5 ms·

The whole "let's blame it on Russia" thing is getting boring. At one point, my dear American friends, you'll just have to face the mirror.

by zabana 9y ago

adamq_q 9y ago
Thought the same thing until recently. https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-troll-princess-duped-the-mainstream-media-and-the-world https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-tro... https://www.texastribune.org/2017/11/03/russian-facebook-pages-organized-houston-protest-and-counterprotest-la/ https://www.texastribune.org/2017/11/03/russian-facebook-pag...
aaron-lebo 9y ago
It's funny that we can't just meet at the obvious middle ground. Russia didn't win the election for Trump, but you are kidding yourself if you believe it didn't play a factor. US democracy has a lot of work to do, but Putin is an ex-KGB strongman who assassinates his opponents and annexes neighbors. It's pretty obvious how he operates.
- zabana 9y ago
  You are most certainly right about Putin, but that's not the point. You can't just blame censorship and failing policies on a foreign country. What I find truly intriguing is this lack of self criticism on the part of many people in the US. And about annexing neighbours, let's not talk about Vietnam, Iraq, Syria, Lybia, Sudan, Somalia and all the shady things that happened in Central/South America in the 60's.
  - aaron-lebo 9y ago
    Not interested in playing "who is the worst". If you want me to acknowledge the US has done and continues to do evil stuff, well, yeah. My only point is that Russia intervened in a flawed American democracy. That's obvious, the only way to have proper self criticism is to acknowledge that reality which doesn't care about your political views.
  - abiox 9y ago
    tu quoque or whataboutism isn't much of an argument. such responses are often vacuous, if not intellectually dishonest. it's can seem like an effort to divert or sidetrack an argument or conversation with blatantly fallacious responses.
- wallace_f 9y ago
  We do have a "trash heap"[1] of blatant lies about the Russia hacking from the "Unelected Deep State" (CIA/NSA/FBI), which just adds to lies from them that have been stacking up for decades. I don't trust agencies with histories of trying to murder civil rights activists like MLK, lying to get us to go to war in Iraq, lying about domestic surveillance, etc. Then we have the DNC very literally and provably rigging the primaries in favor of Clinton. You know what? I hate Trump. But give me a break. This Russia trash is just all a distraction. Trump blatantly supports unconstitutional programs like domestic surveillance and gitmo--this should be enough to impeach him alone for supporting an undermining of the US constitution and American's rights. The fact that they need to rely on this Russia story which requires a number of shifting standards and "just trust us's", rather than in-the-open undemocratic authoritarianism here in the US, is probably a testament to failures of the human mind's ability to think in terms of, and stand up for, liberty. I have been to Germany and Japan and the people are unbeleivably friendly and wonderful. What on earth is wrong with people that they can be coaxed into the evil dreams of tyrants--conflicts, authoritarianism--and is it happening again? Are we so different or special that we really think tyranny cant happen to us when we are going through the same patterns of history? Probably, if we could just adjust the human factor of 'susceptability to sell their liberties and fall in line behind authority figures for short-sighted self-interest,' we would live in a much better world. 1 - https://theintercept.com/2017/09/28/yet-another-major-russia-story-falls-apart-is-skepticism-permissible-yet/ https://theintercept.com/2017/09/28/yet-another-major-russia...
  - aaron-lebo 9y ago
    You've cited a lot of recently proved stuff (DNC rigging) but are ignoring the other stuff (re Russia) propaganda. It seems very arbitrary. Did both not very clearly happen? I don't think there's very many credible sources which believe otherwise. Probably if we could just adjust human susceptability to sell their liberties and fall in line behind authority figures we would live in a much better world. That only happens if you are realistic about what's going on instead of holding ideological political views. That's your solution.
    - wallace_f 9y ago
kumarvvr 9y ago
Russia is not the whole cause, but it was a catalyst. Most importantly the issue is not the effectiveness or outcome of the covert interference, but that interference is wrong. Most importantly, aiding and abetting covert influence should be a punishable crime. Current tech environment, where tech gaints simply saying they hadn't noticed is not an acceptable answer. When you are a tech gaint, with power to influence so many people at once, you have the responsibility to be transparent. With great power comes great responsibility. Not faux remorse after the fact.
aaomidi 9y ago
I don’t think anyone is specifically blaming Russia. If they are that’s a pretty naive thing to do. When I personally talk about Russia, I just point out that this happened. This being the rise of fake news, etc. We should remember it was the United States and her allies that normalized this behavior. We should take a few lessons from this, when we do something unethical or questionable these tactics are going to be normalized and other countries are going to use them. Another example is Trump ordering an attack on a sovereign nation without that nation asking or any resolution passing in US Congress or the UNSC. We need to understand that this is the age we live in, and that we need to work around fixing these issues. Not blaming others or trying to reverse technological processes.

