"A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes" – Author unclear
Can we talk about the supposedly "cosmonauts arriving in the ISS wearing Ukraine's color" for a moment by the way? I saw that news posted at least 3 times today on HN, and it has been pushed all days on the front page on all media over here, I even got a notification on my phone from news outlets. But looking deeper into this: it seems like they've been using said suits since at least 2015, yet news outlet have _zero_ doubt this is a political message from the cosmonauts.
I've been trying to take a step back from "news from the Ukrainian front" for a few days now to preserve my mental health and it's disturbing to notice just how heavily certain things are being pushed by media to fit a certain narrative, I'm in no way a Kremlin sympathizer but I truly feel like I'm "on the other side" and forced to buy into a certain idea of the truth.
"further EU approximation will not be achieved so easily. There is frustration in Kiev that a deeper relationship with the EU has not brought a membership perspective or the kind of large-scale financial assistance that new member states have received." (2018)
And the cost of gas continues to go up while crude goes down (3) and we are doing what would have been unthinkable in 2019, pushing more domestic drilling. (4)
I have to admit I worked in "news" a few years back. Since then I mostly refrain from the dopamine kick of reading news (or headlines).
Imho news is like a mix of slot machine (aka Skinner Box) and a 'Confirmation Bias Machine'. Our brain is wired to prefer new things. Especially if we have the delusion this new thing (or information) might benefit us in some way.
What I found enlightening was the late Hans Rosling's idea (in his book Factfulness) that one roughly consumes (on average) about 10.000 news pieces a year (about 30 per day). And that one should ask oneself how many of them trigger or at least influence a relevant decision one makes/has to make.
How much of news is noise vs. signal?
To me this combination of low signal-to-noise ratio and addictive quality of media/news consumption while fostering my confirmation bias was enough to change jobs and turn my back to news.
Given the additional fact of massive propaganda in war times (or any crisis) would only be the icing on the proverbial cake.
In 2021 they were using the blue suit. In 2022, they switched back to the blue/yellow suit.
It's just a coincidence that those colors happen to align with the Ukrainian colors, and therefore not newsworthy /s.
They were different teams of russians. Each team gets to choose their own colors.
The one in 2014 ( "Oleg Artemyev" ) and the one in 2022 ( "Oleg Artemyev" ) are the same person/team? Maybe yellow is mr artemyev's favorite color. But whatever.
The colors don't "align with the Ukrainian colors". The suits are predominantly yellow with navy blue and a substantial part of the blue is from the Russian flag on their chests.
The Ukrainian flag is yellow and light blue, not yellow and navy blue. I don't know why everyone's saying it's the same colors.
"The Russian astronauts did not say anything that would suggest that their clothing was a political statement. Yet it seemed difficult to believe it was happenstance." -- NY Times
"It was unclear what, if any, message the yellow uniforms they changed into were intended to send." -- The Guardian
"It's not yet clear what message the cosmonauts were trying to send. But when asked about the yellow suits, Artemyev said that every crew chooses their own." -- NPR
I'm not sure this qualifies as "_zero_ doubt". Every news outlet I've seen indicates that the Russians said it was because of excess fabric, etc. And every headline has indicated they arrived in yellow and blue jumpsuits, which, of course, they did.
>> In politics, a dog whistle is the use of coded or suggestive language in political messaging to garner support from a particular group without provoking opposition. The concept is named for ultrasonic dog whistles used in shepherding, which are audible to dogs but not humans. Dog whistles use language that appears normal to the majority but communicates specific things to intended audiences. They are generally used to convey messages on issues likely to provoke controversy without attracting negative attention. One example may be the use of the phrase family values in the United States to signal to Christians that a candidate would support policies promoting Christian values without alienating non-Christian supporters.[1] Another may be the use of the phrase "international bankers" to signal to racists that a candidate is antisemitic without alienating non-racist supporters.[2]
However, since this story is a different topic, it "is" not an example of dog whistling.
We are swimming in a sea of patterns at all times, but unfortunately we often cannot see the ones that are there - but luckily(?), this is compensated for by often seeing ones that are not there!
"Think you of the fact that a deaf person cannot hear. Then, what deafness may we not all possess? What senses do we lack that we cannot see and cannot hear another world all around us?"
> ...they were wearing flight suits of striking colors — yellow and blue, similar to the colors of Ukraine’s flag.
> The Russian astronauts did not say anything that would suggest that their clothing was a political statement. Yet it seemed difficult to believe it was happenstance. The outfits worn by astronauts in orbit on a daily basis tend to be subdued...
