Anti-Fake

Douchebiden, Americ*nts, and the mysterious “Russian soul.” Russia’s propaganda has exploded in the past decade, fueled by a crackdown on media freedom. Even with its low-budget, laughable production, calls for nuclear strikes “On Washington!” are growing louder from Moscow to Murmansk.

Belarus has launched a new propaganda machine: a state-controlled video-streaming platform called Videobel, the brainchild of the Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko himself. What do we know about the channel and how does this impact Russia’s war in Ukraine?

The investigation by Radio Svoboda’s “Schema” and several European media outlets has exposed the “Agency for Social Design” (ASD), led by Russian political technologist Ilya Gambashidze, as a key player in spreading disinformation to undermine Ukraine, its leadership, and Western allies.

"Some bodies have ropes around their necks, tied hands, broken limbs, and burn wounds,” said Kharkiv region governor Oleh Syniehubov, recounting the horrors of Russian occupation in Izium. On September 15, 2022, Ukraine discovered several mass graves in the woods near the city. One site contained over 400 bodies of civilians and soldiers, tortured and killed by the Russian army.

Russian-Canadian filmmaker Anastasia Trofimova premiered her film Russians at War at the Venice Film Festival, claiming it challenges Western media’s one-sided portrayal of Russian aggression. Trofimova wants to offer a different story, and it happens to be one in which she sees no war crimes committed by Russian soldiers.

Putin claims that Russia has media freedom. However, Russia is one of the world’s worst countries for that. What are the facts? How does Russia restrict information sharing, and what punishments are journalists and civilians facing?