Is there a Hyperfocus (and Exaggeration) of Russian Intervention? (And as a result a downplaying of other issues especially US-based ones)

[Kitsunelaine]

oops,
well, um, at least we agree that Trump and Russia are bad, i guess it's cool.

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i'm just getting tired of people asserting what i believe in order to prove their own points as if anything I say doesn't have nuance you can tease out with good faith discussion lol

maybe the internet is the wrong place for that though

basically my thoughts on this are complicated and hard to get into the right words

 

[Mental Atrophy]

I expect Russia to try and fuck with shit. I don't approve of my own representatives assisting them with doing it and benefiting from it.

 

[Kirblar]

influencing an election through criminal activity isn't a coup, if dark money was illegal then Israel could be accused of the same thing

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Russia has actively supported installing crony dictatorships in Ukraine and Venezuela in recent years. (Yes I know the US does not have a good track record on this in the second half of the 1900s.) Supporting a guy like Trump is exactly what they do. Corrupt authoritarian shitheads on the right or left. That's who they like.

 

[Kitsunelaine]

i'm just getting tired of people asserting what i believe in order to prove their own points as if anything I say doesn't have nuance you can tease out with good faith discussion lol

maybe the internet is the wrong place for that though

basically my thoughts on this are complicated and hard to get into the right words

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here though, let me try: (Not an edit because it's big and if it were an edit it'd be missed):

"Understood. Trump shouldn't be the only 100% sole focus and as an extension, Russia too or else we create blind spots in the issues of the country by buying too much into their own hype. "

To me this feels like an extreme and dismissive way of looking at the current crisis facing America. Like there's some level of trump/russia news that is appropriate and some level that isn't. I'm sorry but you don't get to decide that. None of us do. The world is going to keep happening whether we like it or not and it cares not for the appropriateness of talk about the crisis. It also does not generate blind spots on volume alone.

It sounds like you're complaining that people are taking this issue as seriously as they are, and that in doing so they are ignorant of everything else. That is a massive and completely ungrounded assertion on your part. People can care about more than one thing at a time. Just look at all the bitching about The Last Jedi.

My points have never aligned with this, especially because I hold a great ammount of disdain towards the attitude as I think it is a way of belittling people for giving a serious issue it's due. My points have been instead about examining the world that Trump and Russia wish to project and comparing it with actual reality. Because when you have the biggest megaphone on the planet, you have a lot of projection power.

And it's not just about lies. It's about the crowds you gather, and how big those are. It's about the impact on data that it causes. If you have the biggest microphone and you're a loud asshole with opinions, you're gonna get a fuckin' crowd. The internet on it's own is proof of that.

That crowd is going to be rallied into participation on so many levels and distort everything we know by nature. It will drain us of hope or optimisim and that's what they want. They want us to think they're the hottest shit and that they're never going away and that they're this big and massive fuckoff movement that's going to trample all over you and can't be stopped.

They want you to think that you're powerless, not just in dealing with them, but dealing with any issue you might care about.

They'd want you to be too worried about blind spots to do anything.

They want you to do anything BUT examine them for what they are. And that's why I think treating them any less seriously than they deserve to be treated is dangerous.

Why do you think they want you to play the whatabout game? It doesn't matter what the whatabout is. Just that it's brought up INSTEAD of them. You can still bring it up on it's own terms. This entire state of play and tactic is disingenuous as shit and I don't like it one bit and I think we have innocent people falling for it. It's the "Oh, you care about X? What about the starving children in Africa?" of the modern era. Except weaponized.

 

[Deleted member 78]

I'm not the one stanning for Assad and Maduro boo, I'm living my best life.

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Who says you have to?

 

[Iloelemen]

here though, let me try: (Not an edit because it's big and if it were an edit it'd be missed):

"Understood. Trump shouldn't be the only 100% sole focus and as an extension, Russia too or else we create blind spots in the issues of the country by buying too much into their own hype. "

To me this feels like an extreme and dismissive way of looking at the current crisis facing America. Like there's some level of trump/russia news that is appropriate and some level that isn't. I'm sorry but you don't get to decide that. None of us do. The world is going to keep happening whether we like it or not and it cares not for the appropriateness of talk about the crisis. It also does not generate blind spots on volume alone.