Edit: the parent commenter originally said "Citation please." without any elaboration.
To accurately convey the NYT article, it’s necessary to quote more of it:
> The Russian astronauts did not say anything that would suggest that their clothing was a political statement. Yet it seemed difficult to believe it was happenstance. The outfits worn by astronauts in orbit on a daily basis tend to be subdued. But recent crews from Russia have worn vibrant flight suits of various colors during their arrival, including Yulia Peresild, an actress who arrived on the station in November in a bold red coverall.
> Eric Berger, a space reporter at the website Ars Technica, said the flight suits are usually prepared and packed months in advance but that substitutes could have been added among the last items to be loaded on the spacecraft.
> Eric Berger
> @SciGuySpace
> I still haven't found anyone who really knows why the Russian cosmonauts wore yellow flight suits (with Ukraine blue highlights) to board the ISS. However, this is a revealing answer from the mission commander. Just wild if they smuggled these suits on board.
> Katya Pavlushchenko
> @katlinegrey
> Replying to @Ian_Benecken
> They. We’re asked about the color of the suits, and Oleg answered, there was too much yellow fabric accumulated in the warehouse Except that, just usual greetings and best wishes.
> Jonathan McDowell, a scientist at the Harvard Center for Astrophysics who closely follows space missions, suggested the colors might actually be those of Bauman Moscow State Technical University, which all three of the astronauts — Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveev and Sergey Korsakov — attended. An official from the university spoke as a guest on the Russian livestream of the launch on Friday.
> Jonathan McDowell
> @planet4589
> It is actually plausible that the 'Ukrainian' color flight suits are in fact "Bauman University" color suits. They made a big deal of this being the first all-Bauman crew. (BMGTU is sort of Moscow's MIT AeroAstro and many Russian astronauts are graduates)
Apologies, I may have extended my experience of French media to the rest of the world, I got news titles clearly stating "Cosmonauts wearing Ukraine's colors as sign of protest against the war" (paraphrasing).
>I’ve seen a couple of articles about it, neither offered a conclusion.
You seem completely out of touch on how propaganda works. Nobody reads the headline anymore, and news websites know it better than anything else. If the headline presents the news from a particular slant and then questions that slant in the 6th paragraph that 99.9999% of people coming across the article never read, that doesn't make the article not misinformation.
Read the threads on reddit on the topic. 100k+ upvotes, thousands of comments all showing that this sort of propaganda works beautifully.
yeah and let's ignore it's also their university colors and Kazakhstan flag colors from where they are taking off
And speaking about supporting UA with colors same happened with Chinese CCTV news anchor where someone completely changed colors of her dress from green to blue and then spread this changed image for Ukrainian propaganda purposes all over social media, you can see social media photo and real colors in video here:
It is hard to do a search on the topic that isn't overwhelmed with 100 large and small new sites all reporting the same thing.
However, thinking critically, what are the odds that these colors just happen to perfectly align with the Ukrainian flag? Also, I've never see any space suite, from any country, in a yellow color. I've at least attempted to find evidence that they've used yellow suits before, but haven't found any. At this point I feel like I'm trying to prove a negative, and would ask anyone who claims that these yellow suits have been used before to please provide evidence.
On the other hand, I doubt those space suits were made in the last 2 weeks.
Reading the above article on the subject I notice a few interesting things. First, the suits were allegedly made some moths ago in the colors of the crews alma mater. They all have the same alma mater? Seems strange.
Second, the article says: "Every crew picks a color that looks different. It was our turn to pick a color," said the cosmonaut. "The truth is, we had accumulated a lot of yellow fabric, so we needed to use it up. That's why we had to wear yellow flight suits." -- They got to pick their colors, and picked yellow because they had extra fabric and HAD to choose yellow? This seems self contradictory. It also doesn't mention alma mater. There's 3 different explanations put forth by the article.
To top it all off, I haven't seen anything about these suits having existed since 2015 like you claim.
I'm not convinced the suits of a space agency were really determined by the amount of excess fabric they had lying around.
You know what happened in 2014? We just don't know why does everyone feel the need to be right and no one can admit that from an external point of view SOMETIMES you just can't know the real reason behind actions of other people.
In Russian cosmonauts: suits are not inspired by Ukrainian flag, the AP reported that the colors were chosen six months ago.
> Cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev said each crew picks the color of the flight suits about six months before launch because they need to be individually sewn. And since all three of them were graduates of Bauman Moscow State Technical University, they chose the colors of their prestigious alma mater.
>But looking deeper into this: it seems like they've been using said suits since at least 2015, yet news outlet have _zero_ doubt this is a political message from the cosmonauts.
