Where do the Members of SDF stand on the issue of the War in the Ukraine?

Deino said:

You are funny… all I do saying there should be a third option since the situation is not as easy as some think. And now I’m accused of posting political stuff while at the same time I am being offended since I’m either not clear pro Russia as most seem to wish or not too clear anti Ukraine? Seems as if you are the one who cannot accept a different IMO missing third option?!

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If you don't like the options in a poll, then just don't vote. It's just an opinion poll, it makes no difference whatsoever.

I think you are being too emotional about this, especially as a mod. In your announcement, it specifically says:

"As such, take this also as a clear warning: Any additional political thread opened or post to the Ukrainian war in other threads in order to circumvent this decision will immediately be closed and the thread starter banned!"

This thread was just an opinion poll. There was no argument of the sort we were seeing in the Ukraine thread, at least not until your post #64, which elicited responses typical of what we saw in the locked thread.

In fact there's a lot I disagree with in that post, but I won't get into it because we agreed not to discuss that topic. I am just here pointing out that that particular post is exactly the kind of post that will lead a thread into flames.

Deino said:

Once again and please don't misunderstand me, as this is not intended to be blackmail, but I don't understand this arbitrary approach, against all the rules!??

For years we have fared more than well with the fact that no political issues were tolerated and even if the situation here is new and unique, since the world has not been in such danger for decades, I am convinced that our forum had its quality next to the professional quality of its members, above all through the more polite and respectful interaction with each other, since certain rules were strictly observed and this includes the fact that certain things were a "no go" and that political hate speech and propaganda were not allowed.

We are a forum for China's military" ... this is our core business!

The fact that a moderator, contrary to all these rules, is doing exactly that on his own authority, namely by dividing into black and white, pro-Russian or pro-Ukraine - aka Russia or NATO, which is naive, at best only part of the story - and at the same time cheering by openly this split, allowing, even supporting, slander, insults, the use of propaganda symbols etc., is a point on to which I can't say, "ok, then I'll ignore that and leave it to serial numbers and aircraft".

Quite simply and certainly with a very heavy heart, then I'm out.

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How nice of you to protect our sensitive minds from propaganda. Maybe on the movie thread for each film you should post what parts we should look away? We wouldn't want anything to see any nudity or violence.

Seriously though, I think your position is a little authoritarian for my taste. I was fine for closing the thread down for a few days to let the temperature down and to clear out the bile, but then to do that start banning and threatening people who've only contributed good posts to this forum for years is suprising to say the least. I honestly can't even remember the last time a German let a little bit of power get to their head...

Abominable said:

How nice of you to protect our sensitive minds from propaganda. Maybe on the movie thread for each film you should post what parts we should look away? We wouldn't want anything to see any nudity or violence.

Seriously though, I think your position is a little authoritarian for my taste. I was fine for closing the thread down for a few days to let the temperature down and to clear out the bile, but then to do that start banning and threatening people who've only contributed good posts to this forum for years is suprising to say the least. I honestly can't even remember the last time a German let a little bit of power get to their head...

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Personal attacks are not allowed.. you know better than that. Also it was an Austrian.

solarz said:

If you don't like the options in a poll, then just don't vote. It's just an opinion poll, it makes no difference whatsoever

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Your not getting his point.
This topic is in violation of a ban on political posting and the moratorium on the Ukrainian conflict in general as it’s likely to lead to inflammatory posts. Members are getting banned and warned for posting on the topic in other threads. Now a moderator created a thread that encourages said posts. It’s as if a city with a ban on casinos had one operated by a police officer.
The results of the poll were predictable anyway given the obvious biases of the active membership and decline in pro western posters over the last decade.
By the way I obviously don’t need to say my opinion on this. You can probably guess it and it will likely be the case I will take flack for it. Whatever.
I was one of the dozens of posters who have been warned on the topic. So one month vacation here I come.

TerraN_EmpirE said:

Your not getting his point.
This topic is in violation of a ban on political posting and the moratorium on the Ukrainian conflict in general as it’s likely to lead to inflammatory posts. Members are getting banned and warned for posting on the topic in other threads. Now a moderator created a thread that encourages said posts. It’s as if a city with a ban on casinos had one operated by a police officer.
The results of the poll were predictable anyway given the obvious biases of the active membership and decline in pro western posters over the last decade.
By the way I obviously don’t need to say my opinion on this. You can probably guess it and it will likely be the case I will take flack for it. Whatever.
I was one of the dozens of posters who have been warned on the topic. So one month vacation here I come.

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Let me quote Deino's announcement post on the closing of the Ukraine thread again:

"In fact, this decision was univocal due to the latest developments, with so many new members bringing not only new opinions and insights, but most of all several new members brought down the moral attitude, the level of posting to such a shameless battle of propaganda, that it no longer acceptable to be left open."

I did not see the above kind of behavior in this thread until what I mentioned above. I also don't believe that creating a poll on an issue is an encouragement to discuss that issue. A poll is just a poll. In fact, most of the thread consisted of people asking for a third option, not arguing about Ukraine.

