“Vesti Nedeli”, the weekly TV news channel controlled by the Kremlin, recently described a long history of Western predatory powers grieving when they invaded Russia: Sweden entered the world. 18th century, France in the 19th century, Germany in the 20th century.
The enemy is now seeking to reverse those losses, blaming the West for the war Russia instigated in Ukraine, said show host Dmitry Kiselyov. The goal to end Russia, he said, is “century-old and unchanged”. “We’re on the defensive here.”
In the six months since the Russian invasion, the focus of the state media on war coverage has gradually shifted. Gone are the predictions of a flash attack that would wipe out Ukraine. Little is said about being seen as liberators who must “demilitarize” and demilitarize Ukraine, although the “fascist” label is still removed.
Instead, in the Kremlin’s version – the only version most Russians see, with all others outlaws – Ukraine’s battlefields are one aspect of a civilized war. broader is being waged against Russia.
Stanislav Kucher, a veteran Russian TV presenter is currently consulting on a project to give Russians better access to banned news outlets. The United States is the main adversary, with Europe and NATO as their henchmen.
Vladimir Solovyov, talk show host and top cheerleader for President Vladimir V. Putin’s government, said this month that “Russia has been invited to join Western society for dinner – no Not as a guest, but as a dish.”
One of his nightly shows recently introduced the fight as a cosmic duel between good and evil. For specific incidents, he cites various “experts,” such as the one-time American martial arts star Steven Seagal, now a Russian citizen, who pushed the Kremlin story that a explosion in July at a Russian internment camp in eastern Ukraine. killed more than 50 prisoners of war by US-supplied HIMARS missiles. Ukrainian and Western officials argue that evidence that the Russians planned an attack on the prison, including digging a grave before the explosion, and that the damage to the facility was not consistent with an attack by the Russians. HIMARS.
In state media, Russia is the mainstay of traditional values, bound to prevail over the moral swamp that is the West. There is a daily fixation with LGBTQ issues. Watching Russian television is to get the impression that the gay community is running the decadent world of the West. For all that they are claimed to be shock and horror, Russian news agencies rave about airing footage with deplorable depictions of gay life.
One of the most popular talk shows covered by a sly petition was recently posted on the Ukrainian president’s website calling for the replacement of the statue of Empress Catherine the Great in Odesa with one Billy Herrington, a famous American gay adult film star, passed away in 2018. The Russian show illustrated the story with clips of Mr. Herrington wearing only a pair of Speedo-like shorts. and wrestled with another similarly dressed, muscular man in the dressing room.
The level of Incredible Russian casualties in Ukraine remains hidden in the Russian media; Only the Ukrainian army suffered major losses. The people of Ukraine suffer are all but invisible. There are moving stories of individual deaths, though the response has not always been what the Kremlin might have hoped for.
A recent story about Sgt. Aleksei A. Malov, 32, the Russian tank commander killed in the fighting, did not mention how he died. Instead, it focuses on how his parents spent what Russians call “coffin money,” a government-paid death penalty.
Our Report on the Russo-Ukrainian War
“We bought a new car in memory of our son,” said the father, adding that their first trip in a white Lada Granta was to the village cemetery.
The story, which aired on “Vesti Nedeli,” caused an uproar. Critics of the war saw it as mindless, giddy propaganda, while supporters praised the war as illustrating how ordinary Russians espoused the conflict despite the costs.
State television has shown growing Ukrainian attacks on the strategically important and symbolic Crimean peninsula, but social media images of anti-aircraft fire broke out in Crimea began to exert domestic political pressure on the Kremlin to act. The underlying reality of the war, especially the fact that Russian-claimed territory is not immune, was brought home both by the attacks on Crimea and by what investigators call a premeditated assassination in Moscow.
Daria DuginaThe 29-year-old daughter of a prominent nationalist and a hawk herself, was killed by a car bomb late on Saturday, with the official news agency blaming Ukraine and the others. Western supporters.
RT, a state television network, quoted Zakhar Prilepin, a conservative novelist and Ukraine veteran, as saying that the West was “used” to Ukraine with such actions. Many regular commentators on weekday political talk shows took to social media to demand that the Kremlin be tougher on Ukraine.
