[DoctorOW]

> Clear case of "motive justifies the means".

Except, in the case of RT, it was not justified in an abstract way at all. Consistently "reporting" on stories counter-indicated by all available evidence.

To put it another way, if a judge can imprison a murderer for life as justified by the motive of reducing murders, what's stopping them from imprisoning everyone with no justification at all? Well, in practice the evidence required is quite a hurdle to this.

If you're not arguing that RT is innocent of what it has been accused, then you're arguing against the concept of punitive action outright.

[vintermann]

It used to be common sense among non-authoritarians, that propaganda just becomes more potent from suppression.

Plenty of people have never seen moon hoax theorists' propaganda. They imagine if they see it, they'll quickly see through it for its absurdity. But they're often wrong. Moon hoax theorist's propaganda is actually much better than you think. They can point out lots of "inconsistencies", which do have an explanation, but aren't immediately obvious at all. You see they have experience meeting people like you, but you don't have experience meeting people like them.

I used moon hoaxers as an example because their sophisticated propaganda actually have been exposed and explained a few times, although it still isn't common knowledge why e.g. it seems the exact same rock is right behind an astronaut in two different photos. But that isn't nearly as true for suppressed ideologies. You haven't heard their arguments.

[DoctorOW]

Your example of moon landing theories isn't an apt comparison because you're picking a fringe group. RT already had millions of international followers on Facebook, YouTube, etc., often more than high quality journalism outlets. I've been online long enough to see RT showing up uninvited in my feeds before.

Consider the cost of the sites I listed. Literally, how do you pay these companies? With the monetization of your attention, first and foremost. Good journalism costs money to produce, leaving good journalists unable to be the highest bidder.

[vintermann]

Point is, you should be glad the attempt at censoring RT fails pretty bad.

If it had been more effective, more people would become very impressed the first time they came across a new to them, consistent (more or less!) narrative universe in which the bad guys are the good guys. Not only that, but their narrative incorporates a bunch of entirely true, verifiable damning truths about "our" side.

[DoctorOW]

> Verifiable damning truths about "our" side

I don't have a side in terms of a political entity or official, I'm defending evidence-based action. I genuinely think my life is better because I don't have to defend anyone uncritically, but you're welcome to try and change my mind I guess lol

[vintermann]

"Our" side in that particular context obviously means NATO, the US, the five eyes countries, the west etc. Take your pick.

And yes, I think you have a side, and I think these groups' foreign policies are 1. Very far from being simply "evidence based" and 2. Not in any meaningful sense under democratic control.

Have you ever wondered why so many people actually turn up to vote for Putin in Russia, even though they don't really influence anything by doing so?

I think they have simply decided that it's easier to want what they can have. Learn to like the taste of the only course that's on the menu.

And I also think that attitude is very common in the western world.

[zahlman]

> Consistently "reporting" on stories counter-indicated by all available evidence.... If you're not arguing that RT is innocent of what it has been accused

Can you give a concrete example? (Somehow I cannot recall ever seeing one proactively volunteered, in years of people denigrating RT on the Internet.)

[DoctorOW]

Sure, they reported that Jewish individuals had to flee Ukraine due to a Nazi takeover and a supposed ongoing genocide. There's no evidence of the fleeing or the genocide happening. This was one of the false narratives cited in the EU court's ruling.

> Somehow I cannot recall ever seeing one proactively volunteered

I err on the side of brevity, not seeing a claim that RT's removal was unjust in the comment I was responding to, I felt no need to justify it myself.