How do you know if protests in a country are actual protests or just western backed color revolution protests?

Yeah I'd agree with that litmus test. Ukraine is a good example of that, even disregarding their 2004 protest as I'm not sure it always comes in the form of a peaceful protest.

Ukraine was ranked as one of the more corrupt countries in the world circa ~2015.

Then there was a TV show running in Ukraine from 2015 to 2019 starring Zelensky as president of Ukraine. You'll never guess what happened next...

And before everyone gets all "Ukraine good, Russia bad" yes, that was horrible of Russia to start a war. Fuck politicians for using people as pawns.

But I think this paints a clearer picture as to how we got here

This is hexbear, we use Moscow time to plan our movie nights /j

Seriously though, the backpedaling is going to get more pushback than criticizing the oligarchs and their pet banderites.
- Wow, fair enough. This might be the only leftist forum where I can imply zelensky is a puppet and not get down voted into oblivion for saying anything against the narrative. Wild times.
  
  Name a leftist forum that would do that to you and I’ll invoke the “no true marxist” defense. /joke
  
  It legitimately displays a childlike understand of the world to ignore material reality in favor of vibes. /not joke
  
  Furthermore, I invite you to hang out in our news comm. you’ll find people who actually investigate the root causes of current events there.
  
  That channel does pop up on my feed from time to time, but I'm ngl the whole communist thing and pronoun push turns me in the other direction
  
  pronoun push
  
  I don't want to detract from the main line of discussion here, but I find this to be a weird hangup. It's been a normal thing since at least Facebook's founding for social media sites to list the user's gender. I kind of wish there was a more elegant solution in broadly-understood culture, but I think listing how the user would like to be referred to if you discuss them in the third person is, if anything, far less invasive with labeling than the common alternatives (including not including such information, which produces endless little worthless discursive circles of "actually I'm not a he" from assuming everyone on the internet is a man).
  
  I was specifically talking about anonymous forums, Facebook is a bit different.
  
  Just call people by their username, who gives a fuck what anyone is - that's the whole point of an anonymous forum. Maybe this is insensitive, but being misgendered on an anon online forum, open to the public, is not a big deal. If it effects you that much, there's a high likelihood you're narcissistic or need some counseling/exercise/sleep/food.
  
  I don't care if you call me he, she or something in-between, at the end of the day no one knows who you really are in a place like this. So I'm back to: it doesn't fucking matter
  
  Maybe this is insensitive, but being misgendered on an anon online forum, open to the public, is not a big deal
  
  To people who have spent their entire life being misgendered, it is
  
  A single moment of positivity can outshine half a dozen moments of negativity
  
  So we're helping the 1-2% of people, while emboldening narcissist tendencies in others and creating tribes though identity politics.
  
  I can't count how many times people tried "har har, you're cis white male" as something derogatory
  
  Obviously the opposite is true where non-binary/trans folk have had that happen to them as well from the other side of the isle - but this just shows my point of identity politics being part of this whole thing, and isn't necessary for us to get along and treat each other as humans.
  
  I'd argue it might be better to not display it, so we can all converse without a preconceived notion as to what the other person is - so we're all treated the same.
  
  us to get along and treat each other as humans
  
  This begins with acknowledging that some people don't fit into a neat binary category, if they even identify with the spectrum at all
  
  The point isn't to form cliques, the point is acceptance. If one claims to support trans rights, but then misgenders that person and refuses to acknowledge how they would like to be referred, then one is not supportive of trans rights
  
  Be better
  
  You don't get to decide that
  
  Well, I’m here to be rational and have a nice discussion. Maybe we can work through that?
  
  If you don’t mind me asking: what do you ID as politically? Believe it or not we won’t ban you just for not being marxist-Leninist. We tolerate all sorts of liberals.
  
  What do you mean by pronoun push? Hexbear had a pronoun field, yes. We respect the pronouns people ask us to use, yes. We are never going to force you to use or ID pronouns for yourself. Our site explored has “none/use name” as an option. I personally use the comrade option, because I think that’s nifty and wish it existed irl.
  
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  I’ll fight you. We shall use foil fencing rules with scrolls of Kapital Vol. 1 rolled up like swords as we duel.
  
