• Aria
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        1 year ago

        The problem with the RFA source is the CIA funding, not that it’s in English. It’s pretty disingenuous to try to imply Newizu is pro-Putin or anti-imperialist, or anti-west or anything else that would qualify as a separate bias or agenda.

    • Tankiedesantski [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      I searched for her name and despite the RFE article being a week old, no other more credible outlets have picked up on it. Maybe other outlets are using a different romanization of her name but this is certainly a red flag.

    • socsa@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      It literally isn’t. RFE is definitely a US propaganda platform, but it objectively has nothing to do with the CIA these days. But you should probably check under your bed one more time just to make sure.

      • Zuzak [fae/faer, she/her]@hexbear.net
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        RFE also “objectively” had nothing to do with the CIA for nearly 20 years after it was created, at which point it turned out the CIA had been funding it all along. But now we know they’ve stopped because they said they did, and anyone suggesting that they’re not editorially independent is a paranoid loon, just as they would’ve been in the 50’s and 60’s.

        Some of us don’t believe that the people whose job it is to lie stopped lying because they said they did. Suggesting that the CIA is still doing things that they did regularly and successfully kept hidden in the past is not a conspiracy theory.

      • 420blazeit69 [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        The CIA routinely funds groups covertly. As is the case with RFE, we are often able to confirm this covert funding decades later.

        A main purpose of the CIA is to obscure what groups the U.S. supports. Did they just stop doing their job one day?

    • Zaroni@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Compared to Russian sources radio free liberty is a baron of truth and press accountability, so frankly it does not matter.

      • RegularGoose@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        A shitty source not being the absolute worst source doesn’t make it any less shitty than it is. If your only options for news are US government propaganda or Russian government propaganda, the only valid choice is to stop following the news.

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      1 year ago

      The makers of this map, Freedom House, receive funding mainly from the US government. They also took money from BAE Systems, Britain’s biggest arms manufacturer.

        • BigNote@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          The argument would be that their findings are therefore somehow tainted and unreliable. However, without any evidence that this is so, simply pointing it out as if it’s some kind of “gotcha” is in fact fallacious, as you suggest.

      • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz
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        Yeah, well it might not be the best source, but at least they have a map that measures something interesting. The second best option would have been the map of press freedom index. It’s not quite the same things and it isn’t entirely relevant to the conversation either, but there you go. At least it tells you something about the attitude different countries have towards the media, which may or may not be associated with the attitude towards activists. This map also paints a slightly more nuanced picture, but the conclusion is largely the same as before.

        See also: Wikipedia

    • ☭ Blursty ☭
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      …and Russia seems to be in the same group with most of Africa Middle East and Asia. Considering this context, the news article doesn’t seem surprising at all. Just another sad day in American brain dead news for morons.

      Honestly how do you people manage to tie your shoelaces?

    • Piye
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      1 year ago

      So is Turkey, your NATO ally who bombs minorities and steals other peoples cultural heritage. Stop being a hypocrite

      • socsa@lemmy.ml
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        Big words from someone who just brought three different forms of sharia law into BRICS.

        I still don’t fucking understand why tankies simp so hard for this shit. It’s like you are trying to prove that your philosophy is no deeper than “America bad.”

      • BigNote@lemm.ee
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        Unfortunately NATO wasn’t designed in a way that conceived of a rogue member state like Turkey. This means that it has a very limited toolkit for reigning in Erdogan’s excesses. He also has a huge amount of leverage due to Turkey’s pivotal role on the Black Sea which is obviously critical to everything happening in Ukraine. For now, NATO really does have its hands tied with regard to Turkey.

      • Kata1yst@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        The best and last argument of dumb tankies is whataboutism. Thank you for your insightful contribution.

          • ZILtoid1991@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            Lemmygrad 🤡

            (Also Putin is not a communist, but a post-fascist masquerading as an anti-fascist)

            • Duży Szef [he/him]
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              Also Putin is not a communist, but a post-fascist masquerading as an anti-fascist

              Wow, so you do actually have eyes! Fucking hell, you are raising my respect for you!

              Fun fact, I would nothing but for Putin to get hanged. But not by American imperialists and their lapdogs, but by the russian proletariat for the reestablishment of an RSFSR.

              So sorry buddy. It seems your assumption about me has been wrong, I suggest lurking more before speaking about your opponents.

    • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 year ago

      Russian pacifists want Russia to stop invading Ukraine.

      Lemmygrad / Hexbear pacifists want Ukraine to appease Russia and give up territory.

      They are not the same.

      • trot [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        Russian pacifists want Russia to stop invading Ukraine.

        Western “pacifists” want to send NATO tanks to Ukraine.

        They are not the same.

        Russian anti-war activists have a correct position.

        But an important consideration should be whether one’s actions actually contribute to Russia withdrawing sooner, or if they instead help justify further, equally self-interested NATO involvement in the war.

        Unless you are Russian, it’s most likely the latter.

        There are two imperialist blocs involved in the conflict, and it doesn’t matter which one of them technically started it.

        • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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          There are two imperialist blocs involved in the conflict, and it doesn’t matter which one of them technically started it.

          I’m sorry, but when it involves one imperialist bloc invading a smaller country, then it does matter.

          Do you have the same position regarding the Vietnam war, Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan? Or do you only support whichever side is not aligned with the US?

          • Zuzak [fae/faer, she/her]@hexbear.net
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            The Vietnam War? You mean the one where a rebel faction backed by Russia rose up against a smaller, recently established pro-Western government, and the US came to the defense of that government, because if they lost the enemy would surely keep expanding more and more across the entire region, and all the peace advocates were dismissed as supporting appeasement? That Vietnam war?

