Zelenskyy fires recruitment officials for accepting $10,000 bribes to help Ukrainian men dodge the draft: 'bribery during war is treason'

I usually dislike picking hairs of evil when the alternative solution was getting annexed back into a cultural meat grinder

Downvotes for a comment pointing out that forcing people to fight and die is fucked up? Okay, people...

A lot of keyboard warriors that like to belive they would gladly fight and die for the glory of their country if the time came, but are so far removed from the realities of war, that when they think of war they think of movies and video games, not watching your freinds get blown into chunks by an artillery shell or rocket while you're making an MRE in your trench.
Calling it a crime is fucked up. Especially in a thread where actual crime (taking bribes) is discussed.
- You can't seriously be equating the moral shortcomings of taking a bribe to the complete immorality of imposing a draft on others and forcing them to march towards near certain death
  
  I definitely can. It would be a completely different topic in russia where they draft people to sustain occupation. If Ukraine stopped defending now, you'd have Buchas and Mariupols all over Ukraine with many dead. So I don't really see it as immoral as much as it sucks for everyone involved.
  Compared to that, taking bribes from desperate people is next level fucked up and it's effectively profiteering on genocide.

Dude, Ukraine was invaded. The last time the US has had to use a draft for circumstances like this was the Civil War, and everyone now thinks it was warranted then.

There were drafts for the Vietnam shitshow as well.
- I think people generally agree that the drafts for the Vietnam war were not justified.
  
  Drafts are never justified, you don't own anyone else life
  
  And they don't owe you anything either.
  So it would be only fair if Society does not provide any services whatsoever to draft dogers so: citizenship revoked, no ownership of anything they cannot hold and defend themselves, if they're victims of a crime "though luck", no firemen, no use of communal spaces including roads, no public Schools, no emergency medical care and even no indirect benefits like FDIC insurance on their bank deposits and many others.
  If you have no duty to Society then Society has no duty to you, aka you're a Pariah, worse than that even, as anybody can kill you anytime they feel like it since Society does not even has that duty to you - if you have no duty towards everybody else then they have no duty to enforce "rights" for you: it's only fair since "rights" only exists because Society has agreed to them and enforces them so those who don't agree with contributing to that agree to have no rights (and, as I said above, that also means the Right To Live and the Right To Ownership as well as any Citizenship Rights).
  Strangelly, the crowd claiming they want Freedom only seems to want Freedom of their duties never Freedom from all those "Rights" than everybody else as a Society is making sure they have.
  
  Let me know where you sign up to renounce to public services and stop paying taxes
  
  If it were possible to live somewhere without government interference, I would do it in a heartbeat.
  
  Yeah, well, you're slowly getting to my point: if you want to live amongst other people you have to abide by common rules since your Freedom ends were other people's Freedom starts.
  (Which is how we ended up with the complex beast which is the Nation State, with all its imperfections)
  Absolutelly, some people would love to trully be free in the genuine sense of the word and there really aren't that many places on Earth were that is possible (they were born in the wrong Age, IMHO), but most people seem to want Freedom AND all the upsides of Human Civilization both at the same time, in other words, Rights without Duties.
The last time the US has had to use a draft for circumstances like this was the Civil War
Didn't teach history in your school?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_the_United_States
- You missed the "for circumstances like this" part. There were certainly other uses of the draft for other circumstances that are looked at poorly.
  WWI and WWII didn't have a direct US invasion, and we're also looked at positively, but is out of the scope of the discussion.

You won't find a single country on this planet that wouldn't draft their citizens in a wartime situation while you're running out of soldiers. Not a single one.

And it would still be fucked up in every single one of those countries.
You won't also find a single country on this planet that isn't rooted on violence and that isn't ruled by corrupted politicians
- True, but it's a spectrum, some countries are much more violent and corrupt than others. Arguably Russia ranks #1 in corruption, violence, and terrorism.
  Russia's troll farms out here complaining about every other country, when they are globally causing the most problems.
  
  Objection. I would argue that Saudi Arabia ranks #1 in corruption, violence and terrorism and since we are at it i would also want to point out that the west is a partner of SA and sell them plenty of weapons.
  Russia’s troll farms out here complaining about every other country, when they are globally causing the most problems.
  Is Russia the country that spends more money on psyops and propaganda?
  Arguing who's less of a criminal or less of a dictator sounds like hitting the bottom of the barrel anyway and it's exactly the game these warlords want people to play.
  
  Saudi Arabia is far up there, but Russia is still objectively worse.
  The Russia simps like to "whataboutism" pretty much everyone else for doing smaller crimes than Russia. It's cliche, it's low IQ, Russia exports troll farms and nuclear terrorism, we get it.
  
  cough cough North Korea cough cough
- BATTLE-POPE, INITIATE COMBAT SEQUENCE.
  
  FREEDOM FROM YOUR SINS IS NON NEGOTIABLE
- that's because the Vatican already drafts them to keep their heads in 1600, therefore they don't know what modern warfare is
- Don't rest assured, for most of his history the vatican was a kingdom with his own army
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_executed_in_the_Papal_States
  
  Now, Facebook was evil. But, Facebook was different. The Meta Platforms, Inc., as it exists today, was only established in 2021.
  /s, just in case you didn't pick up on my heavy use of it
  
  I don't know shit about The Vatican, the pope, their history, or their dumbass religion (obviously, and on purpose!). Thanks for taking the time to respond to give me some insight. However, your comment reads to the layman like , "They changed their name and are way better now," and it'll read that way to almost anybody without your extensive knowledge of useless things.
  