It sounds like you're complaining that people are taking this issue as seriously as they are, and that in doing so they are ignorant of everything else. That is a massive and completely ungrounded assertion on your part. People can care about more than one thing at a time. Just look at all the bitching about The Last Jedi.

My points have never aligned with this, especially because I hold a great ammount of disdain towards the attitude as I think it is a way of belittling people for giving a serious issue it's due. My points have been instead about examining the world that Trump and Russia wish to project and comparing it with actual reality. Because when you have the biggest megaphone on the planet, you have a lot of projection power.

And it's not just about lies. It's about the crowds you gather, and how big those are. It's about the impact on data that it causes. If you have the biggest microphone and you're a loud asshole with opinions, you're gonna get a fuckin' crowd. The internet on it's own is proof of that.

That crowd is going to be rallied into participation on so many levels and distort everything we know by nature. It will drain us of hope or optimisim and that's what they want. They want us to think they're the hottest shit and that they're never going away and that they're this big and massive fuckoff movement that's going to trample all over you and can't be stopped.

They want you to think that you're powerless, not just in dealing with them, but dealing with any issue you might care about.

They'd want you to be too worried about blind spots to do anything.

They want you to do anything BUT examine them for what they are. And that's why I think treating them any less seriously than they deserve to be treated is dangerous.

Why do you think they want you to play the whatabout game? It doesn't matter what the whatabout is. Just that it's brought up INSTEAD of them. You can still bring it up on it's own terms. This entire state of play and tactic is disingenuous as shit and I don't like it one bit and I think we have innocent people falling for it. It's the "Oh, you care about X? What about the starving children in Africa?" of the modern era. Except weaponized.

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I agree with you on this. And you're right, it's much more complex than anything that can be summed up in a singe line. And yes, it's dangerous to not treat them seriously.

 

[Equippedwithtowel]

What kind of thinking?

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The person I quoted after you. Could have formatted that better in hindsight.

 

[Kitsunelaine]

I agree with you on this. And you're right, it's much more complex than anything that can be summed up in a singe line. And yes, it's dangerous to not treat them seriously.

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Part of my point is that thread plays into their whatabout game by pretending that people can't care about more than one thing at a time and that they have to care about something instead of the trump/russia stuff. This thread poses it as a binary issue when it's not

 

[Neece]

Reminds me of Angela Rye and Joy Reid saying the #ados hashtag was paid by Russia and the angry response that has gotten from black twitter.




Black Critics of Kamala Harris and Cory Booker Push Back Against Claims That They're Russian "Bots"

Angela Rye, a CNN political commentator and board member of the Congressional Black Caucus PAC, has said she believes that some ADOS arguments are not organic, but were "paid for by Russia." She added that she's "not saying everyone who uses the hashtag is a Russian bot," but she does believe "it originated from Russian bots." Rye went on to argue that the same is true of critiques relating to "some of the stuff around the crime bill" circa 2016 — presumably referring to critics of Hillary Clinton who questioned her support of the bill now widely understood to have caused overwhelming harm to black Americans.

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"A lot of the ones that are pretending to be black people, black women in particular, who are focusing on black identity, have these sort of aspects in the ways that they're talking about language," she said. She went on to say that bots are posing as black Americans using "the vernacular or the language of someone that believes they are a part of our community" to claim authority to represent black Americans.

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Carnell told The Intercept that she thinks calling out ADOS is an effort to delegitimize the grassroots movement they've worked to cultivate and to "undermine a real debate that we have about Kamala Harris within the black community." For years, Moore and Carnell have been doing regular YouTube and radio shows together where they discuss issues like reparations and the racial wealth divide under the lens of "native descendants of American slaves."

"We thought that there wasn't enough policy and policy initiatives, policy proposals for Americans who descended from slavery and had ancestors who lived through Jim Crow, reconstruction, all of that, so we came up with the hashtag American DOS or ADOS," Carnell said, adding that they started the hashtag around two years ago.

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Moore said that accusations like Reid's are a McCarthyite tactic in the same vein as the attempts to publicly discredit Martin Luther King Jr. "It's troubling, the lengths that these people will go to undermine authentic Black advocacy in order to prop up the Democratic establishment," he said in an email. An MSNBC spokesperson declined to comment.

