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[Starver]

In my experience, there's often something said on any given (BBC[1]) news programme. I might say I think that it's less wall-to-wall coverage than at times, but the moment something new happens it tends to dominate. If anything, comparing with the various fortunes of Ukraine as a whole as the war has progressed, this tallies well with how well you are/aren't holding back the tide, in that we're (perhaps gruesomely) ramping up the coverage for the widespread problems. It's hard to say much more about the steel-plants defenders/etc in Mariupol with no direct news-source, but the troubles of civilians still trying to (or refusing to, or being unable to) evacuate Donbass or re-enter their ruined Kiev suburb or deal with the trauma of accidents/civilian-targetting during earlier fleeing... ...a wide variety of things are being covered where correspondants are actually able to do their job on the ground, and then things like images released/leaked of the damaged Moskva are being analysed in depth by experts, etc.

It's not going away, though we are letting our newsreaders (some of whom are presenting programmes from Kiev, etc[2]) tell us about other things, obviously.

Spoiler: This bit is a bit rambling, as I jump into one particular rabbithole... (click to show/hide)

A quick poll of the articles on the BBC News app (not sure how similar that is to others' experience, i.e. how much it is individually curated to tastes) is that in the "Popular Stories" section with the top-ten articles and top-ten videos (presumably drawn from what has been clicked on most) there is just one video-article directly about Ukraine of the 18 'subject specific' items. The other two are the generic-aggregation "BBC News Channel" feed which will cross the board in what it contains and the "Today's papers" front-page photos summary. The latter are mostly dominated with a homegrown issue (Boris Johnson being caught out in a scandal that would have sunk more honourable PMs) but there still are mentions of Ukraine dotted around, and tomorrow the PM could be momentarily forgotten about (or so he hopes...) because of something flaring up.

That's the "what the people are clicking" and "what the newspapers are pushing", but the "Top Stories" main tab is still very much Ukraine in the top five (recently/prominantly headlining, by whatever BBC News criteria there is) with four being of the situation there and the other being about Boris Johnson. Which doesn't reflect a certain niche opinion coming from those who criticise the BBC for solely being the "Boris Bashing Club".

Obviously in my personalised tab, it's all very different. I haven't changed the subject-groupings in it for a long time, so Space, Engineering, Tech, etc, plus various subjects keyed to my locality and that of relatives so I'm not caught by surprise by some smalltalk or other. (I still have the Shetland Spaceport proposal at the top of one, I note.) Though I feel uncomfortable 'cyberstalking' any particular meme (and "Cybercrime" is one of the categories!), lest I fall into a bubble of my own making, so I tend to check my 'personal feed' far less (once a week, or when bored, to pop up anything I may have missed elsewhere) than the Top/Popular lists that are curated/crowdsourced for me in an externalised manner.

(I have non-BBC news-sources, too, just to balance out that bias, but honestly I can't deal with all the commercialised baggage they're often 'forced' to use, so again it's mostly a periodic sanity-check that I haven't missed anything that Big Brother Coroporation has newspeaked out of existence, as some might claim... )

...yeah, not sure that helps much, but I've written it now.

So, neither gone nor forgotten. No doubt there's some news-fatigue for various individuals, and the shock of the initial invasion is worn off, but it is displacing other news still (to those important subjects' disbenefit, some might say, but that's the tragedy of finite room to focus on things.

I can't speak for your chosen bubble being conspicuously empty of what you think should be there, but it's showing up in mine, in amongst the usual local "how the British government is broken" stuff. Or as a twofer: The report yesterday/whenever about the small village that had collectively applied to house a number (16?) of Ukrainian families fleeing the war, but the beaurocracy set up to administer this had so far managed to make just one of these offers happen.



[1] And mostly radio, due to the way I mostly participate in the broadcast experience. i.e. Radio 4 (with plenty of news/contemporary documentaries/etc to keep me going) and Radio 4 Extra (for repeated classic comedy/drama stuff that is more likely to include the sinking of the Bismark as a hot topic subject...)

