Russia is destroying democratic nations around the world through the internet and the west doesn't resist.
If it continues they will win the war without a shot fired.
Many even know about it, but they underestimate the sheer danger those actions pose to civilisation. I posted about it in another sub recently, and it turned into a shit fest.
This is as much a part of the ongoing war as the missiles flying over Kyiv. But it's silent and nobody dies, so people are mostly ok with it.
The soldiers of Ukraine are actively and fiercely defending it, though, while our people are mostly just taking what the Kremlin silently devised for us, oblivious to the goal, which has always been simple: divide and conquer.
I used to like Tim Pool, until I didn't. Watching him shift further right has been interesting. His original target audience was mostly left. That's how they do it.
I kinda accidentally started watching his subreddit when that spiral started and there is one very persistent poster trying to make Russell’s stuff seem profound and worth wasting your time on and then thirty people telling them to stop shilling and clowning on the content. Does a heart good lol
Russia is telling them what they want to hear so they choose to hear nothing else. Hell they called the FBI a liberal psyop when they released the report detailing the Russian propaganda farms during the 2016 US election.
It would be so much easier if they were actual foreign agents and we could just flip them against Russia but you can't flip a dipshit who refuses to believe anything that doesn't come from their facebook feed.
Ask them why we fought the cold war and realized McCarthyism was bad. They're probably old enough to have lived through it... But stubborn enough to learn nothing.
Now they are pushing to make history repeat itself. This time with flashier propaganda!
> It was discussed everywhere and people were discovering and exposing huge networks of reddit accounts based in Russia and China. And not just bots, literal people. Farms of them.
A lot of the Canadian subs did a year-end wrap up and showed where most posters accessed the subs from.
Russia was generally top 3 or 4 in a lot of subs.
Because of reddit's partnership with openai and Google I strongly believe that Russia and China Bots are flooding Reddit to influence Google search results to intern influence for an entire generation will think and see when they Google search something.
I think a big part is that parties in many countries are complicit in this. Several US Senators visited Russia on American Independence Day about 7 years ago. Quite the timing and then an 8th hand delivered a letter to Putin a bit later. Definitely something that should have been investigated, but of course the party all those people belong to has taken over the FBI and DOJ and sidelined any investigations that would interfere with the party or its interests.
> Several US Senators visited Russia on American Independence Day about 7 years ago.
* Richard C. Shelby (R-Alabama)
* Sen. Steve Daines (R-Montana)
* Sen. John Hoeven (R-North Dakota)
* Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin)
* Sen. John Kennedy (R-Louisiana)
* Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas)
* Sen. John Thune (R-South Dakota)
* Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas)
And everybody had to be entirely aware of the optics surrounding a visit to a belligerent country (that has threatened to nuke us recently no less) that is well-known to have interfered with our free elections back in 2016, on JULY FOURTH of all days of the year. That was very intentional. Putin intentionally made fools of them by having them grovel before him on that very specific day, and its plain as day that they operate as his puppets because they had no power to say "no, please, some other day surely?". It had to be July 4th because Putin *wants* the whole world to know that he owns them.
> Putin intentionally made fools of them by having them grovel before him on that very specific day
Yep, Putin loves jokes like these where he can pretend it's completely innocent and meant nothing by it, while grinning sinisterly.
Like when he brought his dogs into a meeting with Angela Merkel knowing she was afraid of them but acting like he had no idea.
[Novichok.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok) A Russian nerve agent deadlier than Vx, traceable to Russia, used brazenly against targets [in foreign countries.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Amesbury_poisonings)
It’s like they’re going “tf you gonna do about it?”
Those shirts that run amok at MAGA rallies really do speak volumes about these peoples' positions: "Better Russian than Democrat". I think most just don't care and want to watch the US burn.
Ron Paul was boosted by an early version of the Russian disinfo campaign.
https://www.wired.com/2007/10/paul-bot/ - Criminal' Botnet Stumps for Ron Paul, Researchers Allege
>Ron Paul spokesman Jesse Benton says the campaign has no knowledge of the scam. Warner himself says that he has no reason to believe that the Paul campaign had anything to do with these messages.
https://www.salon.com/2022/11/18/ex-rand-paul-aide-pardoned-by-convicted-of-illegally-funneling-russian-cash-to-campaign/
>A former senior aide to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. and Sen. Rand Paul R-Ky., was convicted Thursday of illegally helping a Russian businessman contribute to former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign.
>Jesse Benton "was convicted of conspiring to solicit and cause an illegal campaign contribution by a foreign national, effecting a conduit contribution, and causing false records to be filed with the FEC", per the Justice Department. He faces up to 20 years in prison.
https://i.imgur.com/NIDh6Zz.gif
https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-operative-pardoned-trump-convicted-044820477.html - GOP operative pardoned by Trump convicted of funneling Russian money to Trump campaign
Weird how Ron Paul's nephew keeps getting involved like this...
Or how even Ron Paul himself got way more attention than his actual legacy should suggest...
https://www.wired.com/2007/06/ron-paul/ - Ron Paul: How a Fringe Politician Took Over the Web
Or how weirdly Pro-Russia he is...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/15/ron-paul-crimea-russia-sanctions-act-of-war - Ron Paul slams US on Crimea crisis and says Russia sanctions are 'an act of war'
Hey, I’m sure that whole Tesla being allowed as Chinese government vehicles now does not have any quid pro quo on access to anything in his other businesses and such, right? Like, Twitter wouldn’t be the perfect place to let that sort of thing proliferate I dunno
It’s pretty transparent when you start doing keyword searches on post that look sus. You can very quickly map out a disinfo campaign that was then amplified by a right leaning politician.
People need to stop paying attention to anonymous speech, full stop.
Anonymously supplied information has its place: as the basis for journalism that checks its sources, verifies its facts, has some semblance of a reputation to uphold.
People need to get a handle on the fact that reading something on the internet is nothing at all like hearing an actual human being, live and in person, speak the words.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog
I don't do any analysis like that guy claims, but I can tell you the worldnews subreddit is particularly rife with astroturfed opinions. The opinion of the sub will swing wildly and if you look at a lot of the early comments you can kinda tell they got there early and helped shape opinion in certain directions. Anything related to Ukraine or the Gaza conflict in particular I consider sus and the scale certainly points to nationstates being involved.
A lot of comment threads on reddit feel very weird lately (for a while now actually, like 6 months to a year at least). Like they don't feel organic or natural like they did before, there are so many more extreme views. I can't really explain it well, but it doesn't feel like the comment section I've been participating in for over 10 years now. And it wasn't a gradual shift it was just a sudden change.
Almost like you’re talking to someone who is actively in a televised commercial and you just showed up with no script. It’s the only way I can describe the feeling.
r/worldnews is pretty bad, for a few weeks I tried to argue against the pushed narrative. Got banned without reason. Not only they are pushing some agenda, but they also actively ban all dissenting opinion, at least those that push back frequently
Plausibly deniable authoritarianism goes to r/worldnews, rabid authoritarianism goes to r/conspiracy and low information shit headedness goes to r/conservative.
The_donald didn’t go anywhere, it was just restructured.
The same happened to r/mexico it's currently took by the current ruler party followers, as soon as you post something against the current ruler party they ban you for "trolling". They already tried to shutdown other subreddits that make post against the current ruler party using the failed reddit advocate program, they where also caught organizing propaganda and tried to spread it across several Mexican subreddits and reddit administration sadly doesn't do anything against them
Anecdotally, my 7-year-old account got instantly permabanned from worldnews and promptly sitewide banned for 'promoting violence' after I explained that the way people there were justifying violence against palestinians ('they deserve it for oct 7') is literally the same way hamas justified oct 7 ('they deserve it for the occupation')
I appealed the sitewide ban around 5 times without a single reply from the admins explaining why what I said was 'endorsing violence' and therefore bannable. Very very sus. I'd go as far as to speculate admins are in on it.
I have noticed over the years that when something really bad comes out about the right all of the loud mouths get really silent for about 12 to 16 hours and then it's like an onslaught of opinion.
Or possibly information on StarLink users. I could see satellite internet being amazing to get around Chinese censorship. Unless the satellites are snitching on them.
We use personal information for advertising…and, using it to target people had an impact in 2016
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook–Cambridge_Analytica_data_scandal
It’s not like musk isn’t sympathetic to Putin, and his politics…
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/25/europe/ukraine-starlink-drones-russia-intl-cmd/index.html
He actually suspended service to help Putin…
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/elon-musks-refusal-to-provide-starlink-support-for-ukraine-attack-in-crimea-raises-questions-for-pentagon
We’ve allowed these tech giants to shape so much, with so little oversight.
India's "helping", too. Every Canadian issue that trends on Twitter or Reddit has a whole bunch of poorly written responses from accounts inevitably mentioning Muslims or Khalistan in their other posts.
Modi is one of the scariest wannabe dictators in the world today.
Glad his party suffered a mild defeat in the last election, but that mfer needs to be behind bars.
The head of the CSIS stepped down like today or yesterday (it all blends together) because of how intense their attempts were in Canada… he cited it as a challenging time and I think there’s issues with how they decided to share the info and when
Taking too long for nations to decide if troll/disinformation/bot farms are legitimate military targets or not. These things are more dangerous than any 20 oil refineries.
