symptoms of the profoundly diseased civilization that we are living in
May 3, 2023 8:48 AM Subscribe
Bono Is Doing Illustrations For The Atlantic Now, Because Everything's Fake And Stupid - by Caitlin Johnstone
This post was deleted for the following reason: Caitlin Johnstone is a columnist for Russia Today and this is Russian propaganda. -- loup
"Imperialist propaganda rag???"
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:51 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:51 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
I'm not impressed with this. She can't even spell Zelenskyy correctly. I don't think this needs to be here.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:52 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:52 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
Yeah, this just sounds kind of like someone trying to be edgy by hating on the mainstream like The Cool Kids do.
(That said, there are some fair points she makes about some aid societies having early ties to the CIA and how that's a bit of a mindfuck, but sometimes a rock star doing magazine cover art is just a rock star doing magazine cover art.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:55 AM on May 3, 2023
(That said, there are some fair points she makes about some aid societies having early ties to the CIA and how that's a bit of a mindfuck, but sometimes a rock star doing magazine cover art is just a rock star doing magazine cover art.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:55 AM on May 3, 2023
This is a series of pretty weird takes.
posted by robotmachine at 8:55 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by robotmachine at 8:55 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
Is she getting paid for this watered-down Russian propaganda
Yes:
Yes:
Lets take a look at how Russia Today hides content:posted by TheophileEscargot at 8:55 AM on May 3, 2023 [32 favorites]
This is a post Caitlin Johnstone, she pushes large amounts of Russian propaganda across Twitter. But she is actually an OP Ed columnist for Russia Today. None of this is disclosed on the account.
Well this is a big mess of tankie sludge
posted by Ferreous at 8:56 AM on May 3, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by Ferreous at 8:56 AM on May 3, 2023 [8 favorites]
Thanks for that Theophile Escargot. I was wondering where this "the imperialist west is corrupt, and the imperialist west supports Ukraine, therefore Ukraine is corrupt" insinuation was coming from.
posted by adamrice at 9:01 AM on May 3, 2023
posted by adamrice at 9:01 AM on May 3, 2023
Пепси blue
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:02 AM on May 3, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:02 AM on May 3, 2023 [7 favorites]
The real shame, in this mess of an article, is the lost opportunity to dunk on Bono's eyerollingly mid art.
posted by ZaphodB at 9:03 AM on May 3, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by ZaphodB at 9:03 AM on May 3, 2023 [15 favorites]
In the midst of all that weird rant, she points out Bono's friendship with GWBush. This is specifically because Bush started PEPFAR which is the single most successful medical intervention in the history of the planet. The US continues to fund PEPFAR to this day.
posted by hippybear at 9:04 AM on May 3, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 9:04 AM on May 3, 2023 [9 favorites]
This is interesting as a case study in how little the Russian propaganda machine is trying to hide how it is working through her. I’m also interested in the targeting that’s going on here. I feel like there could be a pretty broad spectrum of people who find Bono annoying and would think it is lame of The Atlantic to have him do a cover. Both those things could apply to me, but the pivot to pro-Russian talking points is so abrupt I would be surprised if anyone just kept agreeing with the author.
posted by snofoam at 9:06 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 9:06 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
Huh. My "favorite" piece of this might be early on where through cunning use of the passive voice she implies that if Russia uses nukes in this war it will be Ukraine's fault.
posted by Navelgazer at 9:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Navelgazer at 9:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
Indeed, I clicked through for the Bono dunks and got, what, two sentences of that, and then it just went totally haywire.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
ha ha, remember when Apple put the free U2 song on iphones and people were pissed?
I was hoping for something like that, not this clumsy Russian propaganda.
posted by ryanrs at 9:14 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
I was hoping for something like that, not this clumsy Russian propaganda.
posted by ryanrs at 9:14 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
Why is this on the Blue?
posted by cooker girl at 9:17 AM on May 3, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by cooker girl at 9:17 AM on May 3, 2023 [8 favorites]
Is this one of those "leftists" for whom in the expression "American imperialism" the problematic part is "American"?
posted by Pyrogenesis at 9:18 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by Pyrogenesis at 9:18 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
I think this needs to be edited to include more context, if it stays up at all.
posted by Perko at 9:19 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Perko at 9:19 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
The world’s largest company putting a bad U2 album on our phones was proof that we don’t control our most personal devices. It is like having part of your music library taken hostage. Vladimir Putin is a war criminal and mass murderer. See Caitlin, I can do it too!
posted by snofoam at 9:21 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by snofoam at 9:21 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
Was I not on distro for the memo? Who tf is "Caitlin Johnstone" and how is she in any way different from any of the other right-wing/pro-Russia droolers'n'ravers on Substack?
