627 lines
74 KiB
HTML
627 lines
74 KiB
HTML
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<html lang="" xml:lang="" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head>
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<meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes" name="viewport"/>
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<title>13 March, 2022</title>
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<title>Daily-Dose</title><meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" name="viewport"/><link href="styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><link href="../styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><style>*{overflow-x:hidden;}</style><link href="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.css" rel="stylesheet"/><script src="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.js"></script></head>
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<body>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Growing Fear of a Wider War Between Russia and the West</strong> - U.S. officials warn that tensions over Ukraine could trigger a once unthinkable conflict pitting Russia against NATO. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-growing-fear-of-a-wider-war-between-russia-and-the-west">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>At Home with the Families Affected by Texas’s New Anti-Trans Orders</strong> - After Governor Greg Abbott called medical care for trans children “child abuse,” their families began weighing their options. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-southwest/at-home-with-the-families-affected-by-texass-new-%20anti-trans-orders">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine Upended Germany</strong> - In the wake of Russia’s attack, Germany has reoriented its energy policy and committed to dramatic military expansion for the first time since the Cold War. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-putins-invasion-of-ukraine-upended-germany">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Sunday Reading: The World of Helen Rosner</strong> - From the magazine’s archive: a selection of the 2022 National Magazine Award finalist’s work. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/sunday-reading-the-world-of-helen-rosner">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Pope, the Patriarchs, and the Battle to Save Ukraine</strong> - Other Popes have managed to temper tyrants—can Francis do anything about Vladimir Putin? - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-pope-the-patriarchs-and-the-battle-to-save-ukraine">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
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<ul>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The best $4.99 I ever spent: A six-pack after my father’s funeral</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="Illustration of a six-pack of cans of Asahi beer." src="https://cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/thumbor/F6pxUzm3Tzx8JdtcRcI6Sh_8S3I=/500x0:3500x2250/1310x983/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70615595/Beer.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Dana Rodriguez for Vox
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</figcaption></figure></li>
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</ul>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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My mother and I bridged the holes in our heart together with cold beers.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TNEYOg">
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It took me until my father’s funeral to understand how different my mother’s grieving process was from mine. Not because she was his wife of 30 years and I was a daddy’s girl, but because she was raised in Japan and I was raised in Guam. Unknown to us, we had lived in two separate worlds, my father often serving as a bridge. And without him, we quickly discovered how significant that gap between us was.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="I1CEyc">
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Three months prior, my mother and I had flown to Japan to lay my grandfather — her own father — to rest. Dressed in a black ensemble with our juzu beads in hand, we attended his wake at a Buddhist temple and said a thousand prayers that would seal his vase.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sc22e8">
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That night, I watched a grieving widow and daughter with iced towels wrapped around their necks and Asahi beers in hand, slump on the couch recounting long-forgotten memories. I heard my grandmother’s voice crack, then laugh, then sob, while my quick-witted mother reassured her that everything would be okay — that they still had each other.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LlC7Xz">
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As much as I wanted to join in, I quietly retreated into the guest room, taking the cue that this special mother-daughter moment was always carved out for them.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1deFTx">
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The day I received the phone call of my father’s passing, I had just made a new life in Bali. It was only four months before that he dropped me off at the airport and I promised him that I would one day take him around on my scooter. I didn’t think I would have a time limit on that promise. He had a heart attack on what was an ordinary Tuesday night; my mother cooked dinner, they ate together at the table, then my father made their usual dessert run to McDonald’s for hot apple pies. They watched some TV and went to bed separately. That was the last time my mother would hear her husband wish her goodnight.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8StEZr">
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My parents were never affectionate. They slept in separate rooms, and never held hands or kissed, even in the privacy of their home. I spent many of my childhood summers in Japan, observing the similarly chaste interactions between my grandparents. As I entered the age where I was becoming more curious about relationships and romance, I one day asked my grandmother why she never kissed my grandfather. It hit me after watching her cheeks flush that PDA was not as common in Japan as it was in America.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5eUhnD">
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I remember watching my father playfully try to hug or kiss my mother as she would scrunch her eyebrows and shoo him away. Eventually, the efforts stopped altogether. Still, they stayed loyal to each other. Dutiful to one another. I watched them age as roommates whose hair slowly faded from black into silver, but nonetheless, together.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="m98qn3">
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When I was old enough to understand the importance and pleasures of physical affection, I blatantly asked my father why he and my mother never showed affection like people did in romantic movies. Why didn’t they hug? Why didn’t they embrace one another? And most importantly, why weren’t they in love?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="avgwoL">
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“Is this how you imagined marriage would be like?” I asked. “Don’t you want a deep and passionate kiss from your wife? Don’t you want to sleep in the same bed and hold each other?”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="PR83iO">
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My father laughed and admitted that he did want those things, but it was okay. “Your mother is your mother,” he said. “She loves in her own way.”
