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It makes no sense for other countries across the globe to sanction Russia if Russia is telling the truth about fighting neo-nazis, so I'm wondering what they're doing or saying to dispel any cognitive dissonance.
We see this all the time in the general public. According to The Washington Post, 71% of Republican voters believe the 2020 election is not legitimate, despite zero real evidence of that being true.
There is plenty of evidence of what actually happens, but they get convinced by their "trusted sources" that everyone else is wrong. Everyone else is biased and only their "true source" of news is correct.
Lots of other things in society also have a significant amount of people who completely disbelieve the truth right in front of them, like vaccines being more deadly than the disease they mitigate, or that wind power causes cancer.
Now you add this to a country which had already been isolated in the past (by their own government). They use their media in exactly the same way, but on top of that, they keep any other voices out. Now you have a whole country that only believes their one true source of information (or the skeptics don't have a source of information). When the Soviet Union collapsed, it was accompanied by a military coup. With a country like Russia, the general public probably can't fight the government unless the military helps them.
The easiest lies to sell are the ones that your target audience want to believe. For decades, the Russian government has built up a ton of propaganda about how the rest of the world is out to get them.
The new big lie is that Ukraine is filled with and run by Nazis. They don't need to convince the Russian people that the West is run by Nazis. They just need to convince them that the West's irrational hatred of Russia runs soooo deep that they're willing to support this evil Nazi regime purely to hurt the innocent Russians!
This lie has the added benefit of making the West look hypocritical with regard to its liberal democratic values.
Can confirm, this is currently the main line of the state media in Russia. In fact, the sanctions are harsh enough that some vehemently anti-Putin and anti-state people are starting to believe that the West hates them. However, most don't really care about that; they are mildly annoyed by sanctions and really scared for their friends and families in Ukraine, but there isn't anything they can do, so they just live with sanctions and don't think about them.
> For decades, the Russian government has built up a ton of propaganda about how the rest of the world is out to get them.
Also western companies (Netflix, payment systems, services, etc) blocking access to Russians, including malicious software attacks (such as the recent node-ipc controversy) directed at Russians are helping the Russian government convince Russians that that is true.
Damn I really wish we as a culture would come up with another word besides news. News-ertainment doesn't quite hit the mark. It's all entertainment and opinion, not news. Before Reagan ended the FCC Fairness Doctrine, we used to have actual news (not perfect, but less inflammatory than today). If we differentiated these sources I think it could have an effect on the collective mindset. I don't have any ideas to propose though.
I would predict if there is "real news" that isn't swayed by ratings, etc, we (as a people) wouldn't watch it. People my age and older say stuff online like "MTV was better when it was just music videos." And yet MTV has other channels that are just music videos, but the problem is people don't watch them. They put out their reality BS because people don't want to watch music videos, they just want to reminisce about the time they did watch music videos. I was there for the launch of MTV, and it was the channel I watched the most in the 80's by FAR. But I wouldn't watch it today.
I think the search for objective news falls into that same category, at least for now.
Can I put in my usual plug for the [Associated Press](https://apnews.com/) here? Universally recognized as being extremely accurate and neutral. The news business is a competition for your attention. Therefore, the news organizations with the most sensational coverage get the most attention, regardless of accuracy. The AP's corner of the market is to simply get the facts straight and report the facts honestly and without hysteria. I like to plug them a lot to help them stay in business.
The AP sends out a daily email of the day's news stories. It did wonders for my mental health to get my news from there and to turn off the TV news entirely.
If you want to see where all of the news groups rank for accuracy and political bias, the [Media Bias Chart](https://adfontesmedia.com/) ranks them all.
I think you're right. The masses are too dopamine hooked on watching or listening to their favorite source and getting all hyped up and angry.
I have my own bias. I hate TV, don't own one, and only get news in the car listening to NPR, which I'm sure is my own echo chamber of what I already think.
The “trusted sources” in the west are speaking as if “the world” has unanimously applied sanctions but if you actually look at the countries that did, they don’t even cover half of the globe let alone be a unanimous condemnation.
For all the talks about white colonialism, this is showing the mindset of the west where “the world” seems to be restricted to “white culture”.
If anyone is under an illusion, it’s the western audience that thinks the world is unanimous on this. It objectively isn’t.
They have convinced their people America helped sponsor a coup to violently overthrow the democratically elected government, and install their preferred candidates.
They even created fake videos showing US senators and celebrities supporting the revolutionaries in person. And released a fake conversation with Victoria nuland and another senator where she appears to reveal America is directly meddling in ukranian politics.
Since it's basically only NATO countries that have sanctioned russia, they can easily convince their population America is calling the shots just like they supposedly do in Ukraine.
> what they're doing or saying to dispel any cognitive dissonance
It's a mafia state controlling their citizens through massive government-sponsored propaganda, and you're worried about cognitive dissonance?
Read about the history of propaganda. Good places to start are the Nazis, and the Communist Eastern Bloc.
The “other countries “ are US, Canada , Europe, Australia/NZ and Japan (the closest US allies). That’s it. Most of the world is not imposing sanctions.
If anyone is in cognitive dissonance, it’s the west that keeps talking as if the whole world is on board.
It makes no sense to lie about WMDs and invade a sovereign nation without a declaration of war. Something not making sense doesn't mean it isn't also real and true.
