• some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    1 year ago

    I think varying degrees of torture probably occur with all wars, by all sides. War is distasteful and terrible. (International) crimes are surely committed.

    I agree that the article in question is weak. I know there’s already evidence that Russia has committed war crimes. Probably Ukraine, too. War sucks.

    • Wakmrow@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      That’s generally my take, I’m not interested in breathless horse race reporting from CNN. I find it very suspicious that in my googling about torture in Ukraine, I found only one article mentioning atrocities from the Ukrainian side. I probably believe the Russians are being more brutal especially given the limited reporting I’ve seen about penal battalions. But given all the Nazi patches I’ve seen on Ukrainians, I doubt the war has been clean. From my understanding having never lived in a war zone, wars are never clean.

      I don’t like this war reporting portraying Russians in a dehumanizing way. I think that’s dangerous narrative building. I don’t trust western reporting to not toe NATO’s line. So when I say I’m skeptical of articles, I try to take what information presented without the narrative attached. In this example I found not much actual information presented but a strong narrative of an invasive oppressive army brutalizing the civilian population showing no empathy and a penchant for war crimes. That might be true but the evidence presented for such a strong narrative is a picture of an ill maintained room and a police report.