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</p>
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<div class="c-float-right">
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<aside id="D2cUlc">
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<q>Unknown to us, we had lived in two separate worlds, my father often serving as a bridge</q>
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</aside>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sMa1MC">
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On the way to my father’s funeral, we drove through the village in Guam where my father grew up. We climbed the hill to Agana Heights, passing by the one-story houses painted in various shades of purple and beige while rolling through the hills into the neighborhood. I pressed on the brakes to let the chicken shuffle its feet across the road and into the neighbor’s yard, utterly unbothered by the stray dog fast asleep beside a tree.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FXsnNO">
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“Did you ever think you would move here?” I asked my mother of my father’s homeland.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="VwfWZS">
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”Actually, I never thought I would leave Japan,” she responded.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tK5TZj">
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By the time of my father’s passing, my mother had spent more than half her life on foreign soil — more time than she had spent living in her home country. I wondered what she would do now that he was gone. I saved that question for another day.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="G709d8">
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At the funeral, I watched her kiss the cheeks and shake the hands of glassy-eyed family members, friends, and distant “relatives” — aunts and uncles whom I had never met before, but were nonetheless joined to the family by marriage or custom.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="X9rd3o">
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“He was such a good man,” they would say, sobbing into my mother’s cardigan. They would bring her into their arms, hiding her petite frame in their embrace. Keeping a foot apart, my mother would tap their back three times, peppering in an occasional rub when they lingered too long, and repeat the same tired line, “It’s okay. He’s resting now.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0HRa91">
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The thing about funerals is sometimes you don’t quite know whose funeral you are attending. In the spare moments I had, I escaped to the restroom and overheard a conversation not intended for my ears.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pQmBZL">
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“Where’s the wife’s family?” It was an older woman’s voice. The reply, similarly old and similarly judgmental, “I don’t think they’re here. Oh, how awfully sad. Poor things.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NFOgTY">
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I made my way back to my mother while scanning through the seats of island print and coral Sunday best shirts. None were from my mother’s bloodline.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hnmvXI">
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“Why isn’t uncle here?” I asked her, referring to her one and only sibling. “I know grandma doesn’t have a passport, but he should be here.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RHOrlI">
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My mother rocked back and forth, shifting her weight from her heels to her toes without looking at me. She told me in Japanese, perhaps an effort at discretion: “He couldn’t take off from work,” and before I could respond, she answered my phantom concern: “It’s okay. I’m okay.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bxj0uy">
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For the rest of the funeral, I was distracted. I watched my 2-year- old nephew crying in the arms of his mother. I began to wonder how my mother felt raising me at that age without speaking a lick of English, or how she bought oranges, how she pronounced the word at the register. I wonder if she ever cried herself to sleep while my father was away for months at a time for work.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="PkiAma">
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I thought back on the rare times that I had seen my mother cry; the time my father ate a hot dog after she spent an hour cooking, the time we fought over her long hours at work, and our argument just three nights before.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hUF9lX">
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I had passed on eating dinner together at the table. She told me that I’m too gaijin – westernized — and have lost what it means to be Japanese, how we always<em> </em>eat dinner together. I challenged her, arguing that my Japanese culture was all I knew, how I grew up, and who we were as a family.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NGuMuk">
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It was the first time I saw my mother’s grief come through. She turned to me with quivering lips and bloodshot eyes and broke down in a way I did not witness at my grandfather’s funeral or even when my father had passed.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bFmaEt">
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She shook her head slowly and I watched the tears stream down her face. “How are you Japanese if I’m not even Japanese anymore?”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9JBA7I">
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That night, I comforted her in a way that was foreign to us. I held her as she crumpled in my lap and began to ask for forgiveness, most especially from my father about how she had failed at being the ideal westernized wife.
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</p>
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<div>
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<aside id="edT0Vw">
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<q>I watched them age as roommates whose hair slowly faded from black into silver, but nonetheless, together</q>
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</aside>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fwDICz">
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When it was time to close the casket, my mother and I did it together. As we began to lower the crown, bidding my father farewell for the last time, my mother stopped me. She lifted it back up and peeked her head inside.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RutNtq">
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“What’s wrong?” I ask her.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kCPFUc">
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“I just want to make sure he’s okay.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="w3O2FZ">
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My mother, a wife of 30 years, was burying her husband in a foreign country, following foreign customs that were not her own. And even after death, she was still a devoted wife and continued to love in her own way.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LzZWzI">
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On our way home, I stopped by the mom-and-pop store to pick up a six-pack of Asahi Blue for $4.99.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9jNHhS">
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We stripped out of our funeral attire, and I threw on my dad’s sweater before making our way to our family dining room table, once set for three, now only set for two. I handed my mother a cold beer as we both released the day’s heaviness to the crisp sound of the pull tab opening. We said kanpai and cheers to the end of a long day before letting reality sink in.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RNSXru">
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That night, my mother shared stories about my father, while I listened. Stories about how he would sit through seasons of my mother’s favorite anime, <em>Attack on Titan</em>, just to spend extra time with her. Stories of how she would make him bento boxes when they were dating because, as a single airman, his fridge only consisted of oranges and bacon.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QXXcVR">
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These were firsthand accounts from a woman who had given up everything she had known in the pursuit of love — a love that was rarely evidenced physically and yet was still undeniably real.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FTSDEC">
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As we dove into the last of our beer, I thought back to that snapshot of my mother and grandmother sharing a cold lager after my grandfather’s funeral. A renewed relationship that could only transpire after a visit from death. Nothing quite does it like Asahi.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1WaOxw">
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<em>Akina Chargualaf is a writer and podcaster currently exploring topics on human emotions and relationships. </em>
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</p>
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<ul>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Phones can be addictive. Sports betting, too. Now we’re combining them.</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="Two basketball players watch as the ball nears the hoop." src="https://cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/thumbor/W_6FIepzI4d270WVBpa9ism-Wks=/188x0:5095x3680/1310x983/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70615546/1150786897.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Virginia played Texas Tech in the 2019 NCAA basketball championship game. | Jamie Schwaberow/NCAA Photos via Getty Images
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</figcaption>
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</figure></li>
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</ul>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Isn’t anyone worried about the rise of gambling apps?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h2Vxai">
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Remember when we decided that spending too much time on our phones was a bad thing? That immersing ourselves in our <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/10/digital-addiction-smartphone/620318/">iPhones could be unhealthy, or even addictive</a>?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sURlCm">
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That was a couple of years ago. So riddle me this: Now something that we already know is potentially addictive — sports betting — is available on those phones, accompanied by a media blitz promising a path to easy money. But people raising concerns about that combination seem few and far between. So what happens to the sports betting industry if someone — namely Apple or Google, which have enormous control over what you can do with your phones — decides they do have a problem with that?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ko5PGm">
|
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|
Because whether you approve of gambling or not, it seems obvious that making it easily available to anyone with a phone and debit card, with few to no restrictions and a ton of advertising encouraging you to place your bets, is going to lead to problems for some people. This isn’t one of those stories about the unintended consequences we get from tech: It’s right there, on the surface.
|
|||
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|
</p>
|
|||
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bS5Zaw">
|
|||
|
|
“It is an epidemic in the making,” says Felicia Grondin, the executive director of the Council on Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey, where online sports betting has been legal since 2018. Since then, she says, it has been easy to understand the impact: Before the summer of 2018, about 3 percent of the calls to her organization’s helpline for problem gamblers were from people who said they had sports betting problems. Now that number is around 17 percent.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="omH4Xw">
|
|||
|
|
New Jersey is the tip of the gambling spear because it’s the state directly responsible for the <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/17pdf/16-476_dbfi.pdf">Supreme Court ruling</a> in 2018 that gave individual states the ability to legalize online sports betting. But a flood of states has followed, egged on by the promise of easy tax money — or the threat that they’ll be losing that money to neighboring states where online betting is legal.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="4zo4Bk">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
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|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="54biyH">
|
|||
|
|
Big, well-capitalized companies — established gambling outfits like MGM Resorts and relative newcomers like DraftKings and FanDuel — are pouring in. They want you to start betting on sports directly from your couch, or your car, or the bar, placing wagers on NFL games or Olympic hockey or the 2023 Rugby World Cup or anything else with a couple of taps. And they’re spending a ton of money to convince you: <a href="https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1772757/000177275722000007/deac-20211231.htm">DraftKings alone spent $1 billion</a> on sales and marketing last year and plans to spend even more in 2022. (Disclosure: Vox Media has a commercial relationship with DraftKings.)