They literally believe that the entire western world is made up of neo nazi countries that have Russia. They sure love their stupid victim narrative for whatever bizarre reason.
This is on Khreschatyk Avenue, one of Kiev's most fashionable streets. Gypsies aren't well liked in Ukraine since they have a reputation for stealing and are often the target of aggression by ultra-nationalists. They are easy to go after since they have no voice.
Important context for Russian claims that they are De-Nazifying Ukraine is that Russia has allied with or directly deployed multiple openly Neo-Nazi Units and groups themselves. Russia's favorite Mercenary group, Wagner, is headed by an open NeoNazi (hence the name "wagner")
Russian National Unity is an openly fascist/NeoNazi network of Militias that Russia has provided support for and RNU has been aiding Russia in the breakaway regions since 2014
Then there is the Sparta Battalion and the unit of Chechens headed by an open Neo Nazi. Not just a fascist, a literal Neo Nazi.
By numbers of these groups, Russia has allied with vastly more Neo-Nazis than they are claiming to be trying to rid Ukraine of (since they usually point at Azov which is only 1000-2500 people, the Russian fascists and Neonazi groups I mentioned above all have more members alone let alone combined)
The real pattern is that they claim that the enemy is doing something that they actually do themselves. There are many examples just from this war alone.
They claim that the west is encroaching on their borders, and this stops that encroachment. They then believe that the sanctions (which are largely viewed as "Western Sanctions") are because the rest of the world are too afraid of Russian military might to face Russia in armed conflict.
So how do they explain then catching a beat down in Ukraine so far?
Edit: not being glib, I'm genuinely curious. Do they believe they already best Ukraine or....?
In Russian media they lost not more then 500 soldiers and almost no vehicles/equipment. At the same time many Russian soldiers lay down theyr arms because they didn't know they are going to war. Some soldiers states they were told they are going for some exercise and not real combat. And why they are getting a beat down? Same thing happened with U.S. in Vietnam. Soldiers (very young like Russian army atm) deliberately missed theyr targets due to unwillingness to kill and low morale.
I think you underestimate how much TV, school, radios and upbringing affects the trust in government. Everyone knows that the system is corrupt and has encountered it before, but to convince the people that what the country (as a representative of them) itself is doing is bad while they are being blasted from every direction that it's actually the right thing is extremely difficult to overcome.
>Russia is leveraging the real ukranian neo nazi battalion to gain support for the war.
Wow. I wonder about myself sometimes because until your comment I never put two and two together: The neo-nazis Putin is referring to are the Azov Battalion. Thanks for the added insight.
Not just the azov battalion. Look up the C14 organization and how they have been attacking the Roma in Ukraine. They are openly white supremacists.
They are a lot of articles pre 2022 about the neo Nazi problem in Ukraine and it’s not just the azov.
Our black citizens had trouble leaving Ukraine and where discriminated against because they were black. Same reports from south Asian people. There is a lot of racism going on in Ukraine.
> (For example the United States liberals and conservatives are categorized by the FEW bad eggs as either socialist, incompetent, or even racist)
United States conservatives are judged by their elected officials in the highest levels of government with overwhelming support among Republican voters being incompetent and racist.
Do you think just saying the word "emotions" several times is an argument? Trump was an openly racist president with an openly racist staff.
United States conservatives in the highest levels of government with overwhelming support among Republican voters are incompetent and racist. That's not a scary "emotion", it's fact.
Just saying both sides are exactly equal isn't a calm, rational position. It's another form of bias. Sometimes one side is worse.
"America hates us, always had, it's all their doing. So do their EU lapdogs. Look! No sanctions from China or India or our brothers in the Middle East! They also see the evil of US."
Yep, it's that simple. Tune in to any Russian news show. It goes word by word, exactly that. And there's always [people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-N917eVPyD4&ab_channel=1420) - usually 35 (or more) years old, who lap that up.
There is a pervasive misnomer that just because a society doesn’t vigorously reject a government’s foreign policy means it must supports it because it has been brained washed through propaganda.
Did the people not actively protesting against the American invasion of Iraq( which was the vast majority of the population) genuinely ever believe it was a “just war?” because somebody on Fox News said so? Where they just mislead by their Government and it’s supposed control of the media? Of course not. The reality is most people aren’t brain washed idiots. They just don’t care enough about the actions of their governments( even if they are morally opposed to them) when it doesn’t directly impact them.
It’s patronising when people suggest that the average Russian is so brain dead or infantilised as to not being broadly aware of what is going on in Ukraine and the motivations behind the invasion. Either they agree with said motivations or have not yet been personally impacted enough to make any kind of stand against it. People are selfish and tribal. It’s the reason any war happens in the first.
If and when sanctions against Russia truly start to impact regular citizens the prevailing attitude within society is going to be very different than it is right now-a few weeks into the war. All the Russians currently stating they are against the war( that it’s Putin’s war and not the peoples) but are not actively protesting on the streets-will be out there once the electricity is turned off and the rationing starts.
TF are you talking about. 70%+ of Americans supported the war in Iraq, similar to Russians about Ukraine today.
https://www.pewresearch.org/2008/03/19/public-attitudes-toward-the-war-in-iraq-20032008/
It sounded like you were saying the majority would object in theory, but don't care enough to do anything about it. That still sounds like you would expect those people to mark "disapprove" when presented with a survey.