[2] You can see Clive Myrie "Live from Kiev", then soon after watch him host the Celebrity Mastermind knowledge-quiz... Naturally, it's clear that one of these is pre-recorded months ago. Some may argue which one, of course!

[EuchreJack]

From what I've seen of the CBS Nightly News, they usually discuss the War in Ukraine once in each broadcast.

Thankfully, most Americans are very interested in the War, so American Media makes sure to mention it periodically.

The older/conservative bars I frequent usually bring up the War in Ukraine at least once, so again the American People are interested.

Thanks for giving me something to report on.

[brewer bob]

Quoting from the War in Ukraine news thread:

Uh huh. And wasn't it Il Palazzo who was so vehemently admonishing us for sensationalizing the war or daring to suggest that the depraved murderers might possibly continue their depraved murder using bunker-buster bombs or might commit genocide. Funny how well that aged isn't it.

Yes, it has aged well. And it is going to continue to age well, since it was in no way contingent on any of the claims thrown around ever turning factual.
And I don't see how they have. Like, ffs. If true (and we're unlikely to ever know), this is not genocide by any definition. It's a gross disregard for civilian collateral damage. It's horrible, horrifying, despicable, unjustifiable - but not any more than the entire war from the get go, ever since it was decided that killing a percentage of Ukrainians is an acceptable price for some vague political gains.

While there isn't currently consensus on whether genocide is happening in Ukraine or not, and evidence isn't enough, there is evidence of killings based on Ukrainian identity and the rhetoric from Moscow is tipping over into genocidal intent (remember that article 'What Russia should do with Ukraine?' from the state-owned RIA?).

[Loud Whispers]

I've been doing a big thunk. One thing I've been most intrigued by is how the end of all of this will appear. The Ukrainians evidently want to secure a peace where Russia withdraws totally from the nation, Crimea & East Ukraine included. Putin may settle for a token victory where Russia continues to occupy Donetsk, Donbas & Crimea; something which would at the very least ensure he doesn't get decapitated by his own cronies.

The Ukrainian army has thus far done a stellar job of defending, with grit, ATGMs and bayraktars. Yet to secure the kind of peace deal their leadership desires, they need to do more than hold onto defensive positions - they need to attack. I think the thought experiment for me at least is not whether the Ukrainians will launch a counter-assault, but when they will do it, and what that will look like. Will this result in the largest tank battle in European history since WWII? Or will we see a new form of warfare, as was witnessed in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict?

[nenjin]

From the other thread:

Uh huh. And wasn't it Il Palazzo who was so vehemently admonishing us for sensationalizing the war or daring to suggest that the depraved murderers might possibly continue their depraved murder using bunker-buster bombs or might commit genocide. Funny how well that aged isn't it.

Yes, it has aged well. And it is going to continue to age well, since it was in no way contingent on any of the claims thrown around ever turning factual.
And I don't see how they have. Like, ffs. If true (and we're unlikely to ever know), this is not genocide by any definition. It's a gross disregard for civilian collateral damage. It's horrible, horrifying, despicable, unjustifiable - but not any more than the entire war from the get go, ever since it was decided that killing a percentage of Ukrainians is an acceptable price for some vague political gains.

But you know what, go nuts. Cry wolf every day. I'm not going to spend time trying to teach you how to think straight just so that you can stop hating on the Russians a little more than they probably deserve.

When Russia's own propaganda machine is using phrases like "Ukraine cannot exist", how can you then criticize people who read that and draw completely natural conclusions from it?

Put another way, what would Russia have to do to meet that threshold? They've said it. They've done it. At what point does "complete disregard for civilian causalities" become "genocide"?

NGL, it reads like you simply can't countenance it. Or that you expect Holocaust levels of organization around it before you'll deign to admit it's happening.