|
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|
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</p>
|
|||
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LS6Vz0">
|
|||
|
|
And there’s obviously a market for this. In the runup to legalization, there was a debate about whether sportsbooks would pitch themselves to people who were already illegally betting on sports, or whether they’d bring in casual newcomers. We don’t yet know the answer, but we do know there’s a lot of money to be made: In the first six weeks that legal online sports betting was available in New York, residents <a href="https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-hochul-announces-nearly-2-billion-wagers-over-first-30-days-mobile-
|
|||
|
|
sports-wagering">wagered $2.5 billion</a>, which includes <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/23/nyregion/new-york-
|
|||
|
|
now-leads-nation-in-mobile-sports-betting.html">nearly $500 million worth of Super Bowl bets</a>. This week’s March Madness college basketball tournament should spike those numbers again.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="X5ybly">
|
|||
|
|
I’ve been following the rise of legal online sports betting for a while — it’s very much a media story because media companies, which used to hold their noses up at sports betting, are now eager to make money from sports betting programming and advertising. And sports betting apps’ arrival happens to coincide with the movement to reassess our relationship with tech in general and phones in particular, which picked up real steam after the 2016 election.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="plFswI">
|
|||
|
|
In 2018, for instance, former Apple executive Tony Fadell, who helped create the iPhone, called on phone-makers and app-makers to promote a “healthy, moderate digital life … before government regulators decide to step in.” Around the same time, activists like <a href="https://www.vox.com/2017/2/7/14542504/recode-decode-transcript-time-well-spent-founder-tristan-
|
|||
|
|
harris">former Google employee Tristan Harris</a> were promoting the idea of “time well spent” on phones and devices, and criticizing app-makers like Google and Facebook for becoming dopamine dealers. The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/12/technology/grayscale-phone.html">New York Times</a> suggested that you should make your phone less compelling by turning the screen gray.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SAKYUk">
|
|||
|
|
So periodically, when I meet gaming executives and investors salivating at the chance to turn sports betting from a semi-underground pastime into a mainstream activity, I ask them: What happens if Apple or Google decides that sports betting — where every ad is accompanied by a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzbUPfoveok">Micro Machine-speed voiceover</a> at the end telling you to get help if you have a betting problem — is something they don’t want happening on their devices?
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OA2bhk">
|
|||
|
|
Or what if they’re okay with sports betting but want to make it a little less frictionless, and require more opt-ins and sign-offs before you place a bet? Or if they simply restrict the number of notifications betting apps can send? (FanDuel, for instance, sends me a heads-up every day, and sometimes it works: An hour before the Super Bowl, I got a pop-up on my iPhone telling me that FanDuel had improved the odds on a bet about whether the first drive of the game would result in a punt, and exhorted me to <strong>BET NOW </strong>➡️. I did — and won — and then made two more bets while I was there.)
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mjtvlL">
|
|||
|
|
The answer from the gaming guys has been consistent: They look at me like I’m a moron, and shrug.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="90WkwO">
|
|||
|
|
But I don’t think it’s a totally idiotic question. Apple, in particular, has been quite clear about the fact that Apple’s App Store is Apple’s App Store, and it’s willing to go to court to keep it that way; <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/8/20/21373780/fortnite-epic-apple-lawsuit-app-store-antitrust">ask Fortnite<em> </em>maker Epic Games</a>. Apple App Store edicts range from the whimsical — early on, Apple told developers to stop making fart apps for the iPhone because it already had enough of them — to the moralistic — Steve Jobs was ardent about not letting porn apps onto his App Store, and the company has followed his insistence after his death — and everything in between.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="q7sUNN">
|
|||
|
|
Apple has also made a point about advocating for responsible phone use; shortly after Fadell’s 2018 essay, the company rolled out the equivalent of nutrition labels for its apps, which are supposed to tell you what kind of content you’ll find in the app, whether it will ask you for money, and other good- to-know stuff that many users likely totally ignore.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KlIQoO">
|
|||
|
|
So I’ve also asked Apple and Google, <a href="https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#gaming-gambling-and-lotteries">which do have rules about the way gambling apps are supposed to work</a>, but those rules generally amount to “these things have to be licensed and not scammy.” I got non-responses from them, too.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7o2mEi">
|
|||
|
|
To be clear: I don’t necessarily think Apple or Google should prevent me from betting on sports. And I don’t think sports betting is necessarily worse than many other vices or risky behaviors I can engage in on my phone right now. Seamless makes it way too easy for me to order more comfort food than I should; Drizzly lets me buy whiskey without putting on pants. I bought dogecoin via Robinhood, minutes before <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/09/investing/dogecoin-elon-musk-snl/index.html">Elon Musk showed up on SNL</a>, and now I’m down 78 percent. And if I lived in California or Michigan, I would probably have weed gummies delivered to my home via <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/eaze-cannabis-delivery/id1181240617">Eaze</a>. To say nothing of the time I fritter away on stuff that distracts but doesn’t give me any real pleasure, like doomscrolling and shitposting on Twitter.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="it4PUm">
|
|||
|
|
Felicia Grondin agrees with me, up to a point. But she thinks people with sports gambling problems are trickier to detect than, say, someone struggling with substances. “It’s a hidden addiction,” she says. “You don’t smell it on someone’s breath; you can’t see it in their behavior until it’s way too late.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4b3tim">
|
|||
|
|