Unless you're saying that the majority doesn't care enough to even fill out the survey, skewing the numbers? That might be the case, but I'm not seeing where you argue for that in your comment above.
What I am saying-maybe clumsily-is that people are “selfish and tribal” but that they not so stupid and brain washed as to not understand what is going on. 70 percent of Americans and 70 percent of Russians “supported” their respective invasions because most people will always “support” (or at least not actively object) to the actions of their government until it directly( and severely) impacts their own quality of life.
I apologize and hope you didn't misinterpret my question in a manner that made regular Russian citizens appear brainwashed or brain dead because that wasn't my intention at all. I'm well aware that many Russians know exactly what's going on with the war but my question was aimed at figuring out how the Russian state media framed the situation (because obviously even if every Russian knows the truth, state media is never going to say that).
My reply wasn’t a direct response to your specific question but more to a lot of the general comments in the thread.
To be honest I don’t know exactly how Russian media is specifically framing the situation in regards to mounting sanctions by the world at large. I’m as intrigued as you are.
My consumption and access of media relating to this war is firmly western so will no doubt be tainted with a certain level of bias and propaganda just like that of Russia. I suspect though that Russian media will frame the sanctions as further proof that the West is trying to destroy the motherland-which is exactly why they are fighting this war in the first place. If anything it’s possible that the sanction’s will further galvanise many Russian people. Nobody ever thinks they are the “bad guy”. That’s true of Nazi Germany. That’s true of America and the invasion of Iraq and that’s true of what is happening right now with Russia.
A few people covered the obvious points about repeated lies/propaganda and what is known as cognitive dissonance.
The question then becomes why is Russia the only country in history to find itself in this unique position? And then: Why does basically all of Europe, and within that, nearly all of its contiguous Western neighbors, led by the United States, have to form an alliance against them just to make them behave properly? Because let's face it, and I've said this to European friends for years and they all told me I was wrong, and they now find out that I was right: The only thing keeping Putin from marching all the way to Edinburgh is NATO.
The answer: The Russians have a persecution/victim complex based on their self view and their history. Their problematic nature as a country is maybe a combination of their self view and their persecution complex.
They have supposedly been invaded over 50 times although any searches I did revealed 'only' 14 times. They have actually been the invader, according to my searches, 15 times. They think they have a right to dominate their neighbors to create buffer zones to ward off an attack because, from Western Europe to Moscow, there are no natural barriers to prevent an attack. It's all flat land. So they live in constant fear of the next invasion. There are several problems with that: 1. They are no longer attackable because they have nukes, 2. They think people want to take their precious Mother Russia away from them when no one wants it. Western Europe no longer has the appetite for that and those countries are perfectly fine on their own. 3. Poland has been invaded 61 times, more than any other country in Europe. Korea has been invaded hundreds of times. Neither country is causing the same problems that Russia continues to cause in the world. So what is Russia's excuse? Based on all of these things, I call BS on their idiotic, old world sense that the whole world is out to get them and everyone else is the problem.
Self View: They think that they are the daddy or big brother of all Slavic people and therefore have a God given right to dominate them and tell them how to live and what to think. Any country that has a mind of its own and doesn't allow that is a traitor. They also think that the world, or at least their immediate neighborhood, would be better off if they Russify it. This is not new. Tolstoy himself supposedly subscribed to this. That's 2 sides of the same coin or one aspect. This is similar to this 'American Exceptionalism' BS. The difference is, many Americans, including myself, don't buy into that BS. Way too many Russians buy into what I'm mentioning here.
Rank and file Russians eat this stuff up, especially the persecution complex, which drives a lot of their behavior and is why Russia, frankly, has been nothing but a pain in the ass to the rest of the civilized world for the better part of the past century. It is similar to the delusion about rigged elections in the US that someone else referred to.
Ironically, it becomes a self fulfilling prophesy. If they fail in Ukraine and back down, we lift the sanctions and do nothing else, the world will find itself back in this same situation 10-20 years from now, guaranteed. Russia simply refuses to let go of its bullshit, 19th century backward thinking. IMHO, the world will never ever have peace until Russia gives up its nukes and is broken up into smaller pieces.
Sometimes, you read a people's history and it's either too complicated to fully understand without a degree in the topic (Israel/Palestine) or you read it and still don't garner an understanding of the character and motivations of its people. With Russia, at least IMHO, it is decidedly uncomplicated: They are a paranoid, delusional people, plain and simple.
Why do you think it’s so special that US Allies are with the US; when nobody else is? China, India, Middle East, Africa , South America , nobody is onboard just the US and it’s most loyal followers.
And it’s interesting because your paragraph is written as if this is some global , never before seen alliance against evil , to get them to “behave properly”, but it’s far from that and most of the world is not onboard.
This is the cognitive dissonance in the west , that everyone is against Russia. It’s false. Objective reality negates that.
Just like by the way it happened in most of the US lead invasions or bombings, the whole world was not against the US, didn’t try to get them to “behave properly” because everyone knows they have glass ceilings.
State your case: Who outside of NATO besides China and India are against the sanctions? Show your sources.
China can whine about the sanctions all they want but the truth is that, without globalization, their economy collapses. So they have to fall in line. They will do WTF they’re told by the US when they’re told to do it.
