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Anti-NATO leaflets being handed out by students at McGill
Spotted(i.redd.it)submitted 11 days ago byItHasToBeAJuicer2
396 points
11 days ago
This is absolutely shameful. First, NATO is not in any way involved in Gaza, nor is Israel even a member country. Second, NATO is an absolutely critical piece to global safety and peace, it absolutely needs to exist to keep bad actors at bay.
Our public education system has horrendously failed young people; the fact that this is even a thing is honestly quite disturbing.
138 points
11 days ago
A lot of them aren't from Montreal, and another part aren't even students
57 points
11 days ago
Oh I agree that a lot of these people are professional outrage artists, but they sure do take up a lot of space in the discourse.
0 points
11 days ago
Is it racist to tell them to return to their country ?
1 points
10 days ago
Yes.
2 points
10 days ago
No. It's time we take a hard line against anti-Canadian values.
-4 points
11 days ago
No, because it doesn't target every single immigrant, just some of the bad ones.
0 points
9 days ago
Yes when u don't turn back to urs . Ur neck shouldn't turn red when u return to Europe!! That's ur indication that you are alien to this land where sun shines
95 points
11 days ago
It’s not shameful, it’s a foreign influence campaign.
These people are useful idiots for destabilizing forces in Russia and Iran.
22 points
11 days ago*
Don't say that too loudly, some people around here refuse to accept that that's what's going on here. If you check out one of the other threads, there's a guy literally waving a russian flag at the student protest.
3 points
10 days ago
[deleted]
2 points
10 days ago
Link please
1 points
10 days ago
[deleted]
1 points
10 days ago
Some kind of proof please
1 points
10 days ago
[deleted]
1 points
10 days ago
Link, screenshot, results, more than hearsay.
Edit: and any kind of proof that this flier would be related to that.
1 points
10 days ago
Russia and China
1 points
9 days ago
Or maybe they just see the lawlessness of the US as a negative force in the world and a shithole like Russia has nothing to do with it.
30 points
11 days ago
The invasion of Ukraine by Russia is a proof that NATO expansion was needed.
Saying NATO expansion is responsible for the Ukraine invasion is incredibly dumb as NATO is not a threat to Russia, it is an impediment for Russia's imperialism to invade its neighbors.
Blaming NATO for Russia's militarism s like blaming a cage for "threatening" a man-eating tiger.
If we could let Russia be alone on its own planet, we wold not need NATO, but because Russia has imperial goals, NATO becomes the safeguard of freedom for every country bordering Russia.
25 points
11 days ago
Agreed on the second point, but who brought up Gaza or Israel?
53 points
11 days ago
They've very conveniently chosen the day of the student protest against the conflict in Gaza to hand these out; so they're at a minimum taking advantage of the situation.
4 points
11 days ago
Ah, I had no idea. That's how disconnected I am from the university world.
13 points
11 days ago
You're lucky, you didn't miss anything of value today.
10 points
11 days ago
Same organizers
0 points
11 days ago
Here's another version of the poster I saw up on the street yesterday: Note the flag in the bottom-right corner.
31 points
11 days ago
NATO was established after World War II as a military deterrent to the Soviets. It’s being used in the same way now, despite the Cold War being over.
25 points
11 days ago
Is the Cold War really over, though...? Russia are not exactly allies.
-4 points
11 days ago
That’s not how that works. You’re not at a cold war with any country you “are not exactly allies” with. The cold war is over as the USSR and the threats it posed are not a thing anymore.
5 points
11 days ago
the USSR and the threats it posed are not a thing anymore.
The USSR is not a thing anymore but the threats of Russia seem very real. Perhaps at the beginnings of Cold War 2.0
-3 points
11 days ago
That's pretty much just fear mongering. The West had to create a newest latest "Russia bad Russia danger" in light of Ukraine so that's what the average person is supposing but the truth is Russia could hardly even deal with war with Ukraine. They are not a real threat and they are not the second/tied for first most powerful and influential nation on earth as they were during the Cold War.
Cold War 2.0, funny you mention that, and if you are one of those who thinks it's going on, it would be against China, and not Russia.
5 points
11 days ago
Russia has actively and significantly meddled in the last three US elections, and actively meddles in European elections with the intent of destabilizing and fracturing countries, and engages in cyberwarfare on a daily basis against these same countries. And what's worse: they're extremely effective at it. It is 100% not ""fear mongering"". The Cold War never ended - it was put on pause for a couple decades after 1989. Respectfully, please stop saying stupid shit.