The action here was not by choosing Ukrainian flag suits. Like in USSR back then and today in Russia it works in a quantum mechanics way, ie. the suits were already there and those cosmonauts and others involved around instead of paying political correct attention and blocking/replacing those suits - as everybody obviously understood the reaction these suits would produce - they just played dummy and used these suits "Oh! these are just what we've always been using."
That was pretty much my thought. Their alma mater's colors and the use of this color at some other point in the past decade gave them minimally plausible deniability. I don't completely discount the possibility of coincidental timing, but on balance I think that protesting their government's actions is plausible.
The most valuable lesson people should learn is to be skeptical, or at least look for validation in hopefully uncorrelated sources. Not that it's an easy thing today. When the web first took over in the 90's many people thought that truth and facts would now be easier to see; instead it's even easier to spread whatever you want and people will believe it because it's on the internet. Sadly schools are failing to teach kids to validate and challenge everything; instead we get laws passed that require that kids never be shown anything that might make them upset. In the end much of society winds up believing whatever they are told because they have no framework to question anything.
I'm worn out by the news, the transparent propaganda on both sides, the screaming for war from some small but vocal groups, and the general feeling of doom when I think about what is happening in Ukraine.
I have no faith in the MSM any more, and I find the war news is also infecting other areas of life.
I think, having been bombarded with claims and counter claims for the last few years, and seeing media shutting down discussion that doesn't fit, I am utterly exhausted by it.
Here’s a disturbing trend I’ve seen lately: Putin will say something regarding Ukraine, like for instance there are biolabs there which may be used to create biological WMDs. Then right wing media in America starts making the same claim. Trusted conservative voices like Tucker Carlson will spend a good portion of his show talking about the topic, and then he gets rebroadcast in Russia. Meanwhile, whatever he said starts finding it’s way all over the place, including right here on HN. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30640741
It appears that what’s happening is Putin’s propaganda is being laundered through right wing media, causing conservative Americans to support Putin’s worldview without them even knowing it. I don’t think these people are Putin sympathizers, but many don’t realize they’re pushing his lines. How do we counter this?
> we are now in fact quite concerned that Russian troops, Russian forces, may be seeking to gain control of [those labs], so we are working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of Russian forces should they approach
If nothing dangerous is being done there, who cares if the Russians get a hold of them? I'm asking in good faith, because her attitude suggests these aren't just run of the mill labs.
If you think about it the whole thing is totally illogical, why would the US build top secret labs outside American soil, in a country famous for corruption and whose neighbor is the USA's archenemy? Its like moving the Pentagon to Moscow.
It seems tautological that biological research facilities would have biological agents in them? And not a distant stones throw to assume a portion of those under study should not be let out of their cages?
That is a substantively different claim than them having biological weapons or researching/producing such weapons, no? I'm not sure I understand your confusion unless you are conflating the two?
> I'm not sure I understand your confusion unless you are conflating the two?
And this is the whole point. This right here. Putin has made a very strong claim based on a kernel of truth. That kernel of truth is seized upon and amplified, which serves to amplify the original very strong yet fallacious claim.
- False Claim: Biolabs are being used by an American-supported Nazi regime to create a dangerous pathogen that will target Russians specifically with their DNA.
- Kernel of truth: Biolabs exist and have dangerous things in them. They are being funded by money that has Western sources.
- Laundered opinion: Biolabs are dangerous, we should do something about the biolabs.
- Amplified feedback: Everyone agrees the Nazi-run biolabs have deadly things in them! Here are western personalities that are also very concerned about the biolabs, so I think we're all in agreement. They are using these deadly things to produce WMDs that are going to kill us! We have to do something drastic to stop them from using these weapons against us!
Here's the thing about Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi and their substacks: they are part of that whole laundering of Russian propaganda. You have to stop and ask yourself why we are talking about biolabs at all in the first place. The reason is that Putin wants to talk about biolabs because a) he needs to bolster his case that Ukrainians are Nazis intent on killing Russians and b) he possibly is prepping for using biological/chemical WMDs himself, as Russians used this same kind of tactic in their previous aggressions: claim the other side is doing something, and then do that very same thing yourself.
So what happens after Putin makes these claims? Well then Tucker Carlson helpfully comes in and airs a program where he does not make the same exact claims Putin makes, but he does this schtick where he "just asks questions," where the questions he is asking are quite provocative and tacitly align with the Kremlin position. Then the rest of the right-wing chorus comes along and we're all talking about biolabs at different levels, but the whole conversation is being seeded by Putin. What he does then is loop back this chatter on Russian state media. He uses it to show that actually "a lot of people, even in the West" are talking about Ukrainian biolabs and that the whole thing is a legitimate concern.
