Russia Supporters Storm Ukraine Government Buildings

[Igel]

44. There are things like Ekho.

You can find that not everybody in Russia agrees with Putin.

But it's rather like reading Izvestiya and Pravda. It's not exactly the same, because absolute adherence to every utterance of the voice of the party as the voice of God doesn't hold--there are things that the government doesn't much care about. Hence it's "like".


What is true, though, is that RT et al. give you the official perspective. Cut through the nonsense paraded as facts. Many Russians won't be able to distinguish fact from falsity, many will, but again, it only matters because it gins up support. Think "babies being thrown out of incubators" where all the major newspapers report on it and if you deny it you're shut down for a day or two. In the end, low-information and I-wanna-believe and uber-nationalists will buy into it.

Most in the West have an easier time, since we have a variety of perspectives. We can also easily tune in to Ukrainian sources right and left. But for the Russian perspective, only Putin's matters. When the facts go off the rails it's not an accident, by and large--and if it is, the direction still matters because it's what's approved.

When there are demonstrations, real or exaggerated, when there are mass protests of 3000 from people bussed in from 30 villages and towns, etc., etc., and there are official gushes of angst that pro-Russian protesters are threatening Russians with instability, it's not just incidental reporting. It's a threat. And should be read thus: "There are problems for the real humans in the area. Make them go away, appease the real people, or we'll make the problems go away by making you go away."

BTW, most Russians value stability over democracy. They want order instead of freedom. This is a recurring ordering of values in a number of countries. Egypt was the same. Democracy is to produce only prosperity; it has little to do with actual liberty to act because, frankly, social trust is such that corruption wins out. If you don't trust others, you assume they're out to get you and you should get them first. In such a climate you cannot have democracy.