Indeed, people of color who challenge the Democratic Party from the left are often erased or dismissed as somehow not being real.

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https://theintercept.com/2019/02/13/ados-kamala-harris-cory-booker-russian-bots/

 

[Equippedwithtowel]

Your point would be great if that was a fair reading of anything I said. You're projecting your own conclusions onto me and placing them into my mouth in order to make a point.

You don't fuckin' know what I believe and yet you assert it anyway based on conclusions you draw from me thinking that Trump has the potential to be an illegitimate president. Somehow you turned that into me saying "Man if Trump were illegitimate all the problems would just go away!"

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Then what's your point. Policing "whataboutism" and pessimism?

righteous indignance aside, saying that I characterized your position as trump being rendered illigitmate "would make all our problems go away" is a stretch. My point was that it might not nessecarily be that positive in the long run and certainly is a less fruitful drum to beat then directing popular support against American oligarchs (who have captured the state many times over).

I'm sorry for assuming but it seemed pretty safe to assume that you are waiting for a popular validation of the 2016 election being illegitimate because you think it'll help.

 

[Iloelemen]

Part of my point is that thread plays into their whatabout game by pretending that people can't care about more than one thing at a time and that they have to care about something instead of the trump/russia stuff. This thread poses it as a binary issue when it's not

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Of course, it shouldn't be made into a binary because it's not, multi-tasking is a thing.

 

[Kitsunelaine]

Then what's your point. Policing "whataboutism" and pessimism?

righteous indignance aside, saying that I characterized your position as trump being rendered illigitmate "would make all our problems go away" is a stretch. My point was that it might not nessecarily be that positive in the long run and certainly is a less fruitful drum to beat then directing popular support against American oligarchs (who have captured the state many times over).

I'm sorry for assuming but it seemed pretty safe to assume that you are waiting for a popular validation of the 2016 election being illegitimate because you think it'll help.

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no I'm waiting for a validation of the 2016 election being illegitimate because fuck donald trump and we can't deal with any of his fires until he's fuckin' gone and the severity of his shit is given full attention and unveiling without any of the fuckin' obstruction from his cronies and his position as president

i can wish for this while also supporting candidates to replace him by the way, again, not a binary issue

The person I quoted after you. Could have formatted that better in hindsight.

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p.s the user might have me on ignore and thus not know you were quoting anyone

 

[Planet]

Siri, what is Afghanistan, the Iron Curtain, North Korea, Latin America, Ukraine etc?

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Yeah, figured that many people got their education that way.

 

[BowieZ]

Destructive US colonialism does not mean we should ignore Russia's accelerating and increasingly successful meddling and cyber warfare in transatlantic politics ever since Putin rose to power. The US President is an obvious Russian asset. The fact the media is consuming so much oxygen dealing with that crisis can't necessarily be blamed on the media... that's simply another in a long line of disastrous side-effects that their warfare has thrust upon America.

 

[Deleted member 8777]

Some of the libs on here are insane when it comes to it. There was a guy in the russian firewall thread who wanted all russians segregated from the rest of the internet forever.

 

[Iloelemen]

Some of the libs on here are insane when it comes to it. There was a guy in the russian firewall thread who wanted all russians segregated from the rest of the internet forever.

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What the heck?

 

[breakdancing duck]

I didn't realize there were so many here who agree with Trump that our intelligence agencies are wrong about Russia's meddling. Please wait for the the completed report before deciding it's overstated because you think it is.

 

[Deleted member 78]

Russia has actively supported installing crony dictatorships in Ukraine and Venezuela in recent years. (Yes I know the US does not have a good track record on this in the second half of the 1900s.) Supporting a guy like Trump is exactly what they do. Corrupt authoritarian shitheads on the right or left. That's who they like.

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The US has a far worse record. At least they're consistent with their far-right dictators though.

I didn't realize there were so many here who agree with Trump that our intelligence agencies are wrong about Russia's meddling. Please wait for the the completed report before deciding it's overstated because you think it is.

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I hope this applies to the "EVERYTHING WAS RUSSIA" crowd too.