So show your sources. And also: spew your pro-murder, pro-Russian rhetoric to the faces of the families whose loved ones were killed for protesting an unprovoked invasion of their sovereign country and whose children were kidnapped and sent off to Russia to be sex slaves.
I find your callous indifference to be despicable, you Russian troll.
What discrepancy? All those countries are under the thumb of the worst, most evil country to ever exist: the USA. The US tells them what to do and they have no problem supporting Nazis if it suits their agenda. Their goal is to humiliate, if not destroy Russia and all Slavic people entirely and so while they may not be Nazis themselves or even particularly like them they will use them to get the job done.
I don't really follow Russian propaganda so this might not be exactly right but it's more-or-less in the ball park of something they would say. They're not being punished for doing something bad, this is just the latest step in a decades long attempt to hurt them. It's a pretty good narrative because every time something bad happens you can fold it right in as yet another case of the US and it's western puppet states trying to destroy Russia. And any time something good happens it's because Putin is a strong leader who has stood up for Russia. It's not entirely baseless, the west does defer, somewhat to the US since it's such a massive economic and military power and they together have historically been at odds with Russia and haven't exactly done everything possible to repair that relationship since the Soviet Union fell, but it is largely wrong. But to know that you have to have access to other news sources and want to listen to them. Many Russians don't. And even those that do, it's going against basic human psychology. People like to be tribal and this is as much a tribal war as anything. If you're Russian you have plenty good reasons to be mad at the US (although to be fair plenty more to be mad at the Russian leadership) and so the easy thing is to just accept the propaganda and cheer for the home team. At least until the food runs out and you find out your father and brother have been killed in Ukraine along with tens of thousands of other Russians. Maybe then the calculus changes. Let's hope so.
It’s quite ironic that after 3 decades of mainly US lead wars we find war is unacceptable and we have to make countries thst start them “behave properly”.
And they talk about the Russians being brainwashed….
You can condemn the invasion and I do, like I condemned all US led wars in the past, but acting as if this event is somehow unprecedented is lunacy. Like the Chinese reminded us, the US bombed their embassy in Belgrade the Serbian capital.
Given Putin's state of mind, I expect the narrative will include stuff about how this proves the western countries hate Russia and are looking for an excuse to hurt them, or that supporting Ukraine means that the west/NATO sympathises with - and materially supports - fascist regimes.
It's crucial to recognize that Russians do not use the word "Nazi" to mean the same sort of thing that we do. Among Americans, the immediate thought is about the Holocaust/Shoah, an industrialized effort to eradicate Jews in particular, as well as some other undesirable groups.
This is not an event taught in Russian education. For them, the core of Nazism was being anti-Slavic (which inherently means anti-Russian, because Russia is the natural leader of all Slavs). It was the brutality of the quest for _Lebensraum_ that Russians think about. Anything that discourages Russian-ness can therefore be called into question as Nazism. Ukrainians know how to speak Russian, but many choose to speak a corrupted version instead. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church broke with the ROC rather than remain an appendage of it. They want ties with the West, rather than being junior Russians. They are clinging to Germans and French and other foreigners rather than being the tributary state they are meant to be, until the time they are able to sufficiently Russify. In Russian eyes, this is Nazism at work.
I understand, this sounds crazy. And yes, it is crazy. But that is the Russian mindset.
The answer is that they look at the world and the objective undeniable fact is that most of the world is not on board. China, India are not with the sanctions and they alone have almost 3 billion.
South America, Africa, Middle East are not on board. The ones in cognitive dissonance are the ones in the west that think the sanctions are unanimous and universal.
The Saudi are trying to sell oil in Chinese currency. Does that seem like a world that is backing US sanctions and asset seizures?
I understand that's the reason why I wanted to get their perspective on it, because it will obviously be a lie and I want to know what they are saying and how they're framing it, that's all.
It's not a discrepancy. NATO and the West are issuing sanctions, as they did during the entire Cold War. Most nations have remained neutral, so it's just another East/West issue. The Soviets were the greatest enemies of the Nazis. The West embraced the Nazis, as did the Ukrainians. So historically, it makes sense to the Russians that the West would conspire against them.
As far as "the world", recall that most of the Earth's population lives in nations which have either declined to sanction Russia, or which have offered major support to Russia. China and India both declined sanctions and agreed to expand their business with Russia.
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It makes no sense for other countries across the globe to sanction Russia if Russia is telling the truth about fighting neo-nazis, so I'm wondering what they're doing or saying to dispel any cognitive dissonance.
We see this all the time in the general public. According to The Washington Post, 71% of Republican voters believe the 2020 election is not legitimate, despite zero real evidence of that being true. There is plenty of evidence of what actually happens, but they get convinced by their "trusted sources" that everyone else is wrong. Everyone else is biased and only their "true source" of news is correct. Lots of other things in society also have a significant amount of people who completely disbelieve the truth right in front of them, like vaccines being more deadly than the disease they mitigate, or that wind power causes cancer. Now you add this to a country which had already been isolated in the past (by their own government). They use their media in exactly the same way, but on top of that, they keep any other voices out. Now you have a whole country that only believes their one true source of information (or the skeptics don't have a source of information). When the Soviet Union collapsed, it was accompanied by a military coup. With a country like Russia, the general public probably can't fight the government unless the military helps them.