[EuchreJack]

Quoting from the War in Ukraine news thread:

Uh huh. And wasn't it Il Palazzo who was so vehemently admonishing us for sensationalizing the war or daring to suggest that the depraved murderers might possibly continue their depraved murder using bunker-buster bombs or might commit genocide. Funny how well that aged isn't it.

Yes, it has aged well. And it is going to continue to age well, since it was in no way contingent on any of the claims thrown around ever turning factual.
And I don't see how they have. Like, ffs. If true (and we're unlikely to ever know), this is not genocide by any definition. It's a gross disregard for civilian collateral damage. It's horrible, horrifying, despicable, unjustifiable - but not any more than the entire war from the get go, ever since it was decided that killing a percentage of Ukrainians is an acceptable price for some vague political gains.

While there isn't currently consensus on whether genocide is happening in Ukraine or not, and evidence isn't enough, there is evidence of killings based on Ukrainian identity and the rhetoric from Moscow is tipping over into genocidal intent (remember that article 'What Russia should do with Ukraine?' from the state-owned RIA?).

Personally, I think there is evidence of actual genocide.  I am willing to use that term.
The definition I have found is "the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group"
That seems to be occurring in the War in Ukraine.  The Russians are deliberately killing large numbers of Ukrainians in an attempt to destroy Ukraine.
The mass graves, the elimination of fleeing civilians.  Unless that evidence has been refuted, then genocide is being committed by Russia.

But that is my opinion.
Everyone lay off Il Palazzo before you get this thread locked/shut down.
He's entitled to his opinion, even if it may be incorrect.
Or, maybe, you know, actually talk to the guy rather than attacking him?

[nenjin]

If that's an attack the bar is too low. I'm having a conversation here. Don't get carried away.

[bloop_bleep]

Uh huh. And wasn't it Il Palazzo who was so vehemently admonishing us for sensationalizing the war or daring to suggest that the depraved murderers might possibly continue their depraved murder using bunker-buster bombs or might commit genocide. Funny how well that aged isn't it.

Yes, it has aged well. And it is going to continue to age well, since it was in no way contingent on any of the claims thrown around ever turning factual.
And I don't see how they have. Like, ffs. If true (and we're unlikely to ever know), this is not genocide by any definition. It's a gross disregard for civilian collateral damage. It's horrible, horrifying, despicable, unjustifiable - but not any more than the entire war from the get go, ever since it was decided that killing a percentage of Ukrainians is an acceptable price for some vague political gains.

Mass killing deliberately civilians between 18-60 in a village is genocide. Mass rapes of women is genocide. Abducting and relocating children to the other country is specifically and explicitly declared genocide in the UN Convention on Genocide. What, exactly, other atrocities are you waiting for? It is genocide. Your complaining has proven to be nonsense. Stop with the pearl-clutching. The devil doesn't need another advocate.

[Il Palazzo]

NGL, it reads like you simply can't countenance it. Or that you expect Holocaust levels of organization around it before you'll deign to admit it's happening.

Not in terms of organisation, but scale and deliberation. When the Germans invaded Poland a while back, they would indiscriminately bomb civilian targets, and brutally pacify occupied towns by rounding up random people and executing them on the spot. They professed that Poland should not exist. They enslaved Poles, treated them as untermenschen, tortured them, murdered them, and were generally trigger-happy around the local populace. In the end, 10% of the ethnic Polish population died as a result of the war.
But it was not genocide.
When another 10% of Poles, those of Jewish ethnicity, were rounded up and murdered with the intent of ethnic cleansing - that was genocide.

We can't go around calling every war, brutal as it might be, genocidal. It dilutes the meaning of the word.

[EuchreJack]

NGL, it reads like you simply can't countenance it. Or that you expect Holocaust levels of organization around it before you'll deign to admit it's happening.

