4 ms·

So by comment history, there is a pretty good chance this is someone working for the famed "Russian troll farms". Should we allow this kind of poster on HN?

IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
Not sure about other comments, but this one isn’t necessarily wrong. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/what-hbos-chernobyl-got-right-and-what-it-got-terribly-wrong https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/what-hbos-cher... also takes issue with the execution threats.
zaroth 7y ago
I just read the comment history. Clearly a patriotic Russian, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable making this accusation. I find it more fascinating to presume the comments are made by someone in good faith, who simply may be misinformed on some topics due to persistent exposure to their State’s propaganda. I particularly liked the comment about not needing permission to protest. No, no, in Russia you do not need permission, but if your chosen time and place is not available the State will kindly select a suitable alternative for you! Reminds me of some college campuses.
- brianwawok 7y ago
  Hang around reddit enough and you see the pattern. Comments only ever on one side of the issue. Lots of magical upvotes for any post. Any dissenting posts gets mass reported to the mods.
Snawoot 7y ago
I hope my comment history will satisfy you. Basicly, some scenes in series are overdramatized. For example, Sitnikov was not convoyed by soldier to reactor roof - he went willingly, Dyatlov wasn't so bad as he portrayed and so on. Luckily, it is a pretty recent period of history and many witnesses of it are still alive or died in recent past. You may be interested to see explaination from Dyatlov at first hand: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVthWR4cR1g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVthWR4cR1g This interview has been recorded in 1994, year before he died, but I'm not sure if there are English subtitles for it.
- effie 7y ago
  Thanks. Could you summarize what he has to say for us who don't understand him? I think that would be very interesting to many people, after watching the series.
  - zzzcpan 7y ago
    He says everything in the control room was pretty routine, no misdeeds, no risky experiments, no drama, no questioning of orders, no worries as unpredictable behavior of the reactor happens, the reactor was just poorly designed. After the explosion he was confused and didn't know what happened and what to do. At some point after looking around, etc. he figured out that he needs to take measures to prevent new fires on the exploded reactor building. While they were busy taking measures they got sick, started vomiting. Eventually he got taken by the ambulance to the clinic. In the clinic he was questioned, eventually got arrested. Complains about USSR, that soviets wanted to blame the disaster on the reactor personal and that the judge only did what the politburo ordered.
    - effie 7y ago
      Thank you. So it seems in assigning the blame between the personnel and the officials responsible for design, both parties were blaming the other party. I read somewhere that Legasov criticized the steps done in the control room and also the design and lack of oversight in designing/building the reactor. So the truth is probably somewhere in between and the blame is shared between the personnel and the officials/system.
  - Snawoot 7y ago
    Commenter in this branch put it all together just right. Also Dyatlov notes all industrial disasters was attributed to personnel error in Soviet Union, no matter which real reason it was, for political reasons. I'll let myself add some reasoning about accusations against Dyatlov. Even if he violated some instructions (it is still not so clear), environment and way operations conducted in SU (and maybe in some modern countries too) implicitly require that. Management requires real results, not obedience to rules and instructions. Senior personnel has to deliver what is expected from them no matter how. But if something goes wrong, negligence to rules will be formal reason to blame. So, there was no evil layman who got himself near top of hierarchy and made evil decisions. All hierarchy consists of people who was installed at their positions for a reason and they do what is expected from them. Otherwise, replacement occurs. Basically, if you replace in this situation Dyatlov with somebody of same rank, outcomes could be eventually same or even worse.
el_cujo 7y ago
I glanced at their history and it seems that, yes, they are Russian, and a lot of their posts seem to have some anti-US sentiment, but automatically saying that makes them a member of the troll farm is a stretch. I see plenty of other Europeans, especially on sites like reddit, openly hating on the US. Hell, there are plenty of people from the US who do that. Unless I'm missing something glaring from their post history, which maybe I am, I don't think it's fair to say "this person is Russian, they are clearly a paid troll and should be banned."
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago

Not sure about other comments, but this one isn’t necessarily wrong. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/what-hbos-chernobyl-got-right-and-what-it-got-terribly-wrong https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/what-hbos-cher... also takes issue with the execution threats.

zaroth 7y ago

I just read the comment history. Clearly a patriotic Russian, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable making this accusation. I find it more fascinating to presume the comments are made by someone in good faith, who simply may be misinformed on some topics due to persistent exposure to their State’s propaganda. I particularly liked the comment about not needing permission to protest. No, no, in Russia you do not need permission, but if your chosen time and place is not available the State will kindly select a suitable alternative for you! Reminds me of some college campuses.

brianwawok 7y ago
Hang around reddit enough and you see the pattern. Comments only ever on one side of the issue. Lots of magical upvotes for any post. Any dissenting posts gets mass reported to the mods.

Snawoot 7y ago

I hope my comment history will satisfy you. Basicly, some scenes in series are overdramatized. For example, Sitnikov was not convoyed by soldier to reactor roof - he went willingly, Dyatlov wasn't so bad as he portrayed and so on. Luckily, it is a pretty recent period of history and many witnesses of it are still alive or died in recent past. You may be interested to see explaination from Dyatlov at first hand: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVthWR4cR1g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVthWR4cR1g This interview has been recorded in 1994, year before he died, but I'm not sure if there are English subtitles for it.

effie 7y ago
Thanks. Could you summarize what he has to say for us who don't understand him? I think that would be very interesting to many people, after watching the series.
- zzzcpan 7y ago
  He says everything in the control room was pretty routine, no misdeeds, no risky experiments, no drama, no questioning of orders, no worries as unpredictable behavior of the reactor happens, the reactor was just poorly designed. After the explosion he was confused and didn't know what happened and what to do. At some point after looking around, etc. he figured out that he needs to take measures to prevent new fires on the exploded reactor building. While they were busy taking measures they got sick, started vomiting. Eventually he got taken by the ambulance to the clinic. In the clinic he was questioned, eventually got arrested. Complains about USSR, that soviets wanted to blame the disaster on the reactor personal and that the judge only did what the politburo ordered.
  - effie 7y ago
    Thank you. So it seems in assigning the blame between the personnel and the officials responsible for design, both parties were blaming the other party. I read somewhere that Legasov criticized the steps done in the control room and also the design and lack of oversight in designing/building the reactor. So the truth is probably somewhere in between and the blame is shared between the personnel and the officials/system.
- Snawoot 7y ago
  Commenter in this branch put it all together just right. Also Dyatlov notes all industrial disasters was attributed to personnel error in Soviet Union, no matter which real reason it was, for political reasons. I'll let myself add some reasoning about accusations against Dyatlov. Even if he violated some instructions (it is still not so clear), environment and way operations conducted in SU (and maybe in some modern countries too) implicitly require that. Management requires real results, not obedience to rules and instructions. Senior personnel has to deliver what is expected from them no matter how. But if something goes wrong, negligence to rules will be formal reason to blame. So, there was no evil layman who got himself near top of hierarchy and made evil decisions. All hierarchy consists of people who was installed at their positions for a reason and they do what is expected from them. Otherwise, replacement occurs. Basically, if you replace in this situation Dyatlov with somebody of same rank, outcomes could be eventually same or even worse.

el_cujo 7y ago

I glanced at their history and it seems that, yes, they are Russian, and a lot of their posts seem to have some anti-US sentiment, but automatically saying that makes them a member of the troll farm is a stretch. I see plenty of other Europeans, especially on sites like reddit, openly hating on the US. Hell, there are plenty of people from the US who do that. Unless I'm missing something glaring from their post history, which maybe I am, I don't think it's fair to say "this person is Russian, they are clearly a paid troll and should be banned."

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]