Defence agency says Moscow is using the protests in Stockholm to stir tensions between Arab countries and the west

      • M0oP0o@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I am honestly looking for my defence of any “west” and coming up empty. And I think you might have just done whataboutism recursion. Neat!

        • hark@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Nah, you just happen to be using terminology that is used by western propagandists in order to criticize someone who is pointing out western hypocrisy. Any time the west is criticized, it’s “whataboutism”. The term, by the way, was created during the cold war to also dismiss when the west was criticized back then. It really should’ve stayed there, and I’m honestly kind of surprised at how quickly people bought into cold war mentality again to scream about Russia (and China). At least “commie/pinko” got changed to “tankie” so there’s something new I guess.

          • M0oP0o@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Oh its much older then the cold war “Tu quoque” style arguments go way back. I would still call it out no matter where or who it was directed at.

            This is a post about a country doing something shitty, to then excuse shitty actions with a “but look at what other country does” is not calling out hypocrisy but to in fact encourage and endorse those shitty actions.

            • hark@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I didn’t claim that style of argument was invented then, just the term. Turns out I got the invention of the term wrong, but it definitely was used during the cold war. Still, I see endless articles about Russian disinformation campaigns as if it was something unique to them. Instead of talking about disinformation in a post about disinformation, the only acceptable way to go about it is to instead make separate endless posts of American disinformation campaigns?

              • M0oP0o@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                This is a story about a Swedish claim on russian interference in their internal politics with the assumed attempt of disrupting Sweden bid for NATO.

                I hate to have to say this but making everything about the US is how you get a US centric world. I assume as you seem to think the cold war is still on (meaning russia is still the USSR) you would not have missed that the news cycle is full of US fuck ups, global missplays and dastardly acts. You seem to think that when there is an active war on in Europe and a European nation makes a statement about another European nation doing a bit of a nasty this is some how not the time for European issues but that we must now talk about the evils the US of A or the “west” in general has done before.

                • hark@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  A lot of news pieces about Russia are in service of US-centric views on Russia. It’s called manufacturing consent and it’s been going on long before Russia even invaded Ukraine. Like it or not, global politics is US-centric because of the outstretched influence that the US has, from the many military bases to the vast economic machinations stretching its way into every nook and cranny of the Earth and even space.

                  • M0oP0o@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    And you can now say you helped!

                    Would it also be safe to assume you are an American (the country not the containment) citizen?

          • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Pretty sure the Greeks figured out that logical fallacy 25 centuries ago. Wikipedia says the particular coining of that term comes from the 1970s to justify IRA tactics.

            I want a citation that it was “created during the cold war to also dismiss when the west was criticized back then.”

            • hark@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I wasn’t claiming the fallacy was invented that recently, obviously. I thought the term was, but apparently I got the timing wrong on that. My bad.

      • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        No it is whataboutism when it is a thread about a Russian doing X and someone mentions the West also doing X.

        Two wrongs do not make a right, condemning one person doesn’t mean approving of another.

        • hark@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Someone claimed that, and I quote, “Russia at the center of a whole hell of a lot of the tension and strife that the world has gone through over the last few years.”

          How is pointing out a much, MUCH bigger force in global geopolitics whataboutism?

        • freagle@lemmygrad.ml
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          1 year ago

          That’s literally not how whataboutism works. Whataboutism is when you deflect by pointing to a DIFFERENT thing that someone else is doing. When it’s the same thing, we just call it “naming hypocrisy”. The article is hypocritical, because The Guardian literally spreads Western propaganda including lies ALL THE TIME. So when the lying liars who lie tell you that there are other lying liars who lie, then the we can say “you’re a hypocrite.”

          But that’s not even the important part. The important part is that the lying liars who lie in the West are lying are part of a very large and very long process of war mongering that has causes hundreds of millions to die for Western imperialism. So when the Western lying liars who lie tell you about other lying liars who lie, what they are doing is building a case for killing the lying liars who lie that are $OTHER, but they never agree that the same consequences should be applied to the lying liars who lie that are $WESTERN_COUNTRY_LIST[rand()]. So it’s worse than merely hypocrisy, it’s violent war mongering that kills innocent people.

          Even better is when we compare the scope. The lying done by Russia is so small compared to the lying done by the West and has killed far fewer people than the lying done by the West. For example, the lying liars who lie from BRITAIN got 40% of China addicted to opium. When China decided to ban opium, the lying liars who lie from BRITAIN went back to BRITAIN where not only they run a drug dealership but they also own newspapers. They wrote lies about China and convinced the British Navy to attack China. The Opium Wars were literally launched by British drug dealers who owned newspapers and published lies. And who were these drug dealers? Ever heard of Forbes? Yes, Forbes magazine is part of the Forbes business empire that was built from fortunes made on building US railroads funded by the money accumulated by selling opium to China…

          So fuck The Guardian and the lying liars they are. No one gives a shit about the lies of the Russians because the British and the rest of the West have been lying for 600 unbroken years and used those lies to kill 100s of millions of people around the globe and dominate 80% of the world’s population for a long time. Yes, the Russians lie, because that’s the fucking game that the West has put everyone in. It’s the only way to beat the West and no one seriously thinks Russia’s lies are worth getting upset about except the fucking war hawks. So when you repeat the propaganda, you’re participating in the war machine.

          It’s not whataboutism.

    • freagle@lemmygrad.ml
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      1 year ago

      You have no fucking idea what that terms means. Whataboutism is when you say “Johnny stole a cookie” and I use whataboutism to say “But you killed the dog 3 years ago.” Whataboutism is not when you say “Johnny stole a cookie” and I say “But you invaded and occupied the bakery, killed the original owners, steal the ingredients to make your cookies, and issue predatory loans to hungry people so they can buy your cookies at price gouging prices.”

      It is not whataboutism to call out hypocrisy. It takes a special form of brain rot to not see this.

        • freagle@lemmygrad.ml
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          1 year ago

          No argument was actually made. I was the one making the argument, which was that Russia’s meddling is smaller and less damaging than Western meddling.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Your response was to how “Russia meddles” as you put it yourself. And instead of making an argument, you say “so did the West”.

            Which is whataboutism, ad hominem and a red herring.

            You never put forward an actual argument in your comment starting with “Any Western reporting” Which I referred to earlier.

            I find it very hard to understand how you believe you are actually making a point here?

              • M0oP0o@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                The problem is with the argument made by the article, which is that we should care about Russian meddling and we should act, or support actions, to stop it.

                So, by your logic no one should care about anything any country does or does not do and global politics should become a mind your own business type affair?

                I would also guess that you might just try and argue about how some meddling (ie russian) is fine though, somehow.