I normally don't write on this forum, I come to learn new and interesting information and I am very grateful for SDF for this purpose. However, I will speak here simply to explain why I voted for Russia on this poll.

I live in Canada, and it seems like the mainstream opinion here is overwhelmingly pro-Ukraine. I feel that this is veering towards an irrational even dangerous level. There does not seem to be any tolerance for legitimate criticism of Ukraine and the actions of some of its soldiers. We are supposed to be a multicultural country, yet the massive difference in sentiment and government reaction between the war in Ukraine, and the other ongoing wars (Ethiopia nd Myanmar, for example) is very disturbing to see.

I also do not feel that I can express openly my true opinion of the war, which is that Russia was wrong to invade but that Ukraine is hardly an innocent party, without great risk to my career and reputation.

I voted for Russia just to exercise some of my basic rights of free speech, and as a (admittedly inconsequential) protest against the deeply biased behaviour of my country's media and political leaders. I again thank SDF for being a forum which provides a platform for dissenting opinions.

Mishmael said:

I also do not feel that I can express openly my true opinion of the war, which is that Russia was wrong to invade but that Ukraine is hardly an innocent party, without great risk to my career and reputation.

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If you're living in Canada then you should know that you won't be prosecuted for going up against your countries interests writing it over the Internet forums so don't even attempt to create this atmosphere of fear for voicing your thoughts in the first place because it seems like you're clearly pro-western in heart!

You would feel pressure writing like that from a city like Rostov-on-Don (whre you could get 15 years in jail for that for real) so skip your messianism-like posture and come to terms with yourself!

Personally I can't say I'm for Putin but because the West is trying make Ukraine about China, I can't say I'm for Ukraine. Personally I'm against war but I look at it like nuclear weapons. I'm for a total ban of nuclear weapons but because the US is against it because they want to keep their nukes, I'm okay with any country getting them just as long as they understand the consequences. Both I see things that are problematic for China's concern. What business was it for Ukrainian Nazis to go help protest in Hong Kong? A larger narrative has to be going on over there to see them do that. They do lean Western but unlike the total sycophants like you see in China's neighbors, I don't see Ukrainians doing everything the US/West tells them to do just to stay in their good graces. What I admire about Russians is they don't care what people think about them. I wish Beijing had that attitude. They wasted a lot of time with the delusion that the West would eventually accept them as equals. But when Putin's gone and a pro-West government can take its place, will they antagonize China for the West? That's why you see Republicans wanting to cozy up with Russia so easily before the war. It's like how the West acts like they care for Muslim human rights... only if China is violating them with its only sole purpose is to have Islamic extremists target China with terrorism instead of the West. I've read stories about racists attacking Vietnamese in Russia. I don't know if they do that to Chinese in Russia. They also take advantage of other countries' nationalism against China to sell military weapons. Did Russia have a plan and have contingencies for the very consequences happening to them now. I guess time will only tell.

Mishmael said:

I normally don't write on this forum, I come to learn new and interesting information and I am very grateful for SDF for this purpose. However, I will speak here simply to explain why I voted for Russia on this poll.

I live in Canada, and it seems like the mainstream opinion here is overwhelmingly pro-Ukraine. I feel that this is veering towards an irrational even dangerous level. There does not seem to be any tolerance for legitimate criticism of Ukraine and the actions of some of its soldiers. We are supposed to be a multicultural country, yet the massive difference in sentiment and government reaction between the war in Ukraine, and the other ongoing wars (Ethiopia nd Myanmar, for example) is very disturbing to see.

I also do not feel that I can express openly my true opinion of the war, which is that Russia was wrong to invade but that Ukraine is hardly an innocent party, without great risk to my career and reputation.

I voted for Russia just to exercise some of my basic rights of free speech, and as a (admittedly inconsequential) protest against the deeply biased behaviour of my country's media and political leaders. I again thank SDF for being a forum which provides a platform for dissenting opinions.

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That's my feeling exactly. I used to be proud of being Canadian, I believed that Canada, unlike the US, accepted diversity of opinions and culture.

This is no longer the Canada I knew. We've become just another puppet of US imperialism.

It's time to shed any illusions about freedom of speech and democracy. We have neither in this country.

Deino said:

Really??? We had always the stadong of „NO POLITICS! … we tried hard more than once and agreed to close the thread and now you as a moderator start exactly a most political poll, based on black and while exactly like we all agreed NOT to do???

In fact I‘m shocked And hope @Webmaster can decide.

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Thanks for dragging me into this.

I am all for no politics but even when war is discussed from military point of view, politics tend to make their way into the discussion. At that point, it should be up to the senior and mature members in the discussion to steer the thread towards the right direction. Of course, moderators are here for making sure, at at high level, rules are not violated (no insults, no derogatory remarks, etc.). I am not for micromanaging threads/topics. It just consume too much of time and frankly, with hundreds of messages a day, it is tough to weed out who said what.