The Propaganda War

[The Natural]

Ah, you are too dumb to notice. I get it.

Ah, here we go again, With the personal insults and labelling, first Bo and now Mr. Boots on the ground. Hide Your nazi symphaties behind personal attacks all you want, I will not take you any more serious than before.

[Muzh]

Now, who is insulting who?

[The Natural]

I would just like to assign a post here to mention that I am entirely in favor of rooting out the Nazis in Ukraine.  Yes, this is a nation who lost enough of its citizens to populate five of its cities in WWII to the Nazi atrocities.  It would be Natural for the population to embrace the Nazi ideals and to create a government tied to such standards as death camps and a master race.

Anyone who has visited Ukraine, or, I daresay, lived there for a period of time will instantly recognize the Nazi tendencies of the Rada and the average Joe (Stalin) Sixpack on the streets.  After all, the lawmakers in this Rada who, with very few exceptions except those legislators who live in territory now claimed by Russia and its minions, are the same that were there under Yanukovych, surely had Nazi tendencies two years ago.

So, for all you baby killers and soldiers who hide behind babushkas so as not to get killed by the valiant insurgents, I congratulate you for hiding your Nazi sympathies from the West.  If you did not hide them so well, our intrepid reporters would identify you immediately.  You are too clever for us.  Fortunately we have members on this forum who will hunt you down and expose your true Natural tendencies.

I'd say this is pretty passive agressive Jone, haha.

[The Natural]

Now, who is insulting who?

Waiting for it, huh? As I've said before, I NEVER Draw first blood.

[Muzh]

Waiting for it, huh? As I've said before, I NEVER Draw first blood.

I know. You are against vaccination. 

[The Natural]

I know. You are against vaccination. 

Hehe, at least I like Your sense of humour 

[jone]

I'd say this is pretty passive agressive Jone, haha.

Sorry.  I was attempting to be funny.  Doesn't always mean I am.  But you have to agree that the same people who were leading Ukraine under Yanu are the same guys who are there under Petro.

[The Natural]

Sorry.  I was attempting to be funny.  Doesn't always mean I am.  But you have to agree that the same people who were leading Ukraine under Yanu are the same guys who are there under Petro.

Don't know these characters, but if they are, I'd Call them opportunists.

[Muzh]

Don't know these characters, but if they are, I'd Call them opportunists.

I thought they were NAZIs. So what is it? NAZIs or opportunists?


Please be a bit more specific.

[Anotherkiwi]

I thought they were NAZIs. So what is it? NAZIs or opportunists?


Please be a bit more specific.

Duh - they're obviously opportunistic Nazis!    And where are they, by the way?  Admittedly I was only there for a couple of weeks, nearly five years ago, but I didn't see any evidence of Nazis or neo-Nazis in Ukraine.  Yes, I'm sure there were some there, as they are in every country, but they certainly weren't as obvious as the Kremlin would have you believe.

I wonder if the posters who have been there more recently have seen these people wandering around?

[mendeleyev]

On the 5th of June, the most beautiful Mrs. Mendeleyev sent her husband off to the grocery market to pick up some last minute items for her birthday celebration which would take place later that evening. On the list was some canned fish products, much of which comes from places like Latvia, Estonia, Finland, etc.

Just days prior the news media had reported on a story of food poisoning--at a children's orphanage, no less. The storyline is that a large delivery of canned seafood product was delivered to a Russian orphanage as a donation. A few days later, several of the children were said to be sick from tainted meat. That led the government to issue a ban on those products until a team of Russian scientists could travel to the plants to investigate. The news reports, and comments by the president to the media, blamed the product for the sick children. A day after arriving at the processing plants, the team of scientists issued a report that the facilities were insanitary.

Like other supposedly banned items, the fact that this remains on shelves is hardly a surprise. It is common for banned products to slip in from places like Kazakhstan and Belarus, sometimes repackaged and observed but unacknowledged. The bans on Western food products have placed a strain on family budgets and the government, while needing to shake their fists at the evil West, also needs to try to slow down inflation on food prices.

If such a ban were to be more strictly enforced it would impact Latvian fish producers who export around half of their catch to Russian supermarket chains.

All this was curious because I picked off the shelf, then placed in my basket, the banned products which along with other things soon appeared before the cashier. The cashier took my rubles and I went home with the banned product from a major supermarket chain. Later that evening we and our guests consumed those items along with other culinary delights.

So far, no one has been reported ill.

[jone]

I get ill reading your story, Mendy.