That line about agreeing with Trump though. Super weird framing.

 

[Gernau Morat Gurgeh]

My feeling is that there is. That is not to say that Russia did not intervene and in all likelihood worked directly with Trumps' creatures - having an idiot in charge of the US is obviously to Putin's advantage. However, I feel that people should ask how it is that bullshit memes and obvious misinformation was so effective, and how the US electorate ended up so susceptible to this propaganda. I would argue that this is a consequence of domestic failings, namely the normalisation of believing in an alternate reality, primarily pushed by the American right and Fox etc coupled with a system of government that has outright legalised corruption (eg Citizens United). I also think that the immediate jump to assume Russian influence in any US political contretemps is a mental crutch- it's much easier to blame an outside force than to admit that the problem is rooted, perhaps inextricably, in your own society.
Finally, I have very little faith in US intelligence agencies, and find the sudden move from many liberals to view the CIA and FBI as potential saviours as alarming: these organisations have for most of their history served to overthrow democratic governments abroad and infiltrate American reformist movements at home, while establishing a surveillance state.

 

[Iloelemen]

I didn't realize there were so many here who agree with Trump that our intelligence agencies are wrong about Russia's meddling. Please wait for the the completed report before deciding it's overstated because you think it is.

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Agreeing with white supremacist man-baby? LOL no, It's not a binary question of existence or non-existence of intervention, it's a question of a degree of focus (media-wise) relative to other issues.

 

[Wackamole]

I think there is a lot of distraction in general.

 

[Buzzman]

I do think for some people it's easier to blame everything bad on a sinister foreign power instead of realizing that these kinds of people have always been part of your history. You don't need to give a klansman/republican russian money to have them be absolutely vile.

Even in the best case scenario where Trump and his entire administration gets removed, You still have the entire GOP apparatus in place.

 

[Fluffernutter Pancake]

Well documented US interventions in foreign politics and voting all over the globe in the past century dwarf anything Russia might have done in that area by several magnitudes. It's like Al Capone calling a 10yo with his hand on the cookie glass a criminal.

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This right here!

I'll add that it is quite Orwellian how we went from cheering Obama's "Hey Mitt --- the 1980s called --- they want their foreign policy back" in a 2012 debate to "Russia, Russia, Russia!" in 2016. There are much bigger and longer-term plays here by power players way more globally influential than Romney, Obama, Trump or Putin.

 

[Baji Boxer]

No, there's no exaggeration on the significance of all this, but maybe too much focus on the Russians themselves from some people, and not enough on the Republican lawmakers who have been clearly compromised (or were happy about the results and rolled with it). It's not the Russian interference that's the real story, it's how the GOP enabled it and has welcomed its benefits.

The NRA, one of the most destructive organizations in our country, being in bed with Russia really should be a bigger deal, for example.

 

[sapien85]

Well documented US interventions in foreign politics and voting all over the globe in the past century dwarf anything Russia might have done in that area by several magnitudes. It's like Al Capone calling a 10yo with his hand on the cookie glass a criminal.

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3 posts in for whataboutism.

 

[sapien85]

I fail to see why protecting ethnic Russians in Crimea is a less legitimate superficial excuse then inventing weapons of mass destruction to go kill a half million people in Iraq

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The Crimea thing is literally the justification Hitler used to expand that started world war II. You know how many wars would happen if every country in the world annexed territories that had ethnic majorities that matched their own? The whole world system falls apart. You can say that won't happen except it is happening in slow motion. Once the US hegemony declines China is going for Taiwan and Russia is eyeing several more territories.

 

[sapien85]

I've seen people on this forum argue that black activists were duped by russians

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There were literal Facebook groups started by Russian agents both for and against black activism.

 

[sapien85]

This right here!

I'll add that it is quite Orwellian how we went from cheering Obama's "Hey Mitt --- the 1980s called --- they want their foreign policy back" in a 2012 debate to "Russia, Russia, Russia!" in 2016. There are much bigger and longer-term plays here by power players way more globally influential than Romney, Obama, Trump or Putin.

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Between 2012 and 2016, Russia invaded a nearby country, launched a mass cyber attack against another, funneled money to far right and left groups all over the West, Brexit happened, Trump was elected, Russia started building an internet wall. A lot changed in those years on Russian behavior. And Mitt was right. Just because people changed their minds on something based on the facts on the ground isn't Orwellian.

