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Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

economist.com

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Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#91

Post by smcl »

formvoltron wrote: post #60
therusskiy wrote: post #6

I managed to escape the country yesterday, had to flight to Egypt of all places, because ALL (even business) tickets were sold out. The recent news is that starting March 6 all international flights are suspended, the trap has closed. The disheartening thing is that even if you never supported Putin, other countries treat you as enemy. I am at Georgia now and banks refuse to open bank accounts to Russians, and I need…

Quoted post unavailable.

When you organise against Putin the state swiftly organises against you. There are plenty of examples of those who try to resist being jailed or murdered. I do not blame your average Russian for keeping their head down and deciding its safer to just try to get by.

I am quite demotivated at the idea any meaningful change can be effected in my home country, which is technically a well-functioning democracy that doesn’t actively persecute the population at large[0]. If there was also the threat of violence against me or my family for being politically involved, my motivation would drop off altogether.

[0] = the UK does have bizarre fixation on its Muslim population, one example being the story covered by the recent Trojan Horse Affair podcast

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#92

Post by [deleted] »

daenz wrote: post #64
jacquesm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that there is plenty of evidence that this is really the case. Russians are crossing the border in unprecedented numbers, for instance: https://yle.fi/news/3-12345301 Flying is getting harder and harder so while the borders are still open (there is talk of martial law in Russia, which, even though it was just denied does not seem to have much effect on calming things down, in fact the denial seems to have the…

>there is talk of martial law in Russia I want to highlight this, because I think it illustrates my point about propaganda. I dug around for a source on that statement, and this appears the most reliable source[0]. An anonymous EU official picking up on "signs". Again, this also may be totally true, but it's presented in such a flimsy way, how can a reasonable person be expected to believe it at face value? Am I sayi…

[deleted]

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#93

Post by lolinder »

Tistron wrote: post #47
bsedlm wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a lot of people seem ok with punishing Russian individuals for the actions of the government. maybe these people have grown in better functioning democracies (unlike Russia or my own country) so they act as if the people were well represented by their governments; unlike reality for most countries with a serious corruption problem.

Everywhere I've seen anyone motivate restrictions on Russian citizens it's been about pushing them to revolt against their government, not about punishing. I don't know whether it makes sense, but it does seem like one of few avenues to try to get rid of putin that has low chance of resulting in atomic war.

At this point, it doesn't look at all like we can practically expect a popular revolt. For me there are two outcomes to target with the sanctions:

* Make life unpleasant enough for the oligarchs that they replace Putin with someone less intent on ruining the nice thing they had going.

* Handicap Russia's ability to wage war. This includes eliminating their ability to buy supplies and destroying their morale.

It's the second goal that is, in my mind, the motivation for the economy-destroying sanctions.

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#95

Post by systemvoltage »

daenz wrote: post #36
berberous wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I generally agree with you for most stories and facts about the war, but this one is just obvious. The ruble has declined and the Russian stock market has been closed all week. Russia has been sanctioned. Russia is sending people to fight in a war. There are rumors (whether true or not) that Russia is planning to close borders, impose martial law, etc. Those are all verifiable facts. In the face of the above, of cour…

If it was clearly obvious, then why wouldn't the Economist use these other sources directly, instead of leaning so heavily on Google Trends data? It's a flimsy way to present truth.

The Economist is a short-medium form publication. It has excellent reputation. I am wondering about what's causing you to be overly skeptical? Have there been major reputable publications who have misled you (specifically about Russia)?

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#96

Post by moonshinefe »

daenz wrote: post #73
moonshinefe wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would they be searching in English? Also those numbers are "relative popularity" on a scale of 0-100. I'm seeing what the article claims here, more or less. But it's a little unclear exactly what search terms they were all checking.

>Why would they be searching in English? Good point, here's the Russian translation of "how to leave Russia", which doesn't appear to be much different than the English version. https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&ge... EDIT>> This is wrong! My mistake, when I translated, I accidentally switched the source country back to USA.

I'm not sure what some of the spikes in years past were about, but again it's a scale of 'how popular the terms were' from 0-100 not a raw count. You can see it spiking hard recently compared to the average. Without seeing the raw numbers it's hard to tell exactly how significant it is though.

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#97

Post by throw-me-out »

daenz wrote: post #64
jacquesm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that there is plenty of evidence that this is really the case. Russians are crossing the border in unprecedented numbers, for instance: https://yle.fi/news/3-12345301 Flying is getting harder and harder so while the borders are still open (there is talk of martial law in Russia, which, even though it was just denied does not seem to have much effect on calming things down, in fact the denial seems to have the…

>there is talk of martial law in Russia I want to highlight this, because I think it illustrates my point about propaganda. I dug around for a source on that statement, and this appears the most reliable source[0]. An anonymous EU official picking up on "signs". Again, this also may be totally true, but it's presented in such a flimsy way, how can a reasonable person be expected to believe it at face value? Am I sayi…

Well, this was coming straight from Russian officials: https://tass.ru/politika/13873997

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#98

Post by formvoltron »

jdrc wrote: post #69
formvoltron wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

That's easy to say for people on the outside. Russians who want change can influence one another, build up awareness, but standing in front of tanks will just most likely lead to pulverization and it's not like russians are strangers to popular uprising, but the trauma of the fall of the soviet empire has a poisonous influence not just on the old generations

Yes I realize it would be hard for them. But who else on the planet has a better chance?

The reality is that everyone is paying these sanction costs. Europe and US companies too. Even poor people in Morocco will pay the costs in the form of increased food costs or food scarcity.

Russians seem to want a get out of jail for free card, but that would not be fair at all.

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#99

Post by hutzlibu »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #37
bsedlm wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a lot of people seem ok with punishing Russian individuals for the actions of the government. maybe these people have grown in better functioning democracies (unlike Russia or my own country) so they act as if the people were well represented by their governments; unlike reality for most countries with a serious corruption problem.

Maybe because Ukrainian men don't have the choice to flee. It's not like Russians are moving away during peaceful times. It's a full on war in which one party is bombing the civilians of a democratic country, threatening NATO with nuclear war and Russians are the only ones who can actually stop it.

I still do not see the logic of punishing people who left russia - as they obviously do not support the war.

If they stay and get drafted to fight in the war for real, how does this help?

And sure, they could try to organize revolts - but would you? That is extremly dangerous and a million times easier said than done.

Fleeing the country is a strong peaceful revolt on the other hand. Helping those people will mean helping an opposition that one day maybe wants to go back to russia to build up alternative structures.

Re: Russians are trying to flee – data from Google Trends

#100

Post by derefr »

grey-area wrote: post #87
daenz wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>there is talk of martial law in Russia I want to highlight this, because I think it illustrates my point about propaganda. I dug around for a source on that statement, and this appears the most reliable source[0]. An anonymous EU official picking up on "signs". Again, this also may be totally true, but it's presented in such a flimsy way, how can a reasonable person be expected to believe it at face value? Am I sayi…

Rumours are not propaganda. No you haven't discovered a vast EU-wide conspiracy or someone 'saying the quiet part out loud'. Nobody knows what is going on and naturally there is lots of speculation to fill the void.

Rumours are not official propaganda; but they can certainly be a psy-op.

(Not suggesting that that’s the case here; just that you shouldn’t forget how e.g. the US CIA engineers coups in other countries, when thinking about how other large states work.)

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