- This topic has 35 replies, 1 voice, and was last updated 1 year, 7 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
I took a LIBERAL, ANTI WAR Protester to see the truth in Donbass, and THIS Happened!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OysQ7yQl_o&t=2589s&ab_channel=JohnMarkDougan(H/T to Der in Lifeboat News)
cimarrón
thank you for sharing this video.
I’ve no doubt this girl Maria is sincere and she is quite open. She described her feelings in detail and it’s exactly what I myself was feeling. She even said about a magic cover to save these people, in my case I was imagining an angel may come down and spread the wings over Donbas.
I shared this link on my social media. If I’m allowed to translate some comments under the video on YouTube. I hope that translating public comments does not violate any rules.HoperRoys
I am German and I use a translator. I am ashamed of my German government. I am ashamed of the coverage and lies that our media and government are spreading about Russia. Germany vowed never to take part in a war again. All politicians broke their word. All politicians are dragging Germany into the war. Something that no citizen of this country wants.zolotaya arishka
I live in Donetsk, thank you Maria!!! I watch and cry. We ourselves almost believed that we deserve to be destroyed just because we are Russians!!! Lord, please let as many people as possible know the truth. In Europe, they are worried that they have high inflation, but for us it is simply ridiculous. We have been without water for a very long time and partly without electricity, not all houses are heated, our children are dying every day. NATO weapons have killed thousands of civilians. Please take all the Nazis of Ukraine home to Europe and you will understand that these are terrible people who are ready to eat people (in the literal sense), shoot children in the back, burn people alive … You raised a monster in the form of Nazism, so pray that the Russians will destroy them on our land, otherwise they will come to you!!!Alexander Ruskovski
Masha, I am Bulgarian. What they did to the Russians in Ukraine was rehearsed in the Balkans. Bulgaria has Macedonia, Russia has Ukraine. Well, in Macedonia it has already been done. Two generations have passed. Now for the Macedonians – the Bulgarians are some kind of ancestors of the Tatars, although they are true Slavs. We have common grandparents. Russians simply must not allow the same.Igor Shamatrin
I, as a resident of Crimea, do not need explanations on what’s happening, for many years I have seen how Ukraine is degrading. And Russia, no matter what, still helps Ukraine. I have seen multiple NATO landings on the Crimean coast. For some reason, this was not discussed in Russia, or very little was said about it. Therefore, it is not surprising that this woman believed the West, and not Russia. Crimeans don’t need any explanation, everything passed right before their eyes.Olga Vinogradova
It’s funny. A foreign journalist opens the eyes of a Russian liberal. This world has gone crazy!An A
When I visited Instagram on February 24, I was horrified by the hysteria that arose there with all these slogans “no war” and “I’m ashamed to be Russian.” I entered into a dialogue with some authors, and as it turned out, many of them not only don’t know about the events of 2014, but don’t know about the existence of Donbass in principle. They were just worried about their well-being, but the war: they would not be able to buy clothes, go abroad to rest, etc. These are unlikely to ask questions like the girl in the video. I hope they still dumped abroad and forever.
I believe that the West must pay a heavy price for lies and propaganda.Eugenia Varban
Thanks to John and Maria for the interview) Of course, it’s hard to read the credits – although I already know everything without words! I myself am from the Donetsk Republic, but I had to leave for Russia back in 2014. At first, I could not get used to the fact that the Russians were not very worried about what was happening in our Donbass. And often there were those who said – “Why did you come here in large numbers, we ourselves do not have enough work,” although it was more difficult to find work with an average salary of 25-30 thousand, with a higher one, but it is possible! It was insulting to tears – and most importantly, I could not explain to people why this happened with us, and that the same thing could happen in Russia – God forbid! That they should pray to V, V, Putin – he did not allow the country to fall apart, and on all fronts he defends the interests of our Great Russia! Any country has its own history – it has both good and bad pages, but for some reason they demand repentance from our country! Russia did not start a single war – it only ended them !!! May God give us the strength to end this war!!! AmenOxana Oxy
I lost two of my friends this way. They also told me that Russia should not interfere in the conflict of another country. They told me – they kill in the Donbass and Odessa, they kill the Russian-speaking population – these are their problems, let them kill. “This should not concern us”, “my hut is on the ourskirts”* is a well-known saying. These people are most worried that because of the sanctions they cannot buy new Adidas sneakers and pay with Apple watches in the store. I no longer communicate with these people and do not regret it.—
* my hut is on the outskirts – is the Russian idiom, referring to a person living somwhere in the distance from supposed events, so they can give no evidence. Relevant English idiom may be ‘not my circus, not my monkeys’
Tatyana,
Yes, Maria communicates well, doesn’t she. I had thought about linking to this post from the current main thread, seeing that there are some hard-nosed commenters there who think they know it all; but I do not enjoy contact with them and, in any case, I think they prefer to keep their minds closed.This was very eye-opening. I didn’t realize how much pro Western propaganda was disseminated within Russia.
