Thread: Another one bites the dust...

Originally Posted by adoc

Originally Posted by kalinka_vinnie

Well even if she might have been unbeknownst to us, she did win a couple of international prizes for her work. Journalistic prizes that is. So she couldn't have been a total whacko and was soomewhat known in the journalistic circles...

She might have won a prize or two, I don't know much about journalistic prizes. However, whatever I read did not represent a tiniest threat to the Russian government. In all honesty, given the degree of trust the russian media has among Russians (justifiably so), it would not represent a threat to a local milkman. And now how do we learn about the Hollywood style assassination of the famous journalist who would give her life for truth and her beloved country? Right, from the media again. It just doesn't add up. I bet in the end it'll turn out that a crazed neighbor killed her over a cat. Unfortunately, that wouldn't cause a sensation.

You don't have to be a threat in order to irk some sleezeball to order a hit job on you. Pat Robertson poses no threat to noone, but he's received dozens upon dozens of death threats; just because he is a religious wacko. I highly doubt it is a Russian government conspiracy to silence the critics, but rather a Zhirinovsky type who used a little of his personal wealth to deal with a person he thought was annoying. Shut her up once and for all.

BTW, from who else but the media would we learn about the assasination? I don't have friends working in the Moscow police department to give me such information...

Originally Posted by Bisquit

Guys, I want to say something of critisizing Russia in Western media.
I've read Western papers on www.inosmi.ru & www.inopressa.ru for 3 years. I also sometimes visit English papers' websites to read original publications. I think that 80% of publications of Russia is bias. It's not sheer lie, they are too smart to write something like that, but

I don't know, Bisquit, I've seen those websites. But they don't seem to publish all articles about Russia, they only do select ones. For example, I tried to find the New York Times article (a very serious and respected newspaper) about the protection of the Kamchatkan trouts (see my topic), published October 16th, but it wasn't there. I am wondering whether they select articles on purpose that concern them directly and therefore seem more critical... I don't know.

Originally Posted by Bisquit

1. Western journalists rarely ask Russian newsmakers of their opinion. They seldom ask ordinary Russian people what they think of some political or social event in Russia. On the contrary, they tend to use so-called "experts on Russia". (Oh, Is there any school or university that gives the degree in "experting on Russia"?) These "experts" are either Russians who work in Western funded NGOs, or Westeners who visit Russia two or three times a year to meet with Russian "experts". The fact is that both of these groups are not independent. NGOs can't be independent since they are funded, directly or indirectly, by Western governments. Most of these people are virtually unknown in Russia and their opinion has not credibility among ordinary Russians. Politkovskaya is a good example. It's very easy to pose oneself as an "expert" if nobody knows you and you say or write something that pleases people in the West.

True, most news agencies can not afford to have Russia 100% staffed. But if you look at all the main media outlets, you'll see that they do have people on the ground and in Russia.

Originally Posted by Bisquit

2. Most of Western journalists don't speak Russian or their Russian is very poor and, therefore, they can't read Russian quality press (both state controlled and oligarchs controlled) or directly ask questions to Russian people.

That's what translators are for, but you are right they can't directly talk to every single person.

Originally Posted by Bisquit

3. Most of Western journalists live in Moscow spending their time in night clubs or with whores. They seldom visit other cities exept Moscow or SPb and, therefore, have no consistent view on life in Russian province.

Now that I find offensive. I am sorry, but that is a profound lie. I am personally aqcuinted with journalists covering Russian news. Yes, they are based in Moscow (naturally, that is where politics happen), but they travel every place where things happen. My friend did a story on Norilsk (traveled there), Vladivostok (water shortages in 2004) as well as countless of provincial towns and cities since he got assigned to cover Russia. Night clubs and whores Who is biased now, eh?

Make sure you read stories from well-known newspapers and not "the Exile" or "The Weekly Standard" which are totally unknown in the "West" and which I found on your inosmi.

Originally Posted by kalinka_vinnie

BTW, from who else but the media would we learn about the assasination? I don't have friends working in the Moscow police department to give me such information...

That's the problem. In many aspects Russia remains a closed society, even for its own citizens. There is no freedom of information legislation, authorities are not very cooperative, the working practices of Russian journalists are way under par (and believe me, I talked to them, and I was less than impressed by these conversations. Basically, my conclusion is that if under pressing deadlines they cannot get the info they want, and it is often the case considering the reasons I mentioned above, they just make sh|t up. Their idea of opposing spins is to spin the other way. Well, that is all understandable, 20 years ago none of objective reporting was even necessary, so now there are probably only very few people out there to teach acceptable reporting standards to young professionals).

