CW: Homophobia. Putin compares European use of alternative (non-traditional) energy sources to their acceptance of LGBTQ+ ("non-traditional") relationships
Pretty gross. Comments every bit as awful as you're thinking. Just a reminder of the abysmal state of non-cishet rights and acceptance in Russia.
Edit: can't get my screenshot to load properly so text:
T1: Putin on accusations against Russia in the energy crisis: "European countries are big specialists in non-traditional relationships and themselves abandoned traditional energy sources in favor of non-traditional ones"
T2: ("non-traditional relationships" is the legal term in Russia for all things "LGBT")
It’s not an anti imperialist stance if you’re just trying to contest imperial hegemony on behalf of your own imperial ambitions. That’s still just imperialism
Anyone on this site who genuinely believes Vladimir Putin does "anti-imperialism" out of any motive other than supremely cynical, convenient, competing imperialist interest seriously needs to re-evaluate their stances and sources. Or, otherwise, go join the fucking Maupinite/Hazite clowns who are basically doing the most cringe reactionary shit imaginable, because they are your people.
I say this as someone who has for a while tried to stay out of the dogmatic factionalist bullshit in favor of just shitposting when it comes to this site. If you've been suckered into believing a siloviki-dominated hyper-capitalist kleptocracy like Russia is a genuine force for "anti-imperialism", you've been fucking had in the worst way possible. Even the most mindless simping for modern Dengist China has a more rational basis.
Putin is, at the very least, anti-hegemonic in the sense that he falls squarely in the bloc opposing the current hegemonic powers. Whether or not he's also anti-imperialistic is up for debate, but personally anti-hegemonic countries are relatively rare and any which fall into that camp deserve at least critical support.
When Russia provided military aid to Venezuela at the request of Maduro to resist the coup attempt, the US media called it Russian imperialism, but that seems more like anti-imperialism to me.