Ukraine

B

Buster Bluth

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I can only assume all of the dots in the Americas are from people joking. I hope.
 
Ndaccountant

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woolybug25 said:
They did a great job on that peice. Really an interesting read and says a lot about the average American's view on foreign relations.
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As Thomas Jefferson pointed out, an educated citizenry is a vital prerequisite for the success of free people and of our government structure.
 
dublinirish

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Lads so many americans i have met dont know where Ireland is, I wouldnt expect people to be able to pick out the Ukraine on a map
 
IrishLax

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dublinirish said:
Lads so many americans i have met dont know where Ireland is, I wouldnt expect people to be able to pick out the Ukraine on a map
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True story a buddy in college dated a St. Mary's girl who thought London was a country and couldn't name a single European country except France (and definitely couldn't located them on a map, as this all started with a trivia question to name some countries that bordered France).

She had like a 3.8 GPA. Can't make this shit up.
 
dublinirish

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in fairness i get it America is pretty much continental size in itself but yeah i think world geography/history isn't the best there :D
 
Whiskeyjack

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PeGcTFR.png
 
Emcee77

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IrishLax said:
True story a buddy in college dated a St. Mary's girl who thought London was a country and couldn't name a single European country except France (and definitely couldn't located them on a map, as this all started with a trivia question to name some countries that bordered France).

She had like a 3.8 GPA. Can't make this shit up.
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Lol! I've known people like this. My sister's friend was 16 before she learned that the state of Maine was not called New Brunswick. I mean, what? And she was a great, conscientious student. In fact, that's why she thought Maine was called New Brunswick: she was studying for a geography test, looked at a map, and saw the term "New Brunswick" very near Maine (in Canada). Never mind that most educated people in the U.S. know what the 50 states are and that New Brunswick isn't one of them.

I actually have a theory about it: girls are not as good at geography because they don't follow sports as closely. My sister used to think that Oakland was in Colorado because my uncle was an Oakland Raiders fan and he lived in Colorado. When she told me this, I laughed at her for a long time ... and then I realized how much of my knowledge of the map of the U.S. and the world came from following sports as a kid. Would I have been as motivated as a kid to figure out where Oakland is if not for the fact that I wanted to know where my Steelers were headed on a certain Sunday? Not sure. Similarly, would I have really cared where Romania was if Gheorghe Hagi wasn't a fucking baller in my FIFA 1998 video game? Not sure.

So a lot of Americans may not know where Ukraine is, but soccer fans know it is where Andriy Shevchenko is from. So they might be a bit more likely to be able to find it on a map. Just my theory.
 
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Whiskeyjack

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Emcee77 said:
I actually have a theory about it: girls are not as good at geography because they don't follow sports as closely. My sister used to think that Oakland was in Colorado because my uncle was an Oakland Raiders fan and he lived in Colorado. When she told me this, I laughed at her for a long time ... and then I realized how much of my knowledge of the map of the U.S. and the world came from following sports as a kid. Would I have been as motivated as a kid to figure out where Oakland if not for the fact that I wanted to know where my Steelers were headed on a certain Sunday? Not sure. Similarly, would I have really cared where Romania was if Gheorghe Hagi wasn't a fucking baller in my FIFA 1998 video game? Not sure.
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Could also be that men are better adapted to spatial visualization due to our ancestral role as hunters. A recent study that compared the brain scans of men and women seemed to confirm this.

So a lot of Americans may not know where Ukraine is, but soccer fans know it is where Andriy Shevchenko is from. So they might be a bit more likely to be able to find it on a map. Just my theory.
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(1) Sheva was a boss; and (2) being a soccer fan has definitely improved my knowledge of geography.
 
dshans

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Had I been asked, some years ago, to point out Ukraine, I would not have been able to zero in on it. It was simply a part of the red blob that was the USSR on the map.

On the other hand ...
 
Whiskeyjack

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dshans said:
Had I been asked, some years ago, to point out Ukraine, I would not have been able to zero in on it. It was simply a part of the red blob that was the USSR on the map.
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So back in your day, geography was... easier?
 
Ndaccountant

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Emcee77 said:
Lol! I've known people like this. My sister's friend was 16 before she learned that the state of Maine was not called New Brunswick. I mean, what? And she was a great, conscientious student. In fact, that's why she thought Maine was called New Brunswick: she was studying for a geography test, looked at a map, and saw the term "New Brunswick" very near Maine (in Canada). Never mind that most educated people in the U.S. know what the 50 states are and that New Brunswick isn't one of them.

I actually have a theory about it: girls are not as good at geography because they don't follow sports as closely. My sister used to think that Oakland was in Colorado because my uncle was an Oakland Raiders fan and he lived in Colorado. When she told me this, I laughed at her for a long time ... and then I realized how much of my knowledge of the map of the U.S. and the world came from following sports as a kid. Would I have been as motivated as a kid to figure out where Oakland is if not for the fact that I wanted to know where my Steelers were headed on a certain Sunday? Not sure. Similarly, would I have really cared where Romania was if Gheorghe Hagi wasn't a fucking baller in my FIFA 1998 video game? Not sure.

So a lot of Americans may not know where Ukraine is, but soccer fans know it is where Andriy Shevchenko is from. So they might be a bit more likely to be able to find it on a map. Just my theory.
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RISK

That is what really started my geography foundation. I had older brothers and sisters so I started it pretty young.
 
Emcee77

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Ndaccountant said:
RISK

That is what really started my geography foundation. I had older brothers and sisters so I started it pretty young.
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Omg Risk, of course! Reps for thinking of that! There was a reason I always knew where Manchuria was, and it wasn't sports!
 
