I prioritise feedback over outreach. There is no way I can get a quality conversation without blocking a few thousand people. Valuable comments, ideas, references would drown in the ocean of emotional dumping. Therefore, I need to isolate myself from the latter to see the former
I am purposefully looking for comments like this: that's an actual dialogue (that I hoped for) and a valuable input. I learnt something I didn't know before. If I don't block emotional dumpers, comments of value will be buried under the mountains of garbage -> I won't see them
I know many are proud of being direct and straightforward online. But the thing with straightforwardness is that it doesn't scale up. It may work perfectly in one on one dialogue. If there are 10 ppl around, you probably won't share every detail of how you think and feel out loud
Now if it's a discussion between 100 people, we will have to apply even more formal courtesy just so it doesn't degenerate into a fist fight. Talking to a hundred people in a way you would talk to one is not an "honesty", it's an insanity. It's destructive behaviour
The more people are around, the more obvious is the fundamental asymmetry: emotional dumping is very much easier than making a valuable input into a discussion. Ergo, there will be many times more comments with people sharing their negative feelings than those with valuable input
What is worse, emotional dumping adds up. You don't just add your own (destructive) input, you affect other people. You scream, they scream at you, you scream back (read 100500 more comments). Yes, your screams increase my outreach. But they destroy the discussion
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
A new round of donations for the Ukrainian soldiers & civilians 🧵
1. While suffering from the Iranian drone attacks, Ukraine was able to increase efficiency of its air defence with the new software. Now they're fundraising for tablets to coordinate the batteries' fire
Current goal is 100 tablets. Your donation by card, PayPal or wire transfer would be highly helpful
The Pope being Pope. This line of reasoning is based upon a premise that Russian people may not be responsible for the Russian aggression. It's always someone else's fault, in this case - the fault of minorities
What is worse, Russian "liberal opposition" shares this conviction
Prediction: should the regime change and the "liberal opposition" take power, this will become the official narrative. Since Russian people/culture are blameless, liberals will declare minorities to be responsible both for Putinism and for Z-invasion
(they already do btw)
Potential regime change in Moscow will *not* mark the break with the official nationalism but rather its revival. New authorities will equate Putinism and minorities and then launch a crackdown on minorities picturing this as a "fight against Putinism"
Well, most of modern Ukraine was either conquered or incorporated to Russia under Catherine II. She was probably the most aggressive ruler of the Russian Empire, not counting Peter I, and spent most of her reign in ambitious wars of expansion in the West and in the South
Age of Catherine is viewed as the Golden Age of the Russian Empire. Wars, conquests, luxury of St Petersburg. That was paid by incredible human misery. Economy-wise reign of Catherine was catastrophic: Catherine led Russia to the greatest economic contraction it had in the 18th c
Russian serfdom was continuously exacerbating since at least the 16th c. In 1600 it can be still characterised as "serfdom". By 1750 it turned into the New World-style plantation slavery: serfs were bought and sold individually at the slave auctions much like Blacks in Americas
Rearmament of the Russian military industry based on the technological import from the West scaled up once Putin took power. Local peaks were reached around 2007 and 2013. Most recent escalation of import started in 2019 and continues till 2022 with the Covid interruption in 2020
This suggests that 2019 is when Russia probably started preparing for this war. The lockdown disruption of the supply chains might have delayed this war, but could not prevent it as in 2021 rearmament resumed again
Why peaks in 2007 and 2013? Well, in 2008 we had a global crisis and in 2014 Russian currency devaluated by half -> import became more expensive. So the rate of rearmament correlates with the general affordability of import. The more import we can afford the more equipment we buy
So yeah, with every year of this war Europe will be getting poorer and poorer. There is a non-zero chance of it becoming destitute, should the war last for long. And it will be 100% self-inflicted. Moreover, it is being self-inflicted right now as Europe continues to arm Russia
Actions have consequences. And arming a malevolent aggressive power next to your borders *does* have consequences. The more you arm it, the more aggressive it becomes, increasing the risk of a war that will impoverish your continent. Fuck around, and find out basically
I think that the USG should explore the possibility of incentivising German, Italian, Austrian, Swiss, Taiwanese, Korean and Spanish companies to shut down their machines on Russian military plants that produce Kh-101, Kalibr, Iskander and other cruise and ballistic missiles
I would add Japan and Czechia to the list but in their case I have a reason to believe their national governments are concerned about the role their industry is playing in arming Putin and are looking for ways to stop or minimise that. Still USG could help a lot in their case too
Contrary to the popular belief, Russian capacities for mass production of high precision components do NOT rely on Chinese import, but rather on import + training received from a handful of developed countries located in Western Europe and East Asia