Now there a may or may not be concerns about biolabs. I don't pretend to know much about biolabs, although it sure seems there are a lot of experts nowadays. But the point is whatever discussion we are having about biolabs is not organic, and we need to be highly attuned to that fact.
We also have to be attuned to the fact that people like Matt Taibbi and Glenn Greenwald were so wrong about Putin's intentions regarding Ukraine that they were shocked and flabbergasted when Putin actually crossed the border and began his slaughter. Matt Taibbi had to make a public apology based on how wrong he was. And the reason they were so wrong about this is because they have blinders on regarding Russia that have been erected over years, since at least 2016. These blinders prevented them from seeing the obvious: that Putin was amassing a huge force at Ukraine's borders in preparation for an invasion. Because what were they doing during this period? They were again, carrying Putin's water and parroting Putin's position that he was not going to invade at all. So really, I don't know how they have any credibility whatsoever at this point.
> Now there a may or may not be concerns about biolabs.
There are concerns about biolabs. Nuland said exactly that. She even used the word "concern".
They are - I'm guessing from the context - unique enough that the Russians don't have labs like this, otherwise who cares if the Russians capture them? Am I just ignorant about non-weapons biolabs here?
> Matt Taibbi and Glenn Greenwald were so wrong about Putin's intentions regarding Ukraine
OK. And? They've acknowledged this. If being wrong about a thing disqualifies all your future reporting, then I shouldn't believe anyone.
And if we're talking about people being wrong about Putin's intentions, go back and watch the media and Democratic politicians mock Romney when he suggested back in the 2012 Presidential Debates that Putin was a threat - but now I have to believe everything those people say but Greenwald and Taibbi are off limits?
I'm glad you did because he's a perfect example of what I'm talking about.
> There are concerns about biolabs. Nuland said exactly that. She even used the word "concern".
Greenwald did a great job directing you to the conclusion he wanted you to draw. Because even after, I assume, you've read his piece you still have the big question mark over your head, which is "what exactly is in the labs?" And that is the question that Putin wants on everyone's mind. That is the question he needs all over the internet. Because that question will also be on Russian minds, and Putin has filled in that blank with [WMDs designed to target Russians]. The bigger that question, the better Putin's lie works. Putin can't make that lie big on his own.
The counterintelligence term of art for Greenwald is that he's a "useful idiot" for Russia. Glenn Greenwald, as prolific a blogger he is, has no idea whatsoever about what's in those labs. But he's very sure that the utterance of the word "concern" has blown open the whole scheme. It's incredible to me that the whole piece you linked, over 2000 words, hinges on that one word. And now your opinion also hinges on that word.
Actually for all the talk about what's in the labs, it really does not matter. What matters is that everyone has a question about the labs, because when Russia attempts a false flag chemical weapon or biological attack, they will use the question on everyone's mind as a justification. It's called "muddying the waters" or as Steve Bannon put it "flooding the zone with shit". You and me sitting here on HN talking about biolabs is all part of manufacturing that justification.
> Am I just ignorant about non-weapons biolabs here?
Yes and so am I. So are 90% of us talking about the issue here. We have no business talking about biolabs. And yet it seems like all of the experts of biolabs are here on HN to tell us all of the nuance they've learned over the.... last few weeks since Putin wanted us all to be talking about Ukrainian biolabs.
> If being wrong about a thing disqualifies all your future reporting
It's about why they were wrong (100k troops on the border, tanks, equipment, and the US government saying that Russia is about to invade, yet they trusted Putin's word until the moment bombs started falling, when everyone else saw the obvious far in advance). They have blinders when it comes to Russia. They call Russian collusion a "hoax" (which again is also Putin's position) to this day even though Republican Senate investigators confirmed everything. Greenwald and Taibbi are consistently wrong regarding Russia and have been over a number of years.
What we witnessed last month during the build-up of the invasion was the resolution of two-competing worldviews constructed over a number of years. One worldview held that Putin is a master tactician, and a savvy genius who out-maneuvers the West consistently. The other worldview held that Putin is a psychopathic dictator, who is not a master tactician or even a good politician, but a thug and a tyrant. Predictions were made last month from these two competing camps and then they met reality; the reality that won was that Putin is a psychopath. So now you really have to call into question everything that was said from the people with the perspective that Putin is a genius tactician. How much of what they've argued had the wrong priors leading to faulty conclusions?