‘Maria’ presents well. But who is she? Who produced this video?
Establishing the credibility and bios of the participants is crucial to placing a value on the integrity of what we have been presented with.I watched the video through twice, I and am not overwhelmed by what I have been presented with.
Despite it ticking nearly all of my ‘confirmation bias’ boxes, I cannot remove it from the pile of ‘possibly sexed up documents’.The Russian flag on the flack jacket of a person unloading the van of food near the end of the movie caught my attention…_
“Who produced this video?” John Mark Dougan who has a channel on YT. I’d not come across him before this video was posted here. He has a video posted detailing a trip to Svyetagorsk to deliver some food and supplies from which the footage of the guy unloading food is taken. In it all these people are introduced it would seem as security escort, a representative from Donetsk people’s republic and a priest.. John Mark Dougan has some interesting history.
ET,
OK, a name,”John Mark Dougan” who he?Your link has this gem… “During the 2016 U.S. Presidential elections, Dougan falsely claimed to have played a role in the leak of emails from the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign” ……ever heard of Roger Stone?
Sorry, I see nothing so far that passes the smell test…_
DiggerUK, I am just sharing what I found, I’m not giving the guy a character reference.
ET,
I think it would be akin to giving Christopher Steele a character reference. Thanks…_Digger UK
The EverybodysWiki link says
“falsely claimed to have played a role in the leak of emails”
and it has a source link #8 which goes to the Daily Beast article by Kevin Poulsen, Senior National Security Correspondent.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/fugitive-cop-says-hes-behind-the-dnc-leaks-its-his-latest-hoaxThe article says:
“In the early morning of March 14, 2016, the hunt for a Russian hacker brought FBI agents to a condominium complex in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida…
“…In truth, there was no Russian hacker—and there were no hacks. Instead, The Daily Beast has learned exactly how Dougan used public information and sophisticated data analytics to blow holes in Florida’s address confidentiality system without cracking a single network.”I thinks the word ‘false’ refers to the word ‘hack’, which allows to call Mr. Dougan maybe a boaster, but doesn’t allow to call him a liar.
That Daily Beast article is an engrossing read. I haven’t finished reading it yet, but already some interesting passages stand out:
Dougan mastered the dark art of fake news
There are rules to making good fake news, Dougan learned. Rule one: Keep the domain names short and official-looking; nobody trusts a website with a long, silly address. Rule two: Set up an RSS aggregator to continuously pull and post stories from authentic news outlets. “A fake-news site is nothing without real news,” he wrote recently. “There must be real news with real photos on the front of the site so the fake story blends in and becomes believable.”
Hmmmm
Her full name is Maria (Masha) Lelyanova. She just happens to be Dougan’s translator and girlfriend. Make of that what you will.
Dawg
No doubt you’ve read the paragraph which goes before the one you quote
“He kept going, slathering layers of disinformation over his citizen journalism. PBSOtalk hosted countless false accusations about Bradshaw and other PBSO brass, some of them vile, and at one point a fake pedophilia confession appeared under the fraudulent byline of a top department official”🙂 reminds me of Hunter Biden’s laptop story.
I wondered what does pedophilia stands for?
“Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, who faced withering criticism for granting the pervy financier the privileges…
… During his 13-month stay at the jail, Epstein’s driver would pick him and a guard up in the morning and he would spend the day working and meeting with visitors, before returning to the jail for the night.
Epstein also was allowed to visit his Palm Beach mansion, despite restrictions on home visits.”
https://nypost.com/2019/12/17/florida-sheriff-ends-work-release-program-that-let-jeffrey-epstein-visit-office-during-prison-lockup/By the way, anybody knows what was the position of the Daily Beast on Hunter Biden’s laptop story? Did they do some investigative journalism, or just dismissed it as fake news and Russian disinformation? I mean, is the Daily Beast a trusted source, or another government-sponsored media?
tatyana, the Daily Beast is pure government anti Russia propaganda. it’s one of the worst sites. they dismissed the laptop story as Russian disinfo.
Pretzelattack
Thank you. I recall I had a close look at that media, when they attacked Gonzalo Lira. Guys of Daily Beast called up Ukrainian security service and literary said “do you know a guy is living in Kharkiv, filming the war, posting his videos on YouTube? You may be interested to get him”
To me it’s the bottom of hypocrisy, to call them journalists. A bunch of bad greedy folks ready to sell for money literally all of ideals they were supposed to keep toNice deflection, Tatyana! Let’s talk about the beastly laptop story (and the popular misconception about it) on another thread created especially for that purpose. Your Socratic questioning (and feigned ignorance) about an unrelated story brings to mind the “poisoning the well” fallacy.