[Photo Guy]

Russian propaganda is killing thousands, while creating a wall of hatred between the West and Russia. This is a horrible thing. It reminds me of the propaganda produced by the Nazi's- the 'us against them' mentality. The statements from one of Putin's security advisors are all lies. Well, he does mention one truth, that Russians are heading over to Ukraine when 'emotions go into play..'

What he fails to mention, is that those emotions are based on crazy lies from the Kremlin! Finally in the article he gets to his twisted reality:
....America's real goal is to destroy Russia.

This is ridiculous. If there are any Russians reading here, please believe me when I tell you that over here in America, nobody is speaking or thinking about destroying Russia. However, in the EU, and here in the USA, it does appear that Putin is telling lies, and threatening his neighbors. He looks paranoid. Why? Because the world around him prefers free trade, democracy, and wants good relations with other countries, without the kind of bullying that we see from the Kremlin. Let's face it, Ukrainians reject the old Soviet lifestyle. So do Georgians. Russians- can you imagine living in a country where you are not afraid to be outspoken about politics? Or about your leaders?
Can you imagine such a thing? Please don't follow your fuehrer into the abyss.
Putin is ruining Russia, and killing cousins. see:
http://news.yahoo.com/moscow-powerless-stop-russians-fighting-ukraine-091653782.html

[jone]

Russian propaganda is killing thousands, while creating a wall of hatred between the West and Russia. This is a horrible thing. It reminds me of the propaganda produced by the Nazi's- the 'us against them' mentality. The statements from one of Putin's security advisors are all lies. Well, he does mention one truth, that Russians are heading over to Ukraine when 'emotions go into play..'

What he fails to mention, is that those emotions are based on crazy lies from the Kremlin! Finally in the article he gets to his twisted reality:
....America's real goal is to destroy Russia.

This is ridiculous. If there are any Russians reading here, please believe me when I tell you that over here in America, nobody is speaking or thinking about destroying Russia. However, in the EU, and here in the USA, it does appear that Putin is telling lies, and threatening his neighbors. He looks paranoid. Why? Because the world around him prefers free trade, democracy, and wants good relations with other countries, without the kind of bullying that we see from the Kremlin. Let's face it, Ukrainians reject the old Soviet lifestyle. So do Georgians. Russians- can you imagine living in a country where you are not afraid to be outspoken about politics? Or about your leaders?
Can you imagine such a thing? Please don't follow your fuehrer into the abyss.
Putin is ruining Russia, and killing cousins. see:
http://news.yahoo.com/moscow-powerless-stop-russians-fighting-ukraine-091653782.html

I happen to know quite a few Russians.  While many are currently very patriotic, with the anniversary of the end of WWII and the annexation of Krim, they are not overtly political, nor do they believe everything seen on TV.  However, there is a fringe element that is growing that is anti-American and very pro-Russian.  It is this very small segment that people should be worried about.

[Photo Guy]

When I write about Russians, I am referring to the Kremlin and supporters of the Kremlin. Those are the people responsible for all of the death and destruction. I feel the same way about Americans who thought the Vietnam War was a good endeavor. And the idiotic wars in Iraq. There are definitely good people all over the world. It is sad to see so many Russians thinking and feeling that America and the West want to destroy Russia. That is far from reality. If the Kremlin tells their people that the West is a threat, what can we do about it? I get the impression that most of the Russian population are like mindless cattle, willing to die for nothing, to protect themselves from an imaginary monster. It's insane. It's un-Christian. In Russia, it appears that fear trumps benevolence.

[JayH]

This is an older story--but worth another read in the context of the last 12 months and what has become clearer.The part that seems to go unnoticed is Putin plan to "save" the Russian economy--ie-to create a  "war" based economy by creating employment in the armed forces and the necessary equipment industries.At an earlier time I advocated that Ukraine could use the western money coming in to "seed" its economy to revive it over a period of time in this way-thus the Russian invasion is counter productive to Putin in his aim to destroy the Ukrainian economy.
Russia is relying on oil/gas money to "seed" it's economy- and as such is very vulnerable to western pressure on oil prices and supply.

On the face of it, the story sounds familiar: Russian President Vladimir Putin’s nostalgia for the greatness of the Soviet Union, his crackdowns on opponents, his defiant insistence that Russia can make its own way in the world. All these have been constants in his 14-year-long rule.


Putin to Russia: We Will Bury Ourselves
, Putin has embarked on something that has never been done before. For the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union, the Kremlin is overtly campaigning to cut Russia off from the world. Moreover, Putin is building a new state ideology based on the rejection of Western systems and values, and the demonization of internal enemies and traitors.