> go back and watch the media and Democratic politicians mock Romney when he suggested back in the 2012 Presidential Debates
Yes, maybe you shouldn't listen to those people either. This isn't about Republicans vs. Democrats, it's about wrong vs. right and who has a track record of being right about this topic. Perhaps we should all actually be listening to Mitt Romney a lot more!
> So now you really have to call into question everything that was said from the people with the perspective that Putin is a genius tactician.
Actually, the people who spent the last half-decade telling me that Putin was "playing chess" are the exact same people who are now telling me he's unhinged and mentally ill and that we need to send F-16s to Poland.
But really, the specifics don't matter to me.
Biolabs or not, doesn't matter. Putin is a genius with a legitimate beef or he's a nutjob with a brain tumor and short-man syndrome, doesn't matter. imo we should just be avoiding WW3. Everything else is secondary. Maybe that means Ukraine is not defendable.
It's probably good I'm in an armchair. But from where I'm sitting, the people who seem to be getting us closer to nuclear war are also the ones yelling "you're carrying water for Putin!" whenever anyone asks a question.
I was an adult during the Iraq War. I'm cynical, and that clouds my judgement.
> imo we should just be avoiding WW3. Everything else is secondary. Maybe that means Ukraine is not defendable.
This is called "appeasement", and when you practice it with aggressively expansionist dictators, all it gets you is lots of land conquered by them and people killed before you actually admit that they need to be stopped.
The difference here is that Putin has thousands of nukes. That means we can't "just stop" him. It sucks. If Hitler had nukes, Nazi Germany would probably still exist in some form.
I just don't see a viable endgame short of an internal Russian revolution that takes out Putin. Until then, the only truly defendable border stops at NATO. Ukraine is not in NATO.
> imo we should just be avoiding WW3. Everything else is secondary. Maybe that means Ukraine is not defendable.
I have to point out that this is also a Kremlin talking point, the idea that we should just let Russia have Ukraine because otherwise Russia will nuke the world, is literal Russian propaganda.
> the people who seem to be getting us closer to nuclear war are also the ones yelling "you're carrying water for Putin!" whenever anyone asks a question.
It's not "whenever anyone" asks a question, it's specifically when people who have steeped themselves in conservative media are saying the same things that the Kremlin is saying, almost in lock step. I understand you don't want to hear that your words are aligned with Russian propaganda, but that's what I see happening right now. The sentiments you are typing to me are the same sentiments I have seen for weeks coming from the Kremlin. My belief is that this is not organic.
I'm not calling you a Russian agent or anything, because I think I laid out clearly in my original post how you're getting to these conclusions. Obviously you read Greenwald, but are you also consuming the American conservative media that is being re-broadcast without censor on Russian state TV, because it's that on-message with typical Russian State TV broadcasts? If you are that would explain a lot.
And as far as the specifics of Putin's psyche not mattering to you, well I think it does. Because if you believe that Ukraine should surrender and that would be the best for everyone and avoid WWIII, you're tacitly making a judgement about Putin's psyche; you believe that if he gets Ukraine he would stop invading other countries. Because why wouldn't he, he's not crazy, right? Or maybe he is and he won't stop at Ukraine. If that's the case, surrendering Ukraine would not only not avoid WWIII, it would make it more likely because Russia would be emboldened and enriched. How you feel about that question speaks to how you feel about Putin, and what I understand from your comments to me, is that he's rationally attacking Ukraine for legitimate reasons that will be assuaged by ceding the country to him. Which, I for one, don't agree with.
> I have to point out that this is also a Kremlin talking point
Sigh.
Putin has nukes. Comparing him to say, Hitler - and wondering "what if back then we had acted earlier" - ignores this very important point. The present calculation is wildly different.
Look. I don't want to appease Putin. He is a bad guy. But he has nukes. Every possible outcome is far from optimal.
If that position happens to intersect with "Russian propaganda", so be it.
> he won't stop at Ukraine
Putin will not invade an actual NATO country. I have to believe that anyone arguing otherwise is just out of their mind. Maybe I'm being naive, but I really just don't see it happening.
> Obviously you read Greenwald, but are you also consuming the American conservative media
I'm a paying subscriber to the NYT and that's where I get most of my facts and "real news."
Yes, I roll my eyes at the opinion section and at the typical NYT commenter, but I consider their regular reporting to be about as close to the facts as you can get. However, yannow, the NYT was also telling us Iraq had WMD, so I don't just knee-jerk believe everything they publish.
I don't watch TV. When I go home and they're watching Fox News, I'm rolling my eyes there too. If anything, I'm a contrarian because we've been burned so many times when putting blind trust in the media.