For now, let’s return to the topic of this thread: i.e. Dougan’s dubious reportage, covering up his relationship to the woman he interviewed, as well as his long (self-confessed) history of publishing disinformation.
Masha’s heartfelt testimony in the video was that (a) that her preconceptions were formed by a predominant narrative within Russia that Putin’s war is brutal and unjustified (which she suggests is why so many thousands of Russian fighting-age men fled the country to avoid the draft), and (b) that what she observed at those sites she was driven to is not consistent with that anti-Russian narrative.
I didn’t know that the Russian media is telling the Russian public that the war is brutal and unjustified. I certainly didn’t get that impression from Russian or Western media, and I seem to recall you suggesting that popular opinion was firmly in support of the war. I’ve witnessed examples of highly distorted Russian propaganda, some of which has been discussed here over the last year. Dougan even disputes her claim in a different video, arguing that the men leaving the country are just cowards. So what’s the truth of the matter? Is the media in Russia mostly arguing against the war, or not? It would useful to know.
Masha emotes that she bore witness to scenes that she believes are inconsistent with the anti-Russian narrative. Maybe so. If we take it on face value that she was driven to those sites to see the evidence for herself, there is still an obvious weakness: the selection of sites was deliberately biased towards the counter-narrative. So in essence, her interview is equivalent to a Patrick Lancaster propaganda video (except with a prettier face and nicer tits – for people who like that sort of thing). Are such scenes representative of the frontline throughout Eastern Ukraine? Well, that stretch of evidence has to be taken on trust. For the moment, I’m reserving judgement.
Dawg
Thank you for your opinion. I respect your right to express it, but exactly until the moment when you assume that I am lying and deliberately distorting the facts. This is not true and greatly spoils my desire to continue reading your comments.
I find your inserts about tits and about the alleged relationship between Masha and Dugan nasty. I find your words about the deliberate choice of sites to visit silly – it’s obvious that there is a war going on and people on opposite sides of the line have opposite opinions. This stupidity is at odds with the image you are trying to create by referring to the ‘poisoning of the well’ sophism that it paints you as an unpleasant person, arguing for the sake of arguing.
Yes, I’m curious to know what you call a popular misconception about Hunter Biden’s laptop? If you need a separate branch for this, create it.Tatyana
Oh dear. You seem to have taken offence, which is sad and disappointing. I’m sorry about the unnecessarily crude reference to female anatomy. (I understand you’re a very strong character who can normally withstand such banter, but we all have our triggers.) Anyway, the underlying point is that presentational impact tends to be magnified by pretty females. That’s why beautiful models are used ubiquitously in marketing, after all. Imho, Maria is even prettier than Yulia Skripal (2.0). She’s certainly a more attractive sight than Patrick Lancaster! Of course she can’t be any different – she is as she is – but she makes a good choice of interview subject to maximise appeal. It’s a common unconscious bias on the part of the viewer, and drawing attention to it helps to mitigate any potential distortion to rationality.
Why did you raise the issue about Hunter Biden’s laptop? You’re already well familiar with the Daily Beast from its coverage of Gonzalo Lira, so it’s a safe bet you already knew their position on that unrelated story – otherwise, why would you drag that specific issue into the discussion? If you can cast doubt on one issue – which every almost other mainstream outlet was equally wrong about, due to datestamp anomalies detected in the metadata – then you can smear the Daily Beast’s reporting about John Mark Dougan by insinuation. It’s a clear example of the “poisoning the well” fallacy. That’s the only conceivable purpose for introducing it to this discussion.
By the way, the Daily Beast was right about Gonzalo Lira’s shady past as “Coach Red Pill”. And what harm came of his encounter with the Ukrainian security services? These allegedly immoral murderous Nazi scum took him away and returned him completely unscathed a few days later; he was just “a little rattled” by the experience, as anyone would be. His gentle treatment would suggest that his captors weren’t actually murderous scum after all.
It’s worth pointing out that the sites Dougan chose to visit were selected deliberately for a counternarrative purpose, because there is no attempt in that video to acknowledge any other reality on the ground. If people perceive it as representative – as many commentators have done on sites like the Lifeboat News – then they’re likely to form a skewed impression of the war in general. This can be balanced by acknowledging the validity of reports from the Ukrainian side – of which there have been many in the mainstream news. But anti-Westerners don’t like acknowledging that. Bringing it to attention is not “silly”; it’s crucial to evaluating the meaning of the video in context.