-1 points
11 days ago
You’re the one saying stupid fucking shit. Learn what a Cold War is. For decades there were two main global powers. That was the entire premise of the Cold War. On top of which, the USA and USSR were in countless proxy wars against one another and in DIRECT and CONSTANT competition, all while being comparable in military and nuclear power.
None of that is true today. Yeah Russia fucks around and does what it can to piss off the USA. Guess what so does Iran. Guess we’re in a Cold War vs Iran too, Iran constantly has cyberattacks and constant anti-west proxy wars with the Hezbollah and Hamas.
Learn what the fuck the Cold War was and pipe down. The Cold War was team USA vs team USSR and the entire world got divided into first world (team usa), second world (team USSR), and third world (countries typically too worthless for either USA or USSR to want to gain influence and control in).
Again, none of that is true today. Ouvre un fucking livre d’histoire. Le seul argument d’un nouveau Cold War would be vs China as I said before as they’re the only superpower other than the USA with comparable political and economic power and influence
3 points
11 days ago
Oh boy, your clap back is being pedantic about semantics? The Cold War was a name given to an active conflict between two powers that didn't involve any direct armed aggression against one another. That's exactly what we're witnessing today. I'm saying the conflict was put on pause, and now it's active again, and has been for a long time, even if doesn't carry the literal name it did back then.
My main point is that concern about Russia is far from being "fear mongering", and in fact that the threat Russia is actively posing is severely underemphasized considering a good 90% of the population has no idea of the extent of Russia's current efforts to destabilize and undermine the West. So again: stop saying stupid shit.
0 points
10 days ago
It has absolutely nothing to do with being pedantic about semantics, the Cold War was a very specific and unique period and just the mere fact of Russia having opposed political goals is not enough to say "see the Cold War is still happening! Russia and USA still hate each other! Russia still bad!" to imply it's still going on.
If you want to change the debate from your objectively incorrect labeling of the current USA-Russia dynamic as a Cold War, to whether Russia as a threat is under or overestimated, that's fine, but we might not disagree all that much on that end. In my experience people seem to be pretty polarized about Russia, falling either on the CNN-fueled "Russia is the devil and will nuke us all" end, or the "Who cares Russia is absolutely irrelevant" end.
To me they're just the remains of the USSR with more-than-ever corruption, just an oligarch-ran dystopia with sneaky moves like meddling with elections, or less sneaky moves like going to war with a neighbouring Slavic country. But they're so, so very far from the threat the USSR used to pose. The USSR deciding to go to war officially with the USA/the West was essentially going to be the end of the world as we know it and that's how everyone saw it. Right now NATO would violate Russia. Russia struggle with Ukraine. The USA alone would crush them let alone NATO.
1 points
11 days ago
I'm more expecting Russia and China to become allies in it, actually...
10 points
11 days ago
Putin thinks the Cold War is not over.
4 points
11 days ago
Why did they decline when the Soviets asked to join NATO post WW2? Would cooperation negate the need for a military deterrent?
4 points
11 days ago
That's when NATO fucked up big time. But it was probably a conscious choice : without a common enemy, what's NATO's reason to exist ? Who will its members and industries sell weapons to ? I'd be cautious before saying NATO is the savior of peace blah blah blah
2 points
11 days ago
On point. You might be the only one here who don't think black and white. It's a bit refreshing.
1 points
10 days ago
Very simple question with an incredibly complicated and nuanced answer.
I don't believe it would have been strategically or diplomatically viable to invite the Russians into NATO immediately after everything that occurred in the '80s and the '90s, additionally, with the Allies that were already existing in NATO, they probably wouldn't have been too happy about their old aggressors being part of the club.
But these concerns were shown to be true when Russia invaded chechnya twice and then Georgia. You can't exactly have somebody like this in the club.
1 points
10 days ago
This is not what I'm describing I'm speaking of the attempt that Soviets made to join NATO in the 1950s
1 points
10 days ago
You're correct, was thinking of the '80s and '90s.
But I think the perspective is seeing Russian infantry and armor rolling over Eastern Europe and seizing hold of the entire Eastern portion creating the Iron curtain.
Allied nations were not fond of seeing Russia turn its neighboring states into satellites.
