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A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

nytimes.com

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Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#111

Post by dleslie »

berntb wrote: post #108
dleslie wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Americans absolutely overthrow Democratic governments[0]; they justify it by quibbling that perhaps the governments weren't the right kind of democracy. I do not take issue with the notion that Russia engages in propaganda, because they obviously do. I believe I've said as much in this thread. Whether or not I agree with your statement of the existence of a plurality of agreement among the "Western Democratic Wor…

Ah, it was a mistake to mention anything else with you, even in parenthesis... You are not going to touch that the international community, not only US and Sweden, agree that Putin's Russia is much worse. (As you are certainly well aware of: The democratic peace theory discuss wars, not involvements in coups during the second "great game", that of the Cold War.) 4 comments (in 2 places) without touching my point... :…

I did touch it; I stated that it doesn't matter what the international community things.

"Foo did something wrong."

"Bar did the wrong thing as well."

"So what, Quz, Qid and Qaz agree that Foo did something wrong."

It doesn't matter what Quz, Qid and Qaz think. Plurality does not justify propaganda.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#112

Post by dleslie »

berntb wrote: post #107
dleslie wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that effect the legitimacy of the media engaging in cooperation with state actors for messaging, regardless of which state it is? It seems to me it doesn't matter who agrees with the Americans regarding the Russians; hell, I agree with the Americans regarding Russian propaganda.

This was not relevant to my point. 4 comments (in 2 places) without touching my point... :-( You are not serious, bye. You argue also in the other comments that there are small differences between USA and Russia -- my repeated point is that the whole Western democratic world don't agree with your assessments here. (In Sweden, a good part of the ex communists do agree with you -- at most 5-10% of the population-- but…

My assessment of the USA as being an Oligarchy is in good company[0]; feel free to google further.

0: http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FPPS%2FPPS...

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#113

Post by woodandsteel »

woodandsteel wrote: post #80
gfosco wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same shit is happening here. Massive distortion of reality and epic-level propaganda on US media. We need to always be skeptical of the pushed narrative.

The idea that the media in the US is pure government propaganda. There is vigorous debate on innumerable issues. Think for instance of the climate change debate, or Middle East policy. In Russia you don't have that at all. One of the basic tactics of pro-Russian propagandists is to not deny that the media in Russia is all propaganda, but try to persuade people that the same is true everywhere else. The idea is that p…

Oops, the first line should read: The idea that the media in the US is pure government propaganda is nonsense.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#114

Post by berntb »

dleslie wrote: post #111
berntb wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, it was a mistake to mention anything else with you, even in parenthesis... You are not going to touch that the international community, not only US and Sweden, agree that Putin's Russia is much worse. (As you are certainly well aware of: The democratic peace theory discuss wars, not involvements in coups during the second "great game", that of the Cold War.) 4 comments (in 2 places) without touching my point... :…

I did touch it; I stated that it doesn't matter what the international community things. "Foo did something wrong." "Bar did the wrong thing as well." "So what, Quz, Qid and Qaz agree that Foo did something wrong." It doesn't matter what Quz, Qid and Qaz think. Plurality does not justify propaganda.

I have not talked about the "international community", I talked about that the democratic countries agree, regarding Putin's propaganda. Elegant rewrite, by the way.

And so on.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#115

Post by berntb »

dleslie wrote: post #112
berntb wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was not relevant to my point. 4 comments (in 2 places) without touching my point... :-( You are not serious, bye. You argue also in the other comments that there are small differences between USA and Russia -- my repeated point is that the whole Western democratic world don't agree with your assessments here. (In Sweden, a good part of the ex communists do agree with you -- at most 5-10% of the population-- but…

My assessment of the USA as being an Oligarchy is in good company[0]; feel free to google further. 0: http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FPPS%2FPPS...

Still not touching my point:

it is not NY Times/CIA claims vs Putin's propaganda. It is claims by the democratic world vs Putin's paid propaganda.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#117

Post by rz2k »

bfuller wrote: post #110
rz2k wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's different. Ask former classmates or relatives who went into journalism. You may hear they are reluctant to pursue some stories because they don't have enough proof to protect themselves against powerful people the stories could be construed to be slandering, but it's almost unheard of for western journalists to be worried about being assassinated at the rate journalists are assassinated in Russia and the te…

I wish there was some way to get objective data on this subject. Maybe Russian journalists are indeed assassinated and western ones (mostly) aren't. But there are a lot of effective means of coercion that don't involve killing someone, and can actually turn them into an asset rather than a liability..