Now, is John Mark Dougan a reliable source? On the face of it, no, because he has already admitted to indulging in disinformation. But it pays to dig a little deeper to understand how and why that happened. He appears to have been a genuine whistleblower against US police brutality, and he was seemingly persecuted for it. Persecution tends to fuel paranoia (partly justifiably) and tempts people to employ deceptive tactics to level the playing field. It’s worth being mindful of his motives and skills in deception when evaluating any points he’s trying to convey, but they aren’t necessarily invalidated. The key point is that Dougan’s output shouldn’t be regarded as unbiased or trustworthy. That point may be so obvious to you that it’s silly to mention it, but plenty of viewers of that video have neglected it. I’m glad we’ve had the opportunity to examine it here.
[ Mod: Off topic. If you want to pursue the Daily Beast issue, then kindly start a new thread on that topic or wait until someone else does so. ]
Dawg, the premise of the interview story is that Maria changed her opinion on the war and it’s justifications (in her mind) during the course of her work as translator for Dougan. The interview is her story of this change in opinion over time because of what she encountered on her travels with Dougan. The topic of the interview is HER story. To say “but she makes a good choice of interview subject to maximise appeal” is a little disingenuous given that the entire interview is about Maria undergoing a change in opinion.
I don’t disagree with your statement that “that presentational impact tends to be magnified by pretty females” and that that fact is used in marketing etc. However, in my opinion of this interview there is no sexualisation of the content. She is sitting on a chair telling her story. Also, remember 50% of the world’s population are, in fact, female. Are we to subconsciously undermine any testimony from a female as being somewhat suspect because they are pretty? Surely it’s the substance of the subject matter that is important. Reflecting on the prettiness or otherwise of any female giving testimony on any subject matter rather than the substance of said testimony surely denotes a flaw in the person making that reflection.
The problem with acknowledging the validity of reports in the corporatocratic (CRAP) media is that they have been consistently shown to have lied about all sorts of things. Some of these lies have been pointed out by this very blog’s author and many other lies have been exposed by other independent sites. That is presumably why you and I and Tatyana read this blog in the first place. I think it is fairly clear that the CRAP MSM media are working to their own agenda in relation to the war in Ukraine and many other topics.
Nonetheless, that being said, it doesn’t mean that Dougan output and this interview in particular are necessarily unbiased. I suspect, like you, that the places he did visit were somewhat curated either by design or necessity. You make the point yourself: “It’s worth being mindful of his motives and skills in deception when evaluating any points he’s trying to convey,” and I would emphasise “but they aren’t necessarily invalidated.” You also point out that “The key point is that Dougan’s output shouldn’t be regarded as unbiased or trustworthy.” I would add the corollary that it shouldn’t be automatically regarded as necessarily biased or untrustworthy either.
Thanks for your reply, ET.
The first bit is an exercise in missing the point – and zooming way past it to hit another, larger, target. To be clear, the selective “choice” that is relevant here is not a choice by Lelyanova or Dougan, but by cimarrón who posted the video at the beginning of this thread. That particular video has been doing the rounds of certain off-piste websites for many months now. Most people find it very persuasive. My point is that we have to be alert to subliminal effects – and the one I highlighted is very well known in advertising and in psychology: it’s known as the “halo effect”. If you’ve done any unconscious bias training, then you’ll know it’s now considered important to be alert to such subliminal biases and take special care to counteract them. The extent varies from person to person of course, but anyone who discounts the possibility of bias on a priori grounds is most likely to manifest it unknowingly. I noticed myself warming to Maria when I was watching it, so I took that into consideration and focused on the content and verifiability of what she was claiming. That isn’t to discount her emotional expressions: those are part of the relevant information too. But it needs to be noticed and evaluated on an objective basis. Does that kind of self-monitoring constitute a personality flaw? No. Your cynicism is misplaced.
I agree with your “corollary that it shouldn’t be automatically regarded as necessarily biased or untrustworthy either” – provided the same allowance is made for testimony from other parties. The main thrust of what at least three contributors are saying or implying here – using the Maria Lelyanova video and a reference to the Daily Beast as evidence – is that information from Russian sources is significantly more trustworthy than information from Western sources. That’s a point I can’t agree with, I’m afraid.
“It’s propaganda Jim….”…_
“I hate war. I’m not religious, but my philosophy in many ways shares the values of christianity, about love and peace and other very good principles of peaceful co-existence. I’m deeply ashamed and horrified to find myself on the side who hit. No support and no justification will ever work. It’s the core of my soul maybe; it will forever stay inside me. I hope I will find sometime the way to fix what has happened. So far, it is only pain.
I feel responsibility for the whole world, and I’m helpless to make them talk to each other.”Do you find it propaganda? Female with tits emotes?
