Westoids have suddenly started saying /kiv/, which alone makes me want to say /kiːɛv/, like my parents always said.
Neither is even the endonym, which is more like /kɪjiu̯/
the funny thing about the liberal signaling with new spelling/pronunciation is supposed to somehow be a dig against russians but they never pronounced it that way? or spelled it that way. the new western keeev puts them closer to the same page as russians
I think that name sucks to begin with. Let’s call it Azagarium, which is apparently what it (or another city in the area) was called on Ptolemy’s world map. I think Azagarium is a sick ass name.
pick one depending on who you want to piss off at any given moment
For a fun reddit ban, on lib subreddits, call the capitol of Ukraine “Moscow”.
Call it whatever it was called in your language before the lib fixation with Ukraine. The locals call it something different and so what? Lots of cities around the world have different names in different languages, Roma is Rome in English and Rom in German. Praha is Prague in English and Prag in German. Moskva is Moscow in English and Moskau in German.
People have always modified the names of important cities to fit the sounds of their own languages. There is no disrespect in that, if anything, foreign languages having their own version of the name of somewhere is a sign that the place is considered important.