It’s certainly easy enough to get in trouble with this stuff: Ask <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/07/sports/football/calvin-ridley-nfl-betting.html">Calvin Ridley</a>, the Atlanta Falcons player who bet $1,500 on three NFL games last fall, and has now been suspended for at least a year because league rules prohibit players from betting on league games. Ridley’s bets will reportedly end up costing him more than <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/nfl-player-calvin-ridley-suspended-for-at-least-one-year-for-betting-on-nfl-
|
|||
|
|
games-11646687495#:~:text=The%20National%20Football%20league%20has,to%20a%20non%2Dfootball%20injury.">$11 million in lost wages</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="H2al7d">
|
|||
|
|
Again: I’m happy-ish that I’ve been able to place $10 wagers on NFL games from my bedroom. And when I think about my personal problems with phones, sports betting apps aren’t on the list (top of the list right now: Everyone in my son’s sixth grade class is using Discord to gossip about each other, with predictable results). But it seems obvious that someone, eventually — maybe federal or state regulators, maybe the phone platforms — will want to take a step back and ask, “What have we done and how can we fix it?” I’d bet on it.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Could Putin actually fall?</strong> -
|
|||
|
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="An illustration of Putin looking up, with a background of war images." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/w5RqyH0nZfoc8CskWEYRgbGHNbw=/225x0:1576x1013/1310x983/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70615475/how_putin_falls_board_2c.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Christina Animashaun/Vox
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
What history teaches us about how autocrats lose power — and how Putin might hang on.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8s8eRY">
|
|||
|
|
As <a href="https://www.vox.com/22954833/russia-ukraine-invasion-strategy-putin-
|
|||
|
|
kyiv">Russia’s war in Ukraine looks increasingly disastrous</a>, speculation has mounted that President Vladimir Putin’s misstep could prove to be his downfall. A <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-03-04/six-scenarios-
|
|||
|
|
for-how-putin-s-war-in-ukraine-could-end">litany</a> of <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/russia-is-the-
|
|||
|
|
ally-the-world-needs-against-putin.html">pundits</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/03/07/why-putin-must-beware-of-coup-threats/">experts</a> have predicted that frustration with the war’s costs and crushing economic sanctions could lead to the collapse of his regime.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="H4kfSm">
|
|||
|
|
“Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine will result in the downfall of him and his friends,” David Rothkopf declared in <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/ukraine-invasion-by-russia-is-the-beginning-of-the-
|
|||
|
|
end-for-putin-and-his-friends?ref=author">the Daily Beast</a>. “If history is any guide, his overreach and his miscalculations, his weaknesses as a strategist, and the flaws in his character will undo him.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4I3BCU">
|
|||
|
|
But what events could actually bring down Putin? And how likely might they be in the foreseeable future?
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wexLcx">
|
|||
|
|
The best research on how authoritarians fall points to two possible scenarios: a military coup or a popular uprising. During the Cold War, coups were the more common way for dictators to be forced out of office. But since the 1990s, there has been <a href="https://ciaotest.cc.columbia.edu/journals/twq/v37i1/f_0030502_24672.pdf">a shift in the way that authoritarians are removed</a>. Coups have been on the decline while popular revolts, like the Arab Spring uprisings and “color revolutions” in the former Soviet Union, have been on the rise.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h1fwOv">
|
|||
|
|
For all the speculation about Putin losing power, neither of these eventualities seems particularly likely in Russia — even after the disastrous initial invasion of Ukraine. This is in no small part because Putin has done about as good a job preparing for them as any dictator could.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FIGOls">
|
|||
|
|
Over the past two decades, the Russian leader and his allies have structured nearly every core element of the Russian state with an eye toward limiting threats to the regime. Putin has arrested or killed leading dissidents, instilled fear in the general public, and made the country’s leadership class dependent on his goodwill for their continued prosperity. His ability to rapidly ramp up repression during the current crisis in response to antiwar protests — using tactics ranging from mass arrests at protests to shutting down opposition media to cutting off social media platforms — is a demonstration of the regime’s strengths.
|
|||
|
|
</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="y8cld0">
|
|||
|
|
“Putin has prepared for this eventuality for a long time, and has taken a lot of concerted actions to make sure he’s not vulnerable,” says Adam Casey, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan who studies the history of coups in Russia and the former communist bloc.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Jw8WTp">
|
|||
|
|
Yet at the same time, scholars of authoritarianism and Russian politics are not fully ready to rule out Putin’s fall. Unlikely is not impossible; the experts I spoke with generally believe the Ukraine invasion to have been a strategic blunder that raised the risks of both a coup and a revolution, even if their probability remains low in absolute terms.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pmzbLL">
|
|||
|
|
“Before [the war], the risk from either of those threats was close to zero. And now the risk in both of those respects is certainly higher,” says Brian Taylor, a professor at Syracuse University and author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Code-
|
|||
|
|
Putinism-Brian-D-Taylor/dp/0190867329"><em>The Code of Putinism</em></a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lnwIVr">
|
|||
|
|
Ukrainians and their Western sympathizers cannot bank on Putin’s downfall. But if the war proves even more disastrous for Russia’s president than it already seems, history tells us there are pathways for even the most entrenched autocrats to lose their grip on power.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="An illustration of Putin walking
|
|||
|
|
ahead, surrounded by images of government, “Stop Putin” protests, and document signing." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/hkWb7-laQWUflqNIkDKAowHD3NQ=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23306704/how_putin_falls_secondary_2b.jpg"/> <cite>Christina Animashaun/Vox</cite>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<h3 id="0RCLPP">
|
|||
|
|
Could the Ukraine war could cause a military coup?
