Putin is now 'officially' He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, According to Austrian Media

We're apparently reaching peak woke stupidity as 'cognitive imbalances' indicate a quickening of Western Civ circling down the drain

It has happened before: according to images and commentary offered last summer by, among others by Reuters, Russia has become (again) the ‘Mordor’ of Western Civ.

Now, Eric Frey, writing an op-ed for Austrian hate-spewing and hate-mongering daily Der Standard, has outdone himself. So, read on and behold the mighty power of woke stupidity and multiple selective biases at-work.

As always, translation and emphases mine, as are the bottom lines.

---

‘Russian President Vladimir Putin as the Harry Potter villain Lord Voldemort.’

War for the Future of Democracy

A victory for Putin would be a worldwide signal that might is stronger than right

In his speech in Warsaw, US President Joe Biden defined the Ukraine war as a fight for democracy and confidently declared that Russian aggression had ‘made the democracies of the world stronger, not weaker’.

That may be true for the internal cohesion of the Western alliance, but, unfortunately, not for the global balance. In the past decade, the principles of liberal democracy, with political pluralism, freedom of expression, and a peaceful transfer of power, has lost ground on all continents. Liberal democracies have become illiberal, and illiberal democracies have turned into open autocracies. And this is not only true of Vladimir Putin’s Russia itself.

Where Democracy is Losing Ground

Nothing has remained of the Arab Spring since Tunisia slid into a presidential dictatorship. In Mexico a left-wing populist head of state is destroying democratic institutions of control, and in India traditional pluralism is increasingly being supplanted by authoritarian Hindu nationalism. Even in Israel democratic norms are under attack by an extreme right-wing government.

The only recent bright spot was the razor-thin election victory of social democrat Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil. perhaps the most important test in the coming months of whether the popular will can oust unpopular autocrats from power will be the elections in Turkey.

Those Who Do Not Condemn Russia

The weakening of democratic norms also affects the positioning of states in the Russian-Ukrainian war. While a large majority in the UN General Assembly has condemned the Russian attack, two-thirds of humanity live in states that voted against it or abstained—thus condoning and in many cases benefiting from Russian aggression. This can be partly explained by the post-colonial scepticism in the Global South towards anything that sounds like Western morality and hypocrisy, but this isn’t the only reason.

This indifference with which the military assault of a paranoid dictator on a democratic neighbouring country is received testifies to how fragile support for values such as freedom of the press, separation of religion, and state or respect for minority rights is in so many states. Even the breach of the territorial integrity of states—a fundamental principle of the UN Charter—is accepted with a shrug of the shoulders. That Brazil also changed its position on the war when it switched from Jair Bolsonaro to Lula and now condemns Russia is no coincidence.

The connection between domestic and foreign policy can also be observed among Ukraine’s allies in the West: Putin apologists [Putin-Versteher] can be found above all in those parties and movements that do not care about democratic norms in other ways either.

Difference Between Kyiv and Moscow

There has always been much to criticise about Ukraine’s politics, but rarely has the difference between democracy and tyranny been so clearly visible as it is today between Kiev and Moscow, between Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin. That this is so little perceived outside the Western world is sobering.

Whether a clear defeat for Russia in this terrible war will give democracy a fresh boost outside Europe is uncertain. But a victory for Putin would in any case be a disillusionment for democratic movements all over the world and a signal to authoritarian politicians that in the 21st century might is stronger than right after all. And that must not happen.

---

Bottom Lines

This piece is moronic beyond comprehension. Vague generalities (‘Liberal democracies have become illiberal, and illiberal democracies have turned into open autocracies. And this is not only true of Vladimir Putin’s Russia itself.’) are going fist-in-glove with value-judgements.

Sure, this is an op-ed, but there are even more blind spots in this short piece than opinions and value-judgements together:

• No mention of Yemen, Libya, or Syria. Or the NATO-led aggression vs. Yugoslavia, among others.

• No mention of Covid mandates.

• No mention of the usual suspects in terms of ‘pariahs’, esp. Mr. Orbán’s Hungary.

Stranger than fiction, I’m tempted to say.

But then again, this piece of crap is literally a cheap piece of misinformation (of course without attribution), for it also plagiarises, among others:

• Woodrow Wilson’s WW1-themed propaganda (‘make the world safe for democracy’).

• Glosses over the most egregious aggressions, under international law, perpetrated by the US-led West since 1945; remember: if the West actually cared about the ‘values’ it professes, we’d be holding annual Nuremberg-style tribunals for our leaders.

• ‘Democracy vs. tyranny’ = ‘Kyiv vs. Moscow’, ‘Volodymyr Zelensky vs. Vladimir Putin’: when did that happen?

• ‘victory for Putin would in any case be a disillusionment for democratic movements all over the world’—that’s actually quite true, to certain extents, but not in the way Mr. Frey intended it, I’d say: if Russia ‘wins’, it might show everyone that the US Emperor is naked.

At the very least, now we’ve got the quasi-official confirmation that whatever BS emanates from the woke-fied pseudo leftists is, well, cheap and easily demasked agit-prop: there is no mention of anything of substance that bears even the minimum ‘standards’ of facts and, yes, decency.

There’s probably no better example than Lula’s Brazil: remember his widely popular and effective government program ‘Bolsa Família’? This is akin to a quite low-level access social program—in the guise of direct cash benefits (‘going direct’, anyone?)—that lifted millions of destitute Brazilians out of extreme poverty during Lula’s first stint at the presidency. As such, the cash was tied to the number of children per household.

Now, as reported by Globo a few weeks ago, Lula’s government announced that, while the Bolsa Família has been reinstated, its recipients—yes, technically speaking, the children (!)—must be ‘vaccinated' against Covid’: a Hobson’s Choice.

Next up: Western hypocrisy and double standards. Mr. Frey notes:

While a large majority in the UN General Assembly has condemned the Russian attack, two-thirds of humanity live in states that voted against it or abstained—thus condoning and in many cases benefiting from Russian aggression. This can be partly explained by the post-colonial scepticism in the Global South towards anything that sounds like Western morality and hypocrisy, but this isn’t the only reason.

It would be almost ‘funny’, if this wasn’t a kind of ‘self-fulfilling prophecy: on the one hand, it appeared to have dawned on even the most woke-fied zombies that there is a difference between the number of de facto sovereign states that votes ‘with’ the West in the UN, as opposed to the number of people living in them.

Thus, we get the above ‘contradiction’—really: a gaping hole in the worldview, such as it exists, of Mr. Frey and his ilk—between these two aspects of the same reality. Apparently, any thought as to why people and governments in the post-colonial Global South might accuse the West of amorality, double-standards, and hypocrisy is obviously lost to Mr. Frey.

Hey, Mr. Frey, here’s an explanation for this ‘conundrum’, in the undying words of Upton Sinclair:

It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.

Finally, the most laughable issue, to me, is the use of J.K. Rowling’s work—here: Putin as Voldemort—by the editors of Der Standard. While I remain unsure whether Mr. Frey had a hand in this (I certainly believe this to be the case), it’s an expression of the depravity of the woke-fied pencil pushers.

Sure, abuse her work to score cheap political points is one thing; but that these idiots would be so ‘daring’—stupid—to use Ms. Rowling’s work who they themselves have shunned because of her stance on sex/gender issues is quite another admission of: amorality, double-standards, and hypocrisy.