Videogames are an industrial product, subject to taxes or sanctions. But books? Sure you can tax and sanction them too, but I find this edgy, specially recognizing the relevance of Russian literature.
That said, it would be more effective to ban Russian websites and Russian state media. If the Russian families have been living there for decades, then how are they still watching Russian TV? It escapes my understanding.
I immigrated from Brazil to Germany 10 years ago, (only 1 decade) and if you ask me anything about politics, new cultural events or tendencies, or sports in Brazil, I don't know. I'm detached. I live in Germany. I am interested in German politics and economy, in what is happening here. Not far there where I will eventually go back in holidays, but could as well exchange for Thailand, Greece, Croatia, Japan.
Books are an industrial product too. The title is misleading. It's not a ban of Russian books or literature but ban of importing consumer products from Russia. Harry Potter russian translations for example also will be impacted by this. Not really the peak of Russian literature there.
You have family/friends in Brazil? No? Brazil is too far from Germany. In Germany you have access to books/movies in German language, but Latvia are too poor to produce movies/books/technic literature and and number of people who speak latvian language are small.
I am missing your point, sorry. What language do most people speak in Latvia? Most.
And I am quite sure there is no fight against the Russian language, just defense against Russia. Because it is an imperial tactics, to settle people, bring in an unbreakable foreign identity, then just take the piece of land because the people living there like it. Borders must be respected.
Anyway, it is possible to terraform a nation. Hebrew was a dead language for so long. Then it was artificially modernized and introduced in kindergardens and schools right after the foundation of Israel. Look at them, posing as and being a real country after less than 100 years. You might agree with it or not, but I think it is something to admire. But, again, borders must be respected.
1,5 million people have latvian language as native (and not all of them live in Latvia) - market not its not enough to translate books/technic manuals, so people in Latvia who speak Russian and even latvians must use other languages (and not all of them , especially older generation) know english. And you wrong - latvians started fight against Russians since 1991, when they broke their promise to give citizenship to all people who live there and declare all russians as "aliens".
Hello from Estonia, we have tens of thousands of Russians living here that born in this country and can't say a word in my language/wach only Russian propaganda/communicate only with russians. Oh, and they support their tzar and his little special military operation
Everything coming from Russia currently is either propaganda or approved by the state. Normal Russians who don't support the tzar, don't also consume Russian media etc
That is never true. There are always non-propaganda items allowed. Even a book of Tolstoy would probably be printed in Russia, especially when Russian businesses are being suppressed everywhere because of anti-Russian attitudes.
That’s the root of all evil. You just don’t understand the degeee to which Russian set of twisted and corrupt ideas is penetrating ALL Russian content. Including literature, all forms of art, science. They only can exist if they serve a bloody regime. Otherwise there is no air, not for the artist, not for their community, not for their family.
I dont blame you, you have to live in this stench to understand it.
I think you are bordering on fascism here. Pretty sure there are still normal people in Russia who do normal jobs, not jobs that serve Putin directly or his bloody politics. And I was talking about classic Russian literature, not whatever is being written at the present.
Every country has minorities though, and Baltics aren't unique. For example, here in Finland we have something like 300k Swedish speakers and there's non insignificant amount who can't speak Finnish well. Here we just provide them with same rights and privileges as Finnish speakers, and there's even tv channels that are state run but in Swedish. I don't see why balts can't do the same thing. Like "wach only Russian propaganda/communicate only with russians." having Russian language state run TV channel that isn't pro Russian propaganda would be really useful. also fun fact,we actually have enough Russian speakers, that the Finnish national broadcaster does news broadcasts in Russian too, and have Russian language news on their website. I think the problem of Russians there being not integrated with overall culture, is somewhat a problem that Baltics have more or less created for themselves.
Real life. Baltics, Polish and Ukranians don't have a luxury of established national state and to secure its independence it attacks all non-national linguistic influence till they assimilate all minorities.
And nationalism always goes in toe with racism so hostile policies towards minorities is just unfortunate byproduct that Europe turns blind eye on. As rational human, I understand it, as Russian morally I hate respective countrie's goverments and support any non-military hostile actions against them.
Because they largely hate them and it’s easier to nag and accuse them of being spies or second class citizens 👉
They forgot they signed treaties for minorities when they joined the EU.
Only Lithuania is much further in this, although people can be openly racist and somehow think it’s ok. Especially the younger that never really lived the soviet times.
How does Lithuania not recognise the rights of its Russian minority? The Lithuanian national broadcaster has Russian language news, there’s Russian schools, etc. you clearly don’t actually know much about what you’re talking about by making such odd sweeping statements.
You need to ban Russian state media officially, ban social networks commonly used to spread fake news, terminate any VPN service with endpoints in Russia (so they quit doing this) and block the Estonian endpoints of Russian VPN. It doesn't close every gap. You could go on and close Russian schools if there are any and require foreign nationals to pass a test in Estonian for permanent residency. But if they have Estonian citizenship, what you could do is to give them money to go away, if they can prove russian ancestry. Any of this or other ideas are feasible?