The whole "let's blame it on Russia" thing is getting boring. At one point, my dear American friends, you'll just have to face the mirror.

by zabana 9y ago

The whole "let's blame it on Russia" thing is getting boring. At one point, my dear American friends, you'll just have to face the mirror.

adamq_q 9y ago

Thought the same thing until recently. https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-troll-princess-duped-the-mainstream-media-and-the-world https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-tro... https://www.texastribune.org/2017/11/03/russian-facebook-pages-organized-houston-protest-and-counterprotest-la/ https://www.texastribune.org/2017/11/03/russian-facebook-pag...

aaron-lebo 9y ago

It's funny that we can't just meet at the obvious middle ground. Russia didn't win the election for Trump, but you are kidding yourself if you believe it didn't play a factor. US democracy has a lot of work to do, but Putin is an ex-KGB strongman who assassinates his opponents and annexes neighbors. It's pretty obvious how he operates.

zabana 9y ago
You are most certainly right about Putin, but that's not the point. You can't just blame censorship and failing policies on a foreign country. What I find truly intriguing is this lack of self criticism on the part of many people in the US. And about annexing neighbours, let's not talk about Vietnam, Iraq, Syria, Lybia, Sudan, Somalia and all the shady things that happened in Central/South America in the 60's.
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  Not interested in playing "who is the worst". If you want me to acknowledge the US has done and continues to do evil stuff, well, yeah. My only point is that Russia intervened in a flawed American democracy. That's obvious, the only way to have proper self criticism is to acknowledge that reality which doesn't care about your political views.
- abiox 9y ago
  tu quoque or whataboutism isn't much of an argument. such responses are often vacuous, if not intellectually dishonest. it's can seem like an effort to divert or sidetrack an argument or conversation with blatantly fallacious responses.
wallace_f 9y ago
We do have a "trash heap"[1] of blatant lies about the Russia hacking from the "Unelected Deep State" (CIA/NSA/FBI), which just adds to lies from them that have been stacking up for decades. I don't trust agencies with histories of trying to murder civil rights activists like MLK, lying to get us to go to war in Iraq, lying about domestic surveillance, etc. Then we have the DNC very literally and provably rigging the primaries in favor of Clinton. You know what? I hate Trump. But give me a break. This Russia trash is just all a distraction. Trump blatantly supports unconstitutional programs like domestic surveillance and gitmo--this should be enough to impeach him alone for supporting an undermining of the US constitution and American's rights. The fact that they need to rely on this Russia story which requires a number of shifting standards and "just trust us's", rather than in-the-open undemocratic authoritarianism here in the US, is probably a testament to failures of the human mind's ability to think in terms of, and stand up for, liberty. I have been to Germany and Japan and the people are unbeleivably friendly and wonderful. What on earth is wrong with people that they can be coaxed into the evil dreams of tyrants--conflicts, authoritarianism--and is it happening again? Are we so different or special that we really think tyranny cant happen to us when we are going through the same patterns of history? Probably, if we could just adjust the human factor of 'susceptability to sell their liberties and fall in line behind authority figures for short-sighted self-interest,' we would live in a much better world. 1 - https://theintercept.com/2017/09/28/yet-another-major-russia-story-falls-apart-is-skepticism-permissible-yet/ https://theintercept.com/2017/09/28/yet-another-major-russia...
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  You've cited a lot of recently proved stuff (DNC rigging) but are ignoring the other stuff (re Russia) propaganda. It seems very arbitrary. Did both not very clearly happen? I don't think there's very many credible sources which believe otherwise. Probably if we could just adjust human susceptability to sell their liberties and fall in line behind authority figures we would live in a much better world. That only happens if you are realistic about what's going on instead of holding ideological political views. That's your solution.
  - wallace_f 9y ago

kumarvvr 9y ago

Russia is not the whole cause, but it was a catalyst. Most importantly the issue is not the effectiveness or outcome of the covert interference, but that interference is wrong. Most importantly, aiding and abetting covert influence should be a punishable crime. Current tech environment, where tech gaints simply saying they hadn't noticed is not an acceptable answer. When you are a tech gaint, with power to influence so many people at once, you have the responsibility to be transparent. With great power comes great responsibility. Not faux remorse after the fact.

aaomidi 9y ago

I don’t think anyone is specifically blaming Russia. If they are that’s a pretty naive thing to do. When I personally talk about Russia, I just point out that this happened. This being the rise of fake news, etc. We should remember it was the United States and her allies that normalized this behavior. We should take a few lessons from this, when we do something unethical or questionable these tactics are going to be normalized and other countries are going to use them. Another example is Trump ordering an attack on a sovereign nation without that nation asking or any resolution passing in US Congress or the UNSC. We need to understand that this is the age we live in, and that we need to work around fixing these issues. Not blaming others or trying to reverse technological processes.