  I don't really know what I identify as politically, but it's somewhere between liberal, libertarian, and conservative.
  
  By pronoun push, I mean why even display it? None of that info really matters in an anon online forum
  
  It matters to people like me, who are trans and worked very hard for our gender identities. In addition, it helps to combat the assumption that everyone on the internet is male; which can be really harmful for people who aren't. Also it scares people who aren't LGBT friendly.
  
  How do you understand those terms? I get the feeling we understand them very differently.
  
  As for the second part: we insist upon them being visible because that’s the only way to guarantee nobody is accidentally misgendered. We take the well-being of ALL our comrades seriously here.
  
  If you feel similarly about taking care for those around you, maybe you should stick around a while and see that whatever you consider “communism” is mostly just truly caring about the vulnerable. That’s what we are here for, mostly. Caring about people.
  
  Not sure what I'm allowed to comment, mods here keep removing my shit.
  
  Ah well so much for all that
  
  I see them as western world tribes, it's just that the leaders of those tribes are in the same club for the most part. I'm sure that's what you see too.
  
  But I also see how communism kills on large scales. It commonly works on household/small community scales but beyond that it has the same human issues as everything we currently have, but more quickly centralized.
  
  Without free markets, free speech, free thought and free movement, we're not going to make it far.
  
  And with the pronouns - the whole identity politics becomes part of that. I'd rather not group people as she, him, her, black, white, comrade, capitalist.
  
  Labels for groups of people are great for a broad understanding, but at an individual level they're limiting.
  
  Facts are negotiable, perceptions are not
  
  I've a question for ye, then, in regards to foreign policy?
  
  is there such thing as the West, in political terms?
  
  If so, is there also the Global South?
  
  There isn't a general term for the "global south". But when I say Western you know exactly which countries I'm referring too.
  
  South would probably either be "Latin countries" or "Sub Saharan Countries" depending on which side of the globe you're looking at
  
  The West includes Australia et New Zealand, right?
  
  We don't have downvotes also
  
  We have down Bears though:
  
  Yeah this place might be perfect for you. We don't bother couching our language when it comes to Ukraine
yes, that was horrible of Russia to start a war.

Honestly not really. The alternative was allow Ukraine to set up as a springboard for operation Barbarossa 2, which would mean nuclear war. Russia objectively saved the world by destroying a decades worth of western plans in Ukraine. Feel bad for the citizens of the Donbas obviously, but even western Ukrainian citizens only have so much of my sympathy. Now they’re being picked up off the street and suddenly war in the east isn’t so fun anymore.
- but even western Ukrainian citizens only have so much of my sympathy
  
  Ukrainians voted in Zelenskyy because he ran on a platform of stopping the conflict and killings in Donbas, remember
  
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  You are both correct. On an individual oblast level his highest support was in the east. That being said he did win the other oblasts except for Lviv but by a more narrow margin
  
  That is a good point and I agree up to a point, but like I said my sympathy is limited, not nonexistent.
  
  Ukraine is actually resisting, they were couped at least 5 times to keep them in fold, 1991, 2004, 2014, 2021, 2022. I'm afraid that they are on their last legs though.
- operation Barbaross 2
  
  I doubt that was the endgame here, the west doesnt want to do a real war with russia they just want to pressure them into letting western companies extract all that natural gas for themselves. Nuclear winter is not very profitable.
  
  The invasion is not a good thing and I dont see russia as justified here, given the harm on the civilian poulation is far worse in this scenerio, and the west still managed to profit off it anyway.
  
  I doubt that was the endgame here, the west doesnt want to do a real war with russia they just want to pressure them into letting western companies extract all that natural gas for themselves.
  
  I’m going to heavily disagree obviously. It’s very clear that nato was building up a military force to push into the Donbas, that’s the entire premise the special military operation was built on. The Donbas has a large portion of Ukraines natural resources and also a majority of its production capacity. I’m not trying to be argumentative or anything, but I gotta ask, why exactly would nato want that stuff if the plan was not to take Russian resources by force at a later time? They could simply buy it on the market right now, but instead they chose to coup a government on Russias border, arm and train them to nato standards, make war with its Eastern oblasts, then once Russia actually did something about it, nato dumps even more billions of dollars into its armed forces. Ultimately what you’re saying is “nato wouldn’t do that” but that’s IS exactly what I expected from nato to be honest.
  