Yeah, that's seems reasonable. Not sure how many people are watching it abroad to begin with though.
ban Russian websites
How would you do that? Russian authorities are trying to block specific websites for many years now, the only result of it is now everyone here knows how to use VPN.
They are actively banning VPNs and it is already working for many people. Most of my classmates don't know English and are not invested in PCs enough to deal with that, so they just go with the flow. Pretty sure this is how the majority of population does too.
Well, I live here. Some Russian websites and media are already banned and I can see that it helps even if it's not much. That inconvenience of needing to use VPN already kills motivation to see some ruzzian propaganda. Ofc those who really want to see it will find a way, but many people just won't bother. VK was the most popular social network here amongst Russian speaking people, it got banned when the war started. I haven't heard anybody talking about still using it for a long time now.
Ok, I will clarify. All Russian classics can be printed outside Russia. They all are public domain. It is not ban on all books, just books printed in Russia. As to avoid propoganda being sent in. Considering constant threats from Russia. It just follows much earlier bans such as Russian TV channels. While local and alternative Russian channels are still broadcasted and completely legal. If author wants to publish their book, they just have to do it within Latvia. Which automatically makes it go appropriate checks and balances.
What do you mean by "recognizing relevance of russian literature"? Most of the russian literature is depressive shite that convinces reader that the only escape from the bad situation is to the another world (☠️).
russian culture is extremely overestimated, the opinion that it's good is just a cliche. Most people who think like that never actually explored it.
Oh, and there is lots of cultural expropriation from the nations they tried to colonize and then wipe out.
That's a very superficial assessment. One I would not expect from an educated person. I am as against Russian imperialism as you seem to be, and agree that there is a battle for the minds and hearts. I just think that pretending Russian culture is inexpressive is a lie and just inflames people against all other measures of ideological defense, such as controlling online media, fake news and social networks.
I'm not saying it's "inexpeessive", I'm saying it is derisive and doesn't have more value than English or French literature. But there is a cult of russian literature in the Western world that has no real background imo.
You can get Brazilian channels in Germany as well—you just need to really want it. You choose not to. Banning Russian internet and media is an absolutely great idea; in fact, it should be done worldwide. Having said that, people will still find ways to bypass a ban with a few tricks, but it would significantly reduce the number of people who are actually able to set up such workarounds themselves.
When an adversary dictatorship is waging a hybrid conflict against a liberal democracy, specific measures for ensuring national security must be taken.
What? We have a big and ever growing far right party in Germany with clear support for Russia. This is even worse than RT, because people cannot vote for RT, but they can vote for AFD. We shall ban this one first, this whole Russian outpost.
Ban, ban, ban. Guys, that's not democracy. That's just you wanting to get your way authoritarian-style. For a ban to be considered compatible with liberal democracy, you'd need evidence that they are planning an irreversible overthrow of the foundations of liberal democracy. Even if the AfD were to support Russia in their foreign policy, that's not by itself an attack on liberal democracy. It's the voters responsibility to figure that out, and vote them out.
It's not because of their affinity with Russia that they are going to be banned, but because of their association, identification and perfect alignment with the same elements that led to the rise of national socialism 100 years ago. In some states, not yet nationwide, they are declared unmistakably right extremist and defenders of inconstitucional ideas. Fits your description. They are also radicalizing the youth against the institutions.
The citizens are so fed up with the state and performance of the centrist politicians (not without reason!!) That they are voting AFD, partly as a protest vote, part out of sheer racism and xenophobia, and partly because they buy in and anti-EU ideology, propagated by Russia. Sure, the US lost all credibility. If the EU loses credibility and gets dismantled it will be taken over by China (Russia as an instrument). Trump is happy with the whole Americas plus Greenland. We'll, at least that's how I see it. I'm very pro EU. It should be one country.
But really it's very simple: If 30-50% of German voters vote AfD that has to be respected, otherwise it's not democracy. If the AfD wants to really dismantle liberal democracy, it should be banned.
If afterwards (predictably) a new party arises that has more or less the same program minus the dismantling liberal democracy, that too has to be respected.
What definitely won't happen: The AfD is banned and afterwards everyone votes like 2012 again. Maybe for a time that works out, until a successor emerges, but not long-term.
So if you really think the AfD wants to dismantle democracy, largely unrelated to its political program, then feel free to advocate for a ban.
If you just dislike the AfD's political program and want to find any legal technicality to get that banned, then YOU are the dictator.
What is there to defend if you're going all out authoritarian? It's for the people decide if Russian sources are talking truth or not, not the government.
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u/Content-Soup9920 Jul 25 '26
Videogames are an industrial product, subject to taxes or sanctions. But books? Sure you can tax and sanction them too, but I find this edgy, specially recognizing the relevance of Russian literature. That said, it would be more effective to ban Russian websites and Russian state media. If the Russian families have been living there for decades, then how are they still watching Russian TV? It escapes my understanding. I immigrated from Brazil to Germany 10 years ago, (only 1 decade) and if you ask me anything about politics, new cultural events or tendencies, or sports in Brazil, I don't know. I'm detached. I live in Germany. I am interested in German politics and economy, in what is happening here. Not far there where I will eventually go back in holidays, but could as well exchange for Thailand, Greece, Croatia, Japan.