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I have a russian friend living near Moscow, and he can fully use discord, chat to whoever he wants, view any region free video on youtube (be it extremely anti-

I have a russian friend living near Moscow, and he can fully use discord, chat to whoever he wants, view any region free video on youtube (be it extremely anti-Putin or anti-russian) etc. etc. without any effort on his part, just using normal programs, no tor or vpn. It seems that there are just so many avenues for information on the net, anyone in Russia who cares to know about something can find out immediately with minimum effort and zero technical knowhow. It's just the majority of Russians dont want to know anything. Just like US citizens during the invasion of Iraq, most of them barely knew what was happening and simply didnt care to know. They were just comfortable in their assurance that USA was #1.

vogre 4y ago
Telegram channels are big deal in Russia. They are the best source of information about war, from first hands, Russian and Ukrainian. Don't forget that Ukraine and Russia are very tihtly related, with tons of friends and relatives on each side of a border. You don't need some Western media to get news about rumble on your backyard.
- int_19h 4y ago
  It turns out that friends and even relatives often stop listening if you repeatedly tell them something they don't like to hear, as many Ukrainians have found out.
  - vogre 4y ago
    This works perfectly in two ways. Donetsk is shelled for 8 years bu Ukrainian Army, nobody was interested enough to stop it. "naah those separs are shooting themselves"
    - mopsi 4y ago
      The "8 years of shelling" talking point is one of the dumbest, I have trouble imaging who would believe it. We both know that Russia doesn't care even about its own people, let alone anyone else, with the sinking of Kursk and sieges of Nord-Ost and Beslan being shining examples of that. The indiscriminate destruction of large cities in Eastern Ukraine full of ethnic Russians is just another datapoint. According to the UN, civilian deaths in Russian war on Donbas were 25 in 2021, lowest since the war began in 2014. How many have died in 2022? If Russia wanted to stop needless bloodshed, all it had to do was to pull its armed forces out of Ukraine and leave rest of the world alone. Nobody wants to be a part of your pathethic "Russian world" of poverty and hopelessness, and now that everyone's seen the true "might" of Russian army, you've become a laughing stock of the world. Nobody even pays attention to the threats you make in regard to Finland and Sweden joining NATO.
      - int_19h 4y ago
        You don't even need to go to the UN. According to DNR government itself, Ukraine was ostensibly responsible for 77 deaths in 2021 - and only 7 of them civilians (which kinda gives you the indication of what they were aiming at). And yes, you're absolutely correct: again, according to their own official claims, by May, they have already lost about 50 times more civilians since the beginning of the war than they did in the year before. So if the point of the war was to protect the civilian population of Donetsk, it's already objectively a failure of truly epic proportions. And this is all before accounting for mass forced mobilization and the resulting mass casualties, because untrained office workers are sent to assault fortified enemy positions with Mosin bolt-action rifles. It got bad enough that several prominent public figures on the Donbas separatist side called it "genocide of the male population of Donbas by Russia". That said, it is true that civilian casualties in Donbas were much more significant in 2014-2015 - over a thousand per year - and many of those were undeniably due to the actions of the Ukrainian military. It's also true that some people in Ukraine denied that any of that was happening when it did. I'd be surprised if there's any war in which this doesn't happen to some extent, though - what's unusual in the current situation in Russia is the sheer scale of it. (There's a similar issue within Russia across generational rather than national lines, by the way - a family might not have any relatives in Ukraine, but the millennial kids are anti-war and generally pro-West, while their elderly parents call them Nazi sympathizers and cheer Putin.)
5e92cb50239222b 4y ago
I have a bunch of friends and relatives there. 99% of your average citizen's internet time is spent on ok.ru and vk.ru, which work very hard at putting you in a tight information bubble, just as any other social media platform. I think it's pretty much the same in every country, only the domains differ, not their substance. > view any region free video on youtube Only if you specifically look for it, and for the same reason. btw, I have to help my non-technical friends with VPNs/proxies/reading news through sites like archive.ph/some other tricks. They definitely cannot read or watch anything they want without some technical expertise or someone willing to help.
- int_19h 4y ago
  It should be noted that there is no shortage of anti-war content on VK, either - it's taken down when reported, but whether it's reported is another question. It all depends on one's circles.
TulliusCicero 4y ago
As I understand it, a ton of Russians, especially older ones, just rely on TV and print media for news, and those are much more tightly controlled by the Kremlin. > Just like US citizens during the invasion of Iraq, most of them barely knew what was happening and simply didnt care to know. They were just comfortable in their assurance that USA was #1. While the WMD aspect of the invasion of Iraq was bullshit, the rest of it didn't seem to contain nearly as much propaganda -- as in, just blatantly lying -- as what Russia's doing here. I don't think the US lied about US soldier casualties, for instance, acting like they were taking a small fraction of the actual injuries and deaths. Not to mention the war crimes seem enormously more common and severe with Russia's invasion, and those are all getting covered up by the Russian media within their country (e.g. "Azov/Ukraine did Bucha"). Basically any war will involve some amount of propaganda and atrocities, but some people are acting like the way Russia and the US prosecute war are the same, when that appears to be clearly wrong.
- n4bz0r 4y ago
  Providing some additional context. There is no statistics to back up the numbers and it's impossible to make one at the moment. It's rather how informed people in Russia feel plus some anecdata. > As I understand it, a ton of Russians, especially older ones, just rely on TV and print media for news, and those are much more tightly controlled by the Kremlin. All the news sources that are still not blocked either have a hand in their asses or are about to get blocked. They are completely controled by the Kremlin. Much more tightly is an understatement here. Unfortunately, so is 'a ton'. I'll try to elaborate. Moscow, St. Petersburg, and the cities around them, have relatively high percentage of well-educated people with sufficient technical competency and mindfulness to avoid the censorship. I'd say that would be at least a good half of the population of these cities, which amounts (very roughly) to 10M. These people would try to find some facts, and form something resembling a picture of what's really happening. Not too bad, really, but the thing is, I'd be surprised if there is another 20M across the rest of the country (the population is approx. 145M as of 2022). The farther you go from the big cities the faster the freethinkers' (tongue-in-cheek term) percentage declines. When the government says that 90% of the population 'supports' the war, I'm afraid it's not that far from truth. What 'supports' means, though? As it seems, in reality, it means that the people aren't really bothered by the war all that much because they don't consider the country to be (much of?) an agressor. In small cities, people live in poverty and the only thing that's used to hold them together is the TV which gives the hope that some day life is going to get better. But there, of course, are a few hurdles to overcome. The current hurdle is to 'win against Ukraine'. Based on numerous interviews and personal interactions, that's what common folks really think. I believe that they (most of them anyway) are not bad people, but merely simple and gullible. And when the president says that zombie-nazis were about to attack motherland, well, of course they praise the guy who sent the rockets their way thus saving the day. That's the gist of the propaganda, by the way. As for the older people (even well-educated ones), can confirm. First of all, they are stubborn and know better. And they just can't believe that TV isn't a good source of information on the matter. My older relatives are like that and I don't really know how to convince them to think otherwise. As far as I'm concerned, no one has figured that out yet. For every bit of evidence TV has a piece of counter-evidence. You try counter that. I've taught them how to read independent news, but they don't trust them. edit: brainfart with understatement/overstatement in the beginning of the post
cabirum 4y ago
- knowaveragejoe 4y ago
  Seeing this sentiment expressed in seriousness on HN is saddening.