|
|||
|
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EC1VH7">
|
|||
|
|
In a recent appearance on Fox News, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) hit upon what he saw as a solution to the Ukraine war — for someone, perhaps “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/04/world/europe/lindsey-graham-putin-
|
|||
|
|
russia.html">in the Russian military</a>,” to remove Vladimir Putin by assassination or a coup. “The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out,” the senator argued.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oS5U3K">
|
|||
|
|
He shouldn’t get his hopes up. A military revolt against Putin is more possible now than it was before the invasion of Ukraine, but the odds against it remain long.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0l2r5j">
|
|||
|
|
Naunihal Singh is one of the world’s leading scholars of military coups. His 2017<strong> </strong>book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Seizing-Power-Strategic-Logic-
|
|||
|
|
Military/dp/1421422565"><em>Seizing Power</em></a> uses statistical analysis, game theory, and historical case studies to try to figure out what causes coups and what makes them likely to succeed.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8EQ8FV">
|
|||
|
|
Singh finds that militaries are most likely to attempt coups in<strong> </strong>low-income countries, regimes that are neither fully democratic nor fully autocratic, and nations where coups have recently happened. None of these conditions apply very well to modern Russia, a <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/static/website/files/dr/dr_2021.pdf">firmly authoritarian</a> middle-income country that hasn’t seen a coup attempt since the early ’90s.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Abho0y">
|
|||
|
|
But at the same time, wars like Putin’s can breed resentment and fear in the ranks, precisely the conditions under which we’ve seen coups in other countries. “There are reasons why Putin might be increasingly concerned here,” Singh says, pointing to coups in <a href="https://www.usip.org/publications/2020/08/five-things-know-about-malis-coup">Mali in 2012</a> and <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220125-burkina-faso-from-popular-uprising-to-military-coup">Burkina Faso earlier this year</a> as precedent. Indeed, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/26363935">a 2017 study of civil wars</a> found that coups are more likely to happen during conflicts when governments face stronger opponents — suggesting that wartime deaths and defeat really do raise the odds of military mutinies.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tyIXLM">
|
|||
|
|
In Singh’s view, the Ukraine conflict raises the odds of a coup in Russia for two reasons: It could weaken the military leadership’s allegiance to Putin, and it could provide an unusual opportunity to plan a move against him.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OnPSKw">
|
|||
|
|
The motive for Russian officers to launch a coup would be fairly straightforward: The costly Ukraine campaign becomes unpopular among, and even personally threatening to, key members of the military.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="b90xNJ">
|
|||
|
|
Leading <a href="https://ilyalozovsky.substack.com/p/what-russian-officials-think-of-
|
|||
|
|
the?showWelcome=true&s=w">Russian</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/10/opinion/putin-russia-
|
|||
|
|
ukraine.html?partner=slack&smid=sl-share">journalists</a> and <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russian-federation/2022-02-04/bully-bubble">experts</a> have warned that Putin is surrounded by a shrinking bubble of hawkish yes-men who feed his nationalist obsessions and tell him only what he wants to hear. This very small group drew up an invasion plan that <a href="https://www.vox.com/22954833/russia-
|
|||
|
|
ukraine-invasion-strategy-putin-kyiv">assumed the Ukrainian military would put up minimal resistance</a>, allowing Russia to rapidly seize Kyiv and install a puppet regime.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fSr9Fr">
|
|||
|
|
This plan both <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/putin-thought-ukraine-would-fall-quickly-an-airport-battle-proved-him-
|
|||
|
|
wrong-11646343121">underestimated Ukraine’s resolve</a> and overestimated the competence of the Russian military, leading to <a href="https://theweek.com/russo-ukrainian-war/1011133/more-russian-troops-were-killed-in-ukraine-
|
|||
|
|
in-2-weeks-than-us-troops-in">significant Russian casualties</a> and a failed early push toward the Ukrainian capital. Since then, Russian forces have been bogged down in a slow and costly conflict defined by horrific bombardments of populated areas. International <a href="https://www.vox.com/22968949/russia-sanctions-swift-economy-
|
|||
|
|
mcdonalds">sanctions</a> have been <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/unprecedented-scale-of-sanctions-corporate-
|
|||
|
|
boycott-take-russia-by-surprise/">far harsher than the Kremlin expected</a>, sending the Russian economy into a tailspin and specifically punishing its elite’s ability to engage in commerce abroad.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sTGSfC">
|
|||
|
|
According to <a href="https://ilyalozovsky.substack.com/p/what-russian-officials-think-of-the?showWelcome=true&s=w">Farida Rustamova</a>, a Russian reporter well-sourced in the Kremlin, high-ranking civilian officials in the Russian government are already unhappy about the war and its economic consequences. One can only imagine the sentiment among military officers, few of whom appear to have been informed of the war plans beforehand — and many of whom are now tasked with killing Ukrainians en masse.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YEqkts">
|
|||
|
|
Layered on top of that is something that often can precipitate coups: personal insecurity among high-ranking generals and intelligence officers. According to <a href="https://twitter.com/AndreiSoldatov/status/1502221544499601411">Andrei Soldatov</a>, a Russia expert at the Center for European Policy Analysis think tank, Putin is punishing high-ranking officials in the FSB — the successor agency to the KGB — for the war’s early failures. Soldatov’s sources say that Putin has placed Sergei Beseda, the leader of the FSB’s foreign intelligence branch, under house arrest (as well as his deputy).
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sJ5zrG">
|
|||
|
|
Reports like this are hard to verify. But they track with Singh’s predictions that poor performance in wars generally leads autocrats to find someone to blame — and that fear of punishment could convince some among Russia’s security elite that the best way to protect themselves is to get rid of Putin.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/ICAUTEmXgDLsahAbYsjwHp4UZRo=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23307375/GettyImages_1238728652.jpg"/> <cite>Alexander Nemenov/AFP via Getty Images</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Rosgvardiya (Russian National Guard) servicemen detain a demonstrator during a protest in Moscow against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fVYJyj">
|
|||
|
|
“I don’t think Putin will assassinate them, but they may still have to live in fear and humiliation,” Singh says. “They’ll be afraid for their own futures.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KfObWP">
|
|||
|
|
The conflict also provides disgruntled officials with an opening. In authoritarian countries like Russia, generals don’t always have many opportunities to speak with one another without fear of surveillance or informants. Wars change that, at least somewhat.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OcB89H">
|
|||
|
|
There are now “lots of good reasons for generals to be in a room with key players and even to evade surveillance by the state, since they will want to evade NATO and US surveillance,” Singh explains.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zhEgj2">
|
|||
|
|
That said, coups are famously difficult to pull off. And the Russian security state in particular is organized around a frustrating one.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="j3pArU">
|
|||
|
|
Contrary to most people’s expectations, successful military coups are <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022343319839449">generally pretty bloodless</a>; smart plotters typically don’t launch if they believe there’s a real chance it’ll come down to a gun battle in the presidential palace. Instead, they ensure they have overwhelming support from the armed forces in the capital — or at least can convince everyone that they do — before they make their move.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5Ciec1">
|
|||
|
|
And on that front, Russia experts say Putin has done a bang-up job of what political scientists call <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340469330_Avoiding_the_Coup-
|
|||
|
|
Proofing_Dilemma_Consolidating_Political_Control_While_Maximizing_Military_Power">“coup-proofing”</a> his government. He has seeded the military with counterintelligence officers, making it hard for potential mutineers to know whom to trust. He has delegated primary responsibility for repression at home to <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/repression-trap-mechanism-escalating-state-violence-russia">security agencies other than the regular military</a>, which both physically distances troops from Moscow and reduces an incentive to rebel (orders to kill one’s own people being quite unpopular in the ranks).
