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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

#111
post #2

This may very well be true, but I'm having trouble believing anything, from anyone, about the conflict. There is so much propaganda around the subject, that unless you are personally connected to an official source, I believe you can't know with any reasonable certainty. The primary source for this story appears to be public Google Trends data.

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking things are unknowable. Madness lies at the extremes of believing everything and believing nothing

This is very important. I used to believe that keeping an open mind was the most important thing, so I listened to everything. Sounds great but the problem is it leaves one in a state of complete inaction, because you're never sure of anything, and people use that to their advantage. While you're sitting around trying to figure out the state of things, they are acting on convictions which may not be 100% right but at least they are getting things done, and that means they're going to win. So while it's important to be factually right it's also important to have convictions, even if you can't justify all of them without bias.

No matter what any of the media say my conviction with this conflict is that Putin is a psychopath. You can make pretty good predictions about his intent and how the conflict will unfold, and who is doing what, and what atrocities which side are willing to commit, based on that fact alone. For example, everyone who thought he wouldn't invade and was shocked when he did saw him as a tactician rather than a psychopath. If you saw him as a psychopath his invasion of Ukraine was inevitable. The thing that shocked me was how slow-rolling the build-up to an invasion is, and how many people are not willing to call a spade a spade. I thought it had to be done in secret, but you can do it in the open if you just lie to people about your intentions. You have the history of his actions in Syria, Chechnya, and Crimea to know that at least what Western media is saying about Russia has a lot of precedent.

Now you could say I'm wrong about that but again that's my conviction and I'll need more than a little proof to sway me from it (because bad actors love to use just a little bit yet deceiving proof to sway people from their loosely held convictions)

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

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are afraid Putin will use nuclear weapons. We don't like that he came from a KGB background and that he seems to be friends with mafia. And that he likes to assassinate his rivals. If the Russian people are so much against Putin and on the side of the West, then why not arrange them to all leave their apartments at the same time, to walk into their central squares, and to start shaking their keys -- as the Czechs…

Fair chance it would turn into a bloodbath. Better would a national strike. Equally difficult to organize but much harder to attack.

It did turn into a bloodbath at Euromaidan, but the people still came out, for months, and fought to change a corrupt regime that lied to them, as they have in many other countries in the past. Russians are not helpless. The main argument when this gets brought up seems to be that it's going to be hard and people will get hurt. Of course Putin isn't going to just throw up his hands and say "Ok guys, you win, I'm out". Nobody is expecting that. But we've seen that change is possible, and if the Russians are as against Putin's regime as some like to claim they are (with some even saying it's _most_ Russians), maybe it's time to actually do something about it. In the end, they're likely the only ones who can.

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

#113
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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)?

I mentioned in another comment, and I don't want to spam, but I wasn't able to verify their Google search trends claim, using the source country as Russia, and searching both English and Russian translations of the terms they quoted in the article.

EDIT>> This is wrong! I am able to confirm the Google Trends data now.

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

#114
post #13
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe someone else is falsifying google trends ?

I can't even confirm their statements, but I may be using google trends wrong: >More Russians are asking Google “how to leave Russia” than have done so in 18 years since such data became public. https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&ge...

The article gave you the search terms they used. Why would you make up your own? https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%203-m&ge...

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

#115
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what's going to happen with so many countries / companies cutting Russia off is that it's going to play into Putin's narrative that Russia is surrounded by enemies. Imagine you are a neutral teenager who never cared about politics, then Playstation takes all your games, you don't have access to any of the media sources that can explain the situation (they are all banned now), you can only hear what government tells y…

Repeating the parent comment - What's the option, though? What better things can we do to help the > 1,000,000 Ukrainian refugees, and all the other millions that are currently being bombed by Russia? Putin _is_ getting his power from the Russian people. It's unfortunate they believe his lies, but they do, and that's what makes him strong.

to be honest, I don't know, that is the reason I left, I have no hope and don't know how to change things. What could help is all these companies that are blocking Russians sending information to Russians about this war and about Putin's actions. If all Russians on Google, Playstation and etc saw more information it would help get through the blockade. Companies haven't been doing it because it requires more effort and risk getting blocked by Russia. By cutting these people off you are turning these people into Putin supporters. It's so much easier to just cut off Russians than actually trying to solve the problem.

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

#116
post #11

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…

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.

I think it's just how we tend to think, unfortunately. We conflate individuals into uniform groups. Americans certainly do it with domestic politics. ~100 million people become "the Republicans" or "the Democrats" and are spoken of as if they have a single, united mind behind them.

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

#117
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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)?

That closing question is maybe a bit too open-ended? I will happily defend The Economist as one of the highest-integrity journalistic publications in the world, but they've still misled me in the past. Not in any way that I suspect is intentional, but people do honestly get things wrong sometimes. My own mother has misled me numerous times, always with the best of intentions.

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

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair chance it would turn into a bloodbath. Better would a national strike. Equally difficult to organize but much harder to attack.

I'm talking about ALL the people that are against Putin. Which if this guy is to be believed is most of the people. They are not going to kill most of their own people. A million people marching in Moscow would change minds.

> A million people marching in Moscow would change minds

Especially if, say, a quarter of them were military and/or internal security personnel that came out with their gear.

Even the least democratic government relies on support of the people to function, but not even the most democratic (and certainly not Russia) depends on each person’s support equally.

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

#119
post #64

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…

I mean, does it even matter what the Russian government claims or denies at this point? They were clearly dishonest about Ukraine in the months leading up to the invasion. The West was clearly sharing good intel on the Russians' intentions. There is obviously propaganda on both sides, but that does not make the information from our respective governments equally worthless. I think the government that just shut out most foreign and independent press, spins insane stories about Jewish Nazis and make it illegal to even print "war" is probably the less credible propaganda maker in this situation. The truth may be the first victim in war but that does not mean it's dead.

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

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm talking about ALL the people that are against Putin. Which if this guy is to be believed is most of the people. They are not going to kill most of their own people. A million people marching in Moscow would change minds.

> A million people marching in Moscow would change minds. How? What would they do? They would march and riot and protest and then after a day or two they would go home. Meanwhile the politicians will just wait it out and the show will go on (see Belarus).

Why would you assume that? (See Euromaidan)
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