vogre 4y ago

Telegram channels are big deal in Russia. They are the best source of information about war, from first hands, Russian and Ukrainian. Don't forget that Ukraine and Russia are very tihtly related, with tons of friends and relatives on each side of a border. You don't need some Western media to get news about rumble on your backyard.

int_19h 4y ago
It turns out that friends and even relatives often stop listening if you repeatedly tell them something they don't like to hear, as many Ukrainians have found out.
- vogre 4y ago
  This works perfectly in two ways. Donetsk is shelled for 8 years bu Ukrainian Army, nobody was interested enough to stop it. "naah those separs are shooting themselves"
  - mopsi 4y ago
    The "8 years of shelling" talking point is one of the dumbest, I have trouble imaging who would believe it. We both know that Russia doesn't care even about its own people, let alone anyone else, with the sinking of Kursk and sieges of Nord-Ost and Beslan being shining examples of that. The indiscriminate destruction of large cities in Eastern Ukraine full of ethnic Russians is just another datapoint. According to the UN, civilian deaths in Russian war on Donbas were 25 in 2021, lowest since the war began in 2014. How many have died in 2022? If Russia wanted to stop needless bloodshed, all it had to do was to pull its armed forces out of Ukraine and leave rest of the world alone. Nobody wants to be a part of your pathethic "Russian world" of poverty and hopelessness, and now that everyone's seen the true "might" of Russian army, you've become a laughing stock of the world. Nobody even pays attention to the threats you make in regard to Finland and Sweden joining NATO.
    - int_19h 4y ago
      You don't even need to go to the UN. According to DNR government itself, Ukraine was ostensibly responsible for 77 deaths in 2021 - and only 7 of them civilians (which kinda gives you the indication of what they were aiming at). And yes, you're absolutely correct: again, according to their own official claims, by May, they have already lost about 50 times more civilians since the beginning of the war than they did in the year before. So if the point of the war was to protect the civilian population of Donetsk, it's already objectively a failure of truly epic proportions. And this is all before accounting for mass forced mobilization and the resulting mass casualties, because untrained office workers are sent to assault fortified enemy positions with Mosin bolt-action rifles. It got bad enough that several prominent public figures on the Donbas separatist side called it "genocide of the male population of Donbas by Russia". That said, it is true that civilian casualties in Donbas were much more significant in 2014-2015 - over a thousand per year - and many of those were undeniably due to the actions of the Ukrainian military. It's also true that some people in Ukraine denied that any of that was happening when it did. I'd be surprised if there's any war in which this doesn't happen to some extent, though - what's unusual in the current situation in Russia is the sheer scale of it. (There's a similar issue within Russia across generational rather than national lines, by the way - a family might not have any relatives in Ukraine, but the millennial kids are anti-war and generally pro-West, while their elderly parents call them Nazi sympathizers and cheer Putin.)