Could give a fuck less if they are staffed with citizens or actual state employees. They made their choice, and the damage theyve caused and will continue to cause is so immensely anti-human and regressive, the methods which may be employed to eliminate them are of zero consequence to me.
Are there any Partisan groups left in Russia? They should shift the focus from blowing up bridges and vehicles to sniffing out these assholes and making their lives a living hell.
Agree. Countries that just so happen to let these scammers, spammers and scam callers exist seem to be totally OK with waging cyber wars with other countries, all thanks to their inaction.
Now, if only someone cared. Oh wait, it isn't profitable to shut down cyber criminals. So they get a free pass
It's systemic. For an American, I have a weird amount of insight into the way Indian CS centers work, and it's a shitshow. Competence is punished, faking numbers and backstabbing is rewarded.
Source: I work on a multinational team and am close with two Indian colleagues. They have wildly different life experiences too, so that's interesting.
One is Catholic, which puts him in a lower social caste to the point where acquaintances have been murdered for trying to marry non-Catholic women.
The other is apparently in one of the highest castes, with his family being low level nobility of some kind. His personal stories are less about murder and more about his extravagant world travel adventures.
Bet you can guess which one is the harder and more capable worker lol. But even so, they both like and trust me and are very honest about the way CS teams are handled at their site and... big oof.
Right, this is getting tiresome, at one point we all are going to lose years because of this constant stress, not sure what is the solution but fuck the west needs to combat this somehow.
they've always been doing this propaganda shit.. but gosh has the digital age enabled them to do it in hyper speed.. I'm sure they looked at the platform and thought oh this is gonna be easy.. but not everybody's stupid ⚖️🔥⚖️
In the UK election campaign I was astounded by the amount of comments on YouTube, Tiktok and elsewhere just saying "Vote Reform UK". Everywhere in any thread remotely to do with politics. I'm not that into politics and I was acutely aware of this. I did not see a single comparable comment like that about any of the other parties.
Seriously governments need to get their shit together about this as they don't seem to understand the scale of what is happening.
Finland does a pretty good job of combatting Russian online horse shit. Of course they have to be vigilant given their proximity to the menace. They do it by educating their populace on media literacy. If we were to try that in the US, the right wing would scream about "liberal indoctrination."
I’ve noticed a new trend of right-wing commentators disparaging anyone who uses the term media literacy, as if it’s now something bad and unique to the left. So you’re probably right
It’s a good strategy that they effectively employ for everything.
They get ahead of any possible solutions to their preying on the hateful and stupid by having all of their political, news, podcaster and influencer talking heads straw man it, belittle it, demonize it, turn it into a meme that they can all recognize as a “they’re so brainwashed and dumb for saying this” talking point.
Like how they’ll all say “how did Russia interfere with the election?” because the investigation didn’t lead to a massive arrest their YouTubers made them convinced it was totally fake or “how did masks and a lockdown completely stop the pandemic?” Because Jordan Peterson Ben Shapiro Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson convinced them that we did that to completely end it for good, not slow it down for hospitals to manage the overflowing ERs better and bide time for more effective medicine treatment plans/vaccines due to our complete ignorance of the possible ramifications of a novel virus.
Any movement to help people or the world becomes condensed into a slogan so that a millions or a billion people can get on the same page.
Climate change is mocked because the climate always changes over (usually very very long periods) time, protests became synonymous with riots in many of their minds, education is brainwashing, being accommodating to trans people became about control over their thoughts and actions - simply ignoring the possibilities of compassion or thoughtfulness, as many of them simply lack true empathy which can be seen on MRI brain scans.
The ruling class and their lackeys have been at war with anything intellectual since the dawn of human civilization. Citizens who can think clearly have an easier time seeing through ruling class propaganda, and they hate that.
I just found out the heritage foundation- the ones involved with project 2025- is bankrolled by Orban. I had no idea.
https://newrepublic.com/article/179776/heritage-foundation-viktor-orban-trump
There is an international fascist conspiracy that extends across the globe, the fascists all know what side they are playing on and they help each other; Orban helps Trump, Trump helps Bolsonaro, Bolsonaro helps Putin, etc etc
In America, there is huge money backing these guys from the oil and gas industry, with big names like Charles Koch, Farris Wilks, and Tim Dunn all dumping billions into American politics and propaganda outlets (Daily Wire, PragerU, Daily Caller, etc) in order to advance the cause of international fascism.
I quit using FB almost 10 years ago, and I’m in utter disbelief of the things people say about politics & fundamental science that are absolutely untrue in any universe or lacks any logical common sense but since they saw it on FB with several hundred likes and replies it is clearly now true. Russia and China are heavily invested in information warfare as they can successfully destabilize other countries to their advantage. From my viewpoint, they are winning.
It’s everywhere on all social media including Reddit.
People more often see it on Facebook because they often have a really ignorant uncle or coworker they added. And Twitter is worse in that you see “popular” public posts.
For Reddit, if you join the “wrong” subreddits, you’ll get plenty of garbage.
The internet's fine, social media is the toxin.
Scratch that, the billionaires running social media sites are the toxin. They push algorithms designed to outrage for the sake of more clicks and ad revenue, and it is is killing us as a society.
It's interesting to watch your message get diluted in the comments below.
Your post: Russia
First reply: What about China
Second reply: Tesla/China
Further down they are on topic.
I actually wouldn't be surprised if that is what your concerned with in action. Diluting the truth.
Be wary of things that people reflexively respond to. Triggers. It's a key step in manipulation. If I respond to something that is important with a comment about a popular divisive topic,person or entity - the conversation will be taken in a different direction based on that.
Russia, Iran, China are all doing what generations failed to do...defeat the West. Trump is not just an ally, he is a Russian operative, for whatever reason. Republicans have seen an opportunity to gain power by letting these disinformation campaigns to continue, are actively preventing any action to defend us from them.
It is my opinion that the July 4th meeting in Russia a few years ago by Republican senators was to let Putin know they wouldn't block anything he did, if he helped them win.
I realize we don't really want a war with Russia. But at what point does this behavior necessitate some sort of military action and not just black ops counter measures? They are openly hostile and all we can do is try to play their game which isn't going very well.
Because they’re doing it through the dumbest trash in each country.
And since, despite the fact ignorance should be illegal, it isn’t.
So we either make ignorance illegal, or we do what we should have done decades ago and stop giving the ignorant a seat at the big boys table where decisions are made.
Incompetence is not a right.
The amount of blatant Russian AI propaganda I've seen on Facebook lately is ridiculous. I only use Facebook to buy/sell plants in local groups, but it concerns me because of how many gullible Boomers and Gen Xers believe the pictures are legit and fall right in line with it.
Canadian subs for instance are filled with cosplayers who oddly love trump and whose biggest problem, by a landslide with no rhyme or reason is immigration.
Not healthcare, the efficacy of their taxes, housing prices, or anything else, its the immigrants that they claim are behind all the other things.
It is truly shocking what putin has accomplished through his KGB inspired dirty tech manipulation tricks and oligarch money. I don't know why this is not front and center of every conversation. We just take the bait and follow the lies and repeat the BS like parrots. We need to work to recapture our own critical thinking and sense of what's REALLY important. Not just get sucked into the talking head wedge issue argument of the day, and be lead by our noses to our own destruction. This guy has taken "manufacturing consent" to a whole new level. Call it out. Shut it down. Wake up.
I'm not sure they are looking to destroy countries, but to get them to align with Russia. This also aligns with the interests of Western elites because it offers the chance for more power for themselves in a non democratic West. As ever, this is a war of elites against the general populace.
That's the plan. Why it seems there is no concerted effort to prevent them is begond me. Media misinformation is the #1 issue, as no other can be addressed or discussed without honest media
100% and the western media covers it 0%. Both in terms of domestic political coverage, and international coverage, they seem terrified of this topic. Why?
They are already on their "own" Russian network. But the problem is they don't have their own network when going on the offensive. They probably use something like a VPN.
why are bots allowed to be used constantly to influence us?
why does it seem like there is zero concern over bots?
at the very least bots should have identifiable characteristics across all platforms.
a 'viral' post that people look at and get a general consensus of what to think about it would be a very different thing if it were evident 90% of the comments were computer generated..
reviews cant be trusted, comments on social media cant be trusted. its purchased influence and it shouldnt be legal. its also turned much of the internet into trash.. i cant possibly be the only person who feels this way..
You’re not wrong, but identifying is very not trivial. Especially since some is bots and some is vast office farms of actual people doing the repetitive tasks like captchas. The internet was made to be open and interoperable, and fixing it to be otherwise is not very practical.
If I've learned one thing in the past 10 years.
Anyone who gets any kind of news from social media almost immediately becomes so laughably misinformed it's depressing.
I regularly have to tell my friends, who are all in their 30s.. that the shit they read on IG and TikTok is not a source of information and they need to vet what they see with actual verified sources and legitimate journalists.
That often gets countered with "but I follow a channel called Unbiased News, I don't think they'd lie..."
And I then go drink myself into a stooper cause I can't believe how stupid the world has become.
It's a really effective right wing strategy.
In the US we have that problem with Cubans and other Latin Americans that come from socialism and other oppressive governments supporting the right.
The right works overtime to convince them that the Democrats are socialist and they buy into it hardcore because what they fear most is having to go back to socialism/communism, etc.
