RT is gross & unworthy of your sympathy
Germany bans RT DE. Should anyone care? No, not really.
By Riley Waggaman, a former “senior editor” (newsroom errand boy) at RT
Drama alert: Russia has given Germany’s state-owned broadcaster Deutsche Welle the boot after Berlin pulled the plug on RT DE.
Why can’t we all just get along? Well, because according to RT, the German government is allergic to open-minded, truth-telling media—so obviously RT DE had to go:
RT’s deputy editor-in-chief, Anna Belkina, has argued that the case against RT DE could be politically motivated. “It appears as if the German authorities, politicians and even media are really afraid of something, afraid of an alternative point of view that the German-speaking audience can get access to on RT DE channel,” she said on Wednesday.
This is really special. Is this the same RT that attacked Russian activists who oppose coercive medical experiments as “enemies of the people”—a phrase typically associated with 1930s firing squads?
Is this the same RT that works around-the-clock to paint totally valid opposition to Russia’s compulsory injection decrees and cattle-tagging policies as western-backed right-wing extremism?
Is this the same RT whose editor-in-chief, Margarita Simonyan, whined on television about how unfair it is that Russia’s “most rabid and ardent ant-vaxxers” are allowed to express their views on social media and YouTube (actually there’s lots of Big Tech censorship targeting Russian language content but whatever)?
Is this the same Simonyan who said any doctor with misgivings about Russia’s totally unproven and probably dangerous genetic slurry should be barred from practicing medicine?
Is this the same schizo who claimed unvaccinated Russians were murdering children? Is this the same regrettable blob of human failure who fantasized about unvaxxed Russians—at the time, the majority of the country—crawling on their knees as they slowly die (from cold-like symptoms)?
Wait, we’re a bit confused: is this the same RT that regularly panders to disaffected anti-vax westerners while telling Russians to shut their pie-holes and get vaxxed?
Just a second… is this the same RT that copy-pastes deranged TASS articles as part of a ceaseless campaign to shill an experimental gene-shot that nobody in Russia wants or needs? We’re talking about the same RT, right?
RT—this is the media organization funded by Russian taxpayers, right? Why exactly should anyone feel bad for a Russian taxpayer-funded organization that actively lobbies against the Russian people?
Do you think you are being “pro-Russia” by supporting or reading RT? Think again.
Of course, some may still find value in RT. That’s fine. They’re really good at dunking on trans activists, for example.
But just remember: RT is gross and unworthy of your sympathy.
UPDATE: Stanley Sheppard has a good post that explores both sides of the “is RT worthy of your sympathy?” question. Although we stand by our analysis, we’re always happy to hear all sides.
Congrats on interview with Whitney Webb, Riley! She is one of the brightest minds today and an example to all of what a true investigative journalism should be, as this type of journalism became endangered species in MSM. I didn't see that interview yet, but will definitely look it up and watch it.
I scanned through the comments below and they are kind of scarily uniform, everybody agrees with you. Screw RT! Reminds me of the communist party congress meetings in late USSR, every proposal there was getting a unanimous approval. I think most of the readers of this blog are already familiar with the work by Belgian professor of clinical psychology Dr. Mattias Desmet on the subject of "mass formation", I personally think that "mob formation" would be a better term, but it is into your face offensive, so professor had to use softer language. If any of you didn't watch the videos where professor Desmet explains what he meant by this term, I strongly recommend you do.
Not to take a lot of space on Riley's blog after typing it up and realizing it is too much, I have moved my view on RT to my own blog. If you are interested in reading, here is the link: https://stansheppard.substack.com/p/rt-worthy-of-sympathy. Riley, I have left link to your post there too.
My general sentiment though, after more than a quarter century corporate career in Big Tech, is instead of holding grudges against former employers, and there is always something to hold a grudge for, it is far better to step beyond and be thankful for the new freedom and new opportunity that walking into the next thing provides. In any case, that is my position that worked well.
But, hey, Riley, as an RT insider can you help me to understand something? I still leave 4 or 5 comments on RT.com per day, some extended comments. I believe the way the people at RT that monitor comments communicate to me to rate my posts is through silent dislikes, this pushes them down in display priority. For example, they hate when I start writing about Russia's finances, CB head Nabiullina etc. But it's OK, this lets me know I'm on target. However, what is also clear about RT, is that quality of comments there is mostly just terrible. People with broken English write one liners that are the embodiment of cliches. Question for you, are most of those just cheap trolls, as RT doesn't have the budget to hire thinking people to leave comments, or is it simply an indication of the RT's readership quality overall?
I think they enjoy playing the victim and getting banned. Easier than doing actual reporting. They’ve got this game down from being labeled a foreign agent, Twitter bans etc etc. Same playbook for years.
Or it’s 5d chess: they know the Russian antivaxx movement is sponsored by Western right wingers, so they promote it and show how the same movement is in Europe and the US, infiltrate it with their correspondents - all to protect helpless gullible Russians and get them full of Sputnik to prevent the West’s planned Slavic genocide!