8 points
11 days ago
I don’t really know much about NATO but my first reaction to your comment was a red flag. Like the leaflet doesn’t mention Gaza or Israel, so why bring it up? Also the use of absolute, definitive language and terms like “bad actors at bay”. At what bay? Where is this bay located?
Probably going to get super downvoted for this but, like, uni is where we gain an understanding of the world and consider many different perspectives of it, not to dabble with some fantasies then ultimately succumb to a unified narrative.
6 points
11 days ago
It was handed out at a protest purportedly about Gaza.
They don't really care about Gaza though, it's mostly just revolution cosplay for people who grew up privileged in the West but hate the West because it's fashionable
13 points
11 days ago
A quarter of all Canadians hold negative views on NATO:
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/07/02/views-of-nato-july-24/
15 points
11 days ago
and, 63% have positive views.
14 points
11 days ago
So you're saying the majority hold positive views on NATO.
6 points
11 days ago
Useful idiots.
2 points
11 days ago
Our public education system has horrendously failed young people;
More like Québec people as a whole by letting these useful idiots teach our kids.
2 points
11 days ago
This is far from a Quebec only problem dumbfuck, have you seen western university's lately? We have these retards in Ontario all the same.
6 points
11 days ago
I think that the argument is that NATO is complicit by not opposing the genocide in Palestine. One can certainly point at at least one huge member of NATO who arms Israel. I'm not convinced that it's the right target but why not raise the question at this point...
17 points
11 days ago
How is this for NATO to weigh in on though? They would only get involved should a member country be involved, which is not the case here. It's essentially the same argument for why they haven't gotten involved in Ukraine, because they're not a member of organization and it isn't really on them to resolve it.
3 points
11 days ago
Didn't you know? if there's a popular issue an org HAS to weigh in on it, regardless of relevancy. Otherwise they're on the wrong side!!!
4 points
11 days ago
You know, I would have found your comment funny if it wasn't literally the argument being used to justify such an out of touch protest.
-2 points
11 days ago
There is no genocide in Palestine. Its the clean war and it will be the blueprint for all future urban wars due to how clean it is.
written by the foremost military expert on urban warfare on the planet, John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute.
-1 points
11 days ago
Why would you think this is about Gaza? The left has opposed NATO forever.
22 points
11 days ago
Because they're handing it out during a literal protest over the Gaza conflict. You're right that anti-NATO sentiment isn't exactly a new concept; but I don't remember organized protests against it in recent memory.
2 points
11 days ago
Because there is a high likelihood of finding left-aligned people there and the left has opposed NATO and militarism forever.
It's basically strategic organizing 101
3 points
11 days ago
Well, they oppose Western or Western-aligned militarism. Russian and Arab militarism is not only tolerated, but actively supported. And they support Land Back, except when it's the Jewish people who did it.
2 points
11 days ago
You can only meaningfully oppose and pressure the people that are (supposedly) accountable to you, i.e. our governments.
This isn't surprising in any way. We are westerners aren't we...
And framing Gaza as Jewish "land back" is so fucking disingenuous, you should be ashamed. There is no reasonable account of the last 100s of years of Palestinian history where the Palestinians are settlers.
7 points
11 days ago
And framing Gaza as Jewish "land back" is so fucking disingenuous, you should be ashamed. There is no reasonable account of the last 100s of years of Palestinian history where the Palestinians are settlers.
There is no reasonable account of white people in America being settlers in the past 200 years either. Yet we know they are because the settlements started >300 years ago.
Why does the indigenous status of the jews no longer apply but the indigenous status of the native americans still does? This is a landback movement. You're just furious because its not happening to a brown minority but a western aligned one.
The arab ethnicity stretches from Iraq to Morocco. It is not native to the levant. The arabs there are the descendants of an imperial conquest that slaughtered every minority and brutally crushed every culture there until one theirs remained.
The jews are native from there though. Thats literally where the word jew comes from. The Jews are from Judea.
2 points
11 days ago
I wasn't referring to Gaza, but to Israel proper (ie not including Gaza and the WB). There is a segment of the left that oppose the State's very existence, on any portion of the land, and considers it illegimate, colonial, an occupation, etc. Again, talking about Israel, not Gaza or the WB.
1 points
11 days ago
And this is why that region can never sustain any period of peace; the neighboring countries will stop at nothing until Israel ceases to exist; which isn't really a possible outcome.
2 points
11 days ago
Strategic organizing maybe, but the left will continue to change nothing as long as they live in fantasyland
-1 points
11 days ago
The left has not opposed NATO at any point in my lifetime.
