Comment by russellbeattie | Hacker News Reader

Comment by russellbeattie | Hacker News Reader

This article is 100% wrong.

Russia's misinformation campaign against the U.S. is 100% the cause of our current national discord.

Our entire culture has been maliciously and actively poisoned by a proven state sponsored attack on the U.S. and Western Europe. Everything in the past decade needs to be re-evaluated and filtered through the lens of Russian disinformation.

Day in and day out, for over 10 years, the Russian government has been posting millions and millions of divisive and destabilizing messages online, amplifying the most controversial topics and creating true distrust and hatred among fellow Americans. Their efforts happened to occur along with the unprecedented rise of smart phones, which enabled this campaign conceived during the Obama administration, to have success beyond Russia's wildest dreams.

Additionally, there have been thousands of spies sent to the U.S. in order to infiltrate Congressional and Presidential offices, military personnel and business leaders. How many Russian spies have you heard of? Last night I watched PBS Frontline where I learned of yet another one: the former CEO of Overstock's girlfriend was revealed to be a spy by the FBI (Maria Butina). He was the guy funding and pushing for recount efforts like in Arizona. I remember reading about her, but didn't realize the connection with "stop the steal".

We need to respond. Aggressively and radically. We need to pardon the Jan 6th insurrectionists (I'm a liberal Democrat, mind you) and start a national campaign of de-russification. (As someone named Russ, I don't state that lightly. Haha. Sorry dumb joke.)

The reactions to what I'm saying will be predictable:

1) I'm oversimplifying or exaggerating.

I'm not. This is all fact.

2) I'm a liberal Democrat and I'm somehow trying to target Republicans because I hate freedom.

I'm not spreading a narrative. I'm trying desperately to understand why articles like this from the Atlantic keep trying to explain the state of the country, when we already know the answer.

When is the majority of the country going to realize we've been played and react appropriately??

The problem with the country is that the bulk of it has retreated into paranoid fantasies.

I totally agree. What I'm pointing out is the reason they're all paranoid isn't something natural. It's a result of Russian disinformation campaign.

Many of the people who got fooled will go to their graves believing that the election was stolen, etc. We have to accept a certain portion of the populace is a lost cause.

However, everybody else who isn't completely delusional needs to understand what's happening. My honest belief is that if enough people can start to realize the root cause of our current national schism, suddenly things will make more sense.

Eventually there will be enough people on both the left and the right that understand who the real enemy is, and will realize that those pushing for a culture war are doing Russia's work for them.

Hasn't it happened many times throughout history? It might not appear natural as we can identify a direct cause of it.. But who's to say it wouldn't happen in some other form with different actors if it didn't happen with Putin?

Wait, why pardon the Jan 6th people? Just because one's been mislead by misinformation to believe something false doesn't mean that they are blameless for flagrantly breaking the law in response.

I think the idea is to paint Jan 6 as an aberration for which the participants were deliberately mislead by a foreign power and therefore somehow less responsible for their actions.

IMHO its a dangerous step to take. The rule of law is the founding bedrock of civil society where justice needs not only to be done, but seen to be done.

The US hasn't helped itself by having two justice systems, one for the elites and one for the plebs.

I don't think offering an olive branch to people dedicated to the overthrow of elections could possibly work. Not only would it encourage more violence, but it would be a disastrous failure of justice. This was not legit political discourse as some politicians are trying to paint it. Its just a good old fashioned illegal riot.

Yes, an olive branch is exactly what my idea was.

I think your contrary opinion is totally valid way to look at it. What I'm talking about would definitely be a gamble.

I'd be happy if something could be offered as an olive branch as long as it fits within the normal sentencing leniency (i.e. suspended sentences, community service etc) other than for violent offenders.

It's not my fault, it's society's fault. Society put those ideas in my head lol

You are giving too much credit to Putin. All he did was identify already-existing issues and fuel them further.

Saying this: "The reactions to what I'm saying will be predictable" is a good attempt but doesn't really work I've found. Of course it's predictable, that doesn't make it incorrect.

Yes you guys have been played, but if you didn't see huge growing divisions within the united States well before Putin started to use social media then I don't know what to tell you.

I hope readers here can see that spammers and bad actors have been using social media to affect opinion for years and years before Putin was utilizing them to his benefit. You silicon valley guys set up a system that became doomed to fail. Trump and Putin are just catalyzing an already-collapsing system.

