As propagandists know well, words can be weapons. But the careless or incorrect use of language by a well-meaning journalist can cost lives as well.
For instance, Russia’s war on Ukraine has been incorrectly termed a civil war. It is not.
It is a war artificially created by the Kremlin in Ukraine, similar to the ones that have broken out in several states neighboring Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Calling the war in the Donbas a “civil war” ignores the fact that Russia is the aggressor, and an active party in that war – just as the Kremlin wants. It helps the Kremlin continue this war, killing more Ukrainians than the 10,000 who have already lost their lives.
Yet coverage of Ukraine in some international media, almost three years into the war, still incorrectly portrays the war as a civil war between Ukrainian forces and some pro-Russian separatists.
Here are a couple of examples published in January alone:
“Obama first tried out the ‘Russia doesn’t make anything’ line in a 2014 interview with the Economist, as civil war was raging in eastern Ukraine… In just the past few years, (Russia) has managed to enter two wars, in Ukraine and Syria.” Joshua Keating, writing in Slate, “How Vladimir Putin engineered Russia’s return to global power” published on Jan. 2.
“…in Ukraine to fight against pro-Russian rebels in the European country’s civil war.” Joe Leahy writing in the Financial Times “Brazil neo-Nazi claim challenges myth of nation’s racial harmony” published on Jan. 10.
These incorrect characterizations are happening even amid media hand wringing over the “post-truth” world.
Many saw an ominous prophecy by George Orwell come true when the spokeswoman for U. S. President Donald Trump, Kellyanne Conway, described the lies of U. S. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer about the size of the crowd at Trump’s presidential inauguration as “alternative facts.”
In response to Conway’s comment, New York Times book critic Michiko Kautani on Jan. 26 wrote a comprehensive review on why Orwell’s “1984” is a must-read in 2017, quoting the writer’s grim description of a reality in which facts and truth are blurred by a totalitarian propaganda machine, and language becomes one of the primary tools of manipulation.
But only few days later, on Feb. 1, the New York Times ran an article by its Moscow-based correspondent Andrew E. Kramer under the headline “Ukraine Civil War Heats Up as U. S. Seeks Thaw with Russia.” The same trope is used by Russian propaganda outlets like RT and Sputnik.
Although the headline was later altered to “fighting,” the article spread around the internet with the original headline, and can still be found on other websites.
The language we use in reporting political issues shapes reality, and has a direct effect on how the world reacts to political events.
This is what Orwell highlighted in his 1946 essay “Politics and the English language,” where he wrote that “the language can corrupt the thought.” He called for simplicity and clarity in written English.
Phrases like “Ukrainian civil war” or “pro-Russian insurgents” are political language, which, as Orwell wisely noted, is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.
When we use these phrases, it is as if we remove Russia from the narrative and represent the armed conflict as solely an internal crisis of one country, where some separatist groups have simply demonstrated a wish to join another state.
When we use these phrases we forget that Russia is fully accountable for the occupation of Ukrainian territories not only in the Donbas, but in Crimea, and refuses to implement the peace agreement to which it agreed.
Last November, the International Criminal Court in Hague recognized the fighting in eastern Ukraine as an international armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
NATO has recognized, too, that the Russian government deliberately destabilized eastern Ukraine by providing fighters with ammunition and command structures. There isn’t an independent separatist movement in eastern Ukraine, nor there are “Ukrainian-backed forces” or “pro-Russian rebels.” The Ukrainian army is fighting for Ukrainians to defend the Ukrainian nation from Russia’s invasion. Saying it any other way obscures the truth.
The issue is not merely one of semantics. Correctly describing what is happening shows respect for 10,000 Ukrainians who have lost their lives in the war.
We can’t bring them back, but we can accurately describe how they lost their lives, and simply and clearly name who is to blame.
Bermet Talant is a Kyiv Post staff writer.
