Dissidents for “hey we need to fix the problems of socialism” or dissidents for “we have to dissolve socialist democracy and let the capitalists pillage us” were treated very differently

Do you seriously tell yourself the GDR was a democratic socialist country? The GDR not being democratic was exactly it’s problem and why it couldn’t reform its problems. And yeah, the people only wanted to get oppressed by capitalists when they protested in Leipzig and Berlin. If you really believe that I don’t know what to tell you. Are you some Wessi who doesn’t know shit about life in the GDR?

And the ones arguing for dissolving socialism got what they wanted, and the result is justification enough for their oppression tbh.

Man, they wanted something better than the shit show that their life had become. They had many ideas about how they could reform their country. A new socialist constitution, a emancipated reunion with the West etc. All they knew was that it couldn’t go on with the current SED clique.

How did the SED respond? Fucking off with the last money. They left their population with no help when they negotiated with Kohl. But hey, to you that’s just capitalist propaganda probably. Now it’s the people’s fault that they got screwed by the capitalists pfffff

Better to suppress right wing dissidents than let them oppress vast swathes of the population.

Holy shit bro. Do you think Hohenschönhausen was filled with right wingers and capitalists and that your beloved party didn’t oppress the population? First of right wing networks were left alone all over the country. What we see now in Thüringen and Sachsen didn’t just hop over from the BRD after the wall fell. It merely got reinforced. Second, do you really think only right wing dissidents got suppressed? My father got in trouble because he stepped into the voting booth, NOT casting his vote openly for the SED. Democratic my ass bro, righteous suppression of right wingers lol. 100k Stasi agents 200k informants just for right wing dissidents, yeah right

Yes these rights rights were lost, but this paints the GDR in a positive light regarding regarding civil rights when in reality people who showed a smidge of dissent were persecuted.

A war in Lebanon is actually bad for Netanyahu. His interest is a slow-burning war so he can prolong the current situation as much as possible

The current situation is that he’s in a war in Gaza and that is keeping him in office. He can still spin this as “we are fighting against an existential threat”. Rocket defence and retaliation strikes aka the slow burning war in Lebanon is not enough for the Israeli society to unite behind Bibi. Only if they seriously attack. And I think Netanyahu wants to provoke such an attack.

Sending thousands of bombs God knows where they land is not a proper defense. It’s a huge escalation where Hezbollah will answer. I think the best argument against this strike has been thrown around everywhere: What if Hezbollah made such an attack where 3000 bombs where sent to IDF people. We would talk about a terrorist attack. Why is that different now?

Why is it okay for them to bomb Lebanon as well?

Bibi really wants a war with Hezbollah, doesn’t he? I mean you can’t call it defending Israels safety anymore when you provoke any and all responses every other month with a missile here, a bomb there and now thousands of bombs everywhere. This is just another measure to keep Netanyahu in a conflict so that he doesn’t have to bear the consequences of multiple corruption cases against him and the dissolving of his coalition outside unity cases in a war. Why is Europe and the US still covering for him? What is the rest of Israel doing?

Netanyahu really doesn’t want these negotiations to come through, does he? How can he go to the hostage families and tell them he’s gonna get their relatives back when he bombs the shit out of the country they’re hidden in, has blown up and wanted to funnel sea water into the tunnels where they are most likely held (from an outsiders perspective) and now basically shot someone in the face across the negotiating table?

Tell me how that makes sense.

Water and Flying Pokemon gotta be beware man

Absolute insanity. When I’m seeing these things around the world and now in Ukraine I’m always trying to see a logical explanation, some twisted cynical reasoning for why you bomb these vulnerable civilian targets, and I can’t find anything. It’s just cruelty. Ukrainians aren’t going to surrender because of this, people and nations never have before. It just makes resistance to your war that much more defiant. If you bomb a childrens hospital, it’s just because you want to punish people for not letting you win.

The second part that hurts is that this changes so little in the grand scheme. Maybe some guy who was living under a rock who was skeptical changes his mind about this invasion. But the vast majority of Russian internet propagandists, pro-Russia politicians in parliaments in the EU and around the world and people blinded by Putins lies will find some pathetic excuse to deny and deflect. And in a week the next atrocity occurs somewhere

Yeah, when you sell loot boxes of digital skins that are widely used on 3rd party illegal e-sports gambling sites, you make billions. Great job, Valve. Ever wonder why e-sports teams have these “BETKING360”-sponsors? It’s because young men have money to gamble with and the potential for being the next generation of gambling addicts. Valve knows that, it just doesn’t facilitate gambling directly. It just plays bank

I have no love for Gabe Newell, even if he has these charming video skits he sometimes does for TI or whatever