Army of Liars: Public Protest in Ukraine

On Saturday, 16th of August 2008 a quite interesting action took place on the central street of Kyiv, I was one of the organizers of. It was called "Army of Liars" and was aimed to draw attention to the desinformation being spread by Russian mass media about the war in Georgia.



Participants were wearing long noses - representing Pinoccio, who was a famous liar, and logos of major Russian TV stations. They were mere puppets in the hands of puppet-masters - Putin and Medvedev, who were represented by stilt-walkers.

Here are some pictures and the press release we disseminated.













(photos by Nazar Grynyk)







(taken from here)

Also some links to photogalleries at news sites:
UNIAN
DELFI

And the press release:

Public Initiative "Army of Liars"

On Saturday, August 16 2008 dramatized march "Army of Liars" took place in the center of Kyiv.

Participants aimed at attracting Ukrainian and international public attention to the problem of disinformation in highlighting of the war in Georgia by Russian mass media.

Participants of the march allegorically present Russian mass media as an “army of liars”, puppets in the hands of Kremlin leaders. “Army of liars” has a common trait - long noses, which as that of a literary character Pinoccio grow from telling lies. Marching boldly along central Kyiv street, Pinoccios – Russian mass media chant slogans:

Who is marching friendly in a row? It’s our zombies group!
Russian mass media – clense up a brain!
We are not journalists, we are propagandists!

Activists distributed flyers among spectators with a “Gergian – Russian political military vocabulary”, which present Russian mass media language translations (“aggression” – “forcing to peace”, “soldiers of Georgian army” – “killers in a military uniform”, etc.). Kremlin puppets also carried posters with well-known quotes of George Orwells “1984” book:

War is Peace
Freedom is Slavery
Ignorance is Strength

While the military operations on the Georgian territory have been officially ceased, a large-scale informational war continues on television, in the newspapers and on the internet. We believe that Russia is using mass media as a strategic weapon for escalating confrontation between the parties of the conflict, ethnical hatred spin and for devastating reputation of all countries whose position differs from what Kremlin promotes. “A bullet kills one, while a lie kills millions,” – noted Dana Vereschagina, one of the action organizers.

In informational war Russian media use not validated information, false concepts, severely biased statements, exaggerations, discrimination of facts. This as a result harms first of all nations of the Russian Federation.

“Special attention has to be paid also to the irresponsible Ukrainian media, which in majority of cases use Russian sources about war in Georgia, thus translate Russian point of view to Ukrainians. This is POW of the country, which directly threatens Ukraine with military aggression! This can be done even unintentionally, because of lack of professionalism, which compels to search for various sources and check them before publication, - says one of the organizers of “Army of Liars” event Andriy Horbal.

“We call for Ukrainian journalists, editors of newspapers, radio stations, TV channels: great responsibility for Ukrainian future lies on you. It depends on you, whether Ukrainians will know the truth or Kremlin disinformation, ” – adds co-organizer Nazar Grynyk.

The action was organized by the ordinary citizens, not affiliated with any political parties or movements or state offices. They are united by one goal – strive for the truth and protest against manipulating public opinion, brainwashing at the state policy level and attempt to hide disastrous consequences of such actions.

Organizers and participants of the action express their condolences to all victims of the military conflict, independently of their ethnicity or nationality.