  Nuclear winter is not very profitable.
  
  You and I understand that, but profit seeking is not always logical. In nato stockpiles right now there are tactical nukes (nukes that have a small enough payload that they could theoretically destroy one city or so) as if any nuclear nation on this planet would not immediately release their entire nuclear arsenal at the thought of being nuked in any capacity. Being nuked isn’t profitable, neither is climate change ultimately, doesn’t mean they aren’t doing it though.
  
  The invasion is not a good thing and I dont see russia as justified here, given the harm on the civilian poulation is far worse in this scenerio.
  
  Time and time again Russia has been shown to take great care NOT to deliberately attack civilian populations. For example civilian casualties in European wars have historically been 1:1 with military casualties. Ukraine has suffered losses estimated to be closing in on 500,000. Their civilian population however has casualties in the ~20-30,000 range. No where near a 1:1 even if you included the casualties of the pre invasion Donbas war (~12-14,000).
  
  No the war as a whole is not good, but to throw that blame at Russia is not right. the invasion was justified because had Russia not done anything Ukraine would have at least invaded the Donbas region with NATOs approval and assistance. Because of the invasion Russia has defeated NATOs easternmost army, drained a huge chunk of NATOs stockpile that will take years to build up again, secured and is in the process of rebuilding the Donbas, and has given many nations across the globe a sign that nato is not as powerful as it appears. The only thing bad about this is it did it as the Russian federation and not the Soviet Union which is EXTREMELY disappointing. It’s easy to simply be against war, if that’s your position then I understand, but when looking at the situation at hand Russia really did make the best play it could from a shit hand that it was dealt.
  
  Thanks for the writeup, this prospective is actually pretty agreeable, but I still feel like a direct land invasion of Russia doesnt fit NATO's modus operandi. Do you think a color revoltion in Russia might have been their primary goal instead? If NATO baited Russia into war and then used it as propagana against them to sow dissent in the Russian population, that might serve as a decent basis for an insurrection. Seems like it might be a "damned if you do damned if you don't" type situation for the Kremlin.
  
  Actually from what we now know, NATO’s intention was to use the unprecedented sanctions to crush Russia’s economy, which they apparently expected would collapse within weeks. Ukraine’s job was to hold out the Russian advances for a few weeks until the collapsing economy forces Russia to retreat, and for the Russians come back to beg the US/EU to let them sell oil and gas again.
  
  At the same time, we also know that Ukraine had been building up its military since 2014, with the explicit goal of recapturing Donbass and Crimea. If Ukrainian army had reached Donetsk city, it would have been a nightmare for the Russians to retake it again. The civilian casualties could easily go magnitudes of order higher. In this sense, Russia’s pre-emptive strike was almost inevitable if the goal was to prevent the Ukrainians from reaching Donetsk at all cost.
  
  You’re welcome, thank you for not taking it negatively, I didn’t want to come off as argumentative as I said before. As far as direct land invasion I’m pretty sure that if that plan was in the works it would have been at least 30-50 years out. I believe the plan was to win the war against the Donbas with the Ukrainian army, take the resources in the Donbas, make the Donbas the new military supply hub for nato, take Crimea, then eventually start war with Russia. In the meantime color revolution is always on the table. That color revolution would partially look like the sanctions that ended up failing anyways and also maybe terrorism from the ukronazis who would theoretically be occupying the Donbas in this scenario. You could kinda see that taking place with the few units that have crossed into Russian territory proper.

Potential for co-option always blurs the line, too, especially in cases like decentralized Occupy sort of stuff. That sort of leaderless, ad-hoc angle can have perks, but leaves a fundamental opening for bad actors.

Litmus test: Are they suddenly getting widespread positive coverage in western news?

Came here to post this same thing. More to it than that, and there's a lot of great answers here, but that is a shortcut to at least determine if its sus.

More to it than that

give me more. what else can be a sign?