We have this tweet from HQ:
Yet just a day prior, we continue to operate events in Russia: https://youtu.be/fshCgHS5NQ4
While Russian teams don’t necessarily support the war, other competitive organizations have also begun to pull out of Russia.
Should FIRST follow?
Absolutely they should.
yes
No.
I am willing to accept there is communication and execution lag. I’ll still give it a few days before I really criticize anything.
I’m pretty sure any FIRST events going on there are run by Russians, for Russians. In addition, I’m not sure penalizing the youth of their country is really going an effective use of messaging.
So - FIRST could put out a blanket statement saying Russian teams aren’t invited to Worlds. But I’m pretty sure that’s gonna be the case anyway… I’m not sure this is worth time.
They can announce they’re banning use of their trademarks at the very least.
Given how expensive running any international team is, their sponsors may well could be in that position.
So FIRST to cancel Russian teams and events on a whim about their sponsors?
FIRST can, and has made a statement. It is my belief that it is wrong to punish kids who might not even know what is going on, let alone have any decision making power in this.
I hope we can see Ukranian, Russian, as well as teams from all over the world compete this year. It’s a fantastic game!
yeah can’t believe Russia is being cancelled over just a few tweets they made a few years ago
Whim?
Idk where you’re getting your news but the country started a war and are bombing civilians.
What’s next, moaning about “canceling” someone for espousing nazi propaganda or advocating for the creation of a white ethnostate?
Nah, I’m pretty sure playing Cotton Eyed Joe over and over is a war crime and Russia has it coming. Slava Ukraini!
Who hasn’t accidentally shelled a hospital every once in a while? It’s a small trespass that we should all be forgiven for. Certainly don’t want to lower the “canceling” bar to something as paltry as “invasion of a sovereign nation” or “war crimes.”
I guess my question would be to what end does cancelling a Russian event serve? Plenty of FRC teams here are sponsored by unsavory organizations too (let’s please let’s not start this discourse). I’m genuinely curious what people’s reasoning is here.
The IOC and FIFA have dropped Russia. FIRST should too.
Poland refused to play against Russia in World Cup qualifying. [Polish] National team captain Lewandowski tweeted: “I can’t imagine playing a match with the Russian National Team in a situation when armed aggression in Ukraine continues. Russian footballers and fans are not responsible for this, but we can’t pretend that nothing is happening.”
FIRST can’t pretend that nothing is happening either.
Sorry it wasn’t clear, this is what “whim” I was referring to:
Given how expensive running any international team is, their sponsors may well could be in that position.
I’m obviously not defending the Russian invasion of Ukraine and I’m definitely not one to say “keep politics out of FIRST!!!”, but I’m not really sure what the purpose of cancelling an intra-Russian event would be. Yes, the IOC and FIFA and FIA have dropped Russia, but those are professional athletes- they are high profile, have massive sponsor money, and compete against other countries. They also lose very little, comparatively, as again they are professionals and likely still getting paid. Sanctions against professional athletes actually have the chance to effect some change. FIRST is grade schoolers learning about robots, volunteers contributing their time, etc, and at this point competing only inside their country under the blessing of FIRST. Would cancelling these events actually affect the situation without punishing these students over something they have no control over and no leverage to affect?
I don’t think your reasoning on war crimes quite holds here. Not responding to the topic as a whole, but this post specifically, “Who hasn’t?” I don’t know. The United States certainly has. Kunduz hospital airstrike - Wikipedia.
In the aftermath, why were American teams allowed to compete in 2016 FRC events?
I strongly support Ukraine, but I don’t think we should go around picking and choosing which war crimes we care about and which ones don’t matter.
Sorry if it wasn’t clear - I was mocking your entire position as well as your profile.
The entire claim that this is cancel culture rather than “reasonable reactions to a literal war” is so absurd it is almost not worth considering as a belief that would be held by anyone.
The phrase cancel culture has been weaponized by a group of people that seem to be pro banning books, burning books, and creating literal snitch lines. Maybe stop using it.
Come back when you want me to explain to you why the garbage in your profile is deserving of derision.
(Mods - I’m done being nice to the trolls supporting killing civilians or to anyone who supports white supremacists)
I largely agree with this stance. Russian kids largely have no control over what the Russian government choses to do and likely only are hindered from said sanctions. However, I think FIRST taking no stance on this(as well as other conflicts occurring in the world in regards to the Middle East and China) is not something we should necessarily condone. Our world(be it for better or for worse) is inherently political and FIRST must choose whether their views are something that will reflect this world or not.
This topic is temporarily closed for at least 4 hours due to a large number of community flags.
This thread has been auto locked for a few hours, and based on the tone and speed of this thread going off the rails, that seems prudent.
I’d like to remind CDers that attempting to evade the flag system to unhide your own posts is not cool. If your post has been hidden, either it received so many flags so quickly that a moderator has to intervene to unhide it, or a moderator has agreed with a flag. You will need to make an actual substantive change to the post to get it unhidden.
Anyway, see y’all in a few hours.