Sunday, July 31, 2016

RT: Russia's very effective counter to western propaganda

In the course of surfing the Net some time ago, I stumbled on RT, formerly Russia Today, which presents news and perspectives from a point of view (not necessarily Russian) different from that of the mainstream media.

It's easy to brand it an arm of Russian propaganda but I have found the news coverage sober and balanced and, what's important, it does present a refreshingly different perspective. RT is a must read for anybody wanting to arrive at a rounded assessment of international affairs in the face of the fare dished out by mainstream western media.

FT carries a fascinating interview with its editor, Margarita Simonyan.

Here's a telling quote:
“I don’t see why you have the nerve to think that you know better than anyone how to run the world, and who’s marginal in the world and who isn’t. You’ve made so many mistakes, you’ve started so many wars in the last few years, destroyed so many lives, killed so many people, created so many problems.”

Update: Here's a link to an NYT story on how RT is covering the presidential elections in the US. Its' worth pointing out that RT's correspondents and contributors are not just Russian- it hires locals. In the US, it has roped in former talk show host Larry King.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dear Sir,

Thanks for this article, I agree with your views*

Coming back to RT, I would like to add that while BBC World seems quite unbiased (which surprisingly isn't broadcasted in the UK:)), BBC local news is poor in relative terms i.e. to BBC World. Though BBC Local is leaps and bounds better than the common persons media esp, newspapers, which are ingloriously distasteful for e.g. The Sun, Dailies i.e. Daily Mail, Daily Express etc.....); I assume the same applies to RT, i.e. while RT, which is meant for the Rest of World and hence is probably unbiased; I assume the local Russian news must be close to whitewash.

Regarding UK media; I would also like to add that The FT, The Economist, Guardian and to an extent The Independent are quite sensible, however their readership is quite low compared to the dailies and The Sun, which is a great shame.

*somehow I find that I am in agreement with your views, almost always

Thanks & Regards

The Big Picture said...

Thanks, Anonymous for your generous sentiments.

Am not sure about Economist... their political commentaries show a profound bias against Russia.

TTR