Not in terms of organisation, but scale and deliberation. When the Germans invaded Poland a while back, they would indiscriminately bomb civilian targets, and brutally pacify occupied towns by rounding up random people and executing them on the spot. They professed that Poland should not exist. They enslaved Poles, treated them as untermenschen, tortured them, murdered them, and were generally trigger-happy around the local populace. In the end, 10% of the ethnic Polish population died as a result of the war.
But it was not genocide.
When another 10% of Poles, those of Jewish ethnicity, were rounded up and murdered with the intent of ethnic cleansing - that was genocide.

We can't go around calling every war, brutal as it might be, genocidal. It dilutes the meaning of the word.

So...the genocide against your people wasn't recognized, so you are reluctant to recognize the genocide against Ukraine.  I get that.  An appropriate emotional response.

[heydude6]

Or that you expect Holocaust levels of organization around it before you'll deign to admit it's happening.

At least you’re honest.

So here’s a fun fact, the holocaust was a one of kind thing. An operation of that scale, organization and brutality had never been done before and possibly never will be done again. It is the king of genocides, not the stereotypical genocide.

If you look into things like the Armenian genocide, and the Ugyr genocide, you will find them disappointingly tame if you use the Holocaust as your model, but they are still unacceptable crimes against humanity and the UN classifies them as such..

You could argue that Putin genuinely isn’t genociding Ukrainians right now, but a lot of us are afraid that once he achieves a foothold in the country that he will.

Hitler had no intention of stopping at the Jews. In his own words he viewed Slavs as filthy “half-breeds” that also didn’t have a place in this world. Why did he throw away his chances of victory at the obviously suicidal operation “Barabaroosa” if not for blind fanaticism and ideological consistency. Poland would have been next.

Wolfenstein the New Order went soft on their depiction of Nazi occupation. In reality, barely any of us would be left.

[nenjin]

It is the king of genocides, not the stereotypical genocide.

We can't go around calling every war, brutal as it might be, genocidal. It dilutes the meaning of the word.

This is the disconnect. Does it have to be the King of Genocide before the world decides they have to actually intervene, at the cost of their own safety and prosperity?

It's genocide to me, by Russia's own admission. Not "the most genocide" but well beyond the normal brutality of warfare. If this was *just* a war of conquest with Syria-levels of brutality, that'd be one thing, horrifying enough. But Russia in their bid to justify the war has gone completely overboard, in an effort to popularize their war domestically. I say we take them exactly at their own word.

[Il Palazzo]

Hitler had no intention of stopping at the Jews. In his own words he viewed Slavs as filthy “half-breeds” that also didn’t have a place in this world. Why did he throw away his chances of victory at the obviously suicidal operation “Barabaroosa” if not for blind fanaticism and ideological consistency. Poland would have been next.

Possibly. Or the enslaved population would remain as a subservient caste. But it would be genocide against the Slavs only once the actual cleansing had started. As it were, it was a brutal, dystopian, oppressive occupation and exploitation. But not genocide.

So...the genocide against your people wasn't recognized, so you are reluctant to recognize the genocide against Ukraine.  I get that.  An appropriate emotional response.

I'm pretty sure I'm coming at this from a 'words have meaning' angle, not 'that should be called a genocide too and now I'm mad' one.
It's like this is the first war people get to look at closely, without sanitising filters of remoteness, and they can't contextualise what they see in any other way than to go for the most extreme comparison. I'm wondering what words will they reach for should actual genocide start ('I was right all along' would not be logically correct).


What is triggering my emotions is this whole conversation around the word. It's like it has become a pass code for group membership. Either one agrees there's genocide in Ukraine, or one's shilling for Putin. Either with us or against us. Macron doesn't want to call it genocide - he can't possibly have any point, he's just 100% Putin's bitch. I don't think this is genocide - I'm defending(!) Putin. Like, wt actual f.

[Robsoie]

Ideally you need the UN to recognize a genocide because everyone own personnal view of what is or what is not a genocide does not matter on international level.