 

[Iloelemen]

3 posts in for whataboutism.

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???
whataboutism?
what about China?

 

[sapien85]

Some of the libs on here are insane when it comes to it. There was a guy in the russian firewall thread who wanted all russians segregated from the rest of the internet forever.

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The actual Russian government is building the infrastructure to do this. They're only going to allow approved parties to have access to the rest of the internet. Many of those allowed are going to be Russian agents or friendly to the Russian government at least.

 

[DrROBschiz]

Exaggerated?

Hardly. Look at all the indictments

Not to mention the use of various assets (Wikileaks) and spies (Maria Butina) and cyber warfare operatives

What the fuck is exaggerated? Sure their methods may be cheap and require less manpower than before but its no less effective

 

[sapien85]

???
whataboutism?
what about China?

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Where in the post I mentioned is China mentioned? Also mentioning China in a thread about Russian actions as if that excuses the other is whataboutism.

 

[DrROBschiz]

As far as Hyperfocus?

Ehhh we should at the very least keep the public aware of Social media propaganda campaigns and suspected Foreign influence but I would PREFER is Facebook, Google, and Twitter actually did their share of the heavy lifting

Otherwise we can hopefully leave the other issues to Law Enforcement, FBI and the DOJ

 

[Iloelemen]

Where in the post I mentioned is China mentioned? Also mentioning China in a thread about Russian actions as if that excuses the other is whataboutism.

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I brought up China.
I "whatabouted" China and it wasn't my intention to excuse whatever.

I'm just curious why the post you labeled as whataboutism is whataboutist.

 

[Iloelemen]

Exaggerated?

Hardly. Look at all the indictments

Not to mention the use of various assets (Wikileaks) and spies (Maria Butina) and cyber warfare operatives

What the fuck is exaggerated? Sure their methods may be cheap and require less manpower than before but its no less effective

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I think the coverage by the media is what I'm in particular is saying that's Hyper-focused.

 

[SemRockwel]

I mean, there does seem to be a sentiment from anti-capitalist and far left circles that this is overblown, but I feel that is more to do with the fact that they want the focus to be on dealing with unregulated capitalism rather than the 2016 aftermath.

The problem with that essesment is that the russia situation is intristicly tied to capitalist oligarchy. Big money is tied to breaking down our democratic systems and that is exactly what went on.

Some leftists have a softspot for the old ussr socialist ideal, so you get some giving them a free pass (glenwald), and others aren't actually that overly concerned about democracy is general if it isn't a socialist one. My belief though is that democracy is an important gateway to reforms (which russia was interfering with), and that both issues of democracy and capitalism reforms are tightly connected.

 

[DrROBschiz]

I think the coverage by the media is what I'm in particular is saying that's Hyper-focused.

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Media could probably back off and leave the rest to authorities at this point

They seem to have everything tied up in courts now

But you cant really Trust media to handle anything the way you want them too.

As always its up to the consumer of media to sift through what is and isnt important. Media is still valuable but will always require effort on our part even if it feels annoying

 

[RDreamer]

I've never heard anyone credible say that Trump or Brexit outright wouldn't have happened without Russia.

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Thing is that Trump won by very little. If any one thing didn't happen then he realistically doesn't get elected. If Russia didn't steal those emails then Trump loses.

 

[Iloelemen]

Thing is that Trump won by very little. If any one thing didn't happen then he realistically doesn't get elected. If Russia didn't steal those emails then Trump loses.

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Pretty dark though that the hatred and bigotry were big enough to put someone like Trump to the President's seat via the shitty electoral system.

 

[_ifigured]

The massive amount of Russian investments owned by US republican senators which can be factually proved on record should never have been allowed to happen. I'm not as well-versed on their international hijinx, but its no boogey man type situation here. The individuals who comprise the gop have nothing to gain from helping America and everything to gain for themselves by helping Russia. There's no conspiracy there, its all in broad daylight.

 

[Deleted member 6230]

There were literal Facebook groups started by Russian agents both for and against black activism.