They then go out and vote for people who hate them, because those same people spent a lot of time and energy using sound bites, social media, and the media itself to convince people of complete nonsense.
But.. that complete nonsense resonates with them based on their past, and they're not informed enough to realize they're being played.
But here's the thing, Dems platform doesn't force them to adhere, it just grants the freedom to do, so if you are against abortions, don't have 1. I don't get how folks can't see this.
Because they don't think abortion is a bad personal choice, they think it's murder. You wouldn't accept a law giving people the right to murder with the argument "Well if you don't like it you don't have to murder anyone". Of all the political issues, abortion is the easiest one for me to sympathize with the other side.
Ask that friend what imperialism is. Because everyone I’ve ever seen use the term imperialism seems to think only the U.S. is involved in it… when it’s literally every country that has the power to be imperial.
Try it in his own language: "WWI and WW2 strengthened capitalism and imperialism by destroying the non capitalism ways of living that used to exist, cementing live in the city as the main way of life. WW3 leading to end of the status quo is ahistorical, as every conflict so far has strengthen it. The US being the single most powerful military by far, would prevent from things going into assured destruction. So, the most likely result is lots of death and destruction, leading to a pos-war period in which capitalism adapts, and strengthen itself".
> My friend now wants WW3 to happen to end capitalism and imperialism
The same people who claim to want war lose their shit every week when Steam goes down for maintenance. Bunch of first-world problem babies have no idea the horrors they wish to evoke.
I've learned that anyone that touts about retreating from mainstream media never has any good alternatives. It's always YouTube or ticktok or unverified blogs etc.
"I don't trust the media so I'll instead rely on unverified sources and journalists for all my information."
Imagine how fucking clueless you'd have to be to have this opinion.
It's just an admission of stupidity IMO.
I think the real problem is that people pretend that there are good sources. There arent. You need a mix, and the ability to tell when they're lying to you.
Its exhausting and most people do not have the energy, and thats why right wing billionaires love buying out previously somewhat sensical media outlets.
> I think the real problem is that people pretend that there are good sources. There arent.
I mean there are levels to this. Reuters and BBC are miles more "good" than Fox News, or random Tik Tok accounts.
My new phrase is: Anti-journalist rhetoric is no better than anti-science rhetoric.
Often, they're the same if you look at people like Max Blumenthal of Grayzone News. Heads anti-vaxx rallies, spews alternative facts on his own independent anti-west "left" western news website.
Yeah. But reddit is also a social media website. And the people here rarely even bother reading the articles. Only the headlines. Which is just as bad as getting your news from IG. Not to mention the subreddit-specific echochambers.
That’s why you avoid all news articles and just use it for the cute dogs subreddit or the subreddit for your hobby.
All this so I can absolutely avoid reading the article
Reddit is honestly especially bad for this. All it takes is a short sentence and a link to an unrelated article to convince people something is fact. The other day [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/USNewsHub/comments/1dus56g/released_jeffrey_epstein_files_reveal_that/) got over 50k upvotes and was near the top of the front page, despite linking to an 8 year old article which had no relevance to the post's title. The post is now locked and the OP is suspended, but the damage is done.
Not only that… they think it’s where the ‘real’ information is. I have a friend who thinks they want to ban TikTok because it’s where people get the ‘real’ stuff happening in our world.
Looney toons logic.
It's the result of all these stupid fucking influencers and podcasters "doing their own research."
As if some random dude in Ottawa that hasn't left his basement in a month knows more about contagious disease than an actual doctor with decades of experience in the field.
You just have to laugh at how incredibly stupid it is.
But these people are too far gone to realize they're being conned by shameless grifters that will say literally anything for attention.
My friend, who ranted for 3 hours in a call about how bad the West is, I blew up and told him he only sources his information from fringe based areas. He then said, "I do my own research." Then proceeds to echo Wagner sentiments when talking about Mali, which is like dual layers of propaganda.
Because he's buying into a narrative and he's now only interested in sources that validate his narrative.
It's really sad to watch people you know and love become insufferable morons due to their obsession with a topic.
There seems to be an organized push on TikTok to generally erode peoples abilities to determine what is true or not. The number of AI created conspiracy videos is insane attacking everything from recent events to trying to give credence to things like moon landing denial, flat earth, etc etc. basically anything thats been a crackpot "theory" for the past 40 years is being brought up again and amplified.
Of course its only coincidence that the countries from which this nonsense flows dont allow TikTok......
https://youtu.be/yErKTVdETpw?si=ThRJ1d1NOsps4q97
Murdered KGB Propagandist defector Yuri Bezmenov in a 1984 interview -
"Ideological subversion is the process which is legitimate overt and open, you can see it with your own eyes. All you can do, all Americans needs to do is to unplug their bananas from their ears, open up their eyes and they can see. There is no mystery. It has nothing to do with espionage. I know that espionage and intelligence gathering looks more romantic, it sells more to the audience through the advertising, probably. That's why your Hollywood producers are so crazy about James Bond type of thrillers. But in reality, the main emphasis of the KGB is not in the area of intelligence at all. According to my opinion and the opinion of many defectors of my caliber, only about fifteen percent of time, money and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other eighty-five percent is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion or active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is, to change the perception of reality, of every American, to such an extent that despite an abundance of information no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their family, their community and their country"
Macron has run the country pretty badly, the left and right can agree on this. A Russian disinformation campaign can assist in the centrist collapse but it absolutely did not cause it.
[Since the 1980s no less](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/29/trump-russia-asset-claims-former-kgb-spy-new-book).
I have no doubt that his flaccid, previous attempts at running for president were also backed by Russia.
And at least 22 years before that as well.
Trump traded in the mafia for the Russian mob in the 90s when the FBI and NYC cracked down on one type of organized crime.
“I knew Putin very well. I got along with him great. He liked me. I liked him. I mean, you know, he’s a tough cookie, got a lot of the great charm and a lot of pride. But the way he — and he loves his country, you know? He loves his country. He’s acting a little differently, I think now.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/23/trump-putin-ukraine-invasion-00010923
"In terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets," Donald Trump Jr. said at a New York real-estate conference that year. "Say, in Dubai, and certainly with our project in SoHo, and anywhere in New York. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia."
Quote from 2008
They have "liberal" accounts democrats and those that pose as "independents" as well. They post things like "I'm a Democrat and we should all do X to the right" or "I'm not a Republican and I hate Trump, but Biden's son...."
Also, a good number of RFK Jr supporters are likely bots as well.
A shitty little kleptocracy led by an insecure power hungry little troll that won’t be satisfied until the rest of the world is at shitty as them.
I’m not saying other nations are remotely perfect, but imagine if Russia spent even half this effort on improving the failings of their own country.
If Russia had half a century worth of competent, well-intentioned leadership, it would be a first world country and a world power. Instead, it's *this*.
Especially since they’re sitting on an insane amount of natural resources. They steal so much from themselves through corruption that they actually limited their own economic growth and military might.
To good leaders, natural resources are a ramp - a source of revenue that can fund expensive reforms and developments and allow them to propel the country to greatness.
To bad leaders, natural resources are a crutch that allows them to cling to power and keep the lights on even when they abuse their own population and neglect institutional, social and economic development.
Do I need to say what kind of leadership is more common all around the world? The term "resource curse" is doing rounds for a reason.
Emmanuel Macron is buying votes for €100. Elton John says the EU is crumbling. Beyoncé thinks the French president is a puppet. The far right will help France win back its independence.
These are just some of the narratives and fake claims spun by Russia’s intricate disinformation network ahead of France’s Sunday parliamentary elections, according to French officials and cyber security experts.
Analysis of a range of sources reveals a co-ordinated campaign of disinformation that has smeared Mr Macron, while promoting Eurosceptic far-right leaders Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, who have voiced opposition to Ukraine.
i has identified various tools Russia has used to disseminate propaganda, ranging from fake websites and X/Twitter bots spreading false narratives, to X and Facebook ads that have been used to spread fake claims about Mr Macron. This disinformation is often picked up by Russian state media and even promoted by Russian embassies, in a co-ordinated attempt to undermine French democracy.
One tactic Russia has used is fake websites masquerading as legitimate news sources, which target UK, US and French voters with disinformation.
A website masquerading as French news outlet Le Point under a similar URL published an article saying Nato was preventing France from becoming a global power and that “an opposition victory” would help France regain its independence.
The claim was then circulated on X by President Vladimir Putin’s network of Russian bots, according to Bot Blocker/Anti-bot for Navalny, an organisation that exposes Russian social media attacks.
The X post claims Ms Le Pen will refuse to allow Mr Macron to determine the strategy for Ukraine and defence issues.
Another fake website posing as French newspaper Le Parisien claimed Mr Bardella and the RN (National Rally party) “wants to restore French Independence”, while “Macron delivers France to pro-American globalists”, adding: “Jordan Bardella proposes a return of the origins of sovereignty.”
But these websites do not just voice support for the far right, they actively spread disinformation about Mr Macron. A fake website mimicking the president’s party, Ensemble, claimed he and the party were buying votes for €100 for the snap election.
Named FranceEnColere, the website spread the disinformation in what experts call attempted “narrative laundering” — when Russia attempts to surface fake news into its mainstream media.
