Jwayne

If you take a stand against imperialism, then you cannot also support democracy. Because the people may decide/vote/ratify imperialist policies. How are you going to resolve this problem? The world has addressed it by establishing international laws through the UN, which the United States merely leverages as a weapon to veto and blackmail anyone who challenges their hegemony. However the UN is also faulty because most of the world's population is unrepresented on the Security Council (e.g. India, Africa, Indonesia, Brazil, the entire Global South). So the UN also needs reform for its international law to be legitimate. Or, you can claim "My personal sense of morality should be the universal standard and all peoples everywhere should bow to my convictions." That's basically what you're doing now.

Ukraine was artillery shelling its own territory in the breakaway republics in the days leading up to invasion which is a violation of the Minsk agreement. That's when Putin ratified his official protection of them so he can have legal precedent should they be attacked further. At that time Zelensky even suggested reneging on an agreement not to seek nuclear weapons. Going back to October before the conflict Russia was asking for dialogue to remove missile sites around its borders that can hit Moscow in a matter of minutes (how many missiles does Russia have in border regions to Washington DC ?). The USA said we are ready to discuss anything but your terms are non-negotiable. Which is why the rest of the world, specifically Russia and China, consider Americans to be exceptionally poor diplomats. They have no tact and rely upon bullying vulnerable countries. Then in February China and Russia signed a 55,000 word statement announcing their "friendship" which is a very profound sentiment in Eurasian-Chinese cultures. Whereas America sees friendship as a mere pragmatic tool to further its own 'national interests'. The USA is by far the most aggressive imperialist power in the world going back a century. Just type into a search engine "American invasion of ..."

Obviously Xi doesn't have 'absolute power'. China isn't a monarchy like Saudi Arabia. China has a ruling class, as do Western democracies, not a dictatorship. The core power of the Chinese ruling class is shared by the Politburo Standing Committee.

Polls show a majority of Russians support the war. That's even reported in Western media.

Tailored to their interests and abilities, as you would any education.

That's why polling and surveys are done anonymously. There's no fear of reprisal because there's no way to trace who said what. As for social media and public speaking, that's different. Even in Western democracies, you will be censored, targeted and surveilled for expressions of wrongthink.

That's highly presumptuous of you. Are you omniscient? Upon what basis can you say what 'most Russian citizens' think?

He has a domestic approval rating over 80%.

He always speaks from his political and religious biases. It's not about commitment but mutual understanding. Even moreso than that its about respect and fun.

To start a family and have children. Having a family returns an unfathomable amount of richness, pain, beauty and joy into your life. Also family is a source of power. Even if you don't start a family, long relationships provide companionship which means someone to laugh with, explore together, romance, have fun with and to cooperate in sharing labour and knowledge.

Don't go to college to study Buddhism. Go to college to get a practical certification or degree that's going to further your career aspirations. I'm sorry but, my opinion is that, spirituality certification is not going to pay in Indiana.

But people read 'perfect' and interpret it according to their conceptualized expectations, as in having all of their desires fulfilled, especially the 'spiritual' ones, like infinite pleasure without a moment of pain. Many people think 'enlightenment' must be like that. Whereas you mean, I assume, a different sense of perfection.

Specifically, I say that, because the conscious effort to love is indubitably moving in the right direction. And it is suitable for everybody. Whereas the effort to 'awaken' can take you in many different (even opposite, conflicting) directions, including onto potentially dangerous paths not meant for everybody, like an obsession with the use of recreational substances.

But you don't need to wait or rely on 'awakening' to 'LOVE'. You can start being loving right away.

Of course!

Also, "you" can't do it alone. Anything substantial in the world requires the collaboration of others. That's the crucial part missing in all self-help/spiritual discourse. Of course, you should seize the day and not resign yourself to a belief in fate that will justify your anxiety/unwillingness to act, but also, you must work with and serve others.

Exactly, its a game of semantics. It is better not to engage in such silly ego contests, nor to fuel the egomania of the persons starting them.

Love, beauty and bliss are always there but we also have lives to live that demand our attention to be occupied with other tasks. The demand to be entertained or pleasured with "24/7 bliss" is pathological. Instead, you should learn how to contact bliss so that you can be with it when you are not engaged with other more urgent, distracting worldly things. Obviously, bliss is also present in the worldly activity too but not in the form you were expecting, or have as yet learned to appreciate. To appreciate the extraordinary in the ordinary is a wiser intention than to demand 24/7 pleasure from mystic-realization-experiences.

