Another news article from lemmy.world that attempts to subvert the American media narrative about authoritarianism in Russia. If the Fediverse hopes to be a welcome alternative to Reddit, letting more Russian state articles filter through is not a good start.
I joined the Reddit exodus earlier than most, when there were only a handful of Lemmy servers and just the one single kbin server, and it was much worse back then. I’m not terribly concerned, the Reddit refugees are already well on their way to drowning the tankies in content.
My only worry is that many Reddit refugees (which include myself) are highly left-leaning, and it can be much easier for progressive Americans especially to be lured into communist propaganda on unregulated servers than say, MAGA/QAnon philosophies, due to the fact that most of them don’t actually know what it looks like, due to the fact that the United States is subverted in those narratives to look weak, which many serious liberals connect with, and due to the fact that because communist propaganda is based on a myth of Marxism and Leninism, it sounds like an intelligent philosophy of the people to the uninitiated, where MAGA philosophy sounds obviously delusional and greed-motivated.
Also, many Americans don’t always know the difference between peaceful socialism and true communism, so users may be ripe for data manipulation and the threat of dangerous misinformation before they realize it. Many far-left liberals may be so resentful towards Reddit’s actions that they may side with certain Lemmy radicals by accident. It’s a bit of a wild west situation - like, there was a lot of far-right toxicity on Reddit, but it was pushed into certain corners. Here, I’m not sure if anyone realizes where the extremism exists yet.