if it was abject shite nobody wanted to read or watch, they wouldn't bother to ban it

Propaganda is still dangerous, and a country at war has no obligation to allow the country it is at war with to continue to openly spread it. Banning RT makes sense in that context.

I don't see the banning of Al Jazeera in the same light, as it's not like it's a Hamas-run outlet.

A country at war has no moral or legal obligation to publish its enemy’s propaganda. This should be very obvious.

And yes RT was always complete shite for gullible morons, though it is rather beside the point in this case actually. The British government had no moral obligation on free speech grounds to allow the spread of nazi propaganda in the United Kingdom during WW2, either. Again, obvious stuff.

Propaganda in war times is very often directed at a domestic audience. Examples are stories like the Ghost of Kyiv on the "western side". There are examples on the Russian side too.

Sure, but it's still lies.

Somehow we act as if our lies are better than their lies.

Yes: A lie to boost the morale of a country fighting a defensive war against a genocidal dictatorship is unambiguously a better lie than the lies of the genocidal dictatorship to rile up its populace to more effectively execute the genocidal war.

My country lied to its populace during WW2 to boost morale in its fight against Nazi Germany. Nazi Germany lied to its populace to more effectively execute the holocaust. They are not the same.

So it's true, not all lies are equally bad, hope that helps. Most learn that as children.

So we should lie that israel is losing hard, so good morale brings more and more people to fight for hamas?

I would love to live in the universe where popularity was a good indicator of quality.

Yes, they should read about how putin has only thre days of supplies left and not worry about the war, because it'll be over by the weekend.

Oh wait, those articles were from 2022:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-food-...

Why not ban Independent too?

It's arguably not propaganda to publish an article quoting a member of the Ukrainian military. It's even in the headline right there: "Ukraine military claims".

If you think the output of RT and the Independent are indistinguishable then yeah I guess we just will never agree. Still, glad my country banned RT nevertheless. If the only downside is the odd anti-west tankie on HN crying about "hypocrisy", then, it's not so bad ;)

So trust the propaganda side, don't verify and publish such propagnda?

I mean... you can still not read RT, I don't know why you feel the need to forbid others from reading it? What if others want to ban something you wish to read? I mean...i'm glad you admit supporting censorship, but you can't complain then when some other country bans lgbt materials, harry potter, books on sexuality, books about satan, etc.

>So trust the propaganda side, don't verify and publish such propagnda?

?

> What if others want to ban something you wish to read?

Somethings things get banned even in democratic societies, that's never not been the case. Given that Russia is attacking Europe and has carried out numerous executions of private citizens on European soil, I struggle to see why we are obliged to let them air their propaganda in our countries. Maybe suck cuckholdery is appealing to you, but not to me or us.

> but you can't complain then when some other country bans lgbt materials, harry potter, books on sexuality, books about satan, etc

I don't complain. Russia is a shithole, we know this, it's established fact at this point, if it wants to cry about Harry Potter and LGBT rather than finally install toilets in peoples houses and help brings its people into the 21st century, then that's their choice. But invading a sovereign country like Ukraine and committing genocide against Ukrainians, that's not really acceptable, sorry.

The media trusted someone that said the "three days" story, didn't verify and published the lie as propaganda, so more people died because they believed that they'll win after the three days of supplies are used up.

> Somethings things get banned even in democratic societies, that's life

Yeah sure, sometimes innocent people die, sometimes a piano falls from a crane and kills a person. Some people like you even support such stuff.

> Given that Russia is attacking Europe and has carried out numerous executions of private citizens on European soil, I struggle to see why we are obliged to let them air their propaganda in our countries. Maybe suck cuckholdery is appealing to you, but not to me or us.

Russia is attacking ukraine, the same way as a bunch of european and american countries were attacking afghanistan, syria, libya, iraq, twice, etc. Why do you care now? Because you're not the one on the attacking side?

> I don't complain. Russia is a shithole, we know this, it's established fact at this point, if it wants to cry about Harry Potter and LGBT rather than finally install toilets in peoples houses and help brings its people into the 21st century, then that's their choice. But invading a sovereign country like Ukraine and committing genocide against Ukrainians, that's not really acceptable, sorry.

I was refering to this: https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/harry-potter-series-tops... And more and more books are added to the list in recent time.

> But invading a sovereign country like Ukraine and committing genocide against Ukrainians, that's not really acceptable, sorry.

Why not? I mean... why is attacking iraq for nonexisting WMDs acceptable, but attacking ukraine for killing minorities in it's own country isn't? I mean.. didn't nato bomb yugoslavia for that same reason?