Arguably, not the best of the Web.
posted by the sobsister at 9:34 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
Arguably, not the best of the Web.
posted by the sobsister at 9:34 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
I am always happy to dunk on Bono and the Atlantic certainly has done shady shit but this is some weak sauce weird stuff here.
I guess I appreciate knowing that this person is an RT plant, so I learned something.
posted by emjaybee at 9:48 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
I guess I appreciate knowing that this person is an RT plant, so I learned something.
posted by emjaybee at 9:48 AM on May 3, 2023 [6 favorites]
I guess what I don’t get is why, in the first place, Bono doing a cover illustration for The Atlantic would be a symptom of anything.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:53 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Going To Maine at 9:53 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
This is really short!
I think that she's extremely right about how decayed and creepy it is to have "liberal" (Sesame Street, Atlantic) media serving as an arm of the CIA, and that rock opera sponsored by General Dynamics is about as dystopian a thing as possible. Definitely the "sensitive inquiry into the suffering and emotional contradictions of a drone operator, brought to you by an arms dealer" is....well, it's very contemporary. It's like Dancer In the Dark made into a positive story - instead of all the emotional horror indicting the system and all its participants, it simply creates a rich, nuanced story of complex human beings murdering people, complexly.
She's also right that the US isn't supporting Ukraine out of the goodness of our withered little hearts, and she's right that the war is utterly horrifying, and that the net result is likely to be the further integration of Ukraine into a racist, unequal, phony international order. That's all true and deeply dismaying.
And yet it doesn't add up to 'Russia has the right to rule Ukraine over Ukrainians' objections'. That's where the gap always is, and that's where the obfuscation comes in. The Ukrainians are right to resist, they're right to go around the world shilling and propagandizing and begging for aid. That's what anyone would do. The US can aid them or not, but if the Ukrainians can't get aid, they're going to get rolled over by Russia. All pieces like this try to avoid saying "we think it's fine that Russia conquers any little states on their borders" but that's what all this "nothing is worse than American military aid" boils down to.
And I mean, say that if that's what you mean. Maybe it's even true, maybe if you really add up all the deaths and smashed cities the net balance is "it's better to be ruled by Russia than smashed to pieces fighting them off". But if that's the case, you've got to say it and you've got to say it both to US citizens and to the Ukrainians and not hide it behind some vague anti-imperialist sentiment.
I really don't like any of this, I don't like seeing people on my timeline posting Russian positions getting blown up. Those are just some poor schmoes forced to fight and I don't think it's good that people on the left are trying to cheerlead when some impoverished boy from, like, outer nowheresville RU gets blown to smithereens.
But if this were an easy problem to solve we'd have solved it. The problem is that either the Ukrainians fight or they roll over, and it takes a lot of nerve to tell other people that they should just roll over in the interests of world peace.
posted by Frowner at 10:03 AM on May 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
I think that she's extremely right about how decayed and creepy it is to have "liberal" (Sesame Street, Atlantic) media serving as an arm of the CIA, and that rock opera sponsored by General Dynamics is about as dystopian a thing as possible. Definitely the "sensitive inquiry into the suffering and emotional contradictions of a drone operator, brought to you by an arms dealer" is....well, it's very contemporary. It's like Dancer In the Dark made into a positive story - instead of all the emotional horror indicting the system and all its participants, it simply creates a rich, nuanced story of complex human beings murdering people, complexly.
She's also right that the US isn't supporting Ukraine out of the goodness of our withered little hearts, and she's right that the war is utterly horrifying, and that the net result is likely to be the further integration of Ukraine into a racist, unequal, phony international order. That's all true and deeply dismaying.