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MpDn7n">
|
|||
|
|
He has also intensified the coup coordination problem by splitting up the state security services into different groups led by trusted allies. In 2016, Putin <a href="https://www.csis.org/blogs/post-soviet-post/rosgvardiya-hurtling-towards-confrontation">created the Russian National Guard</a> — also called the Rosgvardiya — as an entity separate from the military. Under the command of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/11/ill-make-nice-juicy-steak-out-of-opposition-leader-putin-
|
|||
|
|
alexey-navalny">thuggish Putin loyalist Viktor Zolotov</a>, it performs internal security tasks like border security and counterterrorism in conjunction with Russia’s intelligence services.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lrtQoh">
|
|||
|
|
These services are split into four federal branches. Three of these — the FSB, GRU, and SVR — <a href="https://cybershafarat.com/wp-
|
|||
|
|
content/uploads/2021/11/wp-1637944332557.pdf">have their own elite special operations forces</a>. The fourth, the Federal Protection Services, is Russia’s Secret Service equivalent with a twist: It has <a href="https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2013/10/24/the-fso-praetorians-protectors-political-force/">in the range of 20,000 officers</a>, according to a 2013 estimate. By contrast, <a href="https://www.secretservice.gov/about/faq/general#:~:text=The%20Secret%20Service%20employs%20approximately,professional%20and%20administrative%20support%20personnel.">the Secret Service has about 4,500</a>, in a country with a population roughly three times Russia’s. This allows the Federal Protection Services to function as a kind of Praetorian Guard that can protect Putin from assassins and coups alike.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oMpDbG">
|
|||
|
|
The result is that the regular military, the most powerful of Russia’s armed factions, does not necessarily dominate Russia’s internal security landscape. Any successful plot would likely require complex coordination among members of different agencies who may not know each other well or trust each other very much. In a government known to be shot through with potential informers, that’s a powerful disincentive against a coup.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="PNck9g">
|
|||
|
|
“The coordination dilemma … is especially severe when you have multiple different intelligence agencies and ways of monitoring the military effectively, which the Russians do,” Casey explains. “There’s just a lot of different failsafe measures that Putin has built over the years that are oriented toward preventing a coup.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="An illustration of Putin looking up, with a background
|
|||
|
|
of war images." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/SRLz1G5rznTy2K22mfaroe1SfSI=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23306690/how_putin_falls_board_2c.jpg"/> <cite>Christina Animashaun/Vox</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<h3 id="SvD15Y">
|
|||
|
|
Dreams of a Russian uprising — but can it happen?
|
|||
|
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oaPN1t">
|
|||
|
|
In an interview on <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/07/opinion/sway-kara-swisher-clint-watts.html">the New York Times</a>’s <em>Sway</em> podcast, former FBI special agent Clint Watts warned of casualties in the Ukraine war leading to another Russian revolution.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0H7pnw">
|
|||
|
|
“The mothers in Russia have always been the pushback against Putin during these conflicts. This is going to be next-level scale,” he argued. “We’re worried about Kyiv falling today. I’m worried about Moscow falling between day 30 and six months from now.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BFYOwL">
|
|||
|
|
A revolution against Putin has become likelier since the war began; in fact, it’s probably more plausible than a coup. In the 21st century, we have seen more popular uprisings in post-Soviet countries — like Georgia, Belarus, and Ukraine itself — than we have coups. Despite that, the best evidence suggests the odds of one erupting in Russia are still fairly low.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Z8pyhu">
|
|||
|
|
Few scholars are more influential in this field than Harvard’s Erica Chenoweth. Their finding, in work with fellow political scientist Maria Stephan, that <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/why-civil-resistance-
|
|||
|
|
works/9780231156820">nonviolent protest is more likely to topple regimes than an armed uprising</a> is one of the rare political science claims to have transcended academia, becoming a staple of op-eds and activist rhetoric.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="uu5F2H">
|
|||
|
|
When Chenoweth looks at the situation in Russia today, they note that the longstanding appearance of stability in Putin’s Russia might be deceiving.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5sfWa3">
|
|||
|
|
“Russia has a long and storied legacy of civil resistance [movements],” Chenoweth tells me. “Unpopular wars have precipitated two of them.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EZeCGR">
|
|||
|
|
Here, Chenoweth is referring to two early-20th-century uprisings against the czars: the 1905 uprising that led to the creation of the Duma, Russia’s legislature; and the more famous 1917 revolution that gave us the Soviet Union. Both events were triggered in significant part by Russian wartime losses (in the Russo-Japanese War and World War I, respectively). And indeed, we have seen notable<strong> </strong>dissent already during the current conflict, including <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/10/anti-war-protests-intensify-in-russia-along-with-police-
|
|||
|
|
crackdown">demonstrations in nearly 70 Russian cities on March 6 alone</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="U8NEj4">
|
|||
|
|
It’s conceivable that these protests grow if the war continues to go poorly, especially if it produces significant Russian casualties, clear evidence of mass atrocities against civilians, and continued deep economic pain from sanctions. But we are still very far from a mass uprising.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IKb6F4">
|
|||
|
|
Chenoweth’s research suggests you need to get about <a href="https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world">3.5 percent of the population</a> involved in protests to guarantee some kind of government concession. In Russia, that translates to about 5 million people. The antiwar protests haven’t reached anything even close to that scale, and Chenoweth is not willing to predict that it’s likely for them to approach it.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2L0LxK">
|
|||
|
|
“It is hard to organize sustained collective protest in Russia,” they note. “Putin’s government has criminalized many forms of protests, and has shut down or restricted the activities of groups, movements, and media outlets perceived to be in opposition or associated with the West.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/PLwpML16I_4MyGUdTIQESDKiSLk=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23307160/GettyImages_470588579.jpg"/> <cite>Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Protesters clash with police in Independence Square in Kyiv on February 20, 2014. Demonstrators were calling for the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych over corruption and an abandoned trade agreement with the EU.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dMX6a8">
|
|||
|
|
A mass revolution, like a coup, is something that Putin has been preparing to confront for years. By some accounts, it has been <a href="https://time.com/5039688/vladimir-putin-fears-
|
|||
|
|
