It is the epitome of bothsidesing.Qusdahl wrote: ↑Wed Mar 02, 2022 9:37 am I don't intend whataboutism, but let's run with it. You seem to think I seem to think I'm pointing to one party's actions to justify or normalize or excuse another's? Cuz that's the opposite of what I intend. I'm saying NEITHER Putin's NOR W's war crimes are excusable.
perhaps, even, something to the effect of...it would be easier for me to take our country's condemnations of Putin's war crimes more seriously, if we took condemning our own country's war crimes more seriously too?
Or rather, how much good does it do to condemn Putin’s war crimes, but not W’s?
not that I don't take war crimes seriously!
I guess I'm trying to think of it in some...bigger world view? As freaked out as we are about Russia invading Ukraine right now, isn't that the same way many other folks in many other countries feel when they see us invade Iraq et al?
Is that really bothsidesing it, or just bringing some broader perspective - one that perhaps makes you uncomfortable, so you'd rather dismiss it as bothsidesing?
We're less than a year removed from our own war of foreign invasion, and here we are, once again, dumping all this "lethal aid" into a place most Americans can't even find on a map.
What makes me uncomfortable? I didn't deny we've done some terrible things 20 years ago. I'm hoping we've improved.
Repeatedly complaining about giving anti-aircraft and anti-tank weaponry to someone under attack is effectively pro-war, or at the least pro-Imperialism, when you consider the alternatives.
The fact that you think everyone else here is overly-simplifying things - you might want to rethink that. That maybe "there's two sides to every argument" is the actual oversimplification.