How Putin Controls the Internet and Popular Opinion in Russia

[rysiek]

Dnia poniedziałek, 21 września 2015 14:05:59 Razer pisze:
> On 09/20/2015 09:01 PM, James A. Donald wrote:
> > It used to be that whenever Soviet attempts to brutally subjugate some
> > country failed, the left would cry "Evil US imperialism"
> > 
> > Now you have actual evil US imperialism happening right in front of
> > your noses, for example Haiti, and the left is in total denial.
> 
> The Cruise Missile Left is cheering all "humanitarian interventions".
> All other left-thinking Mericans have been stupidified by TeeVee.
> 
> I defer to: Amusing Ourselves To Death. Neil Postman.
> 
> Available at LibCom Anarchist library:
> 
> https://libcom.org/library/amusing-ourselves-death-public-discourse-age-show
> -business-neil-postman
> 
> The last chapter regarding Orwell or Huxley, who was right? clinches it.

Very much so. Here's a helpful infographic version:
http://rys.io/static/amusing-ourselves-to-death-huxley-orwell.png
/not mine, unfortunately/

One thing to note is that one important way we are being intellectually 
castrated is by being led to radicalizing our positions -- by the filter 
bubble, by keeping more and more to like-minded people on social media, by 
assuming "the other side" (whichever that might be in any given circumstances) 
is "inherently evil", and by assuming off the bat what the "other side" in a 
given discussion has to say. Without listening, without thinking.

This, in turn, makes it impossible to find middle ground and to *actually* 
understand the world, and to *actually* work to improve it.

Look at the US vs. Russia debate. Why the fuck does it have to be "vs."? Why 
the fuck almost every single "lefty" person that I talk to and pass on my 
concerns about what Putin (yes, personally that guy; I have no beef with 
Russians as a people) assumes that at the same time I'm saying I'm okay with 
US internal or international policies? Why if I criticize actions of the 
Russian government I am immediately assumed to be defending actions of the US?

And, on the other hand, why do people that have (rightful) grievances with US 
policies fail to even *consider* that maybe, just maybe, things in Russia 
aren't all that great and that Putin is not entirely the victim here?

They are both fucked up, in many *different* (systemic racism in the US; 
systemic homophobia in Russia), and several *similar* ways (oligarchy running 
things). And yet they are able to play us, because predominantly we simply 
cannot see the bigger picture and cannot seem to understand *anything* more 
complicated than the simplified beyond belief "USA BAD RUSSIA GOOD" (or the 
other way around) worldview.

It sickens me.

-- 
Pozdrawiam,
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak

Zmieniam klucz GPG :: http://rys.io/pl/147
GPG Key Transition :: http://rys.io/en/147
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