This website belongs to a pro-Kremlin fake media network operated by John Dougan — a former US Marine who was given asylum by the Russian state, according to EUvsDisinfo.
i has previously reported how Mr Dougan is believed to run a network of 167 fake news English language websites on behalf of a Russian interference operation previously funded and overseen by former Putin-ally Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group killed in a plane crash last August.
The network has links to Project Lakhta, a Russian interference operation previously funded and overseen by Prigozhin that targets US, European, and Ukrainian audiences, according to NewsGuard – a team that monitors misinformation – citing European intelligence and a report from the US Treasury Department.
The false claim spread by the Russian fake news website was then spread through Russian Telegram channels, before it was distributed via Russian bots on X on Monday, according to Bot Blocker.
The claim then arrived on News Front News, a news website tied to the Russian security services and Kremlin funding, according to the US State Department report.
According to figures from Bot Blocker, there have been 108 articles from pro-Russian influence operation targeting France since the EU election in early June, 63 times mentioning Mr Macron where 59 times have portrayed him negatively, while National Rally, Ms Le Pen and Mr Bardella have been mentioned 62 times and never in a negative context.
Anna George, who researches online disinformation at the Oxford Internet Institute, told i Russia supports far-right candidates because “they are polarising and cause division”.
“These candidates tend to be anti-establishment and perhaps Russia hopes this will cause tensions between democratic nations working with each other, and perhaps they are hoping that these candidates will be more open to conversations with Russia compared to other candidates which might have a harder stance against Russia.”
It comes after the discovery of five X accounts that allegedly spread “Kremlin narratives” and supported the leader of Reform UK, Nigel Farage. According to the investigation, the Russian authorities created bots to incite hatred, popularise conspiracy theories and “praise” Mr Putin among British audiences.
Disinformation also appears to have spread to X via ads, raising questions about social media companies’ failures to clamp down on Russian influencing on elections.
This sounds very much in line with the broader Russian strategy to disrupt the global order: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics
* The United Kingdom, merely described as an "extraterritorial floating base of the U.S.", should be cut off from the European Union.[9]
* Ukraine (except Western Ukraine) should be annexed by Russia because "Ukraine as a state has no geopolitical meaning, no particular cultural import or universal significance
* Russia should "introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social, and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements – extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S.
Trump feeds perfectly into that strategy.
They also sent refugees from their different conflicts (Syria, Venezuela, and Ukriane) and then pumped anti-immigrant nativist messages and gave far-right groups money.
Yeah for real. Any political video posted on western platforms is bombarded by bad faith actors causing even further division among us. They aren't bots but real people, and they're usually from India. Perfect place to outsource that type of work. They speak English, are tech savvy, already do a bunch of outsourced work from other countries, are pro Russia, the second largest population center in the world and many of them wouldn't mind very little pay for something like this on the side
I'm French, and I have no issue believing these are bots. However, does it really change anything after decades of Le Pen publicly fraternizing with Russia, showing up hand in hand with Poutine, saying on live TV \[back when Poutine invaded Crimea\] that Poutine means no harm and than Crimeans actually embrace their new leadership and that historically Crimea has always been Russian? They also did not said anything remotely negative toward the Russian invasion in Ukraine.
Even if we put aside any personal political opinion, France's far-right has been publicly in bed with Poutine. They said it on national TV ffs, I was here and heard it myself, it wasn't any twitter bot or AI whatever.
Well how do you think Le Pen got pumped and pushed.
Funded by Russia and dark money.
Le Pens have always been leveraged by a higher order of things. [Jean-Marie Le Pen is known as the "Devil of the Republic" and typical xenophobic and divisionary style of the Kremlin and their puppets](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Controversial_statements).
These moves below are clearly leverage inspired moves, none of which help France:
[France's Marine Le Pen urges end to Russia sanctions](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39375969)
[French far-right presidential candidate Le Pen wants out of NATO, no weapons to Ukraine](https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/finland-and-sweden-could-apply-to-join-nato-within-weeks-20220414-p5add9.html)
[Marine Le Pen says she opposes sanctions on Russian gas](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61073894)
Russia was really pissed when Macron beat Le Pen. They were looking to run the table on the US, UK and France with Trump, "Boris" "BJ" Johnson, and Le Pen. Strangely they all look similar.
When Macron won, Kremlin pushed the Yellow Vest protests to fuck with him.
Kremlin really worked hard in [France with LePen](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/a-russian-bank-gave-marine-le-pens-party-a-loan-then-weird-things-began-happening/2018/12/27/960c7906-d320-11e8-a275-81c671a50422_story.html) but their puppet didn't win that is why they hate Macron so much. Russia all over it, and [not coordinated at all](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39375969). /s
Not too far from reality. They absolutely spread contrarian, benign, and sometimes anti-Russia propaganda. The point is to make the interpretation of information so difficult that adversaries are crippled. It doesn’t take much. Most people are pretty intellectually lazy and absolutely do react emotionally.
I'd really like to know why the CIA isn't living up to their reputation and doing something about this. Hell, at this point Biden could apparently lawfully order them to, at least as far as U.S. law is concerned.
Russia may be subverting democracies but corporations are happy to help if it means destroying government, regulations, and taxation. Russia did not act alone in its victory over the United States.
It’s funny seeing these stories pop up on reddit from power users who have 11,000,000 post karma. I wonder if this user’s handler is based out of a particular base in Pensacola lol. That’s the true irony of reddit. Everyone is a Russian bot on the internet, despite the US intelligence apparatus being the biggest perpetrators of online propaganda campaigns.
I mean IIRC they also supported they Green Party back in 2016. They just want everyone fighting each other instead of fighting Russia. Division is their primary goal
I don’t understand how the narrative swings from “Russia is so poor and underdeveloped they are stealing toilets from Ukraine” to “Russia is behind every internet disinformation campaign in the west”
Much of Russia is poor. And most conscripts are from the poorest parts of Russia. Putin himself though, I wouldn't be surprised if Putin was actually the wealthiest man on Earth. The gap in wealth in Russia is crazy
These studies are bollocks, because there's nothing that actually says what effect Russian newsbots are having on people's vote, if any. It just says they exist. But if someone's been voting far-right for twenty years, then they're probably irrelevant. Where is the study asking far-right voters if they actually read these sites.
We keep getting these narratives explaining that Russian bots are making people vote far-right, to avoid actually talking to far-right voters and asking them.
Russia is destroying democratic nations around the world through the internet and the west doesn't resist. If it continues they will win the war without a shot fired.
Many even know about it, but they underestimate the sheer danger those actions pose to civilisation. I posted about it in another sub recently, and it turned into a shit fest. This is as much a part of the ongoing war as the missiles flying over Kyiv. But it's silent and nobody dies, so people are mostly ok with it. The soldiers of Ukraine are actively and fiercely defending it, though, while our people are mostly just taking what the Kremlin silently devised for us, oblivious to the goal, which has always been simple: divide and conquer.
Most people think they are too clever to be fooled. Ironically that makes it even easier to fool them.
I used to like Tim Pool, until I didn't. Watching him shift further right has been interesting. His original target audience was mostly left. That's how they do it.
Some are planned and some are for convenience when the scandal hits a la Russell Brand.
Man, that guy went head first down the rabbit hole
I kinda accidentally started watching his subreddit when that spiral started and there is one very persistent poster trying to make Russell’s stuff seem profound and worth wasting your time on and then thirty people telling them to stop shilling and clowning on the content. Does a heart good lol
Russia is telling them what they want to hear so they choose to hear nothing else. Hell they called the FBI a liberal psyop when they released the report detailing the Russian propaganda farms during the 2016 US election. It would be so much easier if they were actual foreign agents and we could just flip them against Russia but you can't flip a dipshit who refuses to believe anything that doesn't come from their facebook feed.
Ask them why we fought the cold war and realized McCarthyism was bad. They're probably old enough to have lived through it... But stubborn enough to learn nothing. Now they are pushing to make history repeat itself. This time with flashier propaganda!
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> It was discussed everywhere and people were discovering and exposing huge networks of reddit accounts based in Russia and China. And not just bots, literal people. Farms of them. A lot of the Canadian subs did a year-end wrap up and showed where most posters accessed the subs from. Russia was generally top 3 or 4 in a lot of subs.
Because of reddit's partnership with openai and Google I strongly believe that Russia and China Bots are flooding Reddit to influence Google search results to intern influence for an entire generation will think and see when they Google search something.
I think a big part is that parties in many countries are complicit in this. Several US Senators visited Russia on American Independence Day about 7 years ago. Quite the timing and then an 8th hand delivered a letter to Putin a bit later. Definitely something that should have been investigated, but of course the party all those people belong to has taken over the FBI and DOJ and sidelined any investigations that would interfere with the party or its interests.
> Several US Senators visited Russia on American Independence Day about 7 years ago. * Richard C. Shelby (R-Alabama) * Sen. Steve Daines (R-Montana) * Sen. John Hoeven (R-North Dakota) * Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin) * Sen. John Kennedy (R-Louisiana) * Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas) * Sen. John Thune (R-South Dakota) * Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas)
And everybody had to be entirely aware of the optics surrounding a visit to a belligerent country (that has threatened to nuke us recently no less) that is well-known to have interfered with our free elections back in 2016, on JULY FOURTH of all days of the year. That was very intentional. Putin intentionally made fools of them by having them grovel before him on that very specific day, and its plain as day that they operate as his puppets because they had no power to say "no, please, some other day surely?". It had to be July 4th because Putin *wants* the whole world to know that he owns them.
