My country was communist 30 years ago, with everything that implies. There was death, there was misery, there was pain. People rebelled and the dictator was shot and so was the country free to pursue freedom and democracy.

I think what I and many don't understand is how Russians accept the political apathy and how they accept their situation. Yes, we saw a lot of them leave, we saw the protests, we saw that two battalions of russians are now fighting in Ukraine with the UA military. But considering the country's size and population, the resistance is still underwhelming.

You could say, yes it's the propaganda, but even that should have limits. How can people believe the whole west is bad and wants to destroy them, when you can just simply talk to them? How can they believe that the war is still justified, given that the reasons for it have changed several times now, with now admitting they simply want back 'historical lands'. How can people live with being arrested and beaten in police stations by expressing anti war opinions? This isn't advanced math, this is simply reactions to endless lies and manipulation by your own government. You literally have less rights than the UN universal charter of human rights says you should have and that's not because of the west.

I don't know man, I personally don't blame you or people that want no part in it. I just hope the russian public wake up and do something before we start WW3, because Russia (the largest country in the world by land mass) STILL wants more land mass at the expense of murdering innocent people.

Yep, thanks to profit obsessed markets, here we are. Manufacturing jobs are returning to the EU though so that's great.

Regardless, as opposed to China, Russia did weaponize our dependency in order to try and manipulate our politics which made them the bigger threat. I as a european, want absolutely nothing from them anymore, regardless of the price. The fact that they invested huge amounts of money to buy off some of our politicians, have an imperial agenda and have no issues with genociding people as close to them culturally as possible, makes them a way bigger threat than China could ever be right now.

I don't think people expected for russians to have nothing over night (though I have to admit, I would have preferred a full embargo starting last year - even though that is indeed a harder approach). What you are describing is the intended effects: replace western stuff with chinese so money stops coming in/out of russia. Which is the right thing to do. People in russia still need to live and people in the west do need to minimize trade until better people come into power over there(ones that don't genocide their neighbors).

Of course Russia becoming reliant on China is gonna become a whole different issue, both for russians but also for the west. Given that China now dominates the markets there and has access to resources at a premium price, who knows what they are capable of in the future. Let's hope they are satisfied with turning Russia into a client state for the moment.

Guess we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. For now the war must be stopped with Russia retreating behind their borders.

It depends on your needs and where you are OP. For example I had to change my phone and went with a Nokia G21 (primarily for the long battery life and good price vs value). I'd also stay away from top brands because you're pretty much paying the brand instead of the phone.

The G21 is great for my needs but it's definitely not gonna be bifl. The EU already passed some interesting laws to make the nex gen phones more repairable for example (replaceable pop in batteries like we had in the good old days). Current generation of phones have everything encapsulated so you have to replace it in 3 years or pay for an expensive repair shop. They are thought out for maximum consumerism.