Game writer. Galactic backpacker. Kaiju whisperer. My other ride is a TARDIS.

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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 11th, 2023

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  • I was in China last month where mask-wearing is frequent and not stigmatized. They had a surge of Covid cases, so I wore a mask on public transport. It’s a total no-brainer there.

    Back in Canada, I don’t wear it as much because I’d be in much less trouble if I caught it here. Still wore one when visiting an aging relative in a medical facility.


  • I have to believe this is just posturing for the people at home on the part of Zelenskyy. He has to know immediate membership of Ukraine into NATO means direct war with Russia leading to nuclear escalation, as Ukraine would immediately invoke Article 5.

    Just saying “Ukraine will be invited to NATO once the conflict is over” is enough; it means whatever territory Russia gets to keep over the course of this conflict is it, because then Ukraine becomes NATO territory. It forces Russia to try and win it all (which they can’t) because there won’t be another invasion of Ukraine.




  • The terrible message is precisely that NATO is only defensive in theory, but is willing to expand into the Pacific to defend a territory that is nowhere near its original purview.

    The problem with the “purely defensive” argument is that historically, NATO Article 5 has been invoked to declare a war on a country that only indirectly threatened a NATO ally’s regional stability. That’s how NATO ended up bombing Serbia, which was doing despicable things to Albanians, but was not threatening NATO sovereignty to a degree that justifies Article 5.

    Add these two together and China’s opposition to a NATO presence in the Pacific makes a whole lot of sense.