[Pasolini 266]

  On 6/27/2024 at 12:18 PM, nenad said:

My last post on this subject, too. 

 

There are different points of view and in this day and age propaganda war is more important than ever. One could argue that Russia invaded Ukraine because they are truly evil people. Someone else might argue that Russia just invaded parts of Ukraine to protect independent republics and Russian speaking people who identify more with Russia than the regime in Kiev (or Kyiv as they would say now) which has close ties to known neo nazi organizations. The truth is probably somewhere in between and this is the consequence to collective west and Nato poking the bear and getting closer and closer to Russian borders and it's sphere of influence. And of course Ukrainian people is the one suffering. So, IOC in no way should be the arbiter of "truth" especially given it's silence on number of other conflicts and war crimes.. 

 

We talked about Israel. If Russia is punished why not Israel? Because they were attacked on Sept 7? Yeah, they were attacked. But three points on that. They were attacked why? Does it maybe have to do something with decades of silent genocide on Palestinians? Did Israel Palestinian conflict started on Sept 7? Secondly, is their response proportionate? Not bloody likely. One crime doesn't justify 100s of others. And thirdly, could Russia have the same answer as Israel in saying, yeah our people in Donbas has been attacked, why wouldn't we defend them? 

 

And Belarus is punished for Russia using their territory like they have any saying in that. And if Belarus is punished, than why Americans aren't punished for providing bombs to Israelis, why Gulf countries aren't punished for providing arms to Hamas and Iran for Hezbollah and Turkey for providing safe pathway to ISIS to come into Syria and devastate both them and Iraq. We could go on for days like this. 

 

Point being, history is going to be written by victors. If Nazis won WW2, we wouldn't be hearing about concentration camps and killing of jews, but sure they would talk about some allied crimes for sure. We know in Serbia there were crimes committed by partisans and chetniks and russians and germans too. Only difference were some were more heinous and some were more reported depending on a time who was in charge of country. 

 

IOC should not be on the side of "western democracies" in deciding what's fair and what's not, it should be only about sports, but we all know who is in charge in this world. Still.. But not for long I would think. 

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Thanks for being a sensible voice in this thread! 
History and politics are not one-sided. But it's hard to people (directly affected specially) to notice it.

[Pasolini 266]

But to be honest, I think we are trying to do something a bit naive, which is to hope for peace all over the world and that all people feel represented by governments etc. It is a bit unreal... and reminds me about "Olympism", which is deep down an utopia.

 

That's why I think we will never really have "one-sided evil", so all these discussions are amazing but don't provide us with real answers. And that's why it shouldn't be a criteria to determine the participation of a NOC in the Olympic Games.

[Pasolini 266]

  On 6/26/2024 at 10:44 AM, mpjmcevoy said:

Civilians are not 'occupying forces', a ridiculous and offensive statement. Or are we expel anyone with some distant portuguese or african blood from Brazil and give it back in toto to its first finders?

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It doesn't need to be about giving back, but to recognize it.

 

And specially in regards to New Caledonia, Tahiti and other French forces: how can one expect that a person born in France, tied to France and to a French company, working and living in the island for a few years, hoping to come back to France later, could have a fair saying on the future of the island?

 

And yeah, @De_GambassiBrazil does a horrible job regarding that.

I think it's naive to think Israel is not attacking Palestine for decades, so for...

 

[Pasolini 266]

  On 6/24/2024 at 8:21 PM, mpjmcevoy said:

No, Kalaks are asking for independence. Kalaks are indigenous people in NC, but they are the minority. Your argument is not helped by reliance on such poor analogies.

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They are minorities, because France politics sent a lot of French people there to settle and occupy, it makes total sense that the occupying forces are majority.