Glimpses of the costs of war, however, are still the exception, as news and talk shows have branched out into a multitude of economic and social topics to try to dispel the idea that Russia is locked in a widespread conflict with the West, notes Francis Scarr of BBC Monitoring, who spends several hours a day see Russian Television.
The official media blamed the Western arms deliveries to Ukraine for prolonging the fighting, stressing that those weapons were not very effective.
Reports rarely mention the pain inflicted on Russia by Western sanctions, which are often dismissed as powerless. Instead, they say how the sanctions have hurt Westerners even more.
The idea that the West could not exist without Russia kept popping up. Experts cheerfully predict that the loss of access to Russian gas will trigger an energy crisis in Europe, with consumers unable to pay sky-high energy bills due to worried politicians.
“Currently, hundreds of millions of Europeans are facing an extreme cold winter that Europe is unlikely to survive,” said Yevgeny Popov, host of the political talk show “60 Minutes.” said recently.
Domestic issues take over from foreign affairs, which was true even before the invasion. On August 9, explosions rocked a Russian airbase in Crimea, the brazenest attack on the occupied peninsula since the war began, killing at least one person and causing substantial destruction, including no less than eight fighters.
However, Russian primetime shows spent more time discussing the FBI raid on former President Donald J. Trump’s home.
Lev Gudkov, director of research at the Levada Center, an independent voting organization, notes that at the start of the war, television had long been the primary, trusted source of information for 75% of Russians. Confidence has dropped since then, he said, after it became clear that what the Kremlin called its “special military operation” in Ukraine would not be a dirt road.
However, older, mainstream TV viewers are especially susceptible to anti-NATO, anti-American rhetoric, he said, because it was so deeply ingrained in Russians as students, and the idea of building The strength and size of the Soviet empire appealed to many people.
Analysts note that in the long run, the Russian propaganda book offers little new information, although the specifics change over time. Throughout the Soviet era, warnings that Western powers were trying to undermine Russia were – often true – as standard, as were claims that those powers were collapsing.
The government explains the hostility of Europe and the US by saying, according to Mr. Gudkov, that “Russia is getting stronger and that’s why the West is trying to get in Russia’s way”, part of the statement. rhetoric that he describes as “blatant lies and pedagogy.”
As the confrontation broke out on state television, the talk show fighters grew “anger and more aggressive,” said Ilya Shelepin, who aired a review of the Russian press on YouTube about the opposition organization. founded by Kremlin critic Aleksei A. Navalny.
Sometimes the accusations against foreign rivals are downright bizarre. The Kommersant newspaper recently quoted Russian lawmakers as saying that some Ukrainian soldiers had been subjected to biological experiments by the US that turned them into “cruel and deadly monsters”. A Russian scientist cited in the story dismissed the claim as far-fetched.
Reports from eastern Ukraine certainly depict life under Russian control as constantly improving. When news anchors intersect with a live front-line report, the most common question is “What successes do you have to report today?” Mr. Scarr, BBC Supervisor noted.
“There’s an auto-rotator on it,” he said. “They always talk about Russia’s successes and Ukraine’s failures.”
The Kremlin has not updated the Russian death toll it gave at the end of March, 1,351; US officials recently estimated the number at 20,000. There are only scattered reports of the heroic deaths of individual soldiers like Sergeant Malov.
Those appalled by the report called it a crude attempt to emphasize the financial benefits for the relatives of fallen soldiers at a time when Russia is struggling to find enough money. soldiers. The episode was removed from the show’s online archives.
Marina Akhmedova, a journalist allied with the Kremlin, suggested on Telegram that the detractors do not match the reality of most Russians.
“Not everyone is rich enough to escape to Europe and eat pain-relieving chocolate in the morning,” she wrote. “For many people, a Lada is essential, as is the fact that they can go to the cemetery to talk to their son.”
Critics have turned this segment into a photo manipulation, an antiwar mocking slogan designed to echo a famous sticker commemorating Russia’s victory in World War II.
It read, “Thank you, for the win.”
The newcomer said, “Thank you son, for the car.”
Alina Lobzina contribution report.
