VAIHTO · VIRTA · BE

🇷🇺 ⤑ Яotten something, in Soviet Russia?

begun ✍️ by Frits on 2025-12-13

“Russia is not as resilient as it wants you to think”, read a headline that caught my eye today; and then tortured, truly wrecked my feeble foggy brain – could not That Economist spare us those two words (“it is”) that would turn the whole into something unambiguously coherent. 🤯 Leaving out “is” would have made it slightly acceptabler, or.. hmh, in hindsight it.. Hmhh — but then paywalling the article, too. A bridge too far..

Luckily, and of course by far not for the first time, there's archive.ph, always there to come and 🎶 save the da-ay. What is with that site, actually.. How can its noble work work. One too many another thing to casually remember to look up later.

Because meantime one u/Designer_Ear_1382 posted the below in the dedicated comment section on r/europe. I very vaguely seemed to recall having read something like it someplace before, but not as ~elaborate, and not overdoing the Mongolian upshot like it does. Rrreally cba rn to try and find out where it's from, which doesn't matter much, because it sure is a poignant, if at times rather crudely worded bit of.. stuff for thought.

The Hellenic civilization passed them by. The Roman civilization passed them by. The Gothic civilization passed them by. The Renaissance passed them by. The Enlightenment passed them by. The concept of open society passed them by. The concept of democratic government passed them by. The concept of rule of law passed them by. The concepts [sic] of human rights passed them by. The modern information society passed them by.

What’s wrong with the Russians is that they have no education: neither a secular ethical education, nor a religious moral education. They glorify violence. They fetishize the criminal class. They applaud deception. They accept lying as a completely normal state of affairs. They appear to have no regard for human suffering: neither their own, nor that of anyone else. Their social vocabulary (outside the family) includes only two concepts: coercion and nihilism.

As far as anyone can tell, they remain a hastily industrialized post-Mongol empire, fundamentally accepting an autocratic czar, his boyars, and a population of passive serfs. It’s essentially the Mongol Empire with crappy tanks and a lot of nukes.

All the bold and italics mine, of course. And it did make you think, dinnit. (:

Not sure if I have anything of relevance to say about it, or add to it, or to consider. Not for now at least! Never unwise to consider Wittgenstein! reminding forever to remain silent by default.

Ahh, “remain silent”, that rare occasion of English vocabulary lacking instead of overbestowing. Yes, “keep silent”, still two words. 🙂 Ehh not the point here, 'cuz – «Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen». 🤐Thinking of, say, Theo Francken, one downcastedly realises one, too! has a bit of Theo inside oneself. It only makes one human. 🫡

🧊 ⤑ a COP by any other name

begun ✍️ by Frits on 2025-11-12

Still such a glaring, awkward, disgraceful cop-out, innit. 😔 Reddit be pointing us to an article about this, the 30th iteration of conferencing parties, so we can type 🙌 FTA:

Leading climate scientist Johan Rockström warns that removing 10bn tonnes of CO₂ annually is necessary to limit global heating to 1.7 °C, even with drastic emissions cuts.

It's a pleasantly compact quote, lending itself to some highlights, then.

Not only did 1.5 just become 1.7 °C, this Jəhaan tells, nay warns us that removing CO₂ is necessary. 🤦 He, or the quote, casually drops a big number, too — 10BN TONNES 🎉 to limit those centigrades. Annually 'course, 'cause we're in it for the long haul. How's that for a challenge. 🦾

He, or the quote, ends in “drastic emissions cuts”, sneakily implying, or at least vaguely urging us to assume, that this cutting of emissions 1) has been, or should become a thing? and can be done 🥁 in a drrrastic manner, and 2) has shown itself to be just as obviously feasible as “removing CO₂”. 🥹 (It's actually far, far feasibler, but that's a depressing realisation to realise, if you hadn't already realised.)

Goes without saying really, because 💪 yes we can, and are known for taking that drastic measure when push comes to shove. Back then fixed that ozone.. hole, di'nt we. 🫥 What's an annual billion.. ah, 10! billion tonnes of CO₂ anyway. Wait, hm how many tonnes fit in an annual.. hm, how many buckets will we need? Oh, barrels? Let's ask ChatGPT to be sure, maybe. 🦄

🔥 21/11 vexing TODO: Rewrite the above entirely, because it got me befuzzled, messes with me head, can be more concise in its absurd obviousness. 😶 With some things quite literally 🔥 on fire, this.. guy, a leading scientist with warts and all, warns us that we need to do something which cannot be done – i.e. removing dozens of billions of tonnes of CO₂ – if we are to avert something that cannot be averted anymore – i.e. earth warming by 1.7 °C. 🤔🔥

Though it long stopped guaranteeing chuckles, there is..

pertinent internet comment abound

.. So glad it only took 30 years of COP to reach this conclusion.

.. Vital? Yes. Possible? No.

.. The grift that keeps on grifting.

Tragically inadequate, again and again. 😔 TBC again and again, too, since, never guess, right now this dungeon of a soul needs cleaning. 😒

ʬ

For a 16/11 PS: The ever guardful Guardian points out how “fossil fuel lobbyists outnumber all Cop30 delegations except Brazil”. Brazenly raping rainforest to make way for these COP clowns could've gotten away with the BAU sad facepalming emoji, but this sort of headline leaves me emoji-less once more.

Like Jewish-besieged Gaza really. Utterly different set, setting, and history, to be sure, but in common this just as utterly hope-, sense-, and pointless, so tragically once-fix- never mind preventable state of affairs.. Unconscionable deluded scummy ol' men like Bibi and Donald and Putain and that Chinese snake — the rotting head of humanity as it were, if we were a fish 🐠  and ideally could include dipshits like jerky ketaSpaceKaren, f* zZZuckerberk, the Murdock, and unrecognized-for-what-he-is nasty Gates, too — shaping this, our time, and legacy to.. a brief, fiery future. Let's wait for the whimper then, сСукаFxckingБлядь.

🧊 ⤑ a BOE by any other name

begun ✍️ by Frits on 2025-09-24

's still a BOE, innit. Quantity, quality, anomaly – catastrophy. Tragedy. But, by the love of all that is c/p, right now this dungeon of a soul needs cleaning. 😒