Ifi crushed by cheap Chinese gear

[Ralf11]

5 hours ago, sligolad said:

Wow....never seen a thread get so derailed....seems like we need a venting section or pub car park around here!

 

 

I blame I Fi

[AnotherSpin]

18 minutes ago, firedog said:

Jews were heavily discriminated against in the USSR and still are in Russia. Ask my freinds, who left about things like quotas against Jews at universities and the like. 

 

Oh, come on. Jews were represented in the high education group significantly above any other nationality in USSR. Most of my friends were Jewish and they were very happy people in USSR. Yes, there were some antisemitic tendencies which were very succesfully used to various kind of advantage by "victims". And not only in that country.

 

[pkane2001]

34 minutes ago, firedog said:

Jews were heavily discriminated against in the USSR and still are in Russia. Ask my freinds, who left about things like quotas against Jews at universities and the like. 

 

I know it, and your friends know it. But our friend AnotherSpin thinks it was just herd mentality, that everyone was enjoying their life and had no reason to leave since it was just as bad everywhere else.

 

7 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

Crowd instincts. "You are leaving?... Ok, we think about the same"

 

[pkane2001]

16 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

Most of my friends were Jewish and they were very happy people in USSR. 

 

No doubt that's why they left USSR en masse at the first opportunity and at a grave risk to their lives, families, and livelihood. Too much happiness is bad for you, right?

 

[AnotherSpin]

Grave risk to lives? Please explain more, I am not so bright to follow.

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, pkane2001 said:

 

I know it, and your friends know it. But our friend AnotherSpin thinks it was just herd mentality, that everyone was enjoying their life and had no reason to leave since it was just as bad everywhere else.

 

 

 

As good as everywhere else.

[pkane2001]

43 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

Grave risk to lives? Please explain more, I am not so bright to follow.

 

Perhaps you weren't around (or too busy chasing girls and listening to Zappa) in the 70's. People risked everything when they applied for  permission to leave USSR. From bodily harm from those friendly antisemites next door, to years of waiting for a permission that may never come, to a complete isolation from society, schools, jobs, inability to feed the family. And if you did finally get a permission to leave, you left with nothing. So, yes, happy days.

 

Enough of this, though. It's depressing me.

[mansr]

If you're ever in Berlin, I recommend a visit to the Stasi museum, housed in their old HQ.

[AnotherSpin]

6 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Perhaps you weren't around (or too busy chasing girls and listening to Zappa) in the 70's. People risked everything when they applied for  permission to leave USSR. From bodily harm from those friendly antisemites next door, to years of waiting for a permission that may never come, to a complete isolation from society, schools, jobs, inability to feed the family. And if you did finally get a permission to leave, you left with nothing. So, yes, happy days.

 

Enough of this, though. It's depressing me.

 

I can see how your thoughts depress you – sorry. I was pretty much around when most of my jewish friends were leaving USSR in 70s, 80s or 90s. It was not fun, agree. But nothing terrible as well. Humiliating, yes. For example, members of Communist Party (more than few jews were) undergo the procedure of obligatory expulsion from a Party. Never heard about bodily harm and inability to feed the families. Quite opposite, the best home food I tasted was on my jewish friends tables also during the emigration process, which sure took some time. Never met a jew who wanted to leave, was not permitted and still hanging around surrounded by antisemites. Did you? Of course there were couple of so called "dissidents" but I speak about next door people.

[AnotherSpin]

6 hours ago, mansr said:

If you're ever in Berlin, I recommend a visit to the Stasi museum, housed in their old HQ.

 

Been in Berlin several times during DDR era, survived. Do not remember anything bone chilling. The small bottle of beer was dirty cheap, something like 3 pfennigs.

[chauphuong]

There's something bad unveiled in some countries because of regime change, and there must be the same never coming to light because of no regime change in other countries.

[firedog]

10 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

Oh, come on. Jews were represented in the high education group significantly above any other nationality in USSR. Most of my friends were Jewish and they were very happy people in USSR. Yes, there were some antisemitic tendencies which were very succesfully used to various kind of advantage by "victims". And not only in that country.

 

Back it up with stats.

 

And BTW, even if true, that doesn't mean there weren't quotas and other forms of discrimination. The two don't contradict each other.  There were once anti-Jewish quotas at leading Universities in the US - at the same time as those universities had many Jewish students.

 

Do you think it's coincidence that so many Jews left when they could, or that many risked prison sentences in order to get the right to leave?  I don't. Ask the people I know who lost their jobs and/or were put in prison for "crimes" like learning Hebrew or asking to emigrate. Maybe your Jewish friends towed the line and did none of these things or were good party members so were mostly left alone. 

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, firedog said:

Back it up with stats.

 

And BTW, even if true, that doesn't mean there weren't quotas and other forms of discrimination. The two don't contradict each other.  There were once anti-Jewish quotas at leading Universities in the US - at the same time as those universities had many Jewish students.