Moscow’s descent into self-isolation has been precipitous. Over the past three months, the Kremlin and its loyal legislators in the State Duma have brought the number of Russian state employees banned from leaving the country for security reasons to nearly 5 million; they have introduced criminal penalties for criticizing the state-approved version of history; they have introduced compulsory registration for citizens with dual nationality and forcibly labeled all nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) with foreign funding “foreign agents”; and they have made bloggers subject to draconian “anti-extremism” laws that make promoting anti-government protests a criminal offense.



Senior officials have discussed restricting access to Facebook, Skype, YouTube and Twitter, and have mooted setting up a Russian-only Internet. The surviving handful of independent websites and an Internet-based TV station have been shuttered—and when one site, grani.ru, challenged the ban, a Moscow court ruled that the authorities “did not have to explain to the websites why they were blocked


http://www.newsweek.com/2014/06/20/putins-paranoia-card-254513.html

[JayH]

The information keeps coming- the more time that goes by -the more information is coming to light. The contempt Russia is showing to the truth is so dangerous in it's execution-- it is about time western countries woke up and did something about it.

Even today--on this forum-under the heading "Russian News" -- a member here has posted more Russian lies over  the shooting down of MH17- it is NOT "news"-- but an attempt to portray propaganda lies as news.

Wake up people and see how this is an abuse of the truth.

Below is another story that illustrates the depths that the Kremlin is going to to perpetrate Russian lying-- and the resultant confusion created must have them laughing themselves silly at how stupid western media is .

The Agency
From a nondescript office building in St. Petersburg, Russia, an army of well-paid “trolls” has tried to wreak havoc all around the Internet — and in real-life American communities.

Around 8:30 a.m. on Sept. 11 last year, Duval Arthur, director of the Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness for St. Mary Parish, Louisiana, got a call from a resident who had just received a disturbing text message. “Toxic fume hazard warning in this area until 1:30 PM,” the message read. “Take Shelter. Check Local Media and columbiachemical.com.”

St. Mary Parish is home to many processing plants for chemicals and natural gas, and keeping track of dangerous accidents at those plants is Arthur’s job. But he hadn’t heard of any chemical release that morning. In fact, he hadn’t even heard of Columbia Chemical. St. Mary Parish had a Columbian Chemicals plant, which made carbon black, a petroleum product used in rubber and plastics. But he’d heard nothing from them that morning, either. Soon, two other residents called and reported the same text message. Arthur was worried: Had one of his employees sent out an alert without telling him?

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html?_r=2

Some follow up of earlier post-- this can help the sceptical get a better idea of what Ukraine is fighting--in fact-fighting for the rest of the world !

Russian Trolls Are Deceiving the American Public and Now They’re Covering Their Tracks

Earlier this month, Adrian Chen penned a disturbing article for the New York Times Magazine outlining how online trolls based in Russia were attempting to manipulate Americans through false media and political misdirection. These Russian trolls are now attempting to discredit his story by wiping it from the internet.

Chen’s piece, called “The Agency“, details a massive operation with ties to the Russian government that perpetuates false news stories, propaganda and general trolling against anti-Russian rhetoric:
Chen had discovered a lead through documents from Russia that were hacked by Anonymous International. The hacked messages included emails from an organization called the Internet Research Agency — the same group employing trolls in Russia.

The emails revealed a number of user names for an operation in English. Chen then began the long process of cross-referencing, and he did find a connection. So, he decided to travel to Russia and confirm his theory, which is when his story shifts from odd to frightening.

While researching and validating his findings, Russian media outlets with vague connections to the Internet Research Agency and the Kremlin, began an operation to discredit him. After he unknowingly met a Neo-Nazi, the Russian press vilified him, saying he was recruiting for the U.S. They even went so far as to create a propaganda video (which proved his entire trip had been under surveillance).

Chen’s chilling story became all the more disturbing when his meticulous sourcing of troll accounts, and even the damning YouTube video, were wiped from the internet. All three of the Facebook pages Chen mentioned as part of the trolling network made up of mostly politically-motivated accounts (Spread Your Wings, Art Gone Conscious, and Celebrities Against Obama) mysteriously disappeared in the past week. Their Twitter counterparts also vanished.

http://www.ijreview.com/2015/06/335533-russian-trolls-deceiving-american-public-outed-nyt-now-theyre-covering-tracks/?utm_content=buffercd7a8&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

[Steamer]

Conversation: The U.S. Media’s Misleading Portrayal of Russia


...Lauren: The way that the American media has put it out there is that Russia is being the aggressor, and instead we're seeing Russia be very reactive instead. NATO starts to build up, then Russia starts to build up. The United States helps support the revolution that took place in Ukraine this past year, Russia then takes Crimea and goes into eastern Ukraine. So it really is a reaction to what is taking place out of the United States and out of NATO....