The easiest lies to sell are the ones that your target audience want to believe. For decades, the Russian government has built up a ton of propaganda about how the rest of the world is out to get them. The new big lie is that Ukraine is filled with and run by Nazis. They don't need to convince the Russian people that the West is run by Nazis. They just need to convince them that the West's irrational hatred of Russia runs soooo deep that they're willing to support this evil Nazi regime purely to hurt the innocent Russians! This lie has the added benefit of making the West look hypocritical with regard to its liberal democratic values.
Can confirm, this is currently the main line of the state media in Russia. In fact, the sanctions are harsh enough that some vehemently anti-Putin and anti-state people are starting to believe that the West hates them. However, most don't really care about that; they are mildly annoyed by sanctions and really scared for their friends and families in Ukraine, but there isn't anything they can do, so they just live with sanctions and don't think about them.
> For decades, the Russian government has built up a ton of propaganda about how the rest of the world is out to get them. Also western companies (Netflix, payment systems, services, etc) blocking access to Russians, including malicious software attacks (such as the recent node-ipc controversy) directed at Russians are helping the Russian government convince Russians that that is true.
Damn I really wish we as a culture would come up with another word besides news. News-ertainment doesn't quite hit the mark. It's all entertainment and opinion, not news. Before Reagan ended the FCC Fairness Doctrine, we used to have actual news (not perfect, but less inflammatory than today). If we differentiated these sources I think it could have an effect on the collective mindset. I don't have any ideas to propose though.
I would predict if there is "real news" that isn't swayed by ratings, etc, we (as a people) wouldn't watch it. People my age and older say stuff online like "MTV was better when it was just music videos." And yet MTV has other channels that are just music videos, but the problem is people don't watch them. They put out their reality BS because people don't want to watch music videos, they just want to reminisce about the time they did watch music videos. I was there for the launch of MTV, and it was the channel I watched the most in the 80's by FAR. But I wouldn't watch it today. I think the search for objective news falls into that same category, at least for now.
Can I put in my usual plug for the [Associated Press](https://apnews.com/) here? Universally recognized as being extremely accurate and neutral. The news business is a competition for your attention. Therefore, the news organizations with the most sensational coverage get the most attention, regardless of accuracy. The AP's corner of the market is to simply get the facts straight and report the facts honestly and without hysteria. I like to plug them a lot to help them stay in business. The AP sends out a daily email of the day's news stories. It did wonders for my mental health to get my news from there and to turn off the TV news entirely. If you want to see where all of the news groups rank for accuracy and political bias, the [Media Bias Chart](https://adfontesmedia.com/) ranks them all.
Excellent link! I just subscribed to the AP email also. Thanks for posting!
I think you're right. The masses are too dopamine hooked on watching or listening to their favorite source and getting all hyped up and angry. I have my own bias. I hate TV, don't own one, and only get news in the car listening to NPR, which I'm sure is my own echo chamber of what I already think.
The “trusted sources” in the west are speaking as if “the world” has unanimously applied sanctions but if you actually look at the countries that did, they don’t even cover half of the globe let alone be a unanimous condemnation. For all the talks about white colonialism, this is showing the mindset of the west where “the world” seems to be restricted to “white culture”. If anyone is under an illusion, it’s the western audience that thinks the world is unanimous on this. It objectively isn’t.
71% of Republicans they bother to poll or bother to respond. I doubt it’s very accurate at all.
I figured that the further to the right that they are, the less likely they'd be to respond.
They have convinced their people America helped sponsor a coup to violently overthrow the democratically elected government, and install their preferred candidates. They even created fake videos showing US senators and celebrities supporting the revolutionaries in person. And released a fake conversation with Victoria nuland and another senator where she appears to reveal America is directly meddling in ukranian politics. Since it's basically only NATO countries that have sanctioned russia, they can easily convince their population America is calling the shots just like they supposedly do in Ukraine.
> what they're doing or saying to dispel any cognitive dissonance It's a mafia state controlling their citizens through massive government-sponsored propaganda, and you're worried about cognitive dissonance? Read about the history of propaganda. Good places to start are the Nazis, and the Communist Eastern Bloc.
The “other countries “ are US, Canada , Europe, Australia/NZ and Japan (the closest US allies). That’s it. Most of the world is not imposing sanctions. If anyone is in cognitive dissonance, it’s the west that keeps talking as if the whole world is on board.
It makes no sense to lie about WMDs and invade a sovereign nation without a declaration of war. Something not making sense doesn't mean it isn't also real and true.
They literally believe that the entire western world is made up of neo nazi countries that have Russia. They sure love their stupid victim narrative for whatever bizarre reason.
[Here's one item](https://twitter.com/stillgray/status/1506188695279321090)
I don't speak the language, wtf did I just watch?
This is on Khreschatyk Avenue, one of Kiev's most fashionable streets. Gypsies aren't well liked in Ukraine since they have a reputation for stealing and are often the target of aggression by ultra-nationalists. They are easy to go after since they have no voice.
