Do you actually asked locals what they think of Russia and China?

I’m not even going to bother replying to the rest of your bootlicking

Trolls and their unoriginal bad faith tactics of saying “not going to reply” when they know they are backed to a corner. At least you’re creative by preemptively pigeon shitting on the chessboard.

To the surprise of nobody.

When the citizens complain and want them out, they are silenced by coercing the local governments.

Do you have a source? American soldiers who commit crimes do get punished. Crimes of individual soldiers does not mean it’s institutionalised and sanctioned by American policies. Meanwhile, in South China Sea, Chinese vessels waterhose Vietnamese and Filipino fishermen and not letting other nations to traverse and fish in international waters, and claiming an entire body of water despite being well away from their legal zone.

For these countries, US is a lesser evil. But I have to admit, Trump’s shenanigans making these countries decouple from US, which is good.

P.S. Fuck Chinese and Russian governments too

Sure bud. Have a plausible deniability.

Although with Trump’s shenanigans, US dollar is gradually losing its value.

Many countries consciously outsource defense to the US, so that they could invest in their own people instead. A clear evidence of this attitude is when Spain expressed hesitancy to increase their defense budget. Obama has a point that EU has been “free riding”. However, the way Trump makes US allies to “pull their weight” is more coercive than diplomatic.

Shh…some will be offended when you call reddit and lemmy social media!

Contrary to certain narratives, and while it has some merit, US bases are in said countries at the explicit request of host countries because there is a perceived bigger and more existential threat next door. The host country is basically subcontracting the defense to the United States. Trolls would tell you that these countries were “influenced” or “coerced” to let American troops be stationed. Well, the US is not the one claiming the entirety of South China Sea, or invading Ukraine. South East Asia and EU want US troops to stay because of this. Poland is very US friendly, and so are Taiwan, Vietnam and Philippines. The Philippines elected to kick the American soldiers out 34 years ago, but are now regretting it with the benefit of hindsight due to territorrial dispute in South Chins Sea. Certain actors who push for US withdrawal stand to benefit from it for obvious reasons.

Bannon is a typical fascist with an outsized ego. He thinks he invented a new idea when he championed “economic nationalism”, where every country would focus on producing their own goods for domestic consumption. And I’m like “isn’t that autarky?” He just rebranded an old idea as if it’s new and claimed it as his own. Fascists think they’re genius when they aren’t.

my argument against it is that the total reliance on passive voice makes research FAR less accessible to people for whom english is a second languange and neurodivergent people. older academics tell me i’m being anti-intellectual.

That’s fair and completely understandable. One of the major reasons for anti-intellectualism are experts talking down on average people. A lot of experts and academics are typically affluent who hardly have to live with salt-of-the-earth, everyday workers and working class. It’s a well-known problem who in academia who scoff at student and laypeople. I am not an academic by profession, although I try to know the audience and talk to their level. But I admit that maybe I have come across as smug before without realising it.

younger academics tell me they don’t know what passive voice is and don’t believe it exists.

I guess the person just have to read academic literatures in their field to get the grasp on how to speak passively. It took awhile for me to master it.

If by social media you mean the brain rotting, ragebaiting sites like Facebook, X or Instagram, I don’t argue on them.

I spent so much time in academia. A lot of us are trained to make objective and impersonal analysis (such as avoiding the use of personal pronouns “I”, “we”, “us” etc.), which I did not realise before sounds dispassionate and cold to laymen. Someone asked me if I’m a bot because apparently I sounded like an anime character. A couple of times, I get into arguments because normal folks would accuse me of “yOu aRe mAkInG ExCuSeS tO TyRaNtS!!” for making a realpolitik analysis of a situation (/r/geopolitics in Reddit is heavily derided for this by average Redditors).

Academically trained folks are ingrained to be conscious of bias and rather encouraged to be more descriptive with the analysis, and less with prescriptive. Otherwise we’d get accused of bias. But when academics do voice out their opinions based on evidence and careful study, they’d be accused of bias. I probably don’t need to elaborate how often educational institutions are accused of being left or liberal. News flash: academics do not come in with inherent bias towards left/liberal thinking, it’s just that their study led them to be more left leaning. Wait until I tell people I am an advocate for a world government by giving UN more power. I might be accused as a globalist bot.

Coloured ink is expensive until much recently. Newspapers in richer countries have only gradually started to printed more in colour from late 1980s onwards. But in poorer countries, only the more serious newspapers who charges higher for their papers, could afford to print in colour, while the tabloids printed in black and white until the 2000s.

That’s why the complaint that “they intentionally print and post pictures in black and white, even though colour is available long ago, is so that people would think the events are old and feel detached” is silly and a first world problem for me. Printing in black and white was simply cheaper and also technically easier than printing in colour. Not to mention most photographers before the 1980s feel that taking photos in black and white is far classier and superior, in their minds.

Could be bit of both. Sweden has always been more right wing than their Scandinavian brethren. Their far right was strong during World War 2, and they have a far right in a coalition government at the moment. But on the one hand, Sweden allowed too many immigrants who share the same attitude as their own far right.

Two things can both be true at the same time.

Complaining on why black and white photos still being a thing in the 1980s and 90s is such a first world problem.

I wasn’t ready for this level of quantum level analysis of Jurassic Park.

I’M JUST HERE FOR THE DINOSAURS!!

That’s an interesting spin I have ever seen of whitewashing crimes of communist regimes. You’re definitely a tankie.

Doesn’t matter if your eyes are ripped, if you have no game.

I just go for the easy ones. I don’t bother with getting 100% achievements that needs to get the harder ones.

I never cheat online multiplayer. I like to be challenged and cheating ruins it.

I hate that modding is considered cheating by some games when all I want is quality of life improvement. Divinity 2 does this by disabling achievements if you installed any mods but thankfully there is another mod that re-enables achievements.

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I should add, those who defend China and USSR as if they can’t do anything wrong are DEFINITELY tankies.