>Why not? I mean... why is attacking iraq for nonexisting WMDs acceptable, but attacking ukraine for killing minorities in it's own country isn't? I mean.. didn't nato bomb yugoslavia for that same reason?

I don't think the invasion of Iraq was a good thing or acceptable.

But you very clearly seem to think the invasion and genocide in Ukraine is acceptable.

We are not the same.

Anyway you've let your mask slip, you're pro war and pro genocide. I'm glad you're seething on Hacker News about so-called "western hypocrisy". It means my countries are doing something to piss yours off. Good. Have a nice life and carry on seething. Good luck in getting toilet installed in beautiful hut/house/shack. Hopefully it is your turn on waiting list.

> I don't think the invasion of Iraq was a good thing or acceptable.

But it was. Nothing happened to anyone, no courts, trials, no jail time for any of the politicians, no nothing. So we, as a "western society" (or whatever you might call us) deem such invasions acceptable. Not just that, but we conduct new ones after that. So yeah, if you do something, officially, with documentation, public money, public employees, and nothing happens, how is it not acceptable?

I mean... if it's not acceptable, why did WE do it then? Assuming you're old enough, you literally financed people getting killed there with your taxes.

> But you very clearly seem to think the invasion and genocide in Ukraine is acceptable.

In the same way as iraq was. But we're not the ones attacking now, and we're bothered by that, so we're using even more money to get more people killed in this war.

I have a toilet, and my taxes are going to ukraine to prolong this war, as they went to helping the occupiers of iraq, and are still going to syria (we have soldiers there too). We had to run away from afghanistan a few years ago though... it just cost us and our 'friends' a trillion to replace the taliban with the taliban there, and kill a lot of locals. Apparently, that's acceptable too, since noone is in jail for that war.

Seems like a good deal to me if you're worried about money rather than lives: give money to Ukraine, keep Russian dictatorship at bay, before it invades other parts of Europe.

So cheer up, your taxes are not being wasted, they are saving you money in the long run by keeping Russia from invading Europe even more.

But ukraine is using that money to kill their own men who don't want to fight. Why don't you go and fight instead, and risk your own life instead of forcing them to do it?

Considering the sitation in ukraine, we've wasted a lot of money and a lot of ukranian men for what exactly?

> Considering the sitation in ukraine, we've wasted a lot of money and a lot of ukranian men for what exactly?

The alternative is that Russia rolls over Ukraine, murders between few hundred thousand and few million people to enforce the occupation, and then decimates Ukrainian male population by using them as cannon fodder against Poland and other European countries. Please explain me how this is any better.

I mean sure... it's their choice. If they want to fight against that, sure, let them volounteer and fight. If you can't get any more people to fight without literally forcing them, then you obviously don't have enough "democractic" support for a fight anymore (at least not from the ones whose opinions should matter), and should start looking at the negotiating table.

This is only going to get more people killed.

If you believe that, then put your life where your mouth is, and go fight. If you want to live, let others live too.

Even during the WW2, a few countries capitulated with the germans and survived, even eg. france. On the other hand, a bunch of those countries (even france), no go half a planet away to kill people over there, and there is no support to those countries to fight harder against the french. And france is far from the only country that does that in europe, not to even mention the USA.

I don't have to volunteer anywhere; I already face rising odds that I'll be conscripted even before this year is out.

As to France and other countries occupied by Nazis, capitulation meant a ride to death camp for some, slave labor to others, starvation and oppression for all. France was used as a staging ground for the Battle of Britain and for the aborted invasion of British Isles, and served as a base of operations for submarines attacking allied convoys in the Atlantic ocean. France didn't regain freedom until massive landings on Normandy beaches and fierce fighting through the country by soldiers who were mostly conscripts and not there on their own will, so I don't understand what it was meant to prove.

> We are not the same.

> Anyway you've let your mask slip, you're pro war and pro genocide.

You should consider the the site guidelines. This is completely unacceptable. How can you be so comfortable seeing the world in black and white?

That person is literally defending the invasion of Ukraine, justifying it in terms of "protecting Russian minorities being killed".

How can you be so comfortable casting everything as exactly the same shade of grey, even when it is not always the same shade of grey?

How about you consider the site guidelines, if you're defending that person?

Don't troll by acting like a neutral observer when you clearly agree with him. Thanks. That's bad faith, and goes against side guidelines.

Explanation isn't excuse. You're confounding the two.

Carry on trying to hit me over the head with the Hacker News rule book whilst turning a blind eye and saying literally nothing to that guy's genocide apologism. You have beclowned yourself.

Speak for yourself. The conclusion was reasonable.