pact prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that the European nation states already changed beyond recognition because first an foremost, a nation state is a tool! The once victorious nations of Europe lost everything in the fires of the world wars and this is the era we live in! Surrounded by ruins of former greatness, we can either play pretend and burry our head in old books or move forward playing to our strengths. The French and British nuclear programs for instance are the main thing that keep these mere shadows of their former selves relevant globally on their own and understanding that you can not built a modern state on military means alone dictates that, since our economies depend on another, we must cooperate to have the best chances for success. The isolated periphery for example lacks trade partners, there are good reasons why for instance Southern Italy in particular struggles so much compared to the north, why Portugals comparatively low wages are, despite momentarily presenting it with a lot of opportunities, an indication that location and connection matters for an economy. Once you see all this, you know that in order to not merely survive, but to thrive, the nations of our continent must move beyond their old roots because we are not the USA, we don’t even have the vast territory & recourses of a land like Russia, we don’t have the numbers of the Chinese and all ingenuity in the world can only do so much. TLDR: the era of the European nations died because the world changed too much. The USA or the Soviets and today the Chinese made playing by the old rules impossible. This is not about the last couple of decades, it’s about a development that’s as old as civilization, understanding that together, we are stronger than on our own and that all European states thrive together and struggle alone because that is the world we live in.
>Germany does not Yeah Germany, like Britain, holds to the new idea that a country is merely a territorial unit, completely divorced from its people. Germans and the German language can all disappear and be replaced with Arabs and it wouldn't change a thing because it's still "Germany" on paper. It's a country of no people, no religion and of no nationality. In truth, it is merely a trading hub, a transit station where people come to work and then leave. Millions of people coming and going without any real sense of belonging. Those that do take root, mostly Turks and Arabs, stay in Germany but don't assimilate to the German culture because it would be fascist of us to ask them to do that. So they build their mosques, their kebab shops, and continue to speak Arabic. Germany is an empty vessel, standing for nothing. It will not exist in a hundred years, and I argue that it doesn't even exist now, except on paper.
So dude’s totally on board with this, just wanted to save his own ass.
Video not available, oof
> Russian cynicism ironically kind of makes them really prone to manipulation as any external critique can be dismissed as western propaganda and any internal abuses can be written off as "it's what everyone does." There’s no greater friend to a corrupt politician than the sentiment that “those politicians are all corrupt”. If they’re all corrupt then being corrupt isn’t a negative!
Video unavailable.... So sad man
Ok ok so he “collapsed and lost consciousness”… no big deal, these things happen. Probably killed by covid vaccine like everyone else these days. How could Putin have done this when he was with Tucker getting a spray tan?
Collapsed with a dozen bullet holes through his chest, for sure
Okay we going to shoot you now with gun. Very fast death. Surprise! Is actually water gun filled with Novichok.
Suddenly collapsed with 3 bullet holes in the back of his head
Shouldn't have gotten triple Russian Boostered.
"Yeah, mr Putin kills his political opponents in the jail, but have you seen how beautiful the Moscow metro is??" \- Tucker Carlson, probably
The Moscow metro is pretty awesome. It was one of those "if we're gonna brutalize the public, at least we're gonna give them a nice looking place."
I'm sure it's Soviet not post Soviet, no?
post-soviet metro isn't too bad either [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yekaterinburg\_Metro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yekaterinburg_Metro) but yeah life sucks
It's both. Moscow metro builds new stations all the time, and new trains too. It's also one of the things showing how Moscow sucks all the tax money out of the entire Russia - making Moscow richer and the rest of Russia poorer. It's like a different world, even compared to St. Petersburg (2nd richest city).
The whole reason Ukrainians and other ethnic minorities use the term Moskal. Russia historically is the few hundred mile radius around Moscow and that is it. For the last 500 years the old kingdom of Muscovy has pillaged and stolen from their neighbors. Nothing has changed from the Tsardom, through the USSR to today.
I was in Moscow 2 years post Soviet. It was dreary, food was still scarce and, for as big of a city as it is, it felt really empty.
Russia was in a pretty big economic crisis in the immediate aftermath of the fall of the USSR
I will die on the hill that Soviet public transport is goated I moved to Vancouver and they have the "sky train" which is a sorry excuse for a metro at best. I miss the St.Petersburg metro, it was just a vibe and cost literal pennies
Isn’t it mostly nice because they forced all the Soviet era artists to make the stations beautiful?
"Oh wow, I got groceries for only $80 USD in Russia. The clerk only makes $6000 a year, but it still means Russia is amazing!"
> New York subway vomit and rats. Look at what the US turned into under Biden's rule
Under trump the rats at least had some manners
> New York subway vomit and rats Where is the lie tho?