own-people/">his number one fear</a> since the Arab Spring and especially the 2013 Euromaidan uprising in Ukraine. The repressive barriers Chenoweth points out are significant, making it unlikely — though, again, not impossible — that the antiwar protests evolve into a movement that topples Putin, even during a time of heightened stress for the regime.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JXH2sX">
|
|||
|
|
In an authoritarian society like Russia, the government’s willingness to arrest, torture, and kill dissidents creates a similar coordination problem as the one coup plotters experience —just on a grander scale. Instead of needing to get a small cabal of military and intelligence officers to risk death, leaders need to convince thousands of ordinary citizens to do the same.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FYVkpD">
|
|||
|
|
In past revolutions, opposition-controlled media outlets and social media platforms have helped solve this difficulty. But <a href="https://time.com/6155187/russia-block-
|
|||
|
|
facebook/">during the war</a>, Putin has shut down <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-ekho-moskvy-
|
|||
|
|
closed/31733880.html">notable independent media outlets</a> and cracked down on social media, restricting <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/russia-blocks-facebook-accusing-it-restricting-access-russian-
|
|||
|
|
media-2022-03-04/">Facebook</a>, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-technology-business-europe-
|
|||
|
|
media-f1da10285a1631542b332597c5d35c29">Twitter</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/KevinRothrock/status/1502300880875491331">Instagram</a> access. He has also introduced emergency measures that punish the spread of “fake” information about the war <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-introduce-jail-terms-spreading-fake-information-about-
|
|||
|
|
army-2022-03-04/">by up to 15 years in jail</a>, leading even international media outlets <a href="https://twitter.com/DylanByers/status/1501214135236788224?s=20&t=LEH-sLZBDQxwM6ijDC0eSA">like the New York Times to pull their local staff</a>. Antiwar protesters have been <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-anti-war-
|
|||
|
|
protests-crackdown-arrests/31745114.html">arrested en masse</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3ziDlI">
|
|||
|
|
Most Russians <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/08/russian-media-state-television-ukraine/">get their news from government-run media</a>, which have been serving up a steady diet of pro-war propaganda. Many of them appear to genuinely believe it: An independent opinion poll found that <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/08/russia-public-opinion-ukraine-invasion/">58 percent of Russians supported the war</a> to at least some degree.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QRI0z9">
|
|||
|
|
“What these polls reflect is how many people actually tune in to state media, which tells them what to think and what to say,” <a href="https://www.vox.com/22967223/ukraine-
|
|||
|
|
russia-war-putin-propaganda-reallity">Russian journalist Alexey Kovalyov</a> tells my colleague Sean Illing.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pZTgZX">
|
|||
|
|
The brave protesters in Russian cities prove that the government grip on the information environment isn’t airtight. But for this dissent to evolve into something bigger, Russian activists will need to figure out a broader way to get around censorship, government agitprop, and repression. That’s not easy to do, and requires skilled activists. Chenoweth’s research, and <a href="http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.841.6342&rep=rep1&type=pdf">the literature on civil resistance more broadly</a>, finds that the tactical choices of opposition activists have a tremendous impact on whether the protesters ultimately succeed in their aims.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9Gj2pn">
|
|||
|
|
Organizers need to “give people a range of tactics they can participate in, because not everyone is going to want to protest given the circumstances. But people may be willing to boycott or do other things that appear to have lower risk but still have a significant impact,” says Hardy Merriman, a senior advisor to the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DS71GY">
|
|||
|
|
You can already see some tactical creativity at work. Alexis Lerner, a scholar of dissent in Russia at the US Naval Academy, tells me that Russians are using unconventional methods like graffiti and TikTok videos to get around the state’s censorship and coercive apparatus. She also notes that an unusual amount of criticism of the government has come from high-profile Russians, ranging from oligarchs to social media stars.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RSBrcz">
|
|||
|
|
But at the same time, you can also see the effect of the past decades of repression at work. During his time in power, Putin has systematically worked to marginalize and repress anyone he identifies as a potential threat. At the highest level, this means attacking and imprisoning prominent dissenters like <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/26/mikhail-khodorkovsky-life-
|
|||
|
|
after-prison-russia-after-putin">Mikhail Khodorkovsky</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/22254292/alexei-navalny-
|
|||
|
|
prison-hunger-strike-end-russia-protests-vladimir-putin">Alexei Navalny</a>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-wide-block">
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/gHv0n0OALMJiz0PE9JFjwNnl-
|
|||
|
|
Rw=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23307061/GettyImages_955002576.jpg"/></p>
|
|||
|
|
<cite>Olga Maltseva/AFP via Getty Images</cite>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Opposition supporters attend an unauthorized anti- Putin rally called by opposition leader Alexei Navalny in St. Petersburg, Russia, on May 5, 2018, two days ahead of Vladimir Putin’s inauguration for a fourth Kremlin term.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UIfQ5P">
|
|||
|
|
But the repression also extends down the social food chain, from journalists to activists on down to ordinary Russians who may have dabbled too much in politics. The result is that anti-Putin forces are extremely depleted, with many Putin opponents operating in exile even before the Ukraine conflict began.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rw5JLq">
|
|||
|
|
Moreover, revolutions don’t generally succeed without elite action. The prototypical success of a revolutionary protest movement is not the storming of the Bastille but the fall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in 2011. In that case, Mubarak’s security forces <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2011/02/behind-the-curtain-how-mubarak-fell-049421">refused to repress the protesters</a> and <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/hosni-mubaraks-dramatic-rise-and-fall-power">pressured him to resign as they continued</a>.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xKDBC4">
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“Symbolic protest is usually not enough to bring about change,” Chenoweth explains. “What makes such movements succeed is the ability to create, facilitate, or precipitate shifts in the loyalty of the pillars of support, including military and security elites, state media, oligarchs, and Putin’s inner circle of political associates.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Q5Eh0b">
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Given the Russian president’s level of control over his security establishment, it will take a truly massive protest movement to wedge them apart.
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</p>
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<h3 id="KkYIgm">
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What are the odds of regime change in Russia?