I understand that you are angry, it comes out in your text. But the way out of this is not to add more fuel to the fire unless you want to speed up the natural process of a decaying empire.

Everyone loses faith in their empire eventually. You see it in the increasing selfishness, fear and greed, no?

Killing Putin won't do much at this point except to temporarily satisfy the anger.

An analogy to me is the USA is sick and Putin is just an opportunistic parasite. A strong, healthy host would be able to defend itself.

"2) I'm a liberal Democrat and I'm somehow trying to target Republicans because I hate freedom.

I'm not spreading a narrative. I'm trying desperately to understand why articles like this from the Atlantic keep trying to explain the state of the country, when we already know the answer."

Like a disease, what started from a single cause quickly becomes multifaceted. At that point fixing the original cause is no longer enough. It's useful to know so it doesn't repeat, however.

As you can see in your example, during times of high stress people break down into what they care about most. Some into their love of freedom, others in their need to help. Some take risks under pressure, others hide. You can see the left and right divide based on a few of these and then everyone else gets pulled in by social gravity. Most of us believe what we believe out of loneliness, purpose, identity, not logic.

I am on the other side. I have zero faith in our institutions as they have literally killed my friends and destroyed my life. And so I have adopted a more libertarian perspective since I have experienced more good coming from individuals with good hearts than any of my experiences with our healthcare or education systems.

That doesn't mean I am correct. And I would be incredibly naive to not accept that there needs to be a healthy balance between all.

To add to this.. Us Americans I don't think understand how many other parts of the world don't like us. If you want evidence of this go travel, and see how people treat you, then watch their eyes light up if you tell them you are a Canadian and not American.

If it wasn't Putin it would be someone else eventually. You can't win the whack-a-mole game forever.

Let's say we could repeat things without Putin. Facebook and Google and tech companies would have kept growing naively, making it easier and easier to break the system over time. Eventually some team somewhere would infect social media and use it against the USA.

I would actually argue that when humans are exposed to too much information their ability to make rational decisions actually goes down, and we are more likely to use our emotion to make decisions. If you e ever felt burnt out, and overwhelmed by decisions you'll likely have felt something like this.

It is inevitable in my eyes. I think us humans make the mistake of thinking history happens because of the names. It doesn't.

> watch their eyes light up if you tell them you are a Canadian and not American.

This is such a cliche. I just deleted a long wordy message as to why, but I've lived abroad, speak Spanish, traveled all over and have tons of extended Canadian family, including my maternal grandmother. This sentiment is 100% not true.

I could be in the middle of Tehran or Cairo and tell someone I'm from California and will inevitably get bombarded with friendly questions and stories about how their aunt visited Vermont once, and have I been there. This is the case anywhere I've gone.

I've personally travelled with Canadians. Trust me, no one's eyes light up outside the English speaking world, if that. "Oh, you're from Calgary? Interesting... Is that on the West Coast? Oh, sort of in the middle. Like near Montana?" I mean, it's Canada.

Also, it's not as if anyone wouldn't already know someone is Canadian. They wear red Maple Leaf patches from head to toe, and will even apply fake maple leaf tattoos.

Anyways, it's completely untrue. The US government may not be the most popular all the time, but Americans are treated just fine.

Lol I literally just did it. I have friends from around the world that talk shit about Americans constantly. They love Canadians.

America and loud obnoxiousness are synonyms in lots of the world. People laugh at loud people and say oh they're probably american.

When I was in Holland this is exactly what my dutch friends said everytime they saw loud people. In Mexico there are lots of resorts where people literally try to get away from Americans. There are places where Canadians are welcome and everyone there tries to shield out Americans from buying property.

It's 100% true. I totally understand why us Americans would have our blinders on about this however.

Ah! OK, I don't agree with you in general, but you inadvertently brought up a good point. There's the perception of Americans online and that in person, and I'm sure Russia has done it everything it can to make sure we're hated abroad as much as possible.

You have a bunch of friends online who think Americans are all fat, loud, obnoxious and ignorant. Join the club. Most Americans think that as well.

Definitely another thing we need to focus on.

Just to add: this was long before Russian propaganda.

I'm not saying I agree with it. Just something I have noticed.

And my friends aren't online. They say this in person. For example, in a bar and hear someone being loud. American.

Seeing tourists making lots of unnecessary noise in the street -> american.