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That has nothing to do with what I said

 

[RDreamer]

Pretty dark though that the hatred and bigotry were big enough to put someone like Trump to the President's seat via the shitty electoral system.

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I mean yeah Russia pushing him over the edge doesn't absolve things. A shitty person like Trump shouldn't have been remotely close. Russia or not it does show where we're at as a country and it ain't pretty.

 

[Deleted member 44129]

Outlining Russian attempts to influence people using social media should be up-played. Hopefully this will make people think carefully about information when they receive it, and consider it's source, and the intention of those delivering it.

 

[Planet]

3 posts in for whataboutism.

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That's one way to see it. Others might call it "HOLD THE THIEF!" method. The US propaganda machine is pointing at Russian influence to distract from internal problems.

Not saying there is none of that. Just saying it's far far from being the root cause of the problems of the western world.

 

[Clefargle]

We can do two things at once:

1: Aknowledge the mistakes the Clinton Campaign made

2. Investigate the Russian meddling and hold people accountable

There is no conflict there. I know many Americans that can do both just fine. What they SHOULDNT have to do is rationalize why the country voted for trump, because he lost the popular vote by 3m.

 

[Deleted member 9838]

Crimea is actively a blatant expansionist landgrab in ways those others are not. Motivations matter.

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It belongs to Russia. It's majority ethnic Russians that live there and belonged to Russia before the disbanding of the Soviet Union. The locals decided as well in a referendum. They took it dirty but they have plenty of claim to it.

 

[Fluffernutter Pancake]

Between 2012 and 2016, Russia invaded a nearby country, launched a mass cyber attack against another, funneled money to far right and left groups all over the West, Brexit happened, Trump was elected, Russia started building an internet wall. A lot changed in those years on Russian behavior. And Mitt was right. Just because people changed their minds on something based on the facts on the ground isn't Orwellian.

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Were they rosy fresh with clean hands in 2012 and the decade prior? How about the US? Three possibilities:

1) It's as straightforward as you say it is, and things just happened to change between 2012 and 2016, and Russia put on its bond villain hat overnight, and media & politicians are just responsibly calling the shots as they see them.

2) Russia always had its bond villain hat on, but media & politicians didn't latch onto and publicize it until it became politically convenient for them in recent years.

3) Russia didn't and doesn't have a bond villain hat on, but media & politicians are latching onto and demonizing Russia's geopolitical muscle-flexing because it is politically convenient for them and/or there are higher-up geopolitical figures spurring this message.

I'm with 2 or 3 (particularly 3), and that is certainly Orwellian --- the whole Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia, and the ease with which we flip and flop between demon-spawns whom we must go to war with.

 

[BigWinnie1]

Were they rosy fresh with clean hands in 2012 and the decade prior? How about the US? Three possibilities:

1) It's as straightforward as you say it is, and things just happened to change between 2012 and 2016, and Russia put on its bond villain hat overnight, and media & politicians are just responsibly calling the shots as they see them.

2) Russia always had its bond villain hat on, but media & politicians didn't latch onto and publicize it until it became politically convenient for them in recent years.

3) Russia didn't and doesn't have a bond villain hat on, but media & politicians are latching onto and demonizing Russia's geopolitical muscle-flexing because it is politically convenient for them and/or there are higher-up geopolitical figures spurring this message.

I'm with 2 or 3 (particularly 3), and that is certainly Orwellian --- the whole Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia, and the ease with which we flip and flop between demon-spawns whom we must go to war with.

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Russia has always been a bond villian we just hoped that they would be better now and we were all optimistic back then. China is Also an issue we have to deal with that we have been lax with.

People act like we are going all in on the russia angle and are missing the other shit when the first bill democrats did upon getting power was pass a bill that would fix a majority of the issues that cause tje past election issues.

Alot of you people are arguiing in bad faith.

 

[bane833]

Yes. And it´s often done to deflect from the actual problems: many western countries are rotten to the core.

 

[Deleted member 9838]

Bush won and lost the popular vote. It's how the electoral college works. The right would of just made up a bunch of shit if the email thing never happened. Not like they remotely care about facts in the first place. The narrative was spun better by the right and he had a strong turnout where he needed. Sucks but it wasn't because another country was fucking around for attention.