Why People Hate Ukraine, Ukrainians, & NATO — Disinformation Narratives You Should Know About

Jakub Ferencik
5 min readJan 29, 2023

It’s hard to say why someone believes disinformation or misinformation in the first place.

It might be because of poor education, a poor economy even, or just malicious intent. I don’t know if we’re that simple as human beings to attribute beliefs with attitudes more generally. I think it’s more complicated than that.

Nonetheless, there are some things we can point to that could explain how disinformation works and why it — unfortunately — often sticks.

Photo by visuals on Unsplash

Since the beginning of Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, much of the anti-NATO, anti-Ukraine, and anti-Ukrainian refugee speech has continued and even grown in East Central Europe.

Some of this includes rhetoric like “Yankee trainers trained the Ukrainians,” “Ukraine is just a US/NATO colony,” or “Russia had no choice but to defend itself.”

We are all familiar with such slogans since we meet people with these views on a near-daily basis.

There are at least two reasons why these views are popular in the region.

The Popularity of Disinformation Narratives in East Central Europe

--

--

Jakub Ferencik

Journalist in Prague | Author of “Up in the Air,” “Beyond Reason,” & "Surprised by Uncertainty" on AMAZON | MA McGill Uni | 750+ articles with 1+ mil. views