5e92cb50239222b 4y ago

I have a bunch of friends and relatives there. 99% of your average citizen's internet time is spent on ok.ru and vk.ru, which work very hard at putting you in a tight information bubble, just as any other social media platform. I think it's pretty much the same in every country, only the domains differ, not their substance. > view any region free video on youtube Only if you specifically look for it, and for the same reason. btw, I have to help my non-technical friends with VPNs/proxies/reading news through sites like archive.ph/some other tricks. They definitely cannot read or watch anything they want without some technical expertise or someone willing to help.

int_19h 4y ago
It should be noted that there is no shortage of anti-war content on VK, either - it's taken down when reported, but whether it's reported is another question. It all depends on one's circles.

TulliusCicero 4y ago

As I understand it, a ton of Russians, especially older ones, just rely on TV and print media for news, and those are much more tightly controlled by the Kremlin. > Just like US citizens during the invasion of Iraq, most of them barely knew what was happening and simply didnt care to know. They were just comfortable in their assurance that USA was #1. While the WMD aspect of the invasion of Iraq was bullshit, the rest of it didn't seem to contain nearly as much propaganda -- as in, just blatantly lying -- as what Russia's doing here. I don't think the US lied about US soldier casualties, for instance, acting like they were taking a small fraction of the actual injuries and deaths. Not to mention the war crimes seem enormously more common and severe with Russia's invasion, and those are all getting covered up by the Russian media within their country (e.g. "Azov/Ukraine did Bucha"). Basically any war will involve some amount of propaganda and atrocities, but some people are acting like the way Russia and the US prosecute war are the same, when that appears to be clearly wrong.

n4bz0r 4y ago
Providing some additional context. There is no statistics to back up the numbers and it's impossible to make one at the moment. It's rather how informed people in Russia feel plus some anecdata. > As I understand it, a ton of Russians, especially older ones, just rely on TV and print media for news, and those are much more tightly controlled by the Kremlin. All the news sources that are still not blocked either have a hand in their asses or are about to get blocked. They are completely controled by the Kremlin. Much more tightly is an understatement here. Unfortunately, so is 'a ton'. I'll try to elaborate. Moscow, St. Petersburg, and the cities around them, have relatively high percentage of well-educated people with sufficient technical competency and mindfulness to avoid the censorship. I'd say that would be at least a good half of the population of these cities, which amounts (very roughly) to 10M. These people would try to find some facts, and form something resembling a picture of what's really happening. Not too bad, really, but the thing is, I'd be surprised if there is another 20M across the rest of the country (the population is approx. 145M as of 2022). The farther you go from the big cities the faster the freethinkers' (tongue-in-cheek term) percentage declines. When the government says that 90% of the population 'supports' the war, I'm afraid it's not that far from truth. What 'supports' means, though? As it seems, in reality, it means that the people aren't really bothered by the war all that much because they don't consider the country to be (much of?) an agressor. In small cities, people live in poverty and the only thing that's used to hold them together is the TV which gives the hope that some day life is going to get better. But there, of course, are a few hurdles to overcome. The current hurdle is to 'win against Ukraine'. Based on numerous interviews and personal interactions, that's what common folks really think. I believe that they (most of them anyway) are not bad people, but merely simple and gullible. And when the president says that zombie-nazis were about to attack motherland, well, of course they praise the guy who sent the rockets their way thus saving the day. That's the gist of the propaganda, by the way. As for the older people (even well-educated ones), can confirm. First of all, they are stubborn and know better. And they just can't believe that TV isn't a good source of information on the matter. My older relatives are like that and I don't really know how to convince them to think otherwise. As far as I'm concerned, no one has figured that out yet. For every bit of evidence TV has a piece of counter-evidence. You try counter that. I've taught them how to read independent news, but they don't trust them. edit: brainfart with understatement/overstatement in the beginning of the post

cabirum 4y ago

knowaveragejoe 4y ago
Seeing this sentiment expressed in seriousness on HN is saddening.