The way your argument falls squarely into the same fallacies you attempt to accuse me of falling is quite interesting.
Examples to try to help you find your own biases:
> But the reality of the world isn't that simple and I certainly don't want to live in one where we decide that victims of atrocities and unspeakable acts "are to blame" because they tried to find peaceful ways to protect themselves
The reality of the world is that a big power gets to dicate what smaller countries can do around them. I don't like that either, but that's how it is and you can find multiple examples of that in the world throughout history. The USA has applied this same kind of doctrine the Russians are trying to impose on their smaller neighbours for over a century[1]. You live in a world where this is how things work and if you pretend you don't , you can cause a lot of suffering to your own people.
> Russia has no reason, NONE, to do what they are doing.
So you get to tell Russians what they can do or not and what reasons are acceptable for them to motivate themselves? Well, then perhaps Russia can tell Ukraine that their reasons to join NATO are not acceptable either?
> They could have been an ally to Ukraine.
They were for a long time.... when they attempted to join NATO, a Russia-hostile alliance whose creation was almost entirely motivated by the desire of Western powers to keep Russia in check, they absolutely signaled to Russia that they see Russia as their enemy.
> So no, Ukraine's actions did not "directly lead to a terrible outcome". Russia's actions did
We can't agree on that, obviously... you believe that anyone should have the right to do what they want without consequences to themselves because there should be no aggression from others. What a nice world it would be if that was the case, but unfortunately, just like Cuba can't have nuclear weapons pointing to the USA, so can't Ukraine have NATO bases within striking distance of Moscow... because both the USA and Russia think that they must protect themselves against the enemy and that their right to do that supersedes the rights of Cubans and Ukrainians to join whatever military alliances they want to. Until that changes, things like this will continue to happen... if Brazil tried to develop nuclear weapons, for example, we know all too well what would happen - because that actually happened and we know how it went - they stopped under enormous pressure from the USA - if they had pushed forward and said to the world "we have the right to peacefully defend ourselves against the american enemy by developing weapons that are as strong as the enemy's", I have no doubt the situation could have escalated to the point where American bombs would've be exploding in Brazil - but luckily brazilians realized that and bowed to the pressure. The problem in Iran was very similar and it was very, very close to being bombed by the USA (and it's still very possible that they will eventually invade).
[1] https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/monroe-doctrine
Examples to try to help you find your own biases:
> But the reality of the world isn't that simple and I certainly don't want to live in one where we decide that victims of atrocities and unspeakable acts "are to blame" because they tried to find peaceful ways to protect themselves
The reality of the world is that a big power gets to dicate what smaller countries can do around them. I don't like that either, but that's how it is and you can find multiple examples of that in the world throughout history. The USA has applied this same kind of doctrine the Russians are trying to impose on their smaller neighbours for over a century[1]. You live in a world where this is how things work and if you pretend you don't , you can cause a lot of suffering to your own people.
> Russia has no reason, NONE, to do what they are doing.
So you get to tell Russians what they can do or not and what reasons are acceptable for them to motivate themselves? Well, then perhaps Russia can tell Ukraine that their reasons to join NATO are not acceptable either?
> They could have been an ally to Ukraine.
They were for a long time.... when they attempted to join NATO, a Russia-hostile alliance whose creation was almost entirely motivated by the desire of Western powers to keep Russia in check, they absolutely signaled to Russia that they see Russia as their enemy.
> So no, Ukraine's actions did not "directly lead to a terrible outcome". Russia's actions did
We can't agree on that, obviously... you believe that anyone should have the right to do what they want without consequences to themselves because there should be no aggression from others. What a nice world it would be if that was the case, but unfortunately, just like Cuba can't have nuclear weapons pointing to the USA, so can't Ukraine have NATO bases within striking distance of Moscow... because both the USA and Russia think that they must protect themselves against the enemy and that their right to do that supersedes the rights of Cubans and Ukrainians to join whatever military alliances they want to. Until that changes, things like this will continue to happen... if Brazil tried to develop nuclear weapons, for example, we know all too well what would happen - because that actually happened and we know how it went - they stopped under enormous pressure from the USA - if they had pushed forward and said to the world "we have the right to peacefully defend ourselves against the american enemy by developing weapons that are as strong as the enemy's", I have no doubt the situation could have escalated to the point where American bombs would've be exploding in Brazil - but luckily brazilians realized that and bowed to the pressure. The problem in Iran was very similar and it was very, very close to being bombed by the USA (and it's still very possible that they will eventually invade).
[1] https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/monroe-doctrine