> what I understand from your comments to me, is that he's rationally attacking Ukraine for legitimate reasons that will be assuaged by ceding the country to him
I would prefer Putin to not attack Ukraine. That said, there is a reason why Ukraine isn't in NATO - because it is not defendable. Why? Because Russia has nukes. That's how I read this. Whether Putin is acting rationally or not is irrelevant.
War drums are being beat but this time there are thousands of nukes pointed at us. What would you have us do?
EDIT:
> you're tacitly making a judgement about Putin's psyche; you believe that if he gets Ukraine he would stop invading other countries. Because why wouldn't he, he's not crazy, right? Or maybe he is and he won't stop at Ukraine.
You're also doing the same thing - assuming that Putin is insane enough to invade NATO but also not insane enough to launch a nuke. Which seems far less likely than Putin being "insane" enough to take Ukraine and stop once he hits NATO.
What if there's no avoiding WW3? Short of a collapse in Russia there doesn't seem to be a path back from this effort. Nothing in the past decade has put a damper on Putin's empire rebuilding.
Then Russell Brand goes and reads Greenwald's words, it's like a horrific game of telephone.
> Yes and so am I. So are 90% of us talking about the issue here. We have no business talking about biolabs. And yet it seems like all of the experts of biolabs are here on HN to tell us all of the nuance they've learned over the.... last few weeks since Putin wanted us all to be talking about Ukrainian biolabs.
Maybe we could innoculate our populace with truth that aligns with facts-on-the-ground? I mean inagine if russia dropped the biolabs propoganda and americans were like "yeah i know, my tax dollars help pay for that to preserve my nations interests abroad"
Its not hard to understand why people are uncomfortable injecting something harmful in small dose- but its how we develop a proper immune response. We need to think big picture biosecurity in information domain.
The pattern we tend to see is that it’s disinformation at the higher levels of distribution, but misinformation at the lower levels, like Facebook friends sharing health, politics, or racist propaganda between accounts.
There have been several write ups about how all of this works since the mid-2010s. One of the most fascinating and disturbing disinformation networks that I’ve ever ever seen is a 2020 analysis of the propaganda web network created by Mike Adams of NaturalNews.com by ISD:
To me, it looks like a foreign-influence operation intended to degrade and disrupt the exchange of free ideas in the US by injecting total nonsense into discussions about health and politics. A lot of Mike Adams’ disinformation is distributed as misinformation by unintended, and unwitting secondhand participants, like right-wing conservative blogs and pundits.
Edit: I forgot to mention that since this initial report came out in 2020, there’s been further revelations about how the NaturalNews network hired hackers to build their extensive network and help disseminate propaganda.
> Disinformation guru “Hacker X” names his employer: NaturalNews.com
I agree with most points in the blog except for the last point which struck me as a bit of misinformation itself.
> P.S. Yet another form of misinformation is political lies of the sort that we’ve been seeing most notoriously from Russian propaganda lately.
Considering that most russian media is banned/censored in the west, it's highly unlikely that we are seeing much russian propaganda. Instead, the political misinformation we've been seeing are western propaganda. Across all social media and all news platforms, it's been 24/7 western propaganda. Even here, we've had daily western propaganda. I don't remember a single russian propaganda post hitting the frontpage.
I don't think anyone can seriously claim the political misinformation we are experience are russian propaganda. It's most definitely anti-russian western propaganda. If I'm wrong, I'd love to see examples of social media or news stations/papers/etc that are running russian propaganda. Obviously russians in russia are being bombarded with russian propaganda. I doubt anyone in NY or columbia is.
> Considering that most russian media is banned/censored in the west, it's highly unlikely that we are seeing much russian propaganda.
Russian propaganda has always been distributed through channels that beyond Russian media. In the US, specifically, Russia has substantial influence with the American Left whose survival of the fall of the USSR into kleptocratic capitalist Russia is an...interesting arc, and has cultivated newer channels through the American far right (particularly White nationalist groups) as well. While there is almost certainly ongoing direct active influence through both groups, even beyond that plenty in both actively seek out Russian media (which, even though most has shut down operations in the west) is trivial to access from the West if you are actively seeking it out and repeat narratives received through it.
Hunter Biden’s lost laptop confirmed real by the New York Times this week. A video that was on it of him sitting nearly naked in a hotel room, smoking crack rocks, and telling a hooker how his last laptop was stolen by Russians and they were trying to blackmail him - completely skipped over.
When asked about the absolutely real laptop, she deflected to say it’s proven that Russians have been spreading misinformation.