  Maybe it was your tone 🤷‍♂️
  
  They changed their name
Costa Rica doesn’t have an army
Running out of soldiers? I thought the Russians were a bunch of morons who can't do anything and the Ukrainians were beating their asses in their sleep? Why would they need more soldiers?
- Pretty sure only you thought that
  
  Guess you weren't paying attention to all the posts laughing about how the Russian military is so incompetent.

If your country is being invaded, you don't have a choice. War is a savage and cruel phenoma. It turns people into animals. What an invading side can do to civilians under occupation is beyond comprehension. The Nanking Massacre comes to mind in modern memory.

You may regard yourself as a pacifist and in the moral high ground, the women and children who get systematically raped and mutilated through no fault other than being a trophy for monsters to use, would think of you in another view.

I know I'm being brutal with my words, but the real fucking crime is the fucking invasion. Zelensky has to do everything to defend it's existence.

- So you think Ukrainians being genocided is preferable to Ukrainians being drafted?
  Really weird take there.
  
  Each person is a person who should have a right to decide the use and value of their own life.
  "Ukrainians" aren't a resource to be allocated for the greatest good.
  
  So you'd off yourself if you were drafted? Or do you think only Ukrainians are better off dead?
Your argument comes down to "sacrices need to be made for the greater good", right?
So, for a hypothetical, if Putin, for some insane reason, offered to leave Ukraine, respect historic border and even pay to rebuild, as long as Zelensky drowned a child with his own hands, would that be worth it? If it is, then what a bout 10 children? 1,000? 100,000? Where's the line you draw of how much of a sacrifice you can make? If Zelensky ordered his men to charge the Russian line unarmed as a distraction for another force, would that be a necessary sacrifice to defend Ukraine, or would it be a crime against humanity?
Or even for a less extreme example, the same as above, but Ukraine must agree to outlaw LGBT people and take aways women rights to vote. Would that be worth it or would compromising morals in that regard be too much?
- You missed the point by so much it's amazing your neighbor didn't lose an eye.
  Civilians will be raped and murdered by an invading military. Towns will be bombed and burned. Children taken from their families and sent thousands of miles away to be enslaved in factories or worse, a toy for an oligarch.
  And ALL of that you're fine with. Hand wave all of that away, because, by your own argument, a draft is more morally outrageous than all of that. Rape, murder, child sex slaves, ALL of that is worse than forcing people into the military.
  If we're really going to make an outrageous argument then here's one for you. If society really has no right to an individual, then taxes and welfare should also be abolished. Who cares if the poor or mentally incapable starve? That's not your problem. Individuals have no responsibility to society. They should just move if they can't succeed.
  
  And ALL of that you're fine with.
  Please show me exactly where in my comment I said I'm fine with the actions of the Russians, or said Ukraine draft is worse than Russias war crimes...........
  Oh you can't? Because I never said anything remotely close to that and you're just putting words in my mouth because you're a simpleton that can only think in strict binaries and just doesn't have the braincells required to comprehend any kind of nuance.
  So let me try and make this easy for you. Pointing out Ukraine is doing a bad thing does not mean Russia isn't also doing a much worse thing.
  If society really has no right to an individual, then taxes and welfare should also be abolished.
  Again, no nuance. Like some part of you must be aware that there's a fundamental difference between paying taxes and being forced to lay down your life. Like in your black and white world does the existence of taxes justify the state to just murder whoever it doesn't like? Because if they have a right to the individual to force them to pay taxes, then surely that's the exact same as just murdering whoever they don't like right? Definitely no shades of grey between those two things.
  
  My entire comment was about how you missed the point.
  I then came up with a ridiculous comparison, to illustrate how ridiculous your comparison was.
  So let me reiterate my point. Is it worse to have a draft or is it worse for civilians to be murdered by the, potentially, millions. Including things like elderly and infirm being tortured before they're executed, and children being shipped hundreds or thousands of miles from their home to be the toy of an oligarch.
  Ukraine cannot get enough troops with volunteers. If you were leading the country, what would you do? Order a draft or let an invading military run free through your country, raping, pillaging, and murdering.

Regular draft is unacceptable. But this is not a regular draft.

a brilliant attempt to bothsides this invasion situation right here

No. The invading side is clearly worse. If it weren't for the invading army, there would be no war.
Forcing people to risk their lives for a piece of dirt is still evil though.
- I think the calculus is different here, because it isn't just dirt. We've seen what happens to cities and civilians when Russia invades an area.
- They're not defending just "dirt" they're defending THEIR CHILDREN AND NEIGHBORS.
  
  Children and neighbors can be moved. I don't live in Ukraine, but when shit hit the fan, I was watching the news daily, while thinking about the most efficient way to pack everyone up in the car, and get the hell out. Luckily, the front line has stabilized relatively far from the western borders of UA. That's enough of a buffer between me and russia for now.
  If the situation ever changes, I'm not going to wait for the bombs to fall. I'm going to try to outrun them. It would suck to loose my home, but life is worth more to me than a bunch of bricks.
  
  Children and neighbors can be moved.
  wow. just wow.
  I don’t live in Ukraine,
  Whelp.
  It would suck to loose my home, but life is worth more to me than a bunch of bricks.
  The point goes sailing so far over your head I wonder about your last reply.
  
  The point goes sailing so far over your head
  As long as it's not the bombs...
  
  You do realize the irony of "dirt doesn't matter, it's just dirt" when you're not moving right now because....people are defending their own dirt???
  
  Yes. I live comfortably thanks to those who fight. I'd not fight if I were them, but I would also not FORCE anyone to fight for me.
  
  From what I gather, the vast majority in Ukraine are kinda PO'ed at the invasion and are having no problem fighting against it.
Their needs to be a term when people use the "both sides" argument in bad faith to try and deflect legitimate criticism. I guess it kind of falls under whattaboutism ironically enough "nevermind the bad things Ukraine is doing, whattabout the bad things Russia is doing?