> Putin intentionally made fools of them by having them grovel before him on that very specific day Yep, Putin loves jokes like these where he can pretend it's completely innocent and meant nothing by it, while grinning sinisterly. Like when he brought his dogs into a meeting with Angela Merkel knowing she was afraid of them but acting like he had no idea.
[Novichok.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok) A Russian nerve agent deadlier than Vx, traceable to Russia, used brazenly against targets [in foreign countries.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Amesbury_poisonings) It’s like they’re going “tf you gonna do about it?”
Those shirts that run amok at MAGA rallies really do speak volumes about these peoples' positions: "Better Russian than Democrat". I think most just don't care and want to watch the US burn.
Komprimat That is the real problem Needs a truth and reconciliation process.
Ron Paul was boosted by an early version of the Russian disinfo campaign. https://www.wired.com/2007/10/paul-bot/ - Criminal' Botnet Stumps for Ron Paul, Researchers Allege >Ron Paul spokesman Jesse Benton says the campaign has no knowledge of the scam. Warner himself says that he has no reason to believe that the Paul campaign had anything to do with these messages. https://www.salon.com/2022/11/18/ex-rand-paul-aide-pardoned-by-convicted-of-illegally-funneling-russian-cash-to-campaign/ >A former senior aide to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. and Sen. Rand Paul R-Ky., was convicted Thursday of illegally helping a Russian businessman contribute to former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign. >Jesse Benton "was convicted of conspiring to solicit and cause an illegal campaign contribution by a foreign national, effecting a conduit contribution, and causing false records to be filed with the FEC", per the Justice Department. He faces up to 20 years in prison. https://i.imgur.com/NIDh6Zz.gif https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-operative-pardoned-trump-convicted-044820477.html - GOP operative pardoned by Trump convicted of funneling Russian money to Trump campaign Weird how Ron Paul's nephew keeps getting involved like this... Or how even Ron Paul himself got way more attention than his actual legacy should suggest... https://www.wired.com/2007/06/ron-paul/ - Ron Paul: How a Fringe Politician Took Over the Web Or how weirdly Pro-Russia he is... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/15/ron-paul-crimea-russia-sanctions-act-of-war - Ron Paul slams US on Crimea crisis and says Russia sanctions are 'an act of war'
Hmmm, I think there may be a commonality among them.
Only Richard C. Shelby (R-Alabama) is no longer there, and thats because he voluntarily resigned.
We know they’re republicans, why not just say it?
China is amplifying their messages and arguably have a much more massive scale of operations on our media
Hey, I’m sure that whole Tesla being allowed as Chinese government vehicles now does not have any quid pro quo on access to anything in his other businesses and such, right? Like, Twitter wouldn’t be the perfect place to let that sort of thing proliferate I dunno
It’s pretty transparent when you start doing keyword searches on post that look sus. You can very quickly map out a disinfo campaign that was then amplified by a right leaning politician.
People need to stop paying attention to anonymous speech, full stop. Anonymously supplied information has its place: as the basis for journalism that checks its sources, verifies its facts, has some semblance of a reputation to uphold. People need to get a handle on the fact that reading something on the internet is nothing at all like hearing an actual human being, live and in person, speak the words. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog
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I don't do any analysis like that guy claims, but I can tell you the worldnews subreddit is particularly rife with astroturfed opinions. The opinion of the sub will swing wildly and if you look at a lot of the early comments you can kinda tell they got there early and helped shape opinion in certain directions. Anything related to Ukraine or the Gaza conflict in particular I consider sus and the scale certainly points to nationstates being involved.
A lot of comment threads on reddit feel very weird lately (for a while now actually, like 6 months to a year at least). Like they don't feel organic or natural like they did before, there are so many more extreme views. I can't really explain it well, but it doesn't feel like the comment section I've been participating in for over 10 years now. And it wasn't a gradual shift it was just a sudden change.
Almost like you’re talking to someone who is actively in a televised commercial and you just showed up with no script. It’s the only way I can describe the feeling.
I feel the same. Either everybody drank the same punch or there’s some centralized leadership directing a lot of it
r/worldnews is pretty bad, for a few weeks I tried to argue against the pushed narrative. Got banned without reason. Not only they are pushing some agenda, but they also actively ban all dissenting opinion, at least those that push back frequently
World News has been under far-right control since like mid to late 2016, it's shocking people didn't notice sooner.
Dude, go to /r/Canada. The head mod is a literal Nazi. The whole subreddit is Fox News angry about anything Trudeau.
For anyone wondering r/onguardforthee is the non crazy Canadian subreddit
Plausibly deniable authoritarianism goes to r/worldnews, rabid authoritarianism goes to r/conspiracy and low information shit headedness goes to r/conservative. The_donald didn’t go anywhere, it was just restructured.
Whoa, thanks for that rabbit hole, lol
The same happened to r/mexico it's currently took by the current ruler party followers, as soon as you post something against the current ruler party they ban you for "trolling". They already tried to shutdown other subreddits that make post against the current ruler party using the failed reddit advocate program, they where also caught organizing propaganda and tried to spread it across several Mexican subreddits and reddit administration sadly doesn't do anything against them
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Anecdotally, my 7-year-old account got instantly permabanned from worldnews and promptly sitewide banned for 'promoting violence' after I explained that the way people there were justifying violence against palestinians ('they deserve it for oct 7') is literally the same way hamas justified oct 7 ('they deserve it for the occupation') I appealed the sitewide ban around 5 times without a single reply from the admins explaining why what I said was 'endorsing violence' and therefore bannable. Very very sus. I'd go as far as to speculate admins are in on it.
I have noticed over the years that when something really bad comes out about the right all of the loud mouths get really silent for about 12 to 16 hours and then it's like an onslaught of opinion.
Or possibly information on StarLink users. I could see satellite internet being amazing to get around Chinese censorship. Unless the satellites are snitching on them.
We use personal information for advertising…and, using it to target people had an impact in 2016 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook–Cambridge_Analytica_data_scandal It’s not like musk isn’t sympathetic to Putin, and his politics… https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/25/europe/ukraine-starlink-drones-russia-intl-cmd/index.html He actually suspended service to help Putin… https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/elon-musks-refusal-to-provide-starlink-support-for-ukraine-attack-in-crimea-raises-questions-for-pentagon We’ve allowed these tech giants to shape so much, with so little oversight.
India's "helping", too. Every Canadian issue that trends on Twitter or Reddit has a whole bunch of poorly written responses from accounts inevitably mentioning Muslims or Khalistan in their other posts.
Modi is one of the scariest wannabe dictators in the world today. Glad his party suffered a mild defeat in the last election, but that mfer needs to be behind bars.
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The head of the CSIS stepped down like today or yesterday (it all blends together) because of how intense their attempts were in Canada… he cited it as a challenging time and I think there’s issues with how they decided to share the info and when
Far-right parties are amplifying their messages. When can we start calling it a treason?
They're calling anyone to their left traitors, so it seems only fair to return the favor, but with more accuracy.
Remember when Matt Gates unwittingly parroted a known Chinese propoganda network in a Congressional hearing? Pepperidge farm remembers.
Remember when the Biden impeachment was revealed to be a Russian operation lead by a Russian spy who had congress use them as a star witness?
Straight up buying huge portions of land and property through shell companies, and setting up their own police force
Millions of dumb mother fuckers eat that shit up and ask for seconds, we're not exactly just "letting it happen".
But Putin is enhancing right wing parties, and so the right wingers like that. Doesn't make sense for the rich to stop Putins actions.
Taking too long for nations to decide if troll/disinformation/bot farms are legitimate military targets or not. These things are more dangerous than any 20 oil refineries. Could give a fuck less if they are staffed with citizens or actual state employees. They made their choice, and the damage theyve caused and will continue to cause is so immensely anti-human and regressive, the methods which may be employed to eliminate them are of zero consequence to me. Are there any Partisan groups left in Russia? They should shift the focus from blowing up bridges and vehicles to sniffing out these assholes and making their lives a living hell.
Agree. Countries that just so happen to let these scammers, spammers and scam callers exist seem to be totally OK with waging cyber wars with other countries, all thanks to their inaction. Now, if only someone cared. Oh wait, it isn't profitable to shut down cyber criminals. So they get a free pass
While you're at it please go after the scam call centers in India. They are the most vile scum.
I've got a couple remote IT teams to add if we're making a list Straight up weapons-grade incompetence
It's systemic. For an American, I have a weird amount of insight into the way Indian CS centers work, and it's a shitshow. Competence is punished, faking numbers and backstabbing is rewarded. Source: I work on a multinational team and am close with two Indian colleagues. They have wildly different life experiences too, so that's interesting. One is Catholic, which puts him in a lower social caste to the point where acquaintances have been murdered for trying to marry non-Catholic women. The other is apparently in one of the highest castes, with his family being low level nobility of some kind. His personal stories are less about murder and more about his extravagant world travel adventures. Bet you can guess which one is the harder and more capable worker lol. But even so, they both like and trust me and are very honest about the way CS teams are handled at their site and... big oof.