Intermittent fasting burns fat the fastest, but its not a healthy option long-term. You shouldn't be tired after eating but feeling satiated and ready to work. More important than meal timing is nutrition.

There are certain situations, despite however 'awakened' you are, when you may confront an unknown, potentially dangerous situation, and especially if carrying a responsibility for others near you, that fear may arise as a aspect of the total situation with which to inform your decision. If fear is present, then simply tally it with the other data that you have.

Have you 'discovered that reality'? Does that make you an expert in art criticism across all cultures throughout all time?

The way the defense (i.e. war) industry, which has a lot of political clout, looks at it is there is no use in developing and possessing cutting-edge military technology if you're never going to test them in live situations. The USA historically - and presently - is hundreds of billions of dollars ahead of its rivals in military spending. It is a sum far more than necessary for protecting its homeland (e.g. the amount other nations spend). The USA spends enough to control the opposite side of both oceans and to even have the means to extend its force into the lands beyond that (as demonstrated dozens of times over the last century). The only reason to enact this policy was originally expressed in terms, since gone out of favor with intellectuals, of 'manifest destiny' and in things like the Monroe Doctrine. The idea is that the American (at least certain white landholding ones) is a unique breed of individual who has reached a higher summit of moral, intellectual, psychological and spiritual (historically Christian) development and thus has a burden to, what amounts to, an epistemic-cultural imperialism of the world, and that's enforced through outright military and economic pressures. That the United States sees itself as possessing a higher moral authority (i.e. American exceptionalism) and thus can't help itself but to undermine and intervene in the self-determination of others, hasn't changed one bit. What is changing is its unipolar hegemony over violence. Multipolarity is the relative decline of American influence. Specifically, north-east Asia is an extremely culturally rich and now economically prosperous pole of geopolitical significance that is also growing in military parity (particularly China). And its building a very impressive trade and infrastructure network in the One Belt One Road project which is re-shaping the faith the developing world had in neoliberal economics. OBOR represents an alternative model of economic growth that's being very well-received, and delivers real results (in terms of tangible industry and infrastructure) and its not done in USD. That is a current, measurable outcome of multipolarity which is nothing but dialectics applied to geopolitics.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I can tell you haven't read any books about this time period of contempory Chinese history by the way you are writing. I'll ask you a question. If it were so simple as 'going capitalist' then why isn't India as equally well-developed, with routine mega-infrastructure projects and massive annual GDP-growth? Why isn't Bangladesh like Singapore, South Korea, Japan and Taiwan? Furthermore, why isn't Taiwan as well-developed as mainland China? Prosperity is not so simple as transitioning from one set of Maoist policies to another set of 'capitalist' ones. The world is not a video game. It is morelike decades of iteration (starting in the 1930s through 2000s), especially in agricultural reform. The foundation for even having a functioning centralized governance to later enact Dengist reforms was first dependent upon the 1949 Revolution. These things move dialectically, which the Chinese understand very well as students of Lao Tzu, Sun Tzu and Marx.

I've thought a great deal about this line of reasoning from beginning to end. And I've had extensive discussion with other people about it elsewhere over the last few years. I'm comfortable to discuss every detail of it. But you were more eager to place a temporary ban on my account then examine your own positions. So let's try it again. What you're claiming is that majority White nations in the Western hemispheres - whom historically enslaved and subjugated the rest of the world based on the belief in the self-superiority of their ideas and genetics - have (again) arrived at a superior state of moral development? I see a pattern here of Western culture, specifically whatever its latest iteration is, asserting itself as a universal standard. How does this not violate the intellectual sovereignty and self-determination of the rest of the world? The implication is the entire world should emulate what White Western English-speaking nations believe to be right.

Your reference point for an absolute claim to morality has shifted to "LGBTQ rights" and "Transparency.org" reports. This is not a philosophical argument but empty talking points. It's arbitrary until you defend what about those specific metrics matter. Imagine someone saying absolute morality depends on Xinhua News reports and Mandarin-fluency. It would be equally ridiculous as what you've said. As for Chinese economic progress, it is a measurable objective fact to put food on people's tables (erasing centuries of famine) and thus to give more opportunities to discover and explore individual potential by enhancing environmental richness, and so forth. This part isn't controversial. As for your vague reference to "authoritarianism", it is another empty remark until you can substantiate what it means in the context of this conversation of East-West hermeneutics. Chinese people (and Russian, as you know) also experience love, and value love. They are not different in that regard.