To play devils advocate, why should we give our enemies the same rights as our neighbors? Both cohorts are not held accountable in the same ways, nor can we expect our enemies to reciprocate the same good faith.
I think in principle free speech is good, but RT news - and any and all messaging coming out of Russia - should be classified as such. If said propaganda is disguised as genuine sentiment on social media then that's bad for free speech.
People also trust non-anonymous posts. You just have to form your own view based on several sources, and try to verify / dismiss some of them. Put everything together, hopefully not like in the movies (wall full of pictures, thumbtacks, and rope)
Sure identified sources can be bad actors too, but that doesn't really matter w.r.t free speech.
For one, the effects are asymmetric. Anonymous bad actors can do more harm than identified sources can do good. Identity discourages bad behavior.
Second, free speech and other ideals of liberalism assume that people are fundamentally good. So if the identified sources are openly bad actors such that they out weigh the good actors, then you're kind of screwed regardless.
No one in the US government is forcing their hand here, and freedom of speech includes freedom from compelled speech, or the compelled platforming of others.
Right, it’s owned by a financial elite who also have control over the state. In China and Russia, there’s a managerial class who run the state and have control over the financial elite.
CNN is also not party owned... It may have similar views to eg. democrats, but that's not even remotely similar. Eg. They aired unedited coverages of many of the Trump campaign rallies.
Show me one 'Ukraine is in war' topic in RT and Russia invaded Ukraine. Which is literally what happened.
> Show me one "How NATO's push eastward scared Russia into war" on CNN.
The only time this comes up on CNN is when they show Putin saying it and talk about what a bullshit lie it is.
The fact is Putin wants to reestablish the Russian Empire. This was just one of the myriad excuses he used to invade. Repeating it is repeating Putin's propaganda, which is the job of his propaganda groups RT/Sputnik/etc
And everyone happily consumes this, as no one has their own opinion anymore. Doesn't make it less of a concern from security perspective of Russia.
Frankly, this kind of chauvinistic attitude is one of the main actual reasons of why Russian-Western relations had degraded to this point. All of this had already been predicted by political experts all over the world almost 20 years ago.
> The fact is Putin wants to reestablish the Russian Empire
Please don't state such ridiculous assertions as facts.
Degraded relations because of testing war responses from Russia, hacking everything except Russian keyboard, actually invading Europe now and 8 years ago could have something to do with it though.
Those warnings were indeed mentioned more than 20 years ago, that is correct. The rest is bs.
> Putin has seen NATO's expansion as an existential threat, and the prospect of Ukraine joining the Western military alliance a "hostile act" -- a view he invoked in a televised speech on Thursday, saying that Ukraine's aspiration to join the military alliance was a dire threat to Russia.
But that's not the whole picture. The main reason behind this war is that Putin considers Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine as one nation, one people. In a lot of ways his actions mirror that of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, when he wanted to unify the german people under one nation. Here's a quote from a lengthy article by Putin published last year:
> I am confident that true sovereignty of Ukraine is possible only in partnership with Russia. Our spiritual, human and civilizational ties formed for centuries and have their origins in the same sources, they have been hardened by common trials, achievements and victories. Our kinship has been transmitted from generation to generation. It is in the hearts and the memory of people living in modern Russia and Ukraine, in the blood ties that unite millions of our families. Together we have always been and will be many times stronger and more successful. For we are one people.
> Today, these words may be perceived by some people with hostility. They can be interpreted in many possible ways. Yet, many people will hear me. And I will say one thing – Russia has never been and will never be ”anti-Ukraine“. And what Ukraine will be – it is up to its citizens to decide.
How convenient. What was Russia's excuse before NATO was created? Do you really think that if NATO did not exist that Putin would keep it in its borders?
> Putin wouldn't even be a thing, and modern world would be vastly different, if NATO did not exist.
You're right, it would be different. Russia would be all over the Baltics, Finland, parts of Poland and Romania, performing special peacekeeping operations.
> Excuse for what?
Excuse for attacking and occupying neighboring countries. Russia's track record goes back in history much further than 1949.
> Russia would be all over the Baltics, Finland, parts of Poland and Romania, performing special peacekeeping operations.
Maybe, maybe not. There would probably be no point in peacekeeping operations if there was no transcontinental military industrial complex as a factor for geopolitical destabilization.
> Russia's track record goes back in history much further than 1949
Considering the historic period you are referring to, Russian track record seems much more restrained then other superpowers rising in 20th century. Maybe you should be more specific?
Are you for real comparing integrity of CNN and RT?
Show me a single outright lie CNN published, comparable to RT publishing a story that ukrainian army crucified a child on a main square in 2014 which caused some people in russia to volunteer as fighters and cross the border with intention of killing ukrainians.
No, please, do tell. Does a different stance make you fascist? Or does it make you pro-Putin? Or are you about to accuse me of being paid for taking a different stance?
You've already called me "fcking piece of sht garbage of a human" in a different thread. Ironic.
it's war. just like north korea would launch missiles during war, they would block enemy propaganda during war. doing the same doesn't make you tyrannical dictatorship - it's just means of waging war. weird that i have to explain basics of logic to you. or maybe not weird at all..
I'm genuinely shocked that all of this goes straight over your head. I suppose that your desperate need for yes-men and sympathy lead you to pulling false equivalence out of thin air. Perhaps that also confirms the name-calling, it must be frustrating to you.
Your account has been breaking the site guidelines by posting flamewar comments and has also been using HN primarily (in fact, it seems exclusively) for political/ideological/nationalistic battle. That's not allowed here, regardless of what you're battling for. It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. Therefore I've banned the account.
If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
Edit: we got such an email so I've unbanned the account. Please stick to the rules going forward.
