September 03, 2022

Russian News Has Gotten Wacky


Russian News Has Gotten Wacky
Fair and balanced? The Russian Life files.

Russia's press is in a bit of a crisis. Anyone caught spreading "misinformation" (regardless of how true that "misinformation" is) can face up to fifteen years in prison. Dissent is being quashed. And, in response, the established media, those that are well-known and run by the state, are filling the void.

Take, for instance, a smattering of articles encountered while on a recent research foray. It is news that's not generally fit to print here at Russian Life, but which is being churned out by daily for RIA Novosti, one of Russia's main media outlets, akin to CNN or BBC.

Back in the day, Russian ideology was obsessed with the "all-pervasive conspiracy theory of Western hostility." These articles noted above, and hundreds others like them, have taken this obsession to near-ridiculous levels. Every whiff of an argument to support this worldview can be used as ammunition, proof that the West is conniving to attack Russia, but that Russia is, at the same time, undoubtedly superior.

This should also serve as a bit of a warning: "fake news at work." It's so easy for a careless article written on a slow day to be picked up, made hysterical, and rebroadcast by the Kremlin's news machine as evidence for crumbling Western civilization. It's a reminder for readers to check sources and traverse the internet with caution and skepticism.

That's how you live in the age of disinformation. Hopefully more Russian journalists can learn how to.

You Might Also Like

Televised Bravery
  • March 15, 2022

Televised Bravery

A one-woman anti-war picket interrupts Russia's most important state news program to tell the country, "They are lying to you!"
The Not-too-Mighty Russian Armed Forces
  • July 24, 2022

The Not-too-Mighty Russian Armed Forces

It's been four months, and Ukraine is still standing. The front lines have hardly moved in ten weeks. Is this the Russian army everyone so feared?
Sci-fi Author, Meet Dystopia
  • June 14, 2022

Sci-fi Author, Meet Dystopia

A well-known science fiction author has been placed on the Kremlin's wanted list for protesting the war in Ukraine.
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

Survival Russian

Survival Russian

Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.
Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

A book that dares to explore the humanity of priests and pilgrims, saints and sinners, Faith & Humor has been both a runaway bestseller in Russia and the focus of heated controversy – as often happens when a thoughtful writer takes on sacred cows. The stories, aphorisms, anecdotes, dialogues and adventures in this volume comprise an encyclopedia of modern Russian Orthodoxy, and thereby of Russian life.
Turgenev Bilingual

Turgenev Bilingual

A sampling of Ivan Turgenev's masterful short stories, plays, novellas and novels. Bilingual, with English and accented Russian texts running side by side on adjoining pages.
Moscow and Muscovites

Moscow and Muscovites

Vladimir Gilyarovsky's classic portrait of the Russian capital is one of Russians’ most beloved books. Yet it has never before been translated into English. Until now! It is a spectactular verbal pastiche: conversation, from gutter gibberish to the drawing room; oratory, from illiterates to aristocrats; prose, from boilerplate to Tolstoy; poetry, from earthy humor to Pushkin. 
Marooned in Moscow

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.
Steppe / Степь (bilingual)

Steppe / Степь (bilingual)

This is the work that made Chekhov, launching his career as a writer and playwright of national and international renown. Retranslated and updated, this new bilingual edition is a super way to improve your Russian.
The Pet Hawk of the House of Abbas

The Pet Hawk of the House of Abbas

This exciting new trilogy by a Russian author – who has been compared to Orhan Pamuk and Umberto Eco – vividly recreates a lost world, yet its passions and characters are entirely relevant to the present day. Full of mystery, memorable characters, and non-stop adventure, The Pet Hawk of the House of Abbas is a must read for lovers of historical fiction and international thrillers.  
Dostoyevsky Bilingual

Dostoyevsky Bilingual

Bilingual series of short, lesser known, but highly significant works that show the traditional view of Dostoyevsky as a dour, intense, philosophical writer to be unnecessarily one-sided. 
The Little Golden Calf

The Little Golden Calf

Our edition of The Little Golden Calf, one of the greatest Russian satires ever, is the first new translation of this classic novel in nearly fifty years. It is also the first unabridged, uncensored English translation ever, and is 100% true to the original 1931 serial publication in the Russian journal 30 Dnei. Anne O. Fisher’s translation is copiously annotated, and includes an introduction by Alexandra Ilf, the daughter of one of the book’s two co-authors.

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955