The 2023 Russian Coup.

[tim]

Few of the Russians and Ukrainians I teach had even been born when RD2003 was getting pie-eyed in Petrograd.

 

[tim]

Yet more drivel about the Russian 'national character'.

It's not "more drivel", it's the same old vintage drivel.

Chateau RD 1988.

 

[ska invita]

Few of the Russians and Ukrainians I teach had even been born when RD2003 was getting pie-eyed in Petrograd.

Tbf the majority of Russian students in the UK come from wealthy families who also value not being in Russia to whatever extent... There is a class dimension to continued Putin support.

It is basically impossible for anyone to know at this point the extent of sentiments in Russia.

This polling suggests Putin support as high as it ever was, but for a variety of reasons its unreliable ... Hard to trust people are answering freely. That said I think it's a mistake to presume a majority are against him just because we are.

Putin approval rating Russia 2024 | Statista

Vladimir Putin's popularity level saw a slight increase in February 2024. The vast majority of Russians approved of activities of their country's president.

www.statista.com

 

[Yossarian]

Yet more drivel about the Russian 'national character'.

There's probably some mirror-image wanker in Moscow at this very minute who went on a few package tours to London 30 to 35 years ago and is now expounding upon the immutable nature of the British character and its implications for the war

 

[RD2003]

It's not "more drivel", it's the same old vintage drivel.

Chateau RD 1988.

Few of the Russians and Ukrainians I teach had even been born when RD2003 was getting pie-eyed in Petrograd.

It was mostly in Moscow. And you should be able to see that when people were born makes no difference to the overall picture.

 

[RD2003]

There's probably some mirror-image wanker in Moscow at this very minute who went on a few package tours to London 30 to 35 years ago and is now expounding upon the immutable nature of the British character and its implications for the war

It isn't anything to do with national character. It 's about material conditions and pragmatism.

 

[tim]

Tbf the majority of Russian students in the UK come from wealthy families who also value not being in Russia to whatever extent... There is a class dimension to continued Putin support.

It is basically impossible for anyone to know at this point the extent of sentiments in Russia.

This polling suggests Putin support as high as it ever was, but for a variety of reasons its unreliable ... Hard to trust people are answering freely. That said I think it's a mistake to presume a majority are against him just because we are.

Putin approval rating Russia 2024 | Statista

Vladimir Putin's popularity level saw a slight increase in February 2024. The vast majority of Russians approved of activities of their country's president.

www.statista.com

The Russians are middle class mostly, definitely not the oligarchs and their children, and at the moment the few that we get are nearly all from Moscow or St Petersburg, although we have one slightly older man from Chechnya, which he doesn't consider Russian.

I teach more Ukrainians at the moment, for obvious reasons.

 

[RD2003]

So you’re building your thesis on your experience of a group of people 30-35 years ago? The people of Russia have been through an awful lot in the last 35 years. The world has also changed an awful lot in the last 35 years, both inside and outside of Russia. Don’t you think that all this might have had an effect on the popular discourses, repertoires, representations, identities etc of the Russian people? Or is your theory that these things are static?

Yes these things have changed, in many instances for the worse. For one thing, I suspect that I'd find Russians in general a lot less friendly and open than under the rule of Gorbachev and co. But you seem well connected to some Russians, so why don't you wangle an invitation to go and stay a while and test how your liberalism is going down there at present?

Edit-apologies Kabbes, I quoted you thinking I was replying to Tim, who seems to place great hope in his students, seemingly oblivious to how many westerners assumed that 'the young people will sort it out ' during Perestroika. (Many did, I suppose, but in their own way.)

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

There's probably some mirror-image wanker in Moscow at this very minute who went on a few package tours to London 30 to 35 years ago and is now expounding upon the immutable nature of the British character and its implications for the war

I've always found that plucky Brits will make any sacrifice necessary, as long as they have a nice cup of tea afterwards.

 

[Pickman's model]

I've always found that plucky Brits will make any sacrifice necessary, as long as they have a nice cup of tea afafterwards.

And warm beer and sandwiches

 

[SpookyFrank]

There's probably some mirror-image wanker in Moscow at this very minute who went on a few package tours to London 30 to 35 years ago and is now expounding upon the immutable nature of the British character and its implications for the war

Maybe giving lectures about how everyone here is in thrall to the god-emperor Elvis Costello.

 

[tim]

Yes these things have changed, in many instances for the worse. For one thing, I suspect that I'd find Russians in general a lot less friendly and open than under the rule of Gorbachev and co. But you seem well connected to some Russians, so why don't you wangle an invitation to go and stay a while and test how your liberalism is going down there at present?

Edit-apologies Kabbes, I quoted you thinking I was replying to Tim, who seems to place great hope in his students, seemingly oblivious to how many westerners assumed that 'the young people will sort it out ' during Perestroika. (Many did, I suppose, but in their own way.)

I don't place hope in anyone in particular. Unlike you, I've given up trying to be a wise all knowing sage. We all know your take in this now and it's getting tedious.

Can't you come up with some new bollocks to bore us with, perhaps an overarching theory based in your experiences of somewhere you used to get pissed earlier this millennium?

 

[Magnus McGinty]

I think I’d give unequivocal support if the alternative was novichok or falling out of a window.

 

[RD2003]

I don't place hope in anyone in particular. Unlike you, I've given up trying to be a wise all knowing sage. We all know your take in this now and it's getting tedious.