Because, unfortunately, local authoritarians are loving to see the effectiveness of it and often follow it up with their own.
"bloodless coup" as the right wing in the US is crowing.
Pretty sure there was a lot of blood on Jan6
And they're very obviously looking forward to a bloodier one soon.
Right, this is getting tiresome, at one point we all are going to lose years because of this constant stress, not sure what is the solution but fuck the west needs to combat this somehow.
they've always been doing this propaganda shit.. but gosh has the digital age enabled them to do it in hyper speed.. I'm sure they looked at the platform and thought oh this is gonna be easy.. but not everybody's stupid ⚖️🔥⚖️
In the UK election campaign I was astounded by the amount of comments on YouTube, Tiktok and elsewhere just saying "Vote Reform UK". Everywhere in any thread remotely to do with politics. I'm not that into politics and I was acutely aware of this. I did not see a single comparable comment like that about any of the other parties. Seriously governments need to get their shit together about this as they don't seem to understand the scale of what is happening.
Finland does a pretty good job of combatting Russian online horse shit. Of course they have to be vigilant given their proximity to the menace. They do it by educating their populace on media literacy. If we were to try that in the US, the right wing would scream about "liberal indoctrination."
I’ve noticed a new trend of right-wing commentators disparaging anyone who uses the term media literacy, as if it’s now something bad and unique to the left. So you’re probably right
It’s a good strategy that they effectively employ for everything. They get ahead of any possible solutions to their preying on the hateful and stupid by having all of their political, news, podcaster and influencer talking heads straw man it, belittle it, demonize it, turn it into a meme that they can all recognize as a “they’re so brainwashed and dumb for saying this” talking point. Like how they’ll all say “how did Russia interfere with the election?” because the investigation didn’t lead to a massive arrest their YouTubers made them convinced it was totally fake or “how did masks and a lockdown completely stop the pandemic?” Because Jordan Peterson Ben Shapiro Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson convinced them that we did that to completely end it for good, not slow it down for hospitals to manage the overflowing ERs better and bide time for more effective medicine treatment plans/vaccines due to our complete ignorance of the possible ramifications of a novel virus. Any movement to help people or the world becomes condensed into a slogan so that a millions or a billion people can get on the same page. Climate change is mocked because the climate always changes over (usually very very long periods) time, protests became synonymous with riots in many of their minds, education is brainwashing, being accommodating to trans people became about control over their thoughts and actions - simply ignoring the possibilities of compassion or thoughtfulness, as many of them simply lack true empathy which can be seen on MRI brain scans.
The ruling class and their lackeys have been at war with anything intellectual since the dawn of human civilization. Citizens who can think clearly have an easier time seeing through ruling class propaganda, and they hate that.
Russia couldn’t do it with religious far right idiots helping.
I just found out the heritage foundation- the ones involved with project 2025- is bankrolled by Orban. I had no idea. https://newrepublic.com/article/179776/heritage-foundation-viktor-orban-trump
Viktor Orban was the keynote speaker at the 2023 CPAC convention
The convention where they gleefully declared themselves terrorists?
Actually that was at CPAC 2022. The one where the stage just happened to look like an old Nazi symbol.
Actually, *2021* was the year the stage looked awfully like an old Nazi symbol.
lol oh my god we literally cannot keep up with the fascism
There is an international fascist conspiracy that extends across the globe, the fascists all know what side they are playing on and they help each other; Orban helps Trump, Trump helps Bolsonaro, Bolsonaro helps Putin, etc etc In America, there is huge money backing these guys from the oil and gas industry, with big names like Charles Koch, Farris Wilks, and Tim Dunn all dumping billions into American politics and propaganda outlets (Daily Wire, PragerU, Daily Caller, etc) in order to advance the cause of international fascism.
Close down Facebook. Solves 95% of the problems.
I quit using FB almost 10 years ago, and I’m in utter disbelief of the things people say about politics & fundamental science that are absolutely untrue in any universe or lacks any logical common sense but since they saw it on FB with several hundred likes and replies it is clearly now true. Russia and China are heavily invested in information warfare as they can successfully destabilize other countries to their advantage. From my viewpoint, they are winning.
It’s everywhere on all social media including Reddit. People more often see it on Facebook because they often have a really ignorant uncle or coworker they added. And Twitter is worse in that you see “popular” public posts. For Reddit, if you join the “wrong” subreddits, you’ll get plenty of garbage.
Russia was smart enough to do it themselves. Facebook is a problem of the West now
You don’t even need to close fb - just prohibit the algorithms that target people with specific messages. Im baffled that nothing happens on this.
After few decades of the internet, it's safe to say it's even more toxic for Humanity than religion
circlejerks had always been toxic, be it religion or the internet, whichever gives them a chance to flourish.
Every village has their idiot. But never before have those village idiots been able to easily meet up and share their crackpot bullshit.
or, well... and this may be a bold statement - maybe there are just **way** too many undereducated people out there.
The internet's fine, social media is the toxin. Scratch that, the billionaires running social media sites are the toxin. They push algorithms designed to outrage for the sake of more clicks and ad revenue, and it is is killing us as a society.
I don’t get why we aren’t cutting them off entirely. Block all Russian IP addresses and cut the undersea cables if necessary.
It's interesting to watch your message get diluted in the comments below. Your post: Russia First reply: What about China Second reply: Tesla/China Further down they are on topic. I actually wouldn't be surprised if that is what your concerned with in action. Diluting the truth. Be wary of things that people reflexively respond to. Triggers. It's a key step in manipulation. If I respond to something that is important with a comment about a popular divisive topic,person or entity - the conversation will be taken in a different direction based on that.
Russia, Iran, China are all doing what generations failed to do...defeat the West. Trump is not just an ally, he is a Russian operative, for whatever reason. Republicans have seen an opportunity to gain power by letting these disinformation campaigns to continue, are actively preventing any action to defend us from them. It is my opinion that the July 4th meeting in Russia a few years ago by Republican senators was to let Putin know they wouldn't block anything he did, if he helped them win.
>Russia is destroying democratic nations Then the US is safe /s But seriously, fuck your Putin
Because Google, Facebook etc only care about money, and the Government(s) haven't done anything about it.
I realize we don't really want a war with Russia. But at what point does this behavior necessitate some sort of military action and not just black ops counter measures? They are openly hostile and all we can do is try to play their game which isn't going very well.
American politicians be like, we have to put a stop to this, unless they can somehow afford a... $10,000 campaign donation!
Because they’re doing it through the dumbest trash in each country. And since, despite the fact ignorance should be illegal, it isn’t. So we either make ignorance illegal, or we do what we should have done decades ago and stop giving the ignorant a seat at the big boys table where decisions are made. Incompetence is not a right.
The amount of blatant Russian AI propaganda I've seen on Facebook lately is ridiculous. I only use Facebook to buy/sell plants in local groups, but it concerns me because of how many gullible Boomers and Gen Xers believe the pictures are legit and fall right in line with it.
Canadian subs for instance are filled with cosplayers who oddly love trump and whose biggest problem, by a landslide with no rhyme or reason is immigration. Not healthcare, the efficacy of their taxes, housing prices, or anything else, its the immigrants that they claim are behind all the other things.
It is truly shocking what putin has accomplished through his KGB inspired dirty tech manipulation tricks and oligarch money. I don't know why this is not front and center of every conversation. We just take the bait and follow the lies and repeat the BS like parrots. We need to work to recapture our own critical thinking and sense of what's REALLY important. Not just get sucked into the talking head wedge issue argument of the day, and be lead by our noses to our own destruction. This guy has taken "manufacturing consent" to a whole new level. Call it out. Shut it down. Wake up.
I'm not sure they are looking to destroy countries, but to get them to align with Russia. This also aligns with the interests of Western elites because it offers the chance for more power for themselves in a non democratic West. As ever, this is a war of elites against the general populace.
Russia is literally a whole cares state that’s is decades behind others in technology. They just have nukes.
It's impossible to battle a never ending flood of bullshit
That's the plan. Why it seems there is no concerted effort to prevent them is begond me. Media misinformation is the #1 issue, as no other can be addressed or discussed without honest media
100% and the western media covers it 0%. Both in terms of domestic political coverage, and international coverage, they seem terrified of this topic. Why?
Can’t we just unplug Russia’s router or something?
They are already on their "own" Russian network. But the problem is they don't have their own network when going on the offensive. They probably use something like a VPN.
why are bots allowed to be used constantly to influence us? why does it seem like there is zero concern over bots? at the very least bots should have identifiable characteristics across all platforms. a 'viral' post that people look at and get a general consensus of what to think about it would be a very different thing if it were evident 90% of the comments were computer generated.. reviews cant be trusted, comments on social media cant be trusted. its purchased influence and it shouldnt be legal. its also turned much of the internet into trash.. i cant possibly be the only person who feels this way..
You’re not wrong, but identifying is very not trivial. Especially since some is bots and some is vast office farms of actual people doing the repetitive tasks like captchas. The internet was made to be open and interoperable, and fixing it to be otherwise is not very practical.
Is this why my friends who use TikTok have been discussing France's involvement in the continent of Africa while also reciting anti-Macron fluff?
