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60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

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Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#161

Post by mc32 »

joecot wrote: post #122
mhh__ wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's obviously better if people always look at things with a sceptical eye but it isn't weird to me people want to support the Ukrainians. Pair the narrative of the smaller country being invaded by the belligerent dictator next door with (in my case) a country where Russia is already unpopular due to various assassinations, sabre-rattling, and so on, its not hard to understand the current balance of In the UK the mai…

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

This is wrong. You are saying, this is so established that entertaining any alternative is wrongheaded. No. That's not how it works. We need dissent even in the middle of battle. We need to re-asses and continuously examine what we hold true to ensure it is still true. People are not gods. We can be in the wrong. This echoes GWBushe's you're either with us, or you're against us. It's a made up dichotomy.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#162

Post by joecot »

20amxn20 wrote: post #138
joecot wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

I'd argue that, yes, there can be a valid counterargument against everything you mention. The only dangerous trend here is pretending that there are undeniable consensus. Especially if they were forged in the last 0.5-0.05% of the lifespan of humanity. Also nobody is critizing Ukraine from defending itself. We're critizing Reddit and redditors in general for being hypocrites. Never in history were "people of color de…

> Never in history were "people of color denied from existing without harassment", etc.

I would suggest reading about Jim Crow, Red Lining, the fight against school integration, New York's Stop and Frisk, and a "Black Lives Matter" movement fighting against cops regularly shooting unarmed black men to death. I would suggest those things, if I had any indication your statements were being made in good faith.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#163

Post by dvfjsdhgfv »

bergenty wrote: post #57
unsupp0rted wrote: post #20

Reddit is weirdly overflowing with pro Ukraine propaganda and people don't seem to notice. Any even neutral story about Russia brings out vitriol about how obvious Russia's propaganda is. But somehow they miss the same effect when the story is pro-Ukraine, no matter who the sources are, how unlikely the content is to be true, etc. This was to be expected in the first months of the war, but after so many months of a s…

I hate Putin and his regime in Russia right now but Ukraine (atleast from the pictures I’m seeing) seems to be overrun with explicitly neo nazi groups. In my ideal scenario they both take each out without effecting the actual EU.

> I hate Putin and his regime in Russia right now but

I'm not saying you are one, but this opening "I hate Putin/Russia/etc. but..." is typical opening line of Kremlin trolls.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#164

Post by igorkraw »

wyager wrote: post #128
joecot wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

> one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong If your model of any political situation resembles a moralizing children's cartoon, 99% chance you are a mark, incapable of identifying propaganda. > it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is 99.9% of issues in the population of issues we ever think about do not have a clear right answer, because if they did we w…

Okay, so what is your take on the issues GP identified? Or is the only conclusion you can arrive at "it's complicated"?

GP made the very salient point that some things are clearly bad. Blind clinging to the idea that everything has two sides is just as simplistic as thinking everything can be viewed from a perspective which is just as moral as every other. Except maybe even more so, because at least the moral simplicity of black and white forces us to show flag instead of hiding in "neutrality".

Nihilism, strong moral relativism and contrarianism without a constructive goal are lazy pseudo intellectual positions that do not serve any constructive purpose (be it insight or improvement of the material world) and serve only as deflections and comfort arguments.

And for those that disagree with me: I'd love to hear where and why I'm wrong about thinking "Putin and other authoritarian strong men are worse than democratically elected politician" and "there are degrees of corruption, and the west is less corrupt than Russia". Because I've got evidence for these beliefs (the industrial output of Russia and Putin's palace being only two data points). What's yours?

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#165

Post by hackerlight »

thrown_22 wrote: post #155
hackerlight wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, your first sentence presumes that the Kremlin propaganda is truthful. Putin's ambitions have nothing to do with neo-Nazis in Ukraine, as his own writings over many years reveal. It's imperial ambition. Ukraine was smart not to get rid of Azov. Putin invaded once for made up reasons, no reason to think he won't do it again. Ukraine's understanding of fascist Russia's true self was correct.