Can't you come up with some new bollocks to bore us with, perhaps an overarching theory based in your experiences of somewhere you used to get pissed earlier this millennium?

I don't claim to be all-knowing, nor do I try to pretend that it's a theory of any kind, as opposed to mere observation. I only remind people of what they know already, however hard they try to ignore it.

 

[RD2003]

I think I’d give unequivocal support if the alternative was novichok or falling out of a window.

To hear many people these days you'd assume that most of the Russian population is constantly in danger of falling out of a window. It would be interesting to see staistics detailing how many among the Russian political class this has actually happened to.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

To hear many people these days you'd assume that most of the Russian population is constantly in danger of falling out of a window. It would be interesting to see staistics detailing how many among the Russian political class this has actually happened to.

Well we know that Navalany had an attempt on his life and is currently in prison. And I can probably count ten it’s happened to in the UK alone.

 

[RD2003]

Well we know that Navalany had an attempt on his life and is currently in prison. And I can probably count ten it’s happened to in the UK alone.

Who are the ten Russians who have fallen from a window in the UK?

Political opponents who are considered a serious threat by the Putin regime clearly do risk repression or even death. But there are probably fewer high-profile Russians being murdered now that during the Yeltsin years. Certainly far, far more of them were murdered in the 1990s than in the final three or so decades of the USSR combined

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Who are the ten Russians who have fallen from a window in the UK?

They're not all Russian and not all fell from windows. In Stephen Curtis' case it was a helicopter crash. He got killed simply for being part of Berezovsky's 'inner circle'. Along with a few others.

 

[RD2003]

They're not all Russian and not all fell from windows. In Stephen Curtis' case it was a helicopter crash. He got killed simply for being part of Berezovsky's 'inner circle'. Along with a few others.

Maybe, but I thought we were talking about Russians falling from windows, seemingly the most currently fashionable western liberal cliche about Russia.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Maybe, but I thought we were talking about Russians falling from windows, seemingly the most currently fashionable western liberal cliche about Russia.

There's an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to this supposed 'fashionable western liberal cliche' that you can have an enjoyable afternoon perusing if it takes your fancy.

Suspicious deaths of notable Russians in 2022–2024 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[RD2003]

There's an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to this supposed 'fashionable western liberal cliche' that you can have an enjoyable afternoon perusing if it takes your fancy.

Suspicious deaths of notable Russians in 2022–2024 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Again, nobody's arguing about suspicious deaths but about the myth of high-profile Russians constantly falling from windows.

 

[Raheem]

Again, nobody's arguing about suspicious deaths but about the myth of high-profile Russians constantly falling from windows.

It's similar to the lazy trope about Fred West burying his victims under his patio, when actually most of them were buried elsewhere.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Again, nobody's arguing about suspicious deaths but about the myth of high-profile Russians constantly falling from windows.

There's nine cases of death from falling from a height on those lists. Which strikes me as a lot.

 

[RD2003]

There's nine cases of death from falling from a height on those lists. Which strikes me as a lot.

Was it from windows though?

 

[Raheem]

How many of them died defending Vladimir Putin through the use of pedantry, I wonder.

 

[RD2003]

How many of them died defending Vladimir Putin through the use of pedantry, I wonder.

There's probably a Wikepedia entry about it. That's the kind of world we're living in now.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Was it from windows though?

One was a cliff, another over railings, a couple of balconies and windows. I doubt the architectural details mattered to the deceased.

 

[Rimbaud]

There's another 145 million(?) to consider however. Many, many of whom are unlikely to be anything like your students in their beliefs, habits and expectations etc.

I know you don't like to hear of my 1988-93 experiences in Russia for some reason, but the kind of people I became acquainted with almost convinced me that there was 'another Russia,' as they say. I now suspect that subsequent events drove many of them into the Putin/ nationalist camp, having already noticed that being in favour of 'liberal' change didn't mean you weren't, at bottom, a 'Great Russian Chauvanist.' Not all but some of them, as changing events bring about changing alliances. The Russia that the self-styled Soviet liberals envisaged (which was bound up with not a small amount of personal ambition and cynicism on the part of people who understood perfectly the nature of their own society) proved an utter disaster, and explains, amongst other things, the Ukraine war.

In my experience, most Russians tell a westerner what they assume they want to hear. The same goes for Ukrainians-they did, after all, grow up in the same society.

I hope your Russian is at least B2 level to be holding forth with such confidence about what Russians are really like.

If it was so self evident then surely all Russians would share your opinion, but they don't.

 

[gosub]

Maybe giving lectures about how everyone here is in thrall to the god-emperor Elvis Costello.

Did think of him yesterday reading about the amount of ship building going on in Asia

 

[RD2003]

I hope your Russian is at least B2 level to be holding forth with such confidence about what Russians are really like.

If it was so self evident then surely all Russians would share your opinion, but they don't.

Don't know what B2 level is, but I did get quite good at it. Not so much now, as I never go there and I'm too much of a lazy bastard to practice. In any case, many, many people at the time, as nowadays probably, were more than willing to speak to you in English.

Don't know where the rest is coming from, however, as like others on here you seem to assume that I'm claiming my opinion, gleaned from a variety of sources including personal experience, is the final word, and that all Rusians would agree with me. If people bothered to read before jumping in it would become quite clear that I'm not, but I do also have an opinion on who will be proved correct in all this.