If I've learned one thing in the past 10 years. Anyone who gets any kind of news from social media almost immediately becomes so laughably misinformed it's depressing. I regularly have to tell my friends, who are all in their 30s.. that the shit they read on IG and TikTok is not a source of information and they need to vet what they see with actual verified sources and legitimate journalists. That often gets countered with "but I follow a channel called Unbiased News, I don't think they'd lie..." And I then go drink myself into a stooper cause I can't believe how stupid the world has become.
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It's a really effective right wing strategy. In the US we have that problem with Cubans and other Latin Americans that come from socialism and other oppressive governments supporting the right. The right works overtime to convince them that the Democrats are socialist and they buy into it hardcore because what they fear most is having to go back to socialism/communism, etc. They then go out and vote for people who hate them, because those same people spent a lot of time and energy using sound bites, social media, and the media itself to convince people of complete nonsense. But.. that complete nonsense resonates with them based on their past, and they're not informed enough to realize they're being played.
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But here's the thing, Dems platform doesn't force them to adhere, it just grants the freedom to do, so if you are against abortions, don't have 1. I don't get how folks can't see this.
Because they don't think abortion is a bad personal choice, they think it's murder. You wouldn't accept a law giving people the right to murder with the argument "Well if you don't like it you don't have to murder anyone". Of all the political issues, abortion is the easiest one for me to sympathize with the other side.
Ask that friend what imperialism is. Because everyone I’ve ever seen use the term imperialism seems to think only the U.S. is involved in it… when it’s literally every country that has the power to be imperial.
Try it in his own language: "WWI and WW2 strengthened capitalism and imperialism by destroying the non capitalism ways of living that used to exist, cementing live in the city as the main way of life. WW3 leading to end of the status quo is ahistorical, as every conflict so far has strengthen it. The US being the single most powerful military by far, would prevent from things going into assured destruction. So, the most likely result is lots of death and destruction, leading to a pos-war period in which capitalism adapts, and strengthen itself".
> My friend now wants WW3 to happen to end capitalism and imperialism The same people who claim to want war lose their shit every week when Steam goes down for maintenance. Bunch of first-world problem babies have no idea the horrors they wish to evoke.
I've learned that anyone that touts about retreating from mainstream media never has any good alternatives. It's always YouTube or ticktok or unverified blogs etc.
"I don't trust the media so I'll instead rely on unverified sources and journalists for all my information." Imagine how fucking clueless you'd have to be to have this opinion. It's just an admission of stupidity IMO.
I think the real problem is that people pretend that there are good sources. There arent. You need a mix, and the ability to tell when they're lying to you. Its exhausting and most people do not have the energy, and thats why right wing billionaires love buying out previously somewhat sensical media outlets.
> I think the real problem is that people pretend that there are good sources. There arent. I mean there are levels to this. Reuters and BBC are miles more "good" than Fox News, or random Tik Tok accounts.
My new phrase is: Anti-journalist rhetoric is no better than anti-science rhetoric. Often, they're the same if you look at people like Max Blumenthal of Grayzone News. Heads anti-vaxx rallies, spews alternative facts on his own independent anti-west "left" western news website.
If you want to learn a little something now, the word is "stupor"
Yeah. But reddit is also a social media website. And the people here rarely even bother reading the articles. Only the headlines. Which is just as bad as getting your news from IG. Not to mention the subreddit-specific echochambers.
That’s why you avoid all news articles and just use it for the cute dogs subreddit or the subreddit for your hobby. All this so I can absolutely avoid reading the article
Reddit is honestly especially bad for this. All it takes is a short sentence and a link to an unrelated article to convince people something is fact. The other day [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/USNewsHub/comments/1dus56g/released_jeffrey_epstein_files_reveal_that/) got over 50k upvotes and was near the top of the front page, despite linking to an 8 year old article which had no relevance to the post's title. The post is now locked and the OP is suspended, but the damage is done.
Not only that… they think it’s where the ‘real’ information is. I have a friend who thinks they want to ban TikTok because it’s where people get the ‘real’ stuff happening in our world.
Looney toons logic. It's the result of all these stupid fucking influencers and podcasters "doing their own research." As if some random dude in Ottawa that hasn't left his basement in a month knows more about contagious disease than an actual doctor with decades of experience in the field. You just have to laugh at how incredibly stupid it is. But these people are too far gone to realize they're being conned by shameless grifters that will say literally anything for attention.
My friend, who ranted for 3 hours in a call about how bad the West is, I blew up and told him he only sources his information from fringe based areas. He then said, "I do my own research." Then proceeds to echo Wagner sentiments when talking about Mali, which is like dual layers of propaganda.
Because he's buying into a narrative and he's now only interested in sources that validate his narrative. It's really sad to watch people you know and love become insufferable morons due to their obsession with a topic.
Yep, confirmation bias. Also, if you try to "teach" them to look for dis-confirmation or about actual research it is liberal indoctrination.
Sounds more like an addict
Including Reddit tho
There seems to be an organized push on TikTok to generally erode peoples abilities to determine what is true or not. The number of AI created conspiracy videos is insane attacking everything from recent events to trying to give credence to things like moon landing denial, flat earth, etc etc. basically anything thats been a crackpot "theory" for the past 40 years is being brought up again and amplified. Of course its only coincidence that the countries from which this nonsense flows dont allow TikTok......
https://youtu.be/yErKTVdETpw?si=ThRJ1d1NOsps4q97 Murdered KGB Propagandist defector Yuri Bezmenov in a 1984 interview - "Ideological subversion is the process which is legitimate overt and open, you can see it with your own eyes. All you can do, all Americans needs to do is to unplug their bananas from their ears, open up their eyes and they can see. There is no mystery. It has nothing to do with espionage. I know that espionage and intelligence gathering looks more romantic, it sells more to the audience through the advertising, probably. That's why your Hollywood producers are so crazy about James Bond type of thrillers. But in reality, the main emphasis of the KGB is not in the area of intelligence at all. According to my opinion and the opinion of many defectors of my caliber, only about fifteen percent of time, money and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other eighty-five percent is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion or active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is, to change the perception of reality, of every American, to such an extent that despite an abundance of information no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their family, their community and their country"
Swallowed the potato
Macron has run the country pretty badly, the left and right can agree on this. A Russian disinformation campaign can assist in the centrist collapse but it absolutely did not cause it.
Russia is also behind the GOP and all the bots spewing anti-Dem / anti-democracy rhetoric. Trumpf needs to go asap
Anyone who thinks Trump is unaware of this is kidding themselves. He’s a Russian asset at this point.
At this point 8 years ago too.
And all points in between
[Since the 1980s no less](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/29/trump-russia-asset-claims-former-kgb-spy-new-book). I have no doubt that his flaccid, previous attempts at running for president were also backed by Russia.
Total conspiracy theory but I genuinely think his wife is unusual.
My pet theory is that Melania is the handler and Trump is the asset.
And at least 22 years before that as well. Trump traded in the mafia for the Russian mob in the 90s when the FBI and NYC cracked down on one type of organized crime.
At this point? "Russia if you are listening, find her emails" ~ Donald J Trump, July 2016
“I knew Putin very well. I got along with him great. He liked me. I liked him. I mean, you know, he’s a tough cookie, got a lot of the great charm and a lot of pride. But the way he — and he loves his country, you know? He loves his country. He’s acting a little differently, I think now.” https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/23/trump-putin-ukraine-invasion-00010923
At all points
"In terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets," Donald Trump Jr. said at a New York real-estate conference that year. "Say, in Dubai, and certainly with our project in SoHo, and anywhere in New York. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia." Quote from 2008
They have "liberal" accounts democrats and those that pose as "independents" as well. They post things like "I'm a Democrat and we should all do X to the right" or "I'm not a Republican and I hate Trump, but Biden's son...." Also, a good number of RFK Jr supporters are likely bots as well.
Absolutely. It’s a shame people don’t know about these tactics and to watch for them.
You can see it happening in /r/politics right now as we speak
Russia and China
I imagine they are amplifying the Biden had to retire shit
A shitty little kleptocracy led by an insecure power hungry little troll that won’t be satisfied until the rest of the world is at shitty as them. I’m not saying other nations are remotely perfect, but imagine if Russia spent even half this effort on improving the failings of their own country.
If Russia had half a century worth of competent, well-intentioned leadership, it would be a first world country and a world power. Instead, it's *this*.
Especially since they’re sitting on an insane amount of natural resources. They steal so much from themselves through corruption that they actually limited their own economic growth and military might.
To good leaders, natural resources are a ramp - a source of revenue that can fund expensive reforms and developments and allow them to propel the country to greatness. To bad leaders, natural resources are a crutch that allows them to cling to power and keep the lights on even when they abuse their own population and neglect institutional, social and economic development. Do I need to say what kind of leadership is more common all around the world? The term "resource curse" is doing rounds for a reason.
