For weeks, Russia has banned state media from calling President Vladimir Putin’s “special military operation” an “invasion” or a “war”. Critics are punished. Moscow has banned social media (Facebook and Instagram) for carrying out so called “extremist activity,” under a new censorship law against publishing “fake” information about the war. Offenses are punishable by up to 15 years in prison. This strain has forced independent news outlets to shut down, leaving an information void being filled by state media propaganda and disinformation.
Very little outside news is making it into the country, and what does slip by state media is being called fake news. This terrible situation has the average Russian being fed internal propaganda and with free flow of information being cut off. Seemingly, the West can do very little about the Russian propaganda machine.
However, in what has been called a difficult – but not an impossible mission – numerous grassroot efforts have begun to inform Russians about the unprovoked war in Ukraine. A group of Lithuanian friends quickly download as many Russian phone numbers as possible. They were posted with instructions on their campaign’s Russian/English website at callrussia.org.
Simply put, the desire was to break through the Moscow’s information vacuum by calling the downloaded numbers, talking to Russians one on one, and describing the humanitarian crisis in the Ukraine. The public initiative has recruited Russian speaking callers from over 116 countries. They have now made over 100,000 calls to Russia, many of which initially hit a wall of opposition.
One of the campaign organizers, Paulius Senūta recently stated, “This is one of the most remarkable activities of civil society in the world of this moment…Our mission is to tell about the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, and we think most people feel sympathy for it.” Senūta brought in friends, who also reeled in dozens of tech experts, communications specialists, and psychologists, to set up the #CallRussia information campaign.
Real Call Examples
During the call, people inform Russians about the real events in Ukraine. Callers like Kristīne Vītola from Kazdanga Parish begins her conversation with an unknown Russian resident with, “Hello, I’m in a volunteer in the “Call Russia” program, I’m Kristīne, calling you from Latvia.” Kristīne believes her calls are important as she does not want to “be sitting peacefully on the sidelines and watch everything being bombed, children dying, how a pregnant woman with unborn children dies.”
When she reached a man from Kursk and the conversation was peaceful, she felt thankful. The man said he did not watch the news and had no knowledge of Mariupol. He also stated that if there must be war, let there be war. Kristīne believes this conversation was a success because of no interruptions or swearing. She said her most emotional moment had been experienced when a woman had answered “I know everything, dear”, started to cry, and refused to talk.
Another similar example is when Marija Stonyte picks up her phone and anxiously dials in a number. In one of dozens of cold calls, a woman picks up and Marija, with trembling voice and baby babbling in the background states, “I’m calling to tell you a very important message. I don’t know if you know a lot about what is actually happening right now in Ukraine.” There’s silence on the other end of the line. “The real truth is that it is a terrible invasion.” Stonyte and her husband make these calls every day to people in Russia from their home in Lithuania as part of the volunteer initiative.
Russian Citizen Response
One of