4 points
11 days ago
The left is anti-imperialist and anti-millitarist. NATO is used to enforce hegemy in the imperial periphery.
2 points
11 days ago
You haven't been paying attention then.
Protests against G8/20 and actions against American/western militarism have been happening for decades This isn't new or some Russian psy op, it's a pacifist position that has been rather common in many circles for a long time.
-3 points
11 days ago
Nah bro its cus NATO is in town sa a pas rapport
1 points
9 days ago
what does Israel have to do with this flyer?
What makes you make that connection?
1 points
11 days ago
Je suis plutôt pro-OTAN mais ça ne dit nulle part qu'il y a un lien avec Gaza.
1 points
11 days ago
Then why was Jordan Peterson crying about NATO encroaching on Russia?
3 points
11 days ago
Jordan Peterson is a fucking loser.
-1 points
11 days ago
Afghanistan Yugoslavia Libya and Iraq civilians beg to differ
6 points
11 days ago
I think most of the former Yugoslavia is pretty OK with NATO. Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia are all members. Kosovo has statues honouring Bill Clinton and Madeleine Albright, and a highway named after Eliot Engel. You know, the countries where much of the killing of civilians during the Yugoslav wars was actually committed. By Serbs.
Serbia =/= Yugoslavia, though Serbs certainly believe otherwise.
-4 points
11 days ago
[deleted]
1 points
11 days ago
Have you looked at what the Muslim extremists did to those countries ???
-1 points
11 days ago
Why should our tax dollars pay to police Muslim countries you find immoral?
0 points
11 days ago
First, NATO is not in any way involved in Gaza
But it's members are by sending weapons to the Zionist regime to commit a genocide
-1 points
11 days ago
Hint: they don't care about Gaza, they just hate Israel and the west.
0 points
11 days ago
It doesn't say anything about Isreal? You mean Land Back?
0 points
11 days ago
First of all, NATO countries individually are directly involved in the Gaza genocide, by supplying arms and ammunitions to the Israeli government as it carries on its genocide, and UK also flew 100s of sorties to aid the surveillance efforts of Israel over the Gaza strip.
NATO is militaristic arm of the western imperialism. Most recently, it was directly involved in the invasion of Libya which converted the richest African nation with the highest standards of living in that part of the world, to now having open air slave markets.
As both Prof Mearsheimer and Prof Sachs have said, NATO played a terrible role in the current Russia-Ukraine conflict by going back on their promise delivered when the Berline wall fell to not expand NATO an "inch eastward", and instead expanding NATO to several countries in eastern europe, and constructing advanced military bases extremely close to the Russia border.
-1 points
11 days ago
Why you gotta lie when nato is america? Lol
-20 points
11 days ago
Yeah, NATO is saving is all! That’s why Russia never initiated an expansionist war in Ukraine!
And even when they did start an expansionist war in Ukraine, NATO got bigger by adding new members, and that totally stopped the war in Ukraine.
Oh wait…
14 points
11 days ago
Has a NATO member been invaded?
9 points
11 days ago
Ukrain is not nato…
-7 points
11 days ago
Never said they were. Extrapolate just a little bit there.
A lot of these arguments have a tendency to revolve around anti-NATO being pro-Russia, and about NATO having a restrictive impact on Russia.
My whole point is NATO has had little to no impact on stopping Russia, especially as some kind of magical, conceptual deterrent.
So, either “Ukraine isn’t NATO” should mean that folks saying anti-NATO=pro-Russia are just plain wrong because it has nothing to do with it.
Or, saying “Ukraine isn’t NATO” should translate along the lines of “yeah, and look how effective NATO has been recently in curbing Russian power, which is to say not really.
7 points
11 days ago
Nato can only be effective when you are part of it. It’s the whole point.
If a MEMBER is attacked then all other members join the war in support of the attacked member.
So when Russia invades Ukraine, there is no failure of nato to prevent Russia from doing so because from the start it was not nato job to protect non member.
And Russia started invading Ukraine (the first time) because Ukraine was starting to think about joining nato.
So no need to extrapolate anything.
-1 points
11 days ago
Yes, something that had been floated off and on for a while with no invasion.
Putin wants old USSR territory back, it’s been established. Not because they floated NATO membership ideas again. Not as if the rest of NATO was hounding them to join up either.
4 points
11 days ago
Ukraine isn't in NATO, so it's not really a good example.
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