It absolutely is not some abstract subject that can be summarily dismissed by saying its impossible to measure intimidation of journalists or that no one has perspective on the issue. Take a look at the exhaustive treatment by the Committee to Protect Journalists [1] of the different ways journalists are targeted and controlled around the world. For example, some like Saudi Arabia and China tend more towards censoring and jailing journalists.

Compare the numbers to see the different types of attacks on journalists in different places around the world. Then read some of the short articles, or in depth reports.

[1] https://www.cpj.org/

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#118

Post by berntb »

dleslie wrote: post #111
berntb wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, it was a mistake to mention anything else with you, even in parenthesis... You are not going to touch that the international community, not only US and Sweden, agree that Putin's Russia is much worse. (As you are certainly well aware of: The democratic peace theory discuss wars, not involvements in coups during the second "great game", that of the Cold War.) 4 comments (in 2 places) without touching my point... :…

I did touch it; I stated that it doesn't matter what the international community things. "Foo did something wrong." "Bar did the wrong thing as well." "So what, Quz, Qid and Qaz agree that Foo did something wrong." It doesn't matter what Quz, Qid and Qaz think. Plurality does not justify propaganda.

Let me put the simple point like this:

Every country do something wrong.

To go from "no country is perfect" to "all countries are equally bad" is Putin's propaganda position -- and the whole democratic world disagrees with your and Putin on this.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#119

Post by zigzigzag »

berntb wrote: post #91
zigzigzag wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are you measuring what the "democratic world" says, exactly? What it's media says? Isn't Donald Trump making waves right now for having improbably high support despite thinking Putin is not so bad after all? Dumb though Trump may be he is without a doubt a key part of the "democratic world" right now.

1. Can you condemn Putin for starting wars and annexing area in Europe, just like Hitler in the 1930s? If you refuse I will assume that you work for the Russian junta. (To _only_ condemn USA instead is not an answer.) 2. My sources are e.g. what is said by common EU institutions and by state chiefs in the EU. Like here http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-eu-31932005 BBC is just part of the anti Russian global conspiracy..?…

Which area are you talking about? The war in Georgia?

Cuz if you are talking about Crimea then no. "Annexation" doesn't tend to have support of the people and the referendum and repeated opinion polls by western research groups afterwards show very clearly that the Crimeans wanted to join Russia (and believe the referendum was fair).

If your entire logic boils down to "you either agree with X or you work for the Russians" where X is a highly subjective and debatable thing, then you're always going to see shadowy operatives everywhere. That's just a ridiculous way to debate things.

2. The BBC is not a part of any "anti-Russian conspiracy" (there is no conspiracy). That story is just reporting the views of EU officials.

Guess what - I don't trust EU officials. Quite a few of them also believe the entire British population was brainwashed by tabloid propaganda and that's why they rejected the EU in their own vote: the idea that maybe people can genuinely understand the EU and dislike it is unprocessable to them.

Re: A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories

#120

Post by summarite »

gfosco wrote: post #63
dmytrish wrote: post #46

As a witness of protests at Maidan square in Kiev, I was staggered by the depiction of the events in Russian medias: it was a heavily engineered and coherently orchestrated image full of humongous distortions to the point of creating a parallel reality. Their usual tool is taking an insignificant trend/event that fits their needs and blowing it out of proportions ("nazi" at Maidan, "repressed Russian-speaking populat…

The same shit is happening here. Massive distortion of reality and epic-level propaganda on US media. We need to always be skeptical of the pushed narrative.

Absolute nonsense. There are occasional biases in the media and some level of circular information flow, but that is not even remotely comparable to the Russian shill factories and the absurd and abstruse stories created and pushed by Russian government and linked media. If you don't believe in the shill factories (which are indeed real), think of that: the Russian foreign minister going on TV to criticise a supposed rape of a young girl in Germany, days after it has been forcefully debunked and state media reporting it as a fact still. All with the intention to get people angry/scared of refugees, rile up the Russian community in Germany and overall sow distrust and conflict.
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