The UN has a page about their definition of genocide :
https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

-Killing members of the group;
-Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
-Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
-Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
-Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

If you stop there, Russia is committing a genocide according to the UN definition.
But you'll need to read more, because according to the UN, what makes the difference between war crimes and genocide is the intent :

The intent is the most difficult element to determine. To constitute genocide, there must be a proven intent on the part of perpetrators to physically destroy a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. Cultural destruction does not suffice, nor does an intention to simply disperse a group. It is this special intent, or dolus specialis, that makes the crime of genocide so unique. In addition, case law has associated intent with the existence of a State or organizational plan or policy, even if the definition of genocide in international law does not include that element.

Importantly, the victims of genocide are deliberately targeted - not randomly – because of their real or perceived membership of one of the four groups protected under the Convention (which excludes political groups, for example). This means that the target of destruction must be the group, as such, and not its members as individuals. Genocide can also be committed against only a part of the group, as long as that part is identifiable (including within a geographically limited area) and “substantial.”

By example, the Russia official propaganda makes it looks like there is an actual intent as shown in that article from the RIA Novostni (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIA_Novosti)  "What to do with Ukraine" : https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html that there are translation floating all around (and that you can google translate, as it does a surprising good job at staying understandable this article)
But despite the article is very clear and show an intent it is still not a proof of intent simply because that can be denied by Russia as a government and point that's just Timofei Sergeyev (the author of that article) own views.

Basically it's the same as in a tribunal trying to prove the criminal is guilty with so many things from accusation or defense constantly blurrying arguments, and adding the various nations own interests getting in the way , having a genocide recognized internationally may prove to be very difficult, case in point the Armenia genocide by the Ottoman empire that even today only 33 UN members formally recognize it ...

[nenjin]

What is triggering my emotions is this whole conversation around the word. It's like it has become a pass code for group membership. Either one agrees there's genocide in Ukraine, or one's shilling for Putin. Either with us or against us. Macron doesn't want to call it genocide - he can't possibly have any point, he's just 100% Putin's bitch. I don't think this is genocide - I'm defending(!) Putin. Like, wt actual f.

I don't think you're shilling for Russia just because you don't agree with the G word. But again, I ask you, where is your line? Stop talking about what isn't genocide and start talking about what is, so people understand your position. To do otherwise is to set yourself up to be painted as a shill.

Because it seems like you're placing the line so far away that by the time it's reached, it's pointless because Ukraine is gone and/or enslaved.

But despite the article is very clear and show an intent it is still not a proof of intent simply because that can be denied by Russia as a government and point that's just Timofei Sergeyev (the author of that article) own views.

Similarly: Russia has already clearly demonstrated they will act in bad faith. Do one thing and claim they didn't. If what was in that article wasn't reflective of their policy, why has it not been refuted? Is it not from an official Russian news agency? If they have an official news agency, and it says something, is it not reflective of policy? Does Russia have an official news agency that allows op-eds? Clearly not, because people get put in fucking jail for saying anything the government doesn't like.

So again. The line some people are drawing for what constitutes G versus just really shitty war, i.e. what we should deal with using normal diplomatic, non-world war starting maneuvers vs. "ok, no, fuck this", seems like a cop out on having to take a stance. What are we supposed to do? Wait for all of Ukraine to be gone before we call it G, or wait for the Russian government to officially say "Yep, we're doin G"?

The fact a first world nation is conqueroring a weaker nation for economic reasons, while stating a fabricated raison de guerre, and the whole world is sitting around watching it happen on Youtube, is fucking appalling already. To stand by and do nothing while they execute citizens in the street, block by block, and bomb them out of or into their shelters, is beyond the pale. Why are they in shelters still? Oh right, Russia bombed evacuation corridors they said they wouldn't.

So when someone then goes on to quibble about the word while the reality plays out, understandably, gets some people upset and likely to question your motivations. Maybe that's not fair. But then neither is what's happening in Ukraine.