From Straford.

[jone]

Conversation: The U.S. Media’s Misleading Portrayal of Russia


...Lauren: The way that the American media has put it out there is that Russia is being the aggressor, and instead we're seeing Russia be very reactive instead. NATO starts to build up, then Russia starts to build up. The United States helps support the revolution that took place in Ukraine this past year, Russia then takes Crimea and goes into eastern Ukraine. So it really is a reaction to what is taking place out of the United States and out of NATO....

Steamer,

You agree that Russia went into Eastern Ukraine?  That is the first I've seen you post that you agree that the Russians are there.

From Straford.

[Steamer]

Maybe

[Boethius]

LOL.  Despite the fact Russian soldiers are going home in caskets (reported by Russian media, and Russian opposition, even the odd Russian mother whose army son died), it's a qualified "maybe".


The problem with Lauren Goodrich's analysis is it ignores the aspirations of Ukrainians.  Same with all the pro Putinists here.


The idea that the U.S. created Euromaidan is laughable.  If the U.S. had wanted Ukraine in its orbit, it would have been in the American orbit in 1992.  This view is also extremely disrespectful to Ukrainians who, tired of corruption even they didn't want to tolerate, demonstrated.  Peacefully.  Whether they have created change is a very different matter.

[Boethius]

Let's also remember that at no time before the invasion of Crimea did Ukrainians ever support joining NATO.  Even during Euromaidan, the biggest percentage of support for NATO was 15%.


The invasion was predicated on the fiction of "protecting" Russian speakers.  Notwithstanding the fact Russian speakers were never in danger in Ukraine, they had the right to speak Russian, to attend Russian schools.  How many Ukrainians have that right in Russia?  They don't even have that right now in Crimea, where not only their existing schools, but their newspapers and their churches are being closed by the government.

[Steamer]

Let's also remember that at no time before the invasion of Crimea did Ukrainians ever support joining NATO.  Even during Euromaidan, the biggest percentage of support for NATO was 15%.


The invasion was predicated on the fiction of "protecting" Russian speakers.  Notwithstanding the fact Russian speakers were never in danger in Ukraine, they had the right to speak Russian, to attend Russian schools.  How many Ukrainians have that right in Russia?  They don't even have that right now in Crimea, where not only their existing schools, but their newspapers and their churches are being closed by the government.

Bo, you're just making this stuff up as you go.
I remember very well 5 or 10 years ago Russian language being banned and Russian schools being forced to shut down in UA. Every manner of discrimination against Russians was allowed to maintain the purity of Ukraine.

[jone]

Bo, you're just making this stuff up as you go.
I remember very well 5 or 10 years ago Russian language being banned and Russian schools being forced to shut down in UA. Every manner of discrimination against Russians was allowed to maintain the purity of Ukraine.

Steamer,

Please show evidence of these allegations.  I remember a country where the leader spoke in Russian because his Ukrainian was so poor that people couldn't understand him.  I have been to Ukraine repeatedly before Euromaidan and all of the people that I knew spoke Russian as their first language.  That did not mean that they wanted to be part of Russia, just that they were taught that language since birth.

I agree with you that there is a segment of Ukrainian society that wants only Ukrainian spoken in the country.  But that is not the majority as we have seen over the course of the past year and a half.

Pardon my ignorance on these matters.  I look to your recollections back to your quotes.  Could you provide us with evidence that Russian language was banned and that Russian language schools were forced to shut down?

[Boethius]

Bo, you're just making this stuff up as you go.
I remember very well 5 or 10 years ago Russian language being banned and Russian schools being forced to shut down in UA. Every manner of discrimination against Russians was allowed to maintain the purity of Ukraine.

Pure BS.

In Donbas, most of the schools were Russian language schools.  In Kyiv, one could choose whether one attended a Russian language school, or a Ukrainian language school.  Even in L'viv, epicentre of "bourgeois nationalist fascist Ukraine", students can attend Russian language schools, even today. 

Crimea was self governing, so their region chose the language in which their students were educated.

What did change during Yushchenko's presidency was that Ukrainian became the official language of Ukraine, and students had to study Ukrainian, even if they attended a Russian school.  The other change was that all official government documents were prepared in Ukrainian.  However, during this time, the language of business remained Russian. 

Students did not necessarily have to study Ukrainian in Ukraine during Soviet times, but students then could attend either a Russian language, or a Ukrainian language school.  The latter was a career killer.

Go to Kyiv today, and  you will still hear Russian spoken on the streets.  Or surzhik.  The difference from twenty years ago is that if you ask someone something in Ukrainian now, you will be answered in Ukrainian, rather than getting a smirk and a response in surzhik.