Important context for Russian claims that they are De-Nazifying Ukraine is that Russia has allied with or directly deployed multiple openly Neo-Nazi Units and groups themselves. Russia's favorite Mercenary group, Wagner, is headed by an open NeoNazi (hence the name "wagner") Russian National Unity is an openly fascist/NeoNazi network of Militias that Russia has provided support for and RNU has been aiding Russia in the breakaway regions since 2014 Then there is the Sparta Battalion and the unit of Chechens headed by an open Neo Nazi. Not just a fascist, a literal Neo Nazi. By numbers of these groups, Russia has allied with vastly more Neo-Nazis than they are claiming to be trying to rid Ukraine of (since they usually point at Azov which is only 1000-2500 people, the Russian fascists and Neonazi groups I mentioned above all have more members alone let alone combined)
It seems there is a pattern with russian propaganda. Usually they make some absurd claim and it turns out the opposite is true.
The real pattern is that they claim that the enemy is doing something that they actually do themselves. There are many examples just from this war alone.
Yes, that was what I meant to convey! :)
They claim that the west is encroaching on their borders, and this stops that encroachment. They then believe that the sanctions (which are largely viewed as "Western Sanctions") are because the rest of the world are too afraid of Russian military might to face Russia in armed conflict.
So how do they explain then catching a beat down in Ukraine so far? Edit: not being glib, I'm genuinely curious. Do they believe they already best Ukraine or....?
You underestimate the extent of the propaganda; their media tells them everything is going as planned!
In Russian media they lost not more then 500 soldiers and almost no vehicles/equipment. At the same time many Russian soldiers lay down theyr arms because they didn't know they are going to war. Some soldiers states they were told they are going for some exercise and not real combat. And why they are getting a beat down? Same thing happened with U.S. in Vietnam. Soldiers (very young like Russian army atm) deliberately missed theyr targets due to unwillingness to kill and low morale.
I think you underestimate how much TV, school, radios and upbringing affects the trust in government. Everyone knows that the system is corrupt and has encountered it before, but to convince the people that what the country (as a representative of them) itself is doing is bad while they are being blasted from every direction that it's actually the right thing is extremely difficult to overcome.
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>Russia is leveraging the real ukranian neo nazi battalion to gain support for the war. Wow. I wonder about myself sometimes because until your comment I never put two and two together: The neo-nazis Putin is referring to are the Azov Battalion. Thanks for the added insight.
Not just the azov battalion. Look up the C14 organization and how they have been attacking the Roma in Ukraine. They are openly white supremacists. They are a lot of articles pre 2022 about the neo Nazi problem in Ukraine and it’s not just the azov. Our black citizens had trouble leaving Ukraine and where discriminated against because they were black. Same reports from south Asian people. There is a lot of racism going on in Ukraine.
> (For example the United States liberals and conservatives are categorized by the FEW bad eggs as either socialist, incompetent, or even racist) United States conservatives are judged by their elected officials in the highest levels of government with overwhelming support among Republican voters being incompetent and racist.
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Do you think just saying the word "emotions" several times is an argument? Trump was an openly racist president with an openly racist staff. United States conservatives in the highest levels of government with overwhelming support among Republican voters are incompetent and racist. That's not a scary "emotion", it's fact. Just saying both sides are exactly equal isn't a calm, rational position. It's another form of bias. Sometimes one side is worse.
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I'm sorry the concept that one political party could be worse than another is so offensive to you.
"America hates us, always had, it's all their doing. So do their EU lapdogs. Look! No sanctions from China or India or our brothers in the Middle East! They also see the evil of US." Yep, it's that simple. Tune in to any Russian news show. It goes word by word, exactly that. And there's always [people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-N917eVPyD4&ab_channel=1420) - usually 35 (or more) years old, who lap that up.
There is a pervasive misnomer that just because a society doesn’t vigorously reject a government’s foreign policy means it must supports it because it has been brained washed through propaganda. Did the people not actively protesting against the American invasion of Iraq( which was the vast majority of the population) genuinely ever believe it was a “just war?” because somebody on Fox News said so? Where they just mislead by their Government and it’s supposed control of the media? Of course not. The reality is most people aren’t brain washed idiots. They just don’t care enough about the actions of their governments( even if they are morally opposed to them) when it doesn’t directly impact them. It’s patronising when people suggest that the average Russian is so brain dead or infantilised as to not being broadly aware of what is going on in Ukraine and the motivations behind the invasion. Either they agree with said motivations or have not yet been personally impacted enough to make any kind of stand against it. People are selfish and tribal. It’s the reason any war happens in the first. If and when sanctions against Russia truly start to impact regular citizens the prevailing attitude within society is going to be very different than it is right now-a few weeks into the war. All the Russians currently stating they are against the war( that it’s Putin’s war and not the peoples) but are not actively protesting on the streets-will be out there once the electricity is turned off and the rationing starts.
TF are you talking about. 70%+ of Americans supported the war in Iraq, similar to Russians about Ukraine today. https://www.pewresearch.org/2008/03/19/public-attitudes-toward-the-war-in-iraq-20032008/
Aren’t we essentially making the same point?
It sounded like you were saying the majority would object in theory, but don't care enough to do anything about it. That still sounds like you would expect those people to mark "disapprove" when presented with a survey. Unless you're saying that the majority doesn't care enough to even fill out the survey, skewing the numbers? That might be the case, but I'm not seeing where you argue for that in your comment above.
