It's A War, Dummy

I don't like thinking a guy is justified in punching a guy for disrespecting a flag. And I don't like thinking that the Russian guy has no call to look all shocked and shit when he gets punched for disrespecting the Ukrainian guy's flag.

But there's something very symbolic about the Russian guy's action (provoked as it was by the Ukrainian guy's video-bombing), and the Ukrainian guy's reaction, and then the Russian guy's reaction to the Ukrainian guy's reaction.

It's a fucking war, the Ukrainians didn't start it, and we can't expect them to behave in a particularly nice way as they fight for their lives - no matter where that fight occurs.

Because it's a war - a total loss of control - a madness. And once it starts, nobody's calling the shots, and nobody can claim to know much of anything about what happens next, or where we go from whatever fucked up place we're at right now.

It's a fucking war.

Scuffles have broken out between Russian and Ukrainian delegates to a conference in Turkey this week, according to videos and state media reports.

Two separate altercations over Ukrainian flags occurred at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation in Ankara, Turkey, on Thursday.

In one video, a woman in a blue suit is capturing herself on a cellphone camera when a Ukrainian lawmaker holds up a Ukrainian flag behind her. A second man, identified by Russia’s Tass state news agency as the secretary of the Russian delegation, then walks up and rips the flag out of the Ukrainian man’s hands.

As he walks away with the yellow and blue flag, the Ukrainian lawmaker follows him, then slaps at him and tears it out of his hands.

“What are you doing with the Ukrainian flag?” shouts the lawmaker, Oleksandr Marikovski. “This is our flag.”

Video of the tussle was posted on Mr. Marikovski’s Facebook page and also circulated widely on social media.

Russian news reports named the woman in the video as Olga Timofeeva, a member of the Russian delegation, and said she was filming a broadcast interview at the time of the incident.

Tass identified the man who grabbed the Ukrainian flag as Valery Stavitsky, the Russian delegation’s secretary, and said that he was taken to a hospital for medical attention after being attacked.

Earlier on Thursday, Tass reported, Ukrainian lawmakers tried to “disrupt” a speech by a Russian official by unfurling a Ukrainian flag. That incident also resulted in a physical altercation, according to video posted by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency.

Слава Україні

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