3 ms·

Yeah, man. I have emigrated from Russia to EU five years ago and it is heartbreaking to see the developed US and some European countries go through the same bul

by aemu 2y ago

Yeah, man. I have emigrated from Russia to EU five years ago and it is heartbreaking to see the developed US and some European countries go through the same bullshit we were going since 2011. Like half the country starts living in wild, completely imaginary world, and you can always tell what is the current agenda of the propaganda machine just by talking to some relatives who fell through that rabbit hole

roxolotl 2y ago
I agree it’s a huge disgrace and half of the US is living in a fantasy land. However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin. A poll two weeks ago[0] actually showed 81% of Americans do not trust Putin. Finding 81% agreement about anything is hard. This is something that is unique to the administration and those who deeply agree with what it’s done. Not that it matters… clearly people don’t care enough to vote for it. My heart goes out to the people of Ukraine. 0: https://thehill.com/policy/international/5153611-quinnipiac-poll-russia-putin-trust/amp/ https://thehill.com/policy/international/5153611-quinnipiac-...
- justin66 2y ago
  That poll in isolation means nothing. A person who "does not trust Putin" but nevertheless subscribes to Russian propaganda is still doing his work. I see plenty of people in social media (enough to be convinced that they aren't all bots) who appear to believe that continuing to support Ukraine with aid would bankrupt the US, would be equivalent in effect to fighting Iraq or Vietnam again, would lead to WW III, and so on and so forth. The conspiracy theories about Ukraine's leadership are elaborate as well. I imagine almost all these people would tell you they don't like Putin.
  - ModernMech 2y ago
    Right. They don’t Trust Putin but they trust Trump. If Trump acts on Putin’s agenda, they will vote for it and call it smart.
    - xg15 2y ago
      They might not even trust Trump, but being driven to hate Biden and/or Harris so to vote against them was enough.
- sangnoir 2y ago
  > However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin. Out of that 81%, how many believe in appeasing Putin to "Avoid world war III" despite their animus? Too many, IMO, and Putin doesn't care for how the American populace feel about him personally, as long as he can achieve his foreign policy goals without hindrance from American bombs, intelligence or funding, which has become the status quo as of yesterday.
orbital-decay 2y ago
You're talking about domestic propaganda. The parent blames external propaganda, instead of doing something or at least admitting that the domestic propaganda pipeline backfired. It's usually extremely hard to make people see their own issues. It's always someone else, not them. Yes, in Russia it happened largely in the same way, and it started much earlier than in 2011 (in 2012 we already had literal Putin cultists marching down the streets). Some people blamed an external enemy for their troubles (both troubles and the enemy were usually imaginary, with the enemy usually being the US), others who rejected the idea blamed the other half and generally had their heads in the sand, but neither wanted to admit their issues or do anything substantial, leaving the Kremlin do what they wanted to do.
- aemu 2y ago
  I agree mostly, but the mechanisms of domestic and external propaganda are basically the same, it's just that autocratic regimes have a "home field advantage" domestically via repressions. And yes, it started before 2011, but this is approximately the year when IMO the tide really started to change for worse. Before that there were some more or less free press and a semblance of political discourse in the country, but since the peak of election fraud protests it progressively got weaker, and by now it feels like the "opposition" is completely destroyed
xg15 2y ago
It's definitely been more than three weeks. As someone who lives in the EU and has the same kind of relatives, what I find frustrating is how little actual engagement with the Russian narratives there is from official sides. There is presented "evidence" for US influence in Ukraine long before the war, like the Victoria Nuland video, yet there seems to be no attempts at debunking those arguments, short of a catch-all labeling of all of it as disinformation (which, I can testify from personal experience, does absolutely nothing to dissuade people who already believe it). The Selinskyji/Trump spat felt like an extreme version of this, where Selinskyji essentially argued with the Western/Ukrainian narrative of the war and Trump argued with the Russian narrative. The strategy of "ignore the Russian narrative and hope not many people will latch on to it" evidently failed, so I think if we want to have a hope of solving this conflict and countering Trump (and maybe get back the parts of the population that follow the narrative), we at least have to engage with it and provide counterarguments.
- generic92034 2y ago
  Countering pushed narratives with facts and arguments is a complete failure. It does not reach the emotional core, which is "us versus them".
  - xg15 2y ago
    OK, but how then?
  - jopsen 2y ago
    Wasn't that what we the west did during the cold war? Is it not just that media is more fragmented and we've underfunded the fact providing media since?
    - Aeolun 2y ago
      Maybe it's more that the media companies have been bought up by oligarchs that think the narrative that's being pushed is just fine and dandy?
  - 2y ago