This is half joking but also what people seem to actually think a lot of the time.

In my experience this is more a European thing, I don’t have the same issues elsewhere, and then in the case of Europeans, they have said, you’re not like I expected an American to be, so they recognize their bias.

I met a girl last night in Mexico and she said, "you're not American are you? Americans are loud and they always want the rest of the world to hear them."

This is the sentiment I was trying to express. It's definitely not a cliche. I also find on a slightly related note that a lot of problems on social media are American problems and the rest of the world doesn't really care.

And I feel bad typing this but it's true, and if the USA wants to climb back from its decline it is going to need to get comfortable with reality.

> This sentiment is 100% not true.

Hate to break it to you but it's true. Been living in 3 different European countries for 25 years and the common perception is that these loud, ignorant tourists making fools of themselves are from the US by default.

As painful as it may sound to you in our eyes America is now a third world country with a Gucci belt.

> huge growing divisions within the united States well before Putin

Of course I'm not saying Russia created our national schizophrenia, which stems literally from the birth of the nation, but they sure as hell helped exacerbate the condition. Russia deliberately amplified and inflamed the culture wars so that they could corrupt and weaken the US from within without being noticed. From fake online accounts, to financing fringe candidates and media personalities to hacking and interfering with the 2016 election.

And it worked.

I respect your cynicism and opinion but maybe part of your feelings are a cause of Russia disinformation as well. Are our institutions really that awful? Or do you think so little of them because of relentless negative propaganda?

I agree with you. And yes I could and probably am manipulated to an extent.

But... I have noticed this before 2016. Years before.

Example of bad American institutions: physical therapy, high schools, colleges for physical therapists. Food. Look at how horrible people eat in America. You'd expect the best country in the world to have a little bit more education when it comes to their bodies and the filth (food, pollution, information) they put into them. Not to mention how horribly ignorant people are about their physical health. These are the ones I have noticed.

I can't comment on the others.

But also, American kids dont do that badly in international tests. They are not the very bestest best. But everytime there is debate about how bad American schools are, I check the stats and ... they are fairly normal on average for democratic world. The only unique thing is American expectation that they should be totally first in everything and anything less then that is failure.

> Look at how horrible people eat in America. You'd expect the best country in the world to have a little bit more education when it comes to their bodies and the filth (food, pollution, information) they put into them.

America is the leader of the world in talking about food constantly. Obsessing about it. Going to extreme with diets and making up ones again and again. America does not need more of that. It maybe needs to stop assuming it is and must be "best country in the world" in everything and be willing to learn from elsewhere.

> But... I have noticed this before 2016. Years before.

I wrote 'decade' for a reason. :-) The push started during the Obama administration. Before Russia invaded the Crimea, Putin was laying groundwork to soften US resistance.

Study Exposes Russia Disinformation Campaign That Operated In The Shadows For 6 Years: https://www.npr.org/2020/06/16/878169027/study-exposes-russi...

Just watching the score of this post go up and down is interesting how controversial it is I guess??

> You are giving too much credit to Putin. All he did was identify already-existing issues and fuel them further.

Yes. But also, fuel on fire makes much worst fire and possibly explosion. While the exact same fire with no fuel could be stopped or would stop. And it will be actually interesting to watch what will happen with politics abroad as Russia will have less money.

Putin was shelling money and supported not just parties in America. And I really want to see what will happen with fascist anti-democratic parties in both Eu and America as Russia gets weaker and weaker. At minimum, they will have less resources, which should weaken them.

> Killing Putin won't do much at this point except to temporarily satisfy the anger. An analogy to me is the USA is sick and Putin is just an opportunistic parasite. A strong, healthy host would be able to defend itself.

I dont think this is accurate. Putin is strongman in Russia, changing strongman means change of policy. Things will change, you just dont know how. And quite likely, it would lead to scramble for power among Russia elite and a lot of disarray. Putin is not just opportunistic parasite. Just like Hitler or Stalin or any other leader, he shaped things quite a lot. He was not magician to create everything he wanted, but he absolutely create situation in Russia as it is.

Putin was president for 20 years. The return to ussr methods is very much his doing.

In my analogy I was meaning to say Putin is a parasite to the USA's host.

I was attempting to argue that it's not so much that Putin is strong, it's that right now the west is weak.

And sure one could argue against that and say that the west uniting against him is a sign of unity and strength. But I'm not so sure.

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