I’m from Russia, can’t say that I love Putin, but he’s better than any other possible USA puppet would be, although he until the last moment couldn’t give up on idea that you can trust western countries and work with them on equal terms.

Most people of older generations like him a lot, because they lived through the Yeltsin years and saw what it was like. A lot of people in younger generations that I know don’t like him, since he’s corrupt, like any other politician in capitalist country would be, which is valid criticism, but anything they are suggesting are much more corrupt pro-westerners shills. So I’m pretty sure that most older people that I know of (like 45+?) are in support mostly because of material conditions which improved while Putin was in power, and yet still can be critical of him and his actions. Although there are exceptions in both older and younger generations.

Also note, that It’s based on my experience and since I’m, sadly, very online person and haven’t talked with many people it might be a bit different from reality, but I hope it’s at least a bit helpful!

I don’t like Putin but his existence is better than allowing the West to carve up, hollow out, and dispose of Russia like a used fleshlight. The sooner American Imperialism fails the sooner the rest of the world can move on with actual development instead of seeking stability at any cost through leaders like Vladimir Putin.

I’m not Russian and don’t see a need to love or hate someone like Putin. It’s only important to have a material analysis of his decisions and the world situations he’s relevant to. Of course he has made made good decisions and bad decisions, and I think he’s kind of interesting because the social conditions of Russia are globally a bit unique right now, but that’s pretty much as far as my feelings on him as a person go.

If not Putin, it would be someone else serving the interests of the Russian homeland and Russian capital. If not that, given the fall of the USSR and the conditions after, it’d probably be someone serving the interests of the US international imperial interests and western capital (which would be far worse for everyone than the alternative). Ideally, we will one day see a resurgence of a communist vanguard in the region, but right now, Russia staying stable as an anti-imperialist counterweight is more important than bringing back local socialism.

So I see Putin as more a representative of the conditions than as someone to be overly preoccupied with as an individual. This isn’t to say he doesn’t have agency as some mechanical materialist view, but that if it wasn’t him, it would be someone acting similarly since the causes that result in someone like him go far beyond him.

The alphabet agencies would no doubt like people to condemn him from whatever angle works. But I am not interested in doing the tango with the CIAssholes. (I am not saying you’re in that camp, but thinking of narratives that try to vilify him in a variety of ways, playing on whatever cause might get people to hate him.) Russia is right now a force of anti-imperialism, whether it’s current leadership really wanted to go that route or was pushed into it by the west’s relentless desire for servitude, and being a force of anti-imperialism is better than it being a western puppet. I’m sure there are far worse leaders of nations, such as in the imperial core itself, so who am I to talk… I mean, if material conditions have improved under Russia’s current leadership overall, that’s already better than the declining capitalist west is doing for its citizens.

Putin has a lot of admirable qualities and some far less admirable ones. He walks a really tight line. I think lots of people have a love/hate respect for him. The left and far right hate and love him for opposite reasons and then a bunch of ignorant anti-imperailists and liberal Russians love him.

He is very intelligent and well educated in history and political economy. He is in the running for the most competent national leader in the last 50 years. But he is a capitalist supporting liberal and with that comes an implicit form of supremacy that says the rich deserve to rule over the poor. Because of his intellect and education this becomes way more damning. He didn’t just accept liberalism because he was ignorant. He understands Marxism and actively rejects it. He does not want a classless society of equals and that means he is a fucking piece of shit who belongs in the chuck pit.

He has done a lot of good for the working class of Russia but I highly suspect that it was done to stave off a Counter-counter-revolution. His stance on LGBT could just as easily be political theater to galvanize support from the religious right as it could be his genuine belief. Either way it is a symptom of his supremacy complex.

For now he is fighting against the Great Satan of anglo-american imperialism which makes him useful to the left. but he isn’t doing it because he wants to but because the west will not let him join their world order. And this is where his intelligence and education fail him. He acts like western “liberals” believe in the values they claim without understanding that it is just words they say to hide that they are racist, classist, supremacists who only respect genocide. Japan was welcomed by the west with open arms after their actions in Korea and China. Zionists were only considered as westerners after the Nakba. Genocide is the true ideology of the western ruling class and Putin’s naivete to this is a sign of his better nature.

(also next time someone says “Holodomor” I’m gonna try arguing that if it was really a genocide than the west would have accepted Stalin as one of their own and the same goes for Xi and the Uyghur “genocide”)

If Putin follows thru with his vow to send oil and aid to Cuba, he’ll go a long way towards getting on my good side.

I fully despise him and wish to see him (and his allies) removed from power.

Unfortunately there’s pretty much no way this happens without another Yeltsin taking over to rape Russia for the benefit of Western oligarchs for the second time within my lifetime.

So I tolerate him and his fellow oligarchs because right now they’re the only thing standing between the West and turning Russia into another neo-Nazi dictatorship like Ukraine; an objectively worse outcome.

Hopefully an opportunity will present itself in the near future where our Russian comrades can oust the crooks from United Russia and restore socialism to the country without the West trying to take advantage of the chaos.

Let’s just say that he’s my favorite bourgeois leader.

putin and current russian government have many implications:

-imo, inside russia, is possibly just a corrupt and reactionary politician allied with russian bourgueoisie using soviet paraphernalia as a populist tool, and doing judo with rightoid western ideas of “exterminating orcs” to hold his popularity and heavy-handed policies, like some kind of russian bukele

-outside russia, is an abstraction used by many ends for many politic ideas:

-for marxist types, it’s just a counterweight to the liberal european order and the US even with his reactionary policies

-for liberal types is just a projection of the evils unleashed by their supported system, because he’s smeared by western propaganda as some kind of boogeyman, even when he didn’t do anything so evil as the typical western bougie on epstein list (as far we know)

-for rightoid types is an unexpected ally in their “cultural war” against the libruls and the leftists (bc he hates gays and wokeness, lole!)

I can’t give you statistics, but people who genuinely like Putin certainly exist in Russia. The overwhelming sentiment in my own experience seems to be that he and UR are just better than the alternatives though. So, critical support.

I assume there are many. Somewhere out there must be reliable polling data.