You linked to an editorial in the wall street journal in another thread, but it seems like you didn’t actually read the times piece. The times confirmed that some of the emails in the email dump from the alleged laptop are authentic, that’s it. Which IIRC they reported back in 2020.
The times article doesn’t even discuss the video you’re referring to, and it doesn’t confirm that the laptop actually belonged to Biden. Maybe those things are true, maybe not, but as far as I can tell there’s no new information here.
I don’t know if they did, but did they do it before or after the election?
Because before the election, both SV and MSM were trying to shut the story down as “misinformation”. Only later (after the election) did I notice that it was quietly confirmed, but that was more convenient for Biden wasn’t it?
Russian propaganda works in a different way than western one. They know that they cant compete with western news behemots like CNN, BBC,... so they go alternative ways -- trying to get their message viral trough alternative channels like social networks. It's hard to notice by design, mostly because their goals is to conquer the west in a way -- they could not simply just say that "hey please break apart into small nations isolate on your own, then we can conquer you one by one". Because this is the core thing Putin wants to reach, and its hidden in plain sight, just read his main propagada philosopher's book summary: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics
They have got multiple modus operandi, the largest one is whataboutism, which is actually an old KGB disinformation tactic: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism#History . A great example is this tweet which was created on the day Russia attacked Ukraine: https://mobile.twitter.com/redfishstream/status/149689293121... (this went viral, was on the Reddit front page)The other one is to have a barrage of fake news (but it always contains a grain of truth), see how Russian officials reacted to the bombing of the maternity ward in Mariupo: First it was denied. They they said it was empty. Then that it was a base for the Azov batallion. Then that the photos were showing "crisis actors", it was staged. Then that the Azov batallion bombed it. And so on...
You can see the effect on Russian people, they do not trust their state at all. For example no one inside Russia believed in their vaccines causing one of the worst Covid infections.
There's another related phenomenon where a claim can be true and false at the same time yet many people get trapped attempting to prove the claim's veracity in a series of "no, actually..." proofs. Each party thinks they have the "actual" truth and both are just spinning around the same nebulous. Examples of this are hard to provide because they only spawn a new version of the controversy. The fantastic story "Sort By Controversial" gives you a glimpse into this occurrence. [0]
I like how he mentioned Russian propaganda, but completely ignores Ukrainian one which is uncritically published by all MSM.
These last two pandemic years taught me to have absolute distrust in MSM, since as we all seen difference between "misinformation" and truth is few months.
It seems this shrank during UA war from months to hours, the best examples immediately forgotten by MSM being famous Ghost of Kiev, Snake island hero zombie soldiers or Mariupol drama theater with 1000 dead/trapped people under rubble with moving satellite photo of KIDS sign yet NOT A SINGLE photo of anyone trying to rescue them, not a single ambulance, digger, dead body etc and let's ignore fact people spreading "misinformation" wrote about this bombing 3 days prior it on Twitter.
And speaking about supporting UA with colors same happened with Chinese CCTV news anchor where someone completely changed colors of her dress from green to blue and then spread this changed image for Ukrainian propaganda purposes all over social media, you can see social media photo and real colors in video here:
> Yet another form of misinformation is political lies of the sort that we’ve been seeing most notoriously from Russian propaganda lately.
Are you referring to propaganda that Russia is spreading or the labeling of anyone who disagrees with the common narrative as Russian propaganda? It would seem to be there's a lot more of the second going on. Likewise, as much misinformation as there is going around, there's just as much labeling things as disinformation in order wield political muscle, which was rampant for the last two years during covid.
This appears to be a strange self-conversation. You take words and twist them until they fit a point you wanted to make.
Apparently you believe in things that most don't believe and that have been labeled (by whom?) as Russian propaganda. What does this add or subtract to the article?
And if I dare say so: if others get the impression that ideas you share are propaganda it is worth reflecting how you formed these opinions/beliefs. We are all victims of one form of propaganda or anotherz so it is generally a good idea to sometimes question whether important beliefs are indeed true, and especially what it would take to falsify them. What could someone show to you to prove that your views are false?
My point is that the "misinformation" label has constantly been used as a cover to censor. Two cases in point:
1. To say that Covid may have originated in a lab would get you censored on youtube, facebook and most other social media. It was misinformation until it wasn't. Now the lab leak theory is just as viable.
2. When the story of Hunter Biden's laptop first broke, it was labeled by most mainstream media, along with 50 intelligence experts, as Russian propaganda. Now even the New York Times admits that it was authentic.
Why not link to the Times article on your second point? It’s more nuanced than you are making it seem. They’re just reporting that some of the emails in the email dump are authentic, not confirming the entire affair
Propaganda can be authentic. For example, during the 2016 election the Russians hacked the DNC and leaked the retrieved e-mails. They were authentic but they were also part of a propaganda campaign.
Hunter Biden’s laptop appears be authentic but it’s hard to tell what data and how much given the unknown provenance of the device. It was also clearly part of a smear campaign involving Rudy Giuliani, who himself has been caught literally spreading Russian propaganda. The heart of the whole Hunter Biden laptop issue was that it was being used to suggest that Pres. Biden was engaged in nefarious business deals with his son and China, which so far has not been proven, the laptop notwithstanding.
On measure given what Russia did in 2016, how the Republican Senate Intel Committee found that Trump and his associates willfully engaged with Russians to aid his campaign, and Trump’s clear assertion that he would engage in the same conduct in the future, the actions taken during 2020 seem prudent to me.
> When the story of Hunter Biden's laptop first broke, it was labeled by most mainstream media, along with 50 intelligence experts, as Russian propaganda. Now even the New York Times admits that it was authentic.
It’s seems impossible to have a nuanced discussion anything political.
Many parts of the story about Hunter Biden’s laptop were true, that doesn’t mean that the story was not propaganda.
The original NYPost story used the Trump team as sources, the story specifically cites Giuliani as the source of the emails seems like reason enough to doubt the veracity.
I agree that there's been too much of this lately. The lab leak one I fell for myself, feeling it was too conspiratorial, until Biden popped up on TV and said the US felt like the idea had legs. And then I felt stupid. But it was a good lesson in not drinking the whole cup of Kool-Aid.
Although I fell again for the Cosmonaut jumpsuit palaver :(
If you want a real kick in the gut… watch the videos and read the texts from Hunter Biden’s laptop. And know that it came out weeks before the election and literally everyone except the NY Post covered it up (and were censored for it).
I’ve seen more of Hunter Biden than I have ever wanted to see of any man.
Both Facebook and Twitter blocked sharing of the NY Post article. You couldn't even share it in a private message. Twitter froze the NY Post's twitter account saying they would unfreeze it once the NY Post took down the article.
> Facebook will no longer take down posts claiming that Covid-19 was man-made or manufactured, a company spokesperson told POLITICO on Wednesday, a move that acknowledges the renewed debate about the virus’ origins.
Disinformation = ungood news pushed by an enemy state. Propaganda = disinformation from your own state. Misinformation = ungood news pushed by the right. Fake news = ungood news pushed by the left.
So when I read "misinformation is ..." I already know it's the left complaining about the right.
Since the war I also noticed a fractal rabbit-hole flavor of the fog of war. You can be argued into oblivion because of past information. While trying to discuss with both camps I see incomplete arguments, referring to previous arguments, that refers to previous arguments. The current conflict being partly due to west/east tensions, birth of nato, cold war.. you can even go back to 1917 according to wikipedia. You can also read articles or books and may never be able to conclude anything [0]. I'm not sure it's coordinated fuzzing at the social level. Just say whatever and point fingers at "facts" so the other camp starts to wonder if there's something, meanwhile you keep doing what you do (invade).
No, I'm wondering if internet gave the idea to some state security agency to cook a mind vacuum by showing bits of potential evidence (1991 agreements, past aggressions, shifting blame) so that people will waste time and energy in sterile debate.
I was reading a series on a .ru sites about history of russian computing, whose author claimed a lot of faults with the soviet system that caused a their demise. But in the comments a few russians (or bots ... I don't know anything anymore at that point) were quick to point at that, the author analysis was fragile, giving him other data points about missing events, or developments.
All to say that even when you try to document yourself.. you never know the whole story. Unless maybe you start an absolute quest of truth to cross all data points. And even then, data can still be wrong (people might forget to record stuff, or deliberately ignore some).
Can we talk about the supposedly "cosmonauts arriving in the ISS wearing Ukraine's color" for a moment by the way? I saw that news posted at least 3 times today on HN, and it has been pushed all days on the front page on all media over here, I even got a notification on my phone from news outlets. But looking deeper into this: it seems like they've been using said suits since at least 2015, yet news outlet have _zero_ doubt this is a political message from the cosmonauts.
I've been trying to take a step back from "news from the Ukrainian front" for a few days now to preserve my mental health and it's disturbing to notice just how heavily certain things are being pushed by media to fit a certain narrative, I'm in no way a Kremlin sympathizer but I truly feel like I'm "on the other side" and forced to buy into a certain idea of the truth.