We know. :(
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yes, seditious shitheads leading gullible morons at the behest of child raping baby eaters
They're exploiting the stupid and mentally unwell to allow the worst in our society to pillage our tax money. They're already well on their way to dismantle public healthcare completely. The Feds should have stepped up back when Jason Kenney came into office in 2019
Thats some Crimea and Dombas level shit.
It should be met with humor and satire.
Oh yeah, all the way back in 2015? It is certainly promoted through US social media algorithms and both the US and Russia intervene in politics through bots that the pro-fascism algorithms privilege. But like, this is by no means a new development because of raising tensions with the US. How are there so many people who don't remember the fallout of Trudeau's first term? It coincided with a general rise in fascist values and rhetoric promoted through social media algorithms.
People out west are correctly identifying that the electoral system devalues their votes, and that the neoliberal state will not support them materially if there is any deviation from capitalist economic imperatives (such as providing expansion of education, employment, and medical welfare programs in the event of a decline in fossil fuel, mining, and forestry employment). Because most of them are also settlers, they are going to gravitate toward more liberal and fascist rhetoric and policy because they still want to remain privileged in this system. It wouldn't work so easily if it wasn't already here.
Lmfao. Legitimate grievances?
Harper was in power for 10 fucking years and gutted Ontario's manufacturing sector, yet do you see Ontario yelling to separate?
Albertans have long been manipulated by Canadian conservatives (i.e. oil companies) into wrongly thinking that they are uniquely picked on and punished.
They're now also being manipulated by outside actors.
For the province of personal responsibility, Albertans really don't seem capable of acknowledging that their insistence on only electing Progressive Conservatives for decades, even in the face of gross fiscal mismanagement, is what got them stuck in the boat they're in. Why is it Canada's problem that Alberta didn't even bother to make oil and gas companies clean up their own wells?
Refer to my other comment in this thread, but no, this is not "manipulation" any more than any form of capitalist and liberal reaffirmations are manipulative. They are in that this system socializes people to hold capitalistic values, and so these people make choices that are consistent with those values (which are always to their detriment, not only at this point), but to call this the result of "outside actors" is deeply dismissive of the fundamental elements in Canadian culture and its way of life. Carney has openly supported the expansion of fossil fuel industry in Canada, is he some Russian spy? I doubt any more than any neoliberal is.
You're too focused on responsibility and punishment. Reality doesn't care, we have what we have to work with. Albertans are deeply influenced by the fossil fuel industry in the same way Canadians are not only deeply influenced, but dominated by the interests of capital and extractive settler-colonialism. Nothing is different here from Canadians wanting to seperate from US imperialism only now that there is a perception that they are "uniquely picked on and punished," despite this state's complicity in that brutal violence. Our entire standard of living and way of life is built through that violence, and guess what, it was to everyone's detriment and that itself is only acknowledged now that we deal with the inevitable decay of that system and the environmental/economic turmoil that it has wrought. It's not like Canadians have responded to this threat by acting in solidarity with colonized people in the global south or demanding systemic change. Instead, they have strengthened ties with other imperialistic and capitalistic powers. Go figure.
Refer to my other comment in this thread, but no, this is not "manipulation" any more than any form of capitalist and liberal reaffirmations are manipulative.
Bruh, the oil industry has literally paid for multi hundred million dollar lobbying groups to push their message. And no, not every capitalist does that.
Your point is an interesting structural argument, but it doesn't need to paper over the real world differences and history to do so.
I'd love for you to explain the substantive difference between the real and unreal manipulation. In what way is the specific lobbying campaign by fossil fuels in Alberta distinct from any lobbying for extraction in Canada? There is no disentangling fossil fuel lobbying in Alberta from settler-colonialism within the federal state of Canada or Canadian culture because these are all elements in a commonly imperialistic, capitalistic, and colonial system. You have misunderstood my criticism of capitalism as something oriented around individual capitalists as though I am talking about some especially naughty people and not recognizing that property-owners share fundamental interests because of what this system is and how it reproduces. In what way are Albertans "fooled" but Canadians who defend property ownership for mining corporations, tech corporations, food distributors, and landlords are not? Neoliberalism was dominant in Canada for decades before Trump even ran the first time (no, before 2016). Even further, why is this presumption made that the literal wealth that these companies have at their disposal is itself unrelated to the Canadian state or its interests? Quite literally, the wealth that it controls is both dependent on and contributive to the resources that these companies have access to in the first place when it is widely invested in this among every other extractive industry. Canada harbours half of the world's mining corporations, and you think that's what, unrelated to the separatist movement? Not in the interest of US hegemony? Why?
It has been intensely frustrating to have Canadians realize for the first time in their lives that they're in an empire, and to have their response be reactionary nationalism rooted in neoliberal politics. You have any idea how many Canadians who did not give a shit about how they related to US imperialism until Trump was reelected have mansplained my own country to me in the past year? Tell me about the "real world differences and history," then.