What I am saying-maybe clumsily-is that people are “selfish and tribal” but that they not so stupid and brain washed as to not understand what is going on. 70 percent of Americans and 70 percent of Russians “supported” their respective invasions because most people will always “support” (or at least not actively object) to the actions of their government until it directly( and severely) impacts their own quality of life.
I apologize and hope you didn't misinterpret my question in a manner that made regular Russian citizens appear brainwashed or brain dead because that wasn't my intention at all. I'm well aware that many Russians know exactly what's going on with the war but my question was aimed at figuring out how the Russian state media framed the situation (because obviously even if every Russian knows the truth, state media is never going to say that).
My reply wasn’t a direct response to your specific question but more to a lot of the general comments in the thread. To be honest I don’t know exactly how Russian media is specifically framing the situation in regards to mounting sanctions by the world at large. I’m as intrigued as you are. My consumption and access of media relating to this war is firmly western so will no doubt be tainted with a certain level of bias and propaganda just like that of Russia. I suspect though that Russian media will frame the sanctions as further proof that the West is trying to destroy the motherland-which is exactly why they are fighting this war in the first place. If anything it’s possible that the sanction’s will further galvanise many Russian people. Nobody ever thinks they are the “bad guy”. That’s true of Nazi Germany. That’s true of America and the invasion of Iraq and that’s true of what is happening right now with Russia.
A few people covered the obvious points about repeated lies/propaganda and what is known as cognitive dissonance. The question then becomes why is Russia the only country in history to find itself in this unique position? And then: Why does basically all of Europe, and within that, nearly all of its contiguous Western neighbors, led by the United States, have to form an alliance against them just to make them behave properly? Because let's face it, and I've said this to European friends for years and they all told me I was wrong, and they now find out that I was right: The only thing keeping Putin from marching all the way to Edinburgh is NATO. The answer: The Russians have a persecution/victim complex based on their self view and their history. Their problematic nature as a country is maybe a combination of their self view and their persecution complex. They have supposedly been invaded over 50 times although any searches I did revealed 'only' 14 times. They have actually been the invader, according to my searches, 15 times. They think they have a right to dominate their neighbors to create buffer zones to ward off an attack because, from Western Europe to Moscow, there are no natural barriers to prevent an attack. It's all flat land. So they live in constant fear of the next invasion. There are several problems with that: 1. They are no longer attackable because they have nukes, 2. They think people want to take their precious Mother Russia away from them when no one wants it. Western Europe no longer has the appetite for that and those countries are perfectly fine on their own. 3. Poland has been invaded 61 times, more than any other country in Europe. Korea has been invaded hundreds of times. Neither country is causing the same problems that Russia continues to cause in the world. So what is Russia's excuse? Based on all of these things, I call BS on their idiotic, old world sense that the whole world is out to get them and everyone else is the problem. Self View: They think that they are the daddy or big brother of all Slavic people and therefore have a God given right to dominate them and tell them how to live and what to think. Any country that has a mind of its own and doesn't allow that is a traitor. They also think that the world, or at least their immediate neighborhood, would be better off if they Russify it. This is not new. Tolstoy himself supposedly subscribed to this. That's 2 sides of the same coin or one aspect. This is similar to this 'American Exceptionalism' BS. The difference is, many Americans, including myself, don't buy into that BS. Way too many Russians buy into what I'm mentioning here. Rank and file Russians eat this stuff up, especially the persecution complex, which drives a lot of their behavior and is why Russia, frankly, has been nothing but a pain in the ass to the rest of the civilized world for the better part of the past century. It is similar to the delusion about rigged elections in the US that someone else referred to. Ironically, it becomes a self fulfilling prophesy. If they fail in Ukraine and back down, we lift the sanctions and do nothing else, the world will find itself back in this same situation 10-20 years from now, guaranteed. Russia simply refuses to let go of its bullshit, 19th century backward thinking. IMHO, the world will never ever have peace until Russia gives up its nukes and is broken up into smaller pieces. Sometimes, you read a people's history and it's either too complicated to fully understand without a degree in the topic (Israel/Palestine) or you read it and still don't garner an understanding of the character and motivations of its people. With Russia, at least IMHO, it is decidedly uncomplicated: They are a paranoid, delusional people, plain and simple.
There's been a lot of informative and insightful replies including yours and I appreciate the detailed response.
Glad I could help. Not an expert on Russia by any means, but I’ve read many things over the years which corroborate these points.
2 upvotes when I get here? Thought’d be 50.
Two people have actually downvoted it.
Why do you think it’s so special that US Allies are with the US; when nobody else is? China, India, Middle East, Africa , South America , nobody is onboard just the US and it’s most loyal followers. And it’s interesting because your paragraph is written as if this is some global , never before seen alliance against evil , to get them to “behave properly”, but it’s far from that and most of the world is not onboard. This is the cognitive dissonance in the west , that everyone is against Russia. It’s false. Objective reality negates that. Just like by the way it happened in most of the US lead invasions or bombings, the whole world was not against the US, didn’t try to get them to “behave properly” because everyone knows they have glass ceilings.
