Also Here on lemmy there seems to be a group (usually easily recognizable by names, profile pics all referring to USSR, DPRK, DDR, etc. etc.) of people that seem to hammer on the “west evil, Russia good” each chance they get. Especially the worldnews on lemmy ml is modded by a group of people that ban for “McCarthyism” but allow death-treats to western politicians stand. These users consistently steer conversations to Russia was forced, NATO Evil and the Ukrainians are Nazi’s. This kind of conversation steering probably happens on all social media, and the cesspool that is twitter is unfortunately still used as a news source by actual decision makers.
Boy if that isn’t the truth. There was an article over the weekend where someone came in boldly claiming how the war could be ended in a day if Ukraine would simply concede the land that was occupied by Russians. I jumped in asking why they would believe that when Russia’s goals from the beginning were to commit genocide against all Ukrainians to claim their land and natural resources. The conversation never even got to the point of discussing how Russia initially attacked regions far removed from the Russian-occupied territories or that those regions are only occupied by Russians because the original Ukrainian people ‘mysteriously’ disappeared and neighbors woke up to find someone else living in their homes. Just trying to defend Ukraine’s actions was too much and the mods deleted my comments without any explanation.
You can see why it was removed: https://lemmy.ml/modlog?page=1&userId=652090
If you go to an instance there is “modlog” on the bottom. Search for your own name and presto.
But be warned, it will probably make you angry :(Interesting, thanks for letting me know about that feature.
I’m genuinely curious though, was anything I said in those two comments incorrect? I thought it was accurate based on what I’ve been hearing since Russia began attacking in 2022 even though I know it’s in direct conflict with the official Russian propaganda, but is my summary in line with the Ukrainian point of view?
Nah they mark it as misinformation, but the stories are way to common to be nonsense. And in a war zone it is difficult to corroborate or properly investigate. This allows Russia to keep denying the accusations and continue the path they are on. As long as you keep a wide view on the world, and read from many sources (not just 2 western echo-puts of alt right trolls) you will be pretty well informed.
Also always keep in mind that “we” tend to look at the world through a very western lens. There are a lot of Nasty people at the top of our countries too.
Oh I agree. I was pretty happy with Biden’s support early-on, but the way he’s now letting that slip in favor of supporting Israel is just disgusting. I don’t scout around for a ton of news sources but it’s pretty easy most times to separate the blatant propaganda pieces, especially since this is one item I’ve tried to keep up on over the last couple years.
removed by mod
Btw the term to describe that type of person is “tankie.” They’re ostensibly leftists, but in reality support all manner of authoritarian and genocidal leaders and groups.
Their foundational principle is generally “America and its allies bad, American enemies good” and almost all of their political positions are developed from that foundation.
Since tankies often don’t like being called tankies, the more historically used term “campist” encompasses that “america vs everyone else” mentality. Campism is dumb and tankies end up fighting against the democratic movements they claim to support.
Yeah, I got banned from world news for calling out the tankie playbook.
Post removal reason: red scare
Ban reason: McCartyism.
Are the obnoxious trolls from hexbear? Lemmy.world and a lot of other instances have defederated from hexbear because they were/are insufferable.
Some of the hexbear users have since then made troll accounts on other instances, but it’s still a lot better than before defederation. It also helps that they tend to get their accounts banned pretty quickly because they are insufferable.
Usually lemmy ml accounts but they might be hexbear. They have names like stalin_blablabla and xXxMaoxXx etc. But look at the modlog for worldnews on ML, they actively supress anything critical of gaza and Russia as “red scare”, trivializing genocide, etc. its pretty blatant.
/c/USA on lemmy ml is filled with them as well. That community is just about news-bashing the US a much as possible.
As far as groups go, there is a tankie “circle” with usernames ɬɧąɬ ųʂɛ ą ʄơŋɬ ʂıɱıƖąཞ ɬơ ɬɧıʂ. From what I can tell, they are mostly based in India for some reason. They have multiple user accounts they use to troll comments as well.
Honestly, I don’t give a fuck if they stay over on lemmy ml. Whatever. When they start leaking into other instances is when I’ll usually shut them down. (It’s happened a few times on lemmy.ca, btw.)
They have a fairly solid M.O.:
- Post something pro-tankie or blatant misinformation on a target instance.
- Try to convince people with chains of links from super-random sites; repeat common misinformation narratives
- They will attempt to prove you wrong about anything. It doesn’t matter what.
- Quickly devolve the conversation to insults when their “facts” are questioned.