(This is also, btw, not my argument. I'm applying basic understandings of feminist, structuralist and decolonial scholarship on capitalism and settler-colonialism that you'd see in other work that is derived from arguments formed by scholars like Patrick Wolfe and Ann Laura Stoler. This is how people who analyze this system with the desire for change make sense of developments like Albertan seperatism.)
go pound sand yankee doodle
I hope Canadians are smarter than the usa dumb fucks
US and Russia
It's so funny to see a few US tech plutocrats going whole hog on Alberta separatism, US media fullying buying into the scam, and US O&G companies frothing for one more captured oil rich territory to govern under a de facto dictatorship.
And then the Brits - who are going through their own fascist transformation - come tiptoeing in to watch from the sidelines. There's no mention of who owns Canadian social media. There's no mention of which accounts are spreading disinformation. They don't even link to the fucking joint-report that the article draws on.
We just get a casual "Yeah, Russia did it". Empty head. No thoughts. Canada is so fucked.
Why would Russia want that?
I get that the U.S. wants Canada and/or Greenland because the ice cap is melting, but how would unrest in Canada help Russia? They aren't going to fight the U.S. for Canada, and they have their own access to that area already.
Russia has been trying to destabilize western democracies in general through this kind of indirect manipulations for a while because the liberal democracy model threatens its authoritarian regime. Other examples are Russia helping anti-EU far right parties, Wagner mercenaries committing atrocities in Africa and attempting to camouflage it as a French operation, paying random dudes to commit easy but high social impact crimes like tagging a Holocauste monument, networks of propaganda accounts on social media to create or amplify anything that will raise anger etc.
Unrest anywhere in "the west" helps Russia. Russia would be delighted to see civil war in North America. They want us busy dealing with our own problems so we leave them alone and don't pay any attention to whatever other horrors they wish to achieve within their supposed "sphere of influence".
The USA and Canada, together, are the heart of a massive power block. Riving the two is a huge policy win for Russia.
The USA and Canada, together, are the heart of a massive power block.
China and Albania moment
Do you mean to say that Camada is not a large economy?
Large, sure, but nowhere near the size of the US.
Big enough that a rift between the two is a big win for Russia. A chunk of both of our GDPs is a direct result of close cooperation and free trade. We are both poorer when Trump and Putin wreck our trade.
I would wager that the USA loses more if Canada goes away than it would be the other way around.
Man, imagine being Quebecois and the fucken Albertans are the ones who seperate!
The Orange Pedo and his MAGAts are trying to destroy every democracy. Don't fall for it.
I’m so sick of everyone in power jockeying for more power via deception and manipulation.
Our entire planet is now run by the people are who are the worst human being you can imagine.
What is the answer to Russia's propaganda warfare?
Do we cut them off from the internet? What happens when they launch attacks from other countries...
Do we firewall ourselves in from the rest of the world? Terrible solution on its face for obvious reasons...
Do we educate people better to spot propaganda? How can you educate someone who doesn't want to learn, and genuinely believes in these things...
What can be done about this? Regime change in Russia? Will Nk just take up the troll job?
It seems like a fight we are destined to lose without an a population that can see through the bullshit, would love to hear some other ideas though.
cf. Finland
Excellent media literacy and digital literacy education built into an excellent foundation of general education, with the government supporting people's awareness of the centuries of bullshit from Tsars and Soviet expansionism and oligarchs.
Basically mind vaccines.
Any chance you have a book recommendation to read more about there system? I would love to hear some of the theoretical stuff!
Nothing specific to Finland, I am not a historian and familiar enough with the details of their system. Here is a brief overview for you.
However, there is an enormous body of literature regarding media literacy, and a smaller, but still helpful, and mostly online, set of resources for digital literacy.
In Canada, a good resource is https://mediasmarts.ca/
There are undoubtedly media literacy resources available to you from your particular region, which may address regional issues like Russian propaganda.
Ordinary education starting at a young age about fundamental prosocial values, dignity, and shared (and local) interests. Critical thinking skills and practice asking questions like "how will this actually help? Where is it coming from? Cui bono?"
And just being open-minded and not overly emotional (and thus easily manipulated).
And point out that unfortunately many entities out there are more than happy to use them as pawns and care not a wit about the wellbeing of them or their friends, neighbours, or loved ones.
But, putting that into schools would be decried as the boogeyman of "socialism" or even xenophobia or something. Irony
Do not forget China, they are highly trying to mess with Canadian election too.
They are? Why? Do you have any examples?
Haha nice try, if you are Canadian you see this in the news at each election. A simple search will show you all the info you want.
It's even documented in wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_government_interference_in_the_2019_and_2021_Canadian_federal_elections
and even on official Canadian election site https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=abo&dir=comp%2Fmar0223&document=p2&lang=e
While several opposition political parties had called for a full-scale judicial inquiry into the allegations, Johnston recommended against this, stating that the intelligence information is considered "top secret" and could not be discussed in a fully-open inquiry. Johnston intended to continue his inquiry with public hearings and a final report in October 2023, but instead resigned as the special rapporteur on June 9.
This really sounds like a lot of hype for something not that big, the 2nd page mentions a 250k donation, thats a pretty small figure when the elections cost 600m
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