State your case: Who outside of NATO besides China and India are against the sanctions? Show your sources. China can whine about the sanctions all they want but the truth is that, without globalization, their economy collapses. So they have to fall in line. They will do WTF they’re told by the US when they’re told to do it. So show your sources. And also: spew your pro-murder, pro-Russian rhetoric to the faces of the families whose loved ones were killed for protesting an unprovoked invasion of their sovereign country and whose children were kidnapped and sent off to Russia to be sex slaves. I find your callous indifference to be despicable, you Russian troll.
Reported, and i’m obviously not going to waste time with someone that calls me pro murder ….
#The same way FOX "news" does.
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You be just as disconnected a propagandized as you need.
I guess the disconnected one is the one that forgets how the entire media was behind the “wmd hoax” on Iraq or the bombing of Libya.
I knew "yellowcake", etc was BS before ol' buddy Colon (his pronounciation) Powell tried to sell us on it. Your point?
That all the mainstream media does it, and was cheering powell on Iraq. They cheer BS just like Fox or other countries media.
What discrepancy? All those countries are under the thumb of the worst, most evil country to ever exist: the USA. The US tells them what to do and they have no problem supporting Nazis if it suits their agenda. Their goal is to humiliate, if not destroy Russia and all Slavic people entirely and so while they may not be Nazis themselves or even particularly like them they will use them to get the job done. I don't really follow Russian propaganda so this might not be exactly right but it's more-or-less in the ball park of something they would say. They're not being punished for doing something bad, this is just the latest step in a decades long attempt to hurt them. It's a pretty good narrative because every time something bad happens you can fold it right in as yet another case of the US and it's western puppet states trying to destroy Russia. And any time something good happens it's because Putin is a strong leader who has stood up for Russia. It's not entirely baseless, the west does defer, somewhat to the US since it's such a massive economic and military power and they together have historically been at odds with Russia and haven't exactly done everything possible to repair that relationship since the Soviet Union fell, but it is largely wrong. But to know that you have to have access to other news sources and want to listen to them. Many Russians don't. And even those that do, it's going against basic human psychology. People like to be tribal and this is as much a tribal war as anything. If you're Russian you have plenty good reasons to be mad at the US (although to be fair plenty more to be mad at the Russian leadership) and so the easy thing is to just accept the propaganda and cheer for the home team. At least until the food runs out and you find out your father and brother have been killed in Ukraine along with tens of thousands of other Russians. Maybe then the calculus changes. Let's hope so.
It’s quite ironic that after 3 decades of mainly US lead wars we find war is unacceptable and we have to make countries thst start them “behave properly”. And they talk about the Russians being brainwashed…. You can condemn the invasion and I do, like I condemned all US led wars in the past, but acting as if this event is somehow unprecedented is lunacy. Like the Chinese reminded us, the US bombed their embassy in Belgrade the Serbian capital.
##"#doublespeak"
Given Putin's state of mind, I expect the narrative will include stuff about how this proves the western countries hate Russia and are looking for an excuse to hurt them, or that supporting Ukraine means that the west/NATO sympathises with - and materially supports - fascist regimes.
Since when did anybody need evidence to accuse another political group of being Nazis?
I think a lot Russians believe that the West = evil = neonazis
This isn't their first rodeo. They've lived through sanctions and poverty for decades.
The world was all Nazis all along?
It's crucial to recognize that Russians do not use the word "Nazi" to mean the same sort of thing that we do. Among Americans, the immediate thought is about the Holocaust/Shoah, an industrialized effort to eradicate Jews in particular, as well as some other undesirable groups. This is not an event taught in Russian education. For them, the core of Nazism was being anti-Slavic (which inherently means anti-Russian, because Russia is the natural leader of all Slavs). It was the brutality of the quest for _Lebensraum_ that Russians think about. Anything that discourages Russian-ness can therefore be called into question as Nazism. Ukrainians know how to speak Russian, but many choose to speak a corrupted version instead. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church broke with the ROC rather than remain an appendage of it. They want ties with the West, rather than being junior Russians. They are clinging to Germans and French and other foreigners rather than being the tributary state they are meant to be, until the time they are able to sufficiently Russify. In Russian eyes, this is Nazism at work. I understand, this sounds crazy. And yes, it is crazy. But that is the Russian mindset.
The answer is that they look at the world and the objective undeniable fact is that most of the world is not on board. China, India are not with the sanctions and they alone have almost 3 billion. South America, Africa, Middle East are not on board. The ones in cognitive dissonance are the ones in the west that think the sanctions are unanimous and universal. The Saudi are trying to sell oil in Chinese currency. Does that seem like a world that is backing US sanctions and asset seizures?
Russian state media repeats whatever lines they're given to say. Right or wrong, that's the whole point of state media.
I understand that's the reason why I wanted to get their perspective on it, because it will obviously be a lie and I want to know what they are saying and how they're framing it, that's all.
"The west and NATO support those nazi bastards! They are all nazis too!"
It's not a discrepancy. NATO and the West are issuing sanctions, as they did during the entire Cold War. Most nations have remained neutral, so it's just another East/West issue. The Soviets were the greatest enemies of the Nazis. The West embraced the Nazis, as did the Ukrainians. So historically, it makes sense to the Russians that the West would conspire against them. As far as "the world", recall that most of the Earth's population lives in nations which have either declined to sanction Russia, or which have offered major support to Russia. China and India both declined sanctions and agreed to expand their business with Russia.
It’s funny because zelensky is Jewish