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by pastacacioepepe 1577 days ago
Good question. Most of the news you read about the conflict are fake at the moment.

Videogames footage has been used, old footage from years ago as well. The western media even used footage of Ukraine soldiers committing crimes of war, branding them as Russian soldiers, in the general indifference.

You have to understand, that as of now the western media have entered the war propaganda mode. If you want to inform yourself neutrally you can't trust anyone media alone.

I watch the Russia Today (RT) streams on YouTube. It's good to have a differing point of view. I don't take everything they say as granted, neither I so that with western media. There are also a few western youtube channels trying to do objective reporting on the conflict, my favorite one is S2 Underground.

3 comments

> I watch the Russia Today (RT) streams on YouTube. It's good to have a differing point of view.

How does watching a state-controlled propaganda channel offer a "differing point of view"?

Isn't the goal to be exposed to truth, as opposed to a smorgasbord of different forms of propaganda?

Is it that you want want to understand what the perspective of someone who lives in Russia is going to be, acknowledging that the average person's information sources are likely highly state-propaganda-filtered?

I watch both western and eastern media because I don't trust either. By putting together information from both sides, I try to get an objective point of view.

Anyway I must say, the west has put out many more lies for what I've seen so far.

Just think about that from a logical perspective: if you start your proof with false axioms, you can never produce anything true. You can only produce a universe of internally-consistent false statements.

The only way out of the propaganda trap is to find organizations that legitimately care about good journalism. They definitely exist!

One place to start might be Wikipedia, the culture there is very much "organize knowledge" as opposed to "achieve some political end".

> One place to start might be Wikipedia, the culture there is very much "organize knowledge" as opposed to "achieve some political end".

There's a crowd right now trying to remove any reference to neo-nazism in the Azov Battalion wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Azov_Battalion&ac...

Please go ahead and verify it yourself. Among this crowd there are the same people that curate the sections about the Uyghur oppression in China. I don't fully trust Wikipedia either for these reasons.

> Just think about that from a logical perspective: if you start your proof with false axioms, you can never produce anything true. You can only produce a universe of internally-consistent false statements.

I strongly disagree. By watching propaganda from both sides, I can easily understand what are the interests in play and what is each side's reasoning. By confronting it then with the rest of the independent information I can form a cohesive opinion. I won't trust anyone to provide me with "news" at the moment. We have to do the hard job and create our news with the sparse information available.

> There's a crowd right now trying to remove any reference to neo-nazism in the Azov Battalion wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Azov_Battalion&ac...

There are always going to be people trying to push certain agendas anywhere.

There's a major difference between an organization whose overarching goal is to produce accurate information, and an organization whose overarching goal is to push for some kind of political gain.

I checked the article you linked to and there's a reference to neo-nazism in the opening paragraph. So your example seems to indicate that Wikipedia is able to withstand ideological attacks (which agrees with my general impression).

> I can easily understand what are the interests in play and what is each side's reasoning.

While I can see that it would be hard to get a feel for what different actors' motivations are from raw facts, I believe that you would still need them as a baseline to understand the propaganda. And it sounds like a lot of (error-prone) work!

Although I speak from ignorance as I am not on any social media and am pretty extreme about filtering my information sources. But I have to say, having had conversations with two people who take this approach, that I am skeptical: both have ended up with very strange/distorted world views and have trouble trusting any institutions (Which makes sense! A core goal of someone trying to destroy a system is to undermine its credibility!)

Wouldn't the best perspectives be those unaffiliated with either side in the conflict?

Ok sure, you may wish to discount "western" media, but Russia is directly involved in the conflict, and has a vested interest in the outcome. They are ground zero for propaganda.

Shouldn't you go for something like Hindustati Times or Al Jazeera for more "neutral" stance?

Nobody has a neutral stance at the moment. That's why I watch both sides. The NATO propaganda is shoved down my throat while I browse the web, watch tv, talk with a neighbour. For the Russian propaganda I go to the RT streams.
I've taken a minute to read through your other comments after referring people to state run propaganda on this one, and it's a whole lot of misinformation about the war. I have my own thoughts on your account origin but either way I hope hn has some antibodies against this.
My account is 5 years old and I'm Italian. I have no interest in supporting any particular side, only for the truth to come out.