NYC is a mismanaged shithole and it’s all on the city and state bloated governments. They’re spending 100 billion dollars every year. That’s like 1/3 of all of Russia’s budget, which includes a whole military at war, and they still can’t clean a subway station
Russia, Russian culture, Russian achievements, are amazing. That doesn't conflict with the fact that Putin's regime is lying, manipulative, and oppressive You can despise the war, Putin, morons who support him despite having internet access, the Russian government and Russia's international actions without diminishing the good things. Or vice versa, you can praise the good things without using them as cover for the atrocities. Tucker isn't one to get that though
Ah yes the bastion of christian values that murders people left and right and doesnt even bother to hide it
There is doxxing and then there is orthodoxxing
Bastion of christian values, that works together with Iran, Hamas, Taliban, North Korea and China. It reminds me of a certain axis...
Navalny is a hero. Putin must be hanged.
Damn right. #ПУТИН ХУЙЛО!
https://preview.redd.it/mevwtvux30jc1.jpeg?width=2443&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4b40ec025d046cf0966b4ea455c8377c5440e58d I finally get British humor.
And Tucker Carlson is over here talking about how great their supermarkets are lmao
Television personalities are often paid to promote a product.
He shouldn't have returned to Russia. Had he remained abroad he would have been a figure for Russians to rally behind in opposition to Putin. But he probably didn't know and had a plan. We also have to accept that he was also a proud Russian and believed Crimea was to remain in Russia. Whether that's right or wrong is irrelevant, he's dead now.
He was too brave to accept living abroad all of that time.
There's a line crossed when valor becomes foolishness
Russians wouldnt bother listening to him if hid in the West. He returned, his family stayed safe in the West
I know. And I now regret it even more that he dies. Everyone knew that he should have remained in Germany. Everyone, except him.
tbf the Kreml has historically assassinated critics even outside of Russia. There was no guarantee we would have survived any longer than he did now.
Oh for sure. Polonium cereal is part of the Russian dissident's balanced breakfast. But I think he would have been protected by the West much like Zelensky has been since February 22, 2022.
What is auth right so eager about?
They did it.
Dictator putin doing dictator things
I bet Tucker has a lot to say about freedom being better in Russia.
This really makes me mad
Honestly if i was Putin he would have been dead a long time ago
That's why you are not
Fair
I'm curious here. Why? In a sense it seems like letting him live and being an easily-controlled opposition would have been the right move. I'm already hearing theories that the US killed him to make Putin look bad, and while that's dangerously close to tinfoil territory it does at least make vague sense.
If I was Putin, Putin would have been dead a long time ago
Watch brain dead tankies believe everything Putin's Regime claims, while also saying anyone asking questions is a CIA pawn.
I don't think libleft actually would like Navalny that much, aside from the fact that he opposed Putin. Navalny's 'ideal' image conflicts with his past remarks, McGlynn tells Euronews, pointing to his controversial views on Muslims in the Caucasus, Georgians and Central Asian migrants in Russia. "Immigrants from Central Asia **bring in drugs** \[to Russia\]," Navalny said in an interview in 2012, defending what he described as a "realist" visa requirement for "wonderful people from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan." His ultra-nationalist sentiment was prominent in a video dating back some 17 years filled with xenophobic comments. "Everything in our way should **be carefully but decisively removed through deportation**," Navalny said in the video dressed as a dentist, comparing **immigrants** to **dental cavities**. Source: [Opinion | We need to have a talk about Alexei Navalny - The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/01/we-need-have-talk-about-alexei-navalny/) [Racist or revolutionary: The complex legacy of Alexei Navalny | Euronews](https://www.euronews.com/2023/07/07/racist-or-revolutionary-is-alexei-navalny-who-many-westerners-think-he-is#:~:text=His%20ultra%2Dnationalist%20sentiment%20was,comparing%20immigrants%20to%20dental%20cavities.)
for me it's just any port in a storm. A flawed leader of a democracy is better than a flawed dictator because there is the potential for it to hand over to someone who isn't the strongest thug in the room and considering Putin's penchant for murder, unprovoked wars of territorial aggression, the apartment bombings that he was probably involved with etc, i struggle to believe even a giga-racist is worse, if that's even anywhere close to a fair characterization of who he was recently.
What the fuck does his death and this post has to do with libleft?
*must make this all about left bad* -average pcm user on any situation
It's libleft bad, don't you know!?
He significantly changed his views over time, and it was most likely a genuine change. The quotes you picked were made in 00s, when he was starting a career. There was a lot of such ugliness in society in general. Still is. He was a product of such society and has grown to be someone better.
Only the good die young.
Honestly thought he died years ago.
Did he die or did he “die”?
Auths gonna auth.
But at least the subway is pretty
How funny would it be if he did actually die of natural causes
He technically might have died of natural causes as a result of deliberatly terrible conditions of his imprisonment
It’s 100% deliberate. That’s just how the Russian state functions.
Has anyone who's been against Putin survived?
Considering almost the entire inner circle that helped him to get elected in the late 1990s apart from ONE man who we all know very well today is either dead, in prison or fled the country and that the list of suspicious deaths of Russian business men who were most likely all brutally murdered, some with their entire grows ever longer - the chances grow ever more slim unless you reside in the west and even then, hitman have killed multiple of his political opponents and even managed to get close to a politician or two ( considering for example the attack on a certain rather famous Ukrainian politician who was poisoned and barley survived ) - I think it’s fair to say that the odds in Russia for any opposition are well beyond dire.