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</h3>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hsqK9j">
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It can be difficult to talk about low-probability events like the collapse of the Putin regime. Suggesting that it’s possible can come across as suggesting it’s likely; suggesting it’s unlikely can come across as suggesting it’s impossible.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qnY6Jn">
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But it’s important to see a gray area here: accepting that Putin’s end is more likely than it was on February 23, the day before Russia launched its offensive, but still significantly less likely than his government continuing to muddle through. The war has put new pressure on the regime, at both the elite and the mass public level, but the fact remains that Putin’s Russia is an extremely effective autocracy with strong guardrails against coups and revolutions.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jQxeqW">
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So how should we think about the odds? Is it closer to 20 percent — or 1 percent?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WQQRFE">
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This kind of question is impossible to answer with anything like precision. The information environment is so murky, due to both Russian censorship and the fog of war, that it’s difficult to discern basic facts like the actual number of Russian war dead. We don’t really have a good sense of how key members of the Russian security establishment are feeling about the war or whether the people trying to organize mass protests are talented enough to get around aggressive repression.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wrayBx">
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And the near-future effects of key policies are similarly unclear. Take international sanctions. We know that these measures have had a devastating effect on the Russian economy. What we don’t know is who the Russian public will blame for their immiseration: Putin for launching the war — or America and its allies for imposing the sanctions? Can reality pierce through Putin’s control of the information environment? The answers to these questions will make a huge difference.
|
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4mhFP2">
|
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Putin built his legitimacy around the idea of restoring Russia’s stability, prosperity, and global standing. By threatening all three, the war in Ukraine is shaping up to be the greatest test of his regime to date.
|
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</p>
|
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</h1>
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<ul>
|
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Kushagara completes double</strong> - Nadeem also hits a century as Jharkhand piles it on</p></li>
|
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Botero shines</strong> -</p></li>
|
|||
|
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>West Indies vs England, 1st Test | Brathwaite accuses Joe Root of being “disrespectful”</strong> - The England skipper waited until the last five balls to concede the draw on day 5 of the opening Test</p></li>
|
|||
|
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ind vs SL, 2nd Test | India reach 61/1 in second innings after bowling out Sri Lanka for 109 on Day 2</strong> - India lead by 204 runs at tea on Day 2</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Won't play unless I'm 100% fit and had adequate training: Praneeth</strong> - He was hopeful of a good show at his maiden Olympics, but everything went downhill for him starting from the Tokyo Games, where he failed to win a match</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Plea in SC for allowing medical students returning from Ukraine to continue education in India</strong> - The petition seeks to invoke the most salient fundamental right guaranteed under Article 21 - the protection of life and personal liberty</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Congress leadership scripted its own defeat in Punjab, says former Minister</strong> - It gave power to turncoats and opportunists who were alien to party, its history and culture, he says</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Goa Guv calls session of Assembly on Mar 15 for MLAs to take oath</strong> - The BJP won 20 seats in the polls to the 40-member Assembly.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>HC restores plea over Mathura mosque row</strong> -</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Exercise on to smoke out Maoists in Jharkhand</strong> - Jharkhand, with a population of little more than 3 crore, has 19 out of the total 90 extremist-hit districts across India</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>War in Ukraine: Russian forces accused of abducting second mayor</strong> - The news comes as Ukraine says Russia is trying to create “pseudo-republics” to break up the country.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Roman Abramovich: Rabbi investigated over Portuguese citizenship</strong> - Daniel Litvak helped Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich obtain Portuguese citizenship.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ukraine war: Evacuations ‘extremely difficult’ amid shelling</strong> - New attempts are under way to get civilians out of bombed Ukrainian cities as Russia’s attack intensifies.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ukraine war: Pictures of war intensifying in third week</strong> - Images from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine show a conflict turning deadlier nearly three weeks on.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>War in Ukraine: What happened on day 17 of Russia’s invasion</strong> - Civilians make new attempts to flee besieged cities as Russia warns it may target Western arms convoys.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Learning physiology by looking at the poisons that shut it down</strong> - A cute book, but not nearly as good as Deborah Blum’s <em>The Poisoner’s Handbook</em>. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1840454">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Activists are reaching Russians behind Putin’s propaganda wall</strong> - Tinder, other apps give activists a way to share what’s really happening in Ukraine. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1840403">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Soldier Boy and Crimson Countess revealed in The Boys red band teaser</strong> - Hit series shows no sign of pulling back on its violently bloody outrageousness. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1840606">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The weekend’s best deals: HyperX gaming headsets, ergonomic keyboards, and more</strong> - Dealmaster also has Sony noise-canceling headphones, standing desks, and <em>Mario</em> games. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1840582">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>When a seismic network failed, citizen science stepped in</strong> - With Haiti’s seismic network down, Raspberry Shakes came through in a quake. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1840555">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>A man walks into a bar and says “I’m here to drink my troubles away!”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
“Well you’ve come to the right place.” says the bartender, “What’ll it be?”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
The man replies “One water please”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
“Just a water??”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
“Yeah, I have kidney stones.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/E-Wagner"> /u/E-Wagner </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcxbet/a_man_walks_into_a_bar_and_says_im_here_to_drink/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcxbet/a_man_walks_into_a_bar_and_says_im_here_to_drink/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Did you hear Lorena Bobbit died in a car accident?</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
Some dick cut her off.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Lukesmash89"> /u/Lukesmash89 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcpvi0/did_you_hear_lorena_bobbit_died_in_a_car_accident/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcpvi0/did_you_hear_lorena_bobbit_died_in_a_car_accident/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>What does a dyslexic racist hate?</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
Gingers
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/BigDaddyCool17"> /u/BigDaddyCool17 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcz3nv/what_does_a_dyslexic_racist_hate/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcz3nv/what_does_a_dyslexic_racist_hate/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Jewish friend sent this to me</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
A jewish guy sends his son to Israel, and he comes back home christian. The man thinks this is odd so he tells his friend about it.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
The friend listens, thinks for a moment and says, “That’s odd. I sent my son to Israel when he was Jewish and he returned as a Christian.” So the two of them went to see the Rabbi.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
They told the Rabbi the story of how they had both sent their sons to Israel as Jews, and how both sons had returned as Christians. The Rabbi listened, thought for a minute and then said “That’s odd. I also sent my son to Israel as a Jew and he returned as a Christian.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
So the three of them decide to go to Israel to find out what’s going on over there. The arrive and go straight to the Western Wall to pray. They explain to God all about how they sent their sons to Israel as Jews and how the all returned as Christians."
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
There is a long silence, and then God begins to speak saying, “That’s odd . . .”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/plony_ben_almony"> /u/plony_ben_almony </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcfery/jewish_friend_sent_this_to_me/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tcfery/jewish_friend_sent_this_to_me/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Yesterday I saw two teenagers making out in the park, reminds me of my teenage days….</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
reminds me of my teenage days when I used to see other teenagers make out in the park
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/mac_128"> /u/mac_128 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tci08x/yesterday_i_saw_two_teenagers_making_out_in_the/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/tci08x/yesterday_i_saw_two_teenagers_making_out_in_the/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
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|
|||
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