And yet it doesn't add up to 'Russia has the right to rule Ukraine over Ukrainians' objections'. That's where the gap always is, and that's where the obfuscation comes in. The Ukrainians are right to resist, they're right to go around the world shilling and propagandizing and begging for aid. That's what anyone would do. The US can aid them or not, but if the Ukrainians can't get aid, they're going to get rolled over by Russia. All pieces like this try to avoid saying "we think it's fine that Russia conquers any little states on their borders" but that's what all this "nothing is worse than American military aid" boils down to.
And I mean, say that if that's what you mean. Maybe it's even true, maybe if you really add up all the deaths and smashed cities the net balance is "it's better to be ruled by Russia than smashed to pieces fighting them off". But if that's the case, you've got to say it and you've got to say it both to US citizens and to the Ukrainians and not hide it behind some vague anti-imperialist sentiment.
I really don't like any of this, I don't like seeing people on my timeline posting Russian positions getting blown up. Those are just some poor schmoes forced to fight and I don't think it's good that people on the left are trying to cheerlead when some impoverished boy from, like, outer nowheresville RU gets blown to smithereens.
But if this were an easy problem to solve we'd have solved it. The problem is that either the Ukrainians fight or they roll over, and it takes a lot of nerve to tell other people that they should just roll over in the interests of world peace.
posted by Frowner at 10:03 AM on May 3, 2023 [4 favorites]
i suspect that bono's real contribution to the fall of western civilization is his band redoing a good part of their catalog instead of coming up with new songs, but he's hardly the only artist who's regurgitating the 20th century for fun and profit, but mostly profit
it's the same reason the rock stations are playing 50 year old songs
that he traced someone's picture with a ball point pen on a bar napkin for the atlantic is just a minor detail - that caitlin johnstone has to make an example of this just illustrates how desperate she is to churn out propaganda for her russian friends
posted by pyramid termite at 10:05 AM on May 3, 2023
it's the same reason the rock stations are playing 50 year old songs
that he traced someone's picture with a ball point pen on a bar napkin for the atlantic is just a minor detail - that caitlin johnstone has to make an example of this just illustrates how desperate she is to churn out propaganda for her russian friends
posted by pyramid termite at 10:05 AM on May 3, 2023
It took me a while to work out who I was thinking of, but I’m relieved that Casey Johnston is not a secret Russian propagandist.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 10:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Horace Rumpole at 10:09 AM on May 3, 2023 [3 favorites]
what I don’t get is why, in the first place, Bono doing a cover illustration for The Atlantic would be a symptom of anything.
Because Bono's, like, the establishment, man.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:12 AM on May 3, 2023
Because Bono's, like, the establishment, man.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:12 AM on May 3, 2023
It's sad for a site I love, but y'all are sipping the imperial Kool-Aid hard. Caitlin Johnstone is like water, and you find it repulsive. Y'all say that anyone disagreeing with you is a Russian propagandist, but have you considered the war propaganda you're imbibing? Do you not remember the countless NATO wars of the past few decades?
Do you really think the world is divided into good guys and bad guys, and that America and NATO are the good guys? Fucking lol.
posted by indica at 10:15 AM on May 3, 2023
Do you really think the world is divided into good guys and bad guys, and that America and NATO are the good guys? Fucking lol.
posted by indica at 10:15 AM on May 3, 2023
Indica, I literally only know you as that guy who pops up to support the idea that somehow, America is the real bad guy, not the country that's invading Ukraine.
Not shocked you're in this thread, too!
posted by sagc at 10:18 AM on May 3, 2023 [10 favorites]
Not shocked you're in this thread, too!
posted by sagc at 10:18 AM on May 3, 2023 [10 favorites]
If it hadn't been Bono's goofy ass drawing of Zelenskyy -- if it had been Bono's goofy ass drawing of basically anything else instead -- I kind of doubt that Johnstone would have written this article.
posted by cubeb at 10:19 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by cubeb at 10:19 AM on May 3, 2023 [2 favorites]
« Older “It’s better than nothing” | Albuquerque should be ranked higher Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by Bobicus at 8:51 AM on May 3, 2023 [16 favorites]