Corry

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Emcee77 said:
Omg Risk, of course! Reps for thinking of that! There was a reason I always knew where Manchuria was, and it wasn't sports!
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The key to Risk is to start with Australia and work your way east. Once you have Australia and Africa cancel Christmas, it's over.
 
Emcee77

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Btw, it's Kamchatka, not Manchuria, right? ... maybe I should have played more Risk as a kid. (Check this video out, starting about 35 seconds in:)

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/kpcxfsjIIbM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
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GoIrish41

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Emcee77 said:
Btw, it's Kamchatka, not Manchuria, right? ... maybe I should have played more Risk as a kid. (Check this video out, starting about 35 seconds in:)

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/kpcxfsjIIbM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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Eddie Izzard is a funny dude.
 
gkIrish

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Here's the text of the article I posted below.

Jews in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk where pro-Russian militants have taken over government buildings were told they have to "register" with the Ukrainians who are trying to make the city become part of Russia, according to Ukrainian and Israeli media.

Jews emerging from a synagogue say they were handed leaflets that ordered the city's Jews to provide a list of property they own and pay a registration fee "or else have their citizenship revoked, face deportation and see their assets confiscated," reported Ynet News, Israel's largest news website.

Donetsk is the site of an "anti-terrorist" operation by the Ukraine government, which has moved military columns into the region to force out militants who are demanding a referendum be held on joining Russia. The news was carried first by the Ukraine's Donbass news agency.

The leaflets bore the name of Denis Pushilin, who identified himself as chairman of "Donetsk's temporary government," and were distributed near the Donetsk synagogue and other areas, according to the reports.

Pushilin acknowledged that fliers were distributed under his organization's name in Donetsk but denied any connection to them, Ynet reported in Hebrew.

Emanuel Shechter, in Israel, told Ynet his friends in Donetsk sent him a copy of the leaflet through social media.

"They told me that masked men were waiting for Jewish people after the Passover eve prayer, handed them the flier and told them to obey its instructions," he said.

The leaflet begins, "Dear Ukraine citizens of Jewish nationality," and states that all people of Jewish descent over 16 years old must report to the Commissioner for Nationalities in the Donetsk Regional Administration building and "register."

It says the reason is because the leaders of the Jewish community of Ukraine supported Bendery Junta, a reference to Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Ukrainian nationalist movement that fought for Ukrainian independence at the end of World War II, "and oppose the pro-Slavic People's Republic of Donetsk," a name adopted by the militant leadership.

The leaflet then described which documents Jews should provide: "ID and passport are required to register your Jewish religion, religious documents of family members, as well as documents establishing the rights to all real estate property that belongs to you, including vehicles."

Consequences for non-compliance will result in citizenship being revoked "and you will be forced outside the country with a confiscation of property." A registration fee of $50 would be required, it said.

Olga Reznikova, 32, a Jewish resident of Donetsk, told Ynet she never experienced anti-Semitism in the city until she saw this leaflet.

"We don't know if these notifications were distributed by pro-Russian activists or someone else, but it's serious that it exists," she said. "The text reminds of the fascists in 1941," she said referring to the Nazis who occupied Ukraine during World War II.

Morton Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America, the oldest pro-Israel group in the USA, said the leaflets should be seen in the context of a rising tide of anti-Semitism across Europe and the world, and that it should prompt a strong response from the White House.

"This is a frightening new development in the anti-Jewish movement that is gaining traction around the world," Klein said.

Secretary of State John Kerry called the incident "grotesque."

"It is beyond unacceptable," Kerry said. "And any of the people who engage in these kinds of activities — from whatever party or whatever ideology or whatever place they crawl out of — there is no place for that."

Kerry, who participated in a conference on Ukraine with his counterparts from Russia, Ukraine and the European Union, told reporters all parties condemned anti-Semitism and all religious intolerance.

Michael Salberg, director of the international affairs at the New York City-based Anti-Defamation League, said it's unclear whether the leaflets were issued by the pro-Russian leadership or a splinter group operating within the pro-Russian camp.

But the Russian side has used the specter of anti-Semitism in a cynical manner since anti-government protests began in Kiev that resulted in the ousting of Ukraine's pro-Russian former president Viktor Yanukovych. Russia and its allies in Ukraine issued multiple stories about the the threat posed to Jews by Ukraine's new pro-Western government in Kiev, Salberg said.

Those stories were based in part on ultra-nationalists who joined the Maidan protests, and the inclusion of the ultra-nationalist Svoboda party in Ukraine's new interim government. But the threat turned out to be false, he said.

Svoboda's leadership needs to be monitored, but so far it has refrained from anti-Semitic statements since joining the government, he said. And the prevalence of anti-Semitic acts has not changed since before the Maidan protests, according to the ADL and the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union, which monitors human rights in Ukraine.

Distributing such leaflets is a recruitment tool to appeal to the xenophobic fears of the majority, "to enlist them to your cause and focus on a common enemy, the Jews," Salberg said.

And by targeting Donetsk's Jews, they also send a message to all the region's residents, Salberg said.

"The message is a message to all the people that is we're going to exert our power over you," he said. "Jews are the default scapegoat throughout history for despots to send a message to the general public: Don't step out of line."
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C

Cackalacky

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Can I say that I am not surprised? The Svboda party is basically a neofascist party. IIRC that is who has been supported by the West in Ukraine. Fascists and Russians have never seen eye to eye.
 
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