by aemu 2y ago

roxolotl 2y ago

I agree it’s a huge disgrace and half of the US is living in a fantasy land. However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin. A poll two weeks ago[0] actually showed 81% of Americans do not trust Putin. Finding 81% agreement about anything is hard. This is something that is unique to the administration and those who deeply agree with what it’s done. Not that it matters… clearly people don’t care enough to vote for it. My heart goes out to the people of Ukraine. 0: https://thehill.com/policy/international/5153611-quinnipiac-poll-russia-putin-trust/amp/ https://thehill.com/policy/international/5153611-quinnipiac-...

justin66 2y ago
That poll in isolation means nothing. A person who "does not trust Putin" but nevertheless subscribes to Russian propaganda is still doing his work. I see plenty of people in social media (enough to be convinced that they aren't all bots) who appear to believe that continuing to support Ukraine with aid would bankrupt the US, would be equivalent in effect to fighting Iraq or Vietnam again, would lead to WW III, and so on and so forth. The conspiracy theories about Ukraine's leadership are elaborate as well. I imagine almost all these people would tell you they don't like Putin.
- ModernMech 2y ago
  Right. They don’t Trust Putin but they trust Trump. If Trump acts on Putin’s agenda, they will vote for it and call it smart.
  - xg15 2y ago
    They might not even trust Trump, but being driven to hate Biden and/or Harris so to vote against them was enough.
sangnoir 2y ago
> However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin. Out of that 81%, how many believe in appeasing Putin to "Avoid world war III" despite their animus? Too many, IMO, and Putin doesn't care for how the American populace feel about him personally, as long as he can achieve his foreign policy goals without hindrance from American bombs, intelligence or funding, which has become the status quo as of yesterday.

orbital-decay 2y ago

You're talking about domestic propaganda. The parent blames external propaganda, instead of doing something or at least admitting that the domestic propaganda pipeline backfired. It's usually extremely hard to make people see their own issues. It's always someone else, not them. Yes, in Russia it happened largely in the same way, and it started much earlier than in 2011 (in 2012 we already had literal Putin cultists marching down the streets). Some people blamed an external enemy for their troubles (both troubles and the enemy were usually imaginary, with the enemy usually being the US), others who rejected the idea blamed the other half and generally had their heads in the sand, but neither wanted to admit their issues or do anything substantial, leaving the Kremlin do what they wanted to do.

aemu 2y ago
I agree mostly, but the mechanisms of domestic and external propaganda are basically the same, it's just that autocratic regimes have a "home field advantage" domestically via repressions. And yes, it started before 2011, but this is approximately the year when IMO the tide really started to change for worse. Before that there were some more or less free press and a semblance of political discourse in the country, but since the peak of election fraud protests it progressively got weaker, and by now it feels like the "opposition" is completely destroyed

xg15 2y ago

It's definitely been more than three weeks. As someone who lives in the EU and has the same kind of relatives, what I find frustrating is how little actual engagement with the Russian narratives there is from official sides. There is presented "evidence" for US influence in Ukraine long before the war, like the Victoria Nuland video, yet there seems to be no attempts at debunking those arguments, short of a catch-all labeling of all of it as disinformation (which, I can testify from personal experience, does absolutely nothing to dissuade people who already believe it). The Selinskyji/Trump spat felt like an extreme version of this, where Selinskyji essentially argued with the Western/Ukrainian narrative of the war and Trump argued with the Russian narrative. The strategy of "ignore the Russian narrative and hope not many people will latch on to it" evidently failed, so I think if we want to have a hope of solving this conflict and countering Trump (and maybe get back the parts of the population that follow the narrative), we at least have to engage with it and provide counterarguments.

generic92034 2y ago
Countering pushed narratives with facts and arguments is a complete failure. It does not reach the emotional core, which is "us versus them".
- xg15 2y ago
  OK, but how then?
- jopsen 2y ago
  Wasn't that what we the west did during the cold war? Is it not just that media is more fragmented and we've underfunded the fact providing media since?
  - Aeolun 2y ago
    Maybe it's more that the media companies have been bought up by oligarchs that think the narrative that's being pushed is just fine and dandy?
- 2y ago