 

Do you think it's coincidence that so many Jews left when they could, or that many risked prison sentences in order to get the right to leave?  I don't. Ask the people I know who lost their jobs and/or were put in prison for "crimes" like learning Hebrew or asking to emigrate. Maybe your Jewish friends towed the line and did none of these things or were good party members so were mostly left alone. 

 

I do not have such stats. But I have my personal experience and my memory is not so weak yet. Sweeping majority of my school teachers were jews. And almost all of them were excellent teachers. My dentist was jewish, and doctor who helped my wife deliver kids was jewish as well. I was a college lecturer for +10 years, just before the USSR collapsed. I never saw any documents asking to quote jews, nor I never heard any requirements of this kind. My jewish students were not better nor worse than any other. Some of them were excellent, some mediocre. Never met anyone who suffered prison sentence because he or she wanted to leave. I know many people who left and they were not jewish too. 

[firedog]

2 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

I do not have such stats. But I have my personal experience and my memory is not so weak yet. Sweeping majority of my school teachers were jews. And almost all of them were excellent teachers. My dentist was jewish, and doctor who helped my wife deliver kids was jewish as well. I was a college lecturer for +10 years, just before the USSR collapsed. I never saw any documents asking to quote jews, nor I never heard any requirements of this kind. My jewish students were not better nor worse than any other. Some of them were excellent, some mediocre. Never met anyone who suffered prison sentence because he or she wanted to leave. I know many people who left and they were not jewish too. 

It's really simple: thousands and thousands or even millions of stories of discrimination, including assault, and even imprisonment for the "crime" of being Jewish, or even the crime of wanting to know Hebrew and Jewish history. None of your anecdotal stories change that, nor does your rose colored glasses view of what the situation was like. 

[mansr]

4 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

Of course there were couple of so called "dissidents"

A couple of dissidents do not a Gulag camp make.

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

A couple of dissidents do not a Gulag camp make.

 

GULAG camps were populated by all Soviet nationalities. 

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, firedog said:

It's really simple: thousands and thousands or even millions of stories of discrimination, including assault, and even imprisonment for the "crime" of being Jewish, or even the crime of wanting to know Hebrew and Jewish history. None of your anecdotal stories change that, nor does your rose colored glasses view of what the situation was like. 

 

You are free to believe those millions stories. Thank you.

[mansr]

4 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

GULAG camps were populated by all Soviet nationalities. 

And that makes them OK?

[AnotherSpin]

Just now, mansr said:

And that makes them OK?

Did I tell it? GULAG system of camps finished its existence after Stalin's death, long before dissidents and emigration of jews. Among NKVD officers of high calibre were many... guess who?

[mansr]

18 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

dissidents

A place where "dissident" is a useful term is not a place I want to be.

[pkane2001]

6 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

But nothing terrible as well. Humiliating, yes. For example, members of Communist Party (more than few jews were) undergo the procedure of obligatory expulsion from a Party. Never heard about bodily harm and inability to feed the families. Quite opposite, the best home food I tasted was on my jewish friends tables also during the emigration process, which sure took some time. Never met a jew who wanted to leave, was not permitted and still hanging around surrounded by antisemites. Did you? 

 

Sorry buddy, you really need to walk a mile in someone's shoes to try to pretend to understand what they feel and suffer. I know literally hundreds of families that have gone through this process in the 70's. This was a risky and terrible thing to go through. Getting back to my point, the only reason they left or tried to leave was because their life was in shambles, their kids had no future, they suffered discrimination and abuse on a daily basis. And yes, even in the beautiful Odessa. That was the reason they risked everything, gave up all earthly possessions, uprooted the family and moved into an unknown. All just to get away from... what? being happy? Sorry, but that's nonsense. 

 

[firedog]

30 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

You are free to believe those millions stories. Thank you.

Turns out your handle on this site is very appropriate. You certainly have a unique spin.

[AnotherSpin]

1 hour ago, firedog said:

Turns out your handle on this site is very appropriate. You certainly have a unique spin.

 

To ridicule someone else handle is a very strong argument..))

[jabbr]

14 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Sorry buddy, you really need to walk a mile in someone's shoes to try to pretend to understand what they feel and suffer. I know literally hundreds of families that have gone through this process in the 70's. This was a risky and terrible thing to go through. Getting back to my point, the only reason they left or tried to leave was because their life was in shambles, their kids had no future, they suffered discrimination and abuse on a daily basis. And yes, even in the beautiful Odessa. That was the reason they risked everything, gave up all earthly possessions, uprooted the family and moved into an unknown. All just to get away from... what? being happy? Sorry, but that's nonsense. 

 

 

The reason America became great is because we are a country comprised of the descendants of people who risked their lives to leave oppression of various forms. 

[AnotherSpin]

3 hours ago, jabbr said:

 

The reason America became great is because we are a country comprised of the descendants of people who risked their lives to leave oppression of various forms. 

 

The greatest oppression among all various forms comes from inside. From own ego. One may try to change outer conditions, many do.