Sure, but if they had killed a few hundred Nazis 14,000 civilians wouldn't have been killed by Nazis. That sounds like a win no matter what.

Are you saying 14,000 civilians were killed by neo-Nazis in the Donbas? Do you have a source for that?

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#166

Post by notahacker »

20amxn20 wrote: post #138
joecot wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

I'd argue that, yes, there can be a valid counterargument against everything you mention. The only dangerous trend here is pretending that there are undeniable consensus. Especially if they were forged in the last 0.5-0.05% of the lifespan of humanity. Also nobody is critizing Ukraine from defending itself. We're critizing Reddit and redditors in general for being hypocrites. Never in history were "people of color de…

Insistence we should respect the possibility that arguments against say, evolution are equally valid to arguments to arguments against it whilst altogether dismissing the idea that anyone in history has ever been subject to harassment because of their colour is an... interesting juxtaposition.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#167

Post by Grimburger »

thrown_22 wrote: post #80
unsupp0rted wrote: post #20

Reddit is weirdly overflowing with pro Ukraine propaganda and people don't seem to notice. Any even neutral story about Russia brings out vitriol about how obvious Russia's propaganda is. But somehow they miss the same effect when the story is pro-Ukraine, no matter who the sources are, how unlikely the content is to be true, etc. This was to be expected in the first months of the war, but after so many months of a s…

Reddit's weakest link is the moderators. You pay the moderators off and you subvert the whole site. I imagine that's what the Ukrainian propaganda ministry has managed. Outside this I find it somewhat bizarre that we've let the unemployed mentally ill decide what is and isn't acceptable for millions to see.

> You pay the moderators off and you subvert the whole site.

You'll also get a sitewide permanent ban for talking about or mentioning the places where moderators sell their accounts for significant chunks of money. This is automatic and not in response to a report with certain keywords.

It's a problem they really want to pretend doesn't exist.

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#168

Post by notahacker »

drewrv wrote: post #154
notahacker wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And on the flip side, there's also the assumption that posters who are ill-informed, aggressively partisan and posting repetitive shit constantly throughout the day are bots. But that's actually how ordinary people behave when spending too much time on social media... (There are clearly enormous effective coordinated propaganda campaigns on Ukraine's behalf, but I'm pretty sure kids on Reddit shouting about killing '…

Sufficiently advanced fanboys are indistinguishable from bots.

And on social media, they don't even need to be "sufficiently advanced".

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#169

Post by canadiantim »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #150
tut-urut-utut wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you see Ukraine vs Russia as black and white, it means you are already manipulated. The conflict didn't start on 24th of February this year. Even if the press pretends it's all clear, there's a long history of events full of nuances going back hundreds of years that can paint the current events in one or other colour.

Yes, the story is long. Yes, there are many Russians in Ukraine, especially in the East. Yes, there were some alt-right people in Ukraine, too. No, none of these justifies starting a full-scale war, killing thousands of people.

I think the point he was making is it's tough to pinpoint who start the war, considering ukraine has been a pretty intense proxy battlefield for almost a decade and beyond

Re: 60-80% of Tweeters posting on Russia-Ukraine war are bots, 90% pro Ukraine

#170

Post by drewcoo »

wyager wrote: post #128
joecot wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been so indoctrinated to the idea that every issue must have two sides who should be equally considered, that when we have issues where one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong, they don't know how to comprehend it. Our media has made everything a debate game because it gets viewers, and it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is. There is n…

> one side is the obvious aggressor completely in the wrong If your model of any political situation resembles a moralizing children's cartoon, 99% chance you are a mark, incapable of identifying propaganda. > it's rotting people's ability to actually figure out what the right side of an issue is 99.9% of issues in the population of issues we ever think about do not have a clear right answer, because if they did we w…

> model of any political situation resembles a moralizing children's cartoon

I'd actually be interested in those cartoons, if you have links. Propaganda pointed at kids is fascinating!

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