The western media also doesn't get much to go on, I wouldn't be surprized if an average foreign reporter is already happy if he's simply let into the country. So, naturally, with the lack of sufficient reader's interest and resources, they take the unchecked "dissenting" sources as a countermeasure to the government bs and hush-hush and publish that. Of course there is going to be bias everywhere.

I just want to wait and see, it is most likely someone's personal vendetta, not a high-profile political scandal.

Originally Posted by Бармалей

Главный Вопрос:
Что хуже -- убийства в России или Бармаленина грамматика?

I will ask you a counter-question: Have you ever assassinated someone with you grammar ???

Originally Posted by Chuvak

Originally Posted by Бармалей

Главный Вопрос:
Что хуже -- убийства в России или Бармаленина грамматика?

I will ask you a counter-question: Have you ever assassinated someone with you grammar ???

Not yet, but I've put several people into comas with it...

ASSasinated... Hahahaha

Originally Posted by paasikivi

I wondered how she could survive so long. If one doesn't keep one's mouth shut, one soon ends up in the graveyard, it was like that in Stalin's Russia, it is the same in China, in today's Russia (thanks to Putin) and in all totalitarian countries.

What a horror. You just forgot to add to your list the "liberated" Afghanistan and "liberated" Iraq. In the Iraq 26 reporters were assasinated only in this year (or, maybe, previous year -- can't remember exactly). (This is a bit more, than in entire Russia for last 5 years.)

Originally Posted by paasikivi

In my country most people think that she did important work in revealing the atrocities of Putin's army.

I don't know, what is "Putin's army" -- I guess, he doesn't have a personal army of his own.

Originally Posted by paasikivi

Of course, my opinion may be affected by the fact that I live in a country which has been oppressed by Russia for the last 100 years.

Hmm, it is getting interesting. What is your country -- Finland? And which way it was "oppressed by Russia for the last 100 years"??

Where Is America's Politkovskaya?

Главная проблема том что, Россию всегда шетают виновный до время когда она доказанна невиновный.

Проблемы есть, конечно, как у всех стран, ну ситуация вроде бы меняица

Yikes. Another one, guys:
http://www.russiablog.org/2006/10/dalne ... .html#more

I'm starting to think that it's better to be that lady who sells the toilet paper for the public toilets than anybody important in Russia today -- they have a bad habit of ending up dead.

Originally Posted by Python

Главная проблема в том, что_ Россию всегда считают виновной, пока не докажут, что она невиновна.

Проблемы есть, конечно, как у всех стран, ну ситуация вроде бы меняется

Anna Politkovskaya and the Self-Defense of Democracy

The russian translation of the article is here: http://inosmi.ru/translation/230708.html

John Laughland. " Who killed Anna Politkovskaya?"

http://www.sandersresearch.com/index.ph ... &Itemid=67

John Laughland. Paid mouthpiece of the world's worst pieces of excrement.

Good Lord, now there is a journalist no-one would mourn.

Originally Posted by scotcher

John Laughland. Paid mouthpiece of the world's worst pieces of excrement.

Scotcher, I wonder what made you so upset? And did you even look at this article before starting to insult its author?

I wonder, if it is really your idea of "freedom of word"? Despite I completely desagree with hordes of journalists, which now try to depict Politkovskaya as kind of ex-heroine -- I'm not going to call them "mouthpieces of the world's worst pieces of excrement", or likewise. Rude insults look like very poor arguments for me.

I'm not upset Scorpio, I am quite able to dimiss out of hand any article written by that whore without generating any emotional response at all, and since we've been through my reasons for considering him a whore in the past, I see no reason to do so again.

Originally Posted by Scorpio

... Rude insults look like very poor arguments for me.

+1

Originally Posted by Lampada

Originally Posted by Scorpio

... Rude insults look like very poor arguments for me.

+1

In this case I would call it a correct and very reasonable description, rather than an insult though (I haven't read the article, but I do recall the name).
The argument being that if a person has never been observed writing anything but trash in the past, one might not be that interested in his new creations.

In politics, the question whether to call someone a whore or a paid professional is a matter of semantics or personal allegiance.

In politics, the question whether to call someone a whore or a paid professional is a matter of semantics or personal allegiance.

Or personaly morality.

My own personal morality tells me that when a journalist is consistently and knowingly dishonest, and goes from placing a certain ideological slant on a story to constructing entire polemics around pure, self-conscious, custom-built falsehoods, then they have crossed the line between paid proffessional and whore.

Your milage may vary, of course. That's entirely up to you.