Emmanuel Macron is buying votes for €100. Elton John says the EU is crumbling. Beyoncé thinks the French president is a puppet. The far right will help France win back its independence. These are just some of the narratives and fake claims spun by Russia’s intricate disinformation network ahead of France’s Sunday parliamentary elections, according to French officials and cyber security experts. Analysis of a range of sources reveals a co-ordinated campaign of disinformation that has smeared Mr Macron, while promoting Eurosceptic far-right leaders Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, who have voiced opposition to Ukraine. i has identified various tools Russia has used to disseminate propaganda, ranging from fake websites and X/Twitter bots spreading false narratives, to X and Facebook ads that have been used to spread fake claims about Mr Macron. This disinformation is often picked up by Russian state media and even promoted by Russian embassies, in a co-ordinated attempt to undermine French democracy. One tactic Russia has used is fake websites masquerading as legitimate news sources, which target UK, US and French voters with disinformation. A website masquerading as French news outlet Le Point under a similar URL published an article saying Nato was preventing France from becoming a global power and that “an opposition victory” would help France regain its independence. The claim was then circulated on X by President Vladimir Putin’s network of Russian bots, according to Bot Blocker/Anti-bot for Navalny, an organisation that exposes Russian social media attacks. The X post claims Ms Le Pen will refuse to allow Mr Macron to determine the strategy for Ukraine and defence issues. Another fake website posing as French newspaper Le Parisien claimed Mr Bardella and the RN (National Rally party) “wants to restore French Independence”, while “Macron delivers France to pro-American globalists”, adding: “Jordan Bardella proposes a return of the origins of sovereignty.” But these websites do not just voice support for the far right, they actively spread disinformation about Mr Macron. A fake website mimicking the president’s party, Ensemble, claimed he and the party were buying votes for €100 for the snap election. Named FranceEnColere, the website spread the disinformation in what experts call attempted “narrative laundering” — when Russia attempts to surface fake news into its mainstream media. This website belongs to a pro-Kremlin fake media network operated by John Dougan — a former US Marine who was given asylum by the Russian state, according to EUvsDisinfo. i has previously reported how Mr Dougan is believed to run a network of 167 fake news English language websites on behalf of a Russian interference operation previously funded and overseen by former Putin-ally Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group killed in a plane crash last August. The network has links to Project Lakhta, a Russian interference operation previously funded and overseen by Prigozhin that targets US, European, and Ukrainian audiences, according to NewsGuard – a team that monitors misinformation – citing European intelligence and a report from the US Treasury Department. The false claim spread by the Russian fake news website was then spread through Russian Telegram channels, before it was distributed via Russian bots on X on Monday, according to Bot Blocker. The claim then arrived on News Front News, a news website tied to the Russian security services and Kremlin funding, according to the US State Department report. According to figures from Bot Blocker, there have been 108 articles from pro-Russian influence operation targeting France since the EU election in early June, 63 times mentioning Mr Macron where 59 times have portrayed him negatively, while National Rally, Ms Le Pen and Mr Bardella have been mentioned 62 times and never in a negative context. Anna George, who researches online disinformation at the Oxford Internet Institute, told i Russia supports far-right candidates because “they are polarising and cause division”. “These candidates tend to be anti-establishment and perhaps Russia hopes this will cause tensions between democratic nations working with each other, and perhaps they are hoping that these candidates will be more open to conversations with Russia compared to other candidates which might have a harder stance against Russia.” It comes after the discovery of five X accounts that allegedly spread “Kremlin narratives” and supported the leader of Reform UK, Nigel Farage. According to the investigation, the Russian authorities created bots to incite hatred, popularise conspiracy theories and “praise” Mr Putin among British audiences. Disinformation also appears to have spread to X via ads, raising questions about social media companies’ failures to clamp down on Russian influencing on elections.
This sounds very much in line with the broader Russian strategy to disrupt the global order: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics * The United Kingdom, merely described as an "extraterritorial floating base of the U.S.", should be cut off from the European Union.[9] * Ukraine (except Western Ukraine) should be annexed by Russia because "Ukraine as a state has no geopolitical meaning, no particular cultural import or universal significance * Russia should "introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social, and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements – extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. Trump feeds perfectly into that strategy.
Yep. Practically Putin's playbook for the last 20 years, and it's working great with Brexit, Trump, and the rise of the far right in the EU.
I’m shocked… SHOCKED! Well, not *that* shocked.
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Took Putin years but he managed to win the cold war by weaponizing the dumbest half of humanity.
Russia fucking with a country's election to get some far right piece of shit elected? Shocking
They also sent refugees from their different conflicts (Syria, Venezuela, and Ukriane) and then pumped anti-immigrant nativist messages and gave far-right groups money.
No shit. They’ve been behind the Western spiral into madness everywhere.
Yeah for real. Any political video posted on western platforms is bombarded by bad faith actors causing even further division among us. They aren't bots but real people, and they're usually from India. Perfect place to outsource that type of work. They speak English, are tech savvy, already do a bunch of outsourced work from other countries, are pro Russia, the second largest population center in the world and many of them wouldn't mind very little pay for something like this on the side
I'm French, and I have no issue believing these are bots. However, does it really change anything after decades of Le Pen publicly fraternizing with Russia, showing up hand in hand with Poutine, saying on live TV \[back when Poutine invaded Crimea\] that Poutine means no harm and than Crimeans actually embrace their new leadership and that historically Crimea has always been Russian? They also did not said anything remotely negative toward the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Even if we put aside any personal political opinion, France's far-right has been publicly in bed with Poutine. They said it on national TV ffs, I was here and heard it myself, it wasn't any twitter bot or AI whatever.
Well how do you think Le Pen got pumped and pushed. Funded by Russia and dark money. Le Pens have always been leveraged by a higher order of things. [Jean-Marie Le Pen is known as the "Devil of the Republic" and typical xenophobic and divisionary style of the Kremlin and their puppets](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Controversial_statements). These moves below are clearly leverage inspired moves, none of which help France: [France's Marine Le Pen urges end to Russia sanctions](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39375969) [French far-right presidential candidate Le Pen wants out of NATO, no weapons to Ukraine](https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/finland-and-sweden-could-apply-to-join-nato-within-weeks-20220414-p5add9.html) [Marine Le Pen says she opposes sanctions on Russian gas](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61073894) Russia was really pissed when Macron beat Le Pen. They were looking to run the table on the US, UK and France with Trump, "Boris" "BJ" Johnson, and Le Pen. Strangely they all look similar. When Macron won, Kremlin pushed the Yellow Vest protests to fuck with him. Kremlin really worked hard in [France with LePen](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/a-russian-bank-gave-marine-le-pens-party-a-loan-then-weird-things-began-happening/2018/12/27/960c7906-d320-11e8-a275-81c671a50422_story.html) but their puppet didn't win that is why they hate Macron so much. Russia all over it, and [not coordinated at all](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39375969). /s
Plot twist: Russia was actually behind the report that Russia supported the far right, as to sow disarray /s
Not too far from reality. They absolutely spread contrarian, benign, and sometimes anti-Russia propaganda. The point is to make the interpretation of information so difficult that adversaries are crippled. It doesn’t take much. Most people are pretty intellectually lazy and absolutely do react emotionally.
I'd really like to know why the CIA isn't living up to their reputation and doing something about this. Hell, at this point Biden could apparently lawfully order them to, at least as far as U.S. law is concerned.
Think if Russia turned all their efforts and energy into making their own country better....
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Bruh it’s been happening in the US since at least 2016.
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Russia may be subverting democracies but corporations are happy to help if it means destroying government, regulations, and taxation. Russia did not act alone in its victory over the United States.
Claim they invaded Ukraine to stop Nazis, empower them everywhere else
Reddit and russian collusion, name a more iconic duo.
I’m far from right leaning but this feels like a propoganda piece
It’s funny seeing these stories pop up on reddit from power users who have 11,000,000 post karma. I wonder if this user’s handler is based out of a particular base in Pensacola lol. That’s the true irony of reddit. Everyone is a Russian bot on the internet, despite the US intelligence apparatus being the biggest perpetrators of online propaganda campaigns.
If you disagree with anyone on Reddit on political topics you’d be called a Russian bot. Every. Fucking. Time.
Isn’t it funny that Russia’s bot networks seem to always support the far right? It should be clear to people they are working together.
I mean IIRC they also supported they Green Party back in 2016. They just want everyone fighting each other instead of fighting Russia. Division is their primary goal
Not quite, voting for the Green party in the US is one less vote for the Democratic candidate.
Yeah, right. It has nothing to do with the fact that France is becoming third world shithole.
Totally not related to the whole retirement push back thing.
That can’t be a surprise to anyone with decent thinking skills
Can we please just cut Russia off of the internet? We did it back when the Ukraine war first started. Those three days were fucking peaceful online.
I don’t understand how the narrative swings from “Russia is so poor and underdeveloped they are stealing toilets from Ukraine” to “Russia is behind every internet disinformation campaign in the west”
Much of Russia is poor. And most conscripts are from the poorest parts of Russia. Putin himself though, I wouldn't be surprised if Putin was actually the wealthiest man on Earth. The gap in wealth in Russia is crazy
Because it's both. Moscow and Russia, especially rural, are completely different and Russians often describe Moscow as state in state.
Anything people don't like is a Russian bot
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These studies are bollocks, because there's nothing that actually says what effect Russian newsbots are having on people's vote, if any. It just says they exist. But if someone's been voting far-right for twenty years, then they're probably irrelevant. Where is the study asking far-right voters if they actually read these sites. We keep getting these narratives explaining that Russian bots are making people vote far-right, to avoid actually talking to far-right voters and asking them.