            Yes, we take a similar position on that as we do to this, do you?

            • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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              Vietnam was opposing a puppet government imposed by the US.

              The Ukrainians opposed a Russian puppet government in 2013.

              Do you support both Vietnam and Ukraine?

              • Zuzak [fae/faer, she/her]@hexbear.net
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                I support both the Vietnamese fighting against the South Vietnam puppet government and the Ukranians in the DPR fighting against the current Ukrainian puppet government, yes (though my support for the latter is more critical since they’re not communists)

                • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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                  You did not answer my question.

                  Did you support the Ukrainians rebelling against their government back in 2013. Or do you only support a side if that side happens to oppose the US?

          • trot [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            I literally said that

            Russian anti-war activists have a correct position.

            Are you aware that it’s possible to want neither NATO tanks nor Russian tanks in Ukraine?

            You can even make sure you are consistent with both things in action 100% of the time - it’s a neat little trick called “opposing the position of your own government”.

            • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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              Are you aware that it’s possible to want neither NATO tanks nor Russian tanks in Ukraine?

              I am.

              But do you believe Ukraine is able to maintain their territory protected from Russia without NATO’s weapon supply?

              • Sphere [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.net
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                He most likely doesn’t believe Ukraine is able to maintain their territory protected from Russia with NATO’s weapon supply, and for good reason, given how clearly this is demonstrated by the utter failure of the vaunted counter-offensive. The only thing your position is really advocating is the useless deaths of vast numbers of Ukrainians (and Russians, for that matter).

                • The only thing your position is really advocating is the useless deaths of vast numbers of Ukrainians (and Russians, for that matter). [emphasis mine]

                  They never admit it, but the fact that Russian deaths will continue is one of if not the main reason these NATO dronies are fine with sacrificing the lives of all those Ukrainians they pretend to care about. Spoiler warning: they don’t actually care about Ukrainians. But they’ll still couch it in terms as if they’re “supporting Ukraine.” Such “Ukraine supporters” are either completely, pathetically fooled by obvious NATO propaganda or they are just bloodthirsty bigots (or both, which is most often the case).

              • trot [he/him]@hexbear.net
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                No, just as it would be unable to resist NATO in being turned into a far-right paramilitary-led banana republic if Russia were to suddenly withdraw without any decrease in NATO involvement.

                But the beauty of the neat little trick above is that if the working classes of both sides correctly oppose their respective ruling classes’ interests, we can end up with a scenario where both sides lose - objectively the best outcome for the Ukrainian people, as well as everyone else.

                The Russian anti-war activists are clearly holding up their end of the bargain. Why are you not holding up yours?

                • CamaradeBoina [comrade/them, any]@hexbear.net
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                  Exactly this.

                  Revolutionary defeatism is the name of the word. Those who should be concerned with Russian imperialism must be russian working class people.

                  We in the west have to fight against our own imperalists. It’s very simple and in the end very logical.

                • orizuru@lemmy.sdf.org
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                  The Russian anti-war activists are clearly holding up their end of the bargain. Why are you not holding up yours?

                  Ah! To be young and naive enough to believe that the anti-war activists in Russia have any leverage. They will all end up in Siberia or jumping out of a window.

                  Any regime change in Russia will come from the oligarchs, and the Russian working class will still be in a bad position (if not worse).

          • AntiOutsideAktion [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            The second you call Russia’s actions imperialist you just broadcast that you’re someone who just uses words for their impact and not their meaning and you should be completely disregarded in any conversation on the topic

            • SeaJ@lemm.eeOP
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              TIL invading other countries and annexing their territories does not qualify as imperialism.

              • AntiOutsideAktion [he/him]@hexbear.net
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                It can involve that. But you’re using imperialism to “accuse them of what you’re doing before they can” by flattening all history and context away.

                Russia is defending itself from encirclement. Acting like you’re against imperialism rings hollow when you only apply it to an act of resistance to your empire expanding.

                • Encirclement by what? Countries that don’t like to suck off Russia anymore?

                  Maybe Russia should act less like an authoritarian mafia state and then its neighbours wouln’t turn away from it. Food for thought

      • InappropriateEmote [comrade/them, undecided]@hexbear.net
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        No, we want Ukraine to stop trying to ethnically cleanse the Donbas and give the people there self determination. And we want the Ukrainian government to stop forcibly conscripting people to go die needlessly on the front in a clearly losing war. We want NATO to stop enabling all of that (it literally wouldn’t be happening if they weren’t demanding that it continue). That’s what it is to be a peace activist. And I’m fairly sure I can speak for all of us, we are not pacifists, lol. But we are advocates for peace and the end to the horrible and needless loss of life.

        Nice try to completely twist reality, and completely misrepresent us, as you war mongering dronies always do.

        Edit: We actually give a shit about all the Ukrainian people being thrown into a fucking meat grinder. We care about their lives. The people who just say “more weapons to Ukraine!” do not give a shit about the lives of the people there. They’re happy to just let the war keep dragging on until the last capable Ukrainian is dead. An example of how WE feel about the tragedy of the situation: https://hexbear.net/post/503747 (hexbear link to a lemmygrad news post)

      • Zuzak [fae/faer, she/her]@hexbear.net
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        Adding “jailing pacifists for speaking out” to the things dronies openly support, along with forcing others to fight when they’re not willing to, poisoning civilians with generations of birth defects, and giving cluster bombs to Nazis.

        The moral high ground, ladies and gents amerikkka-clap

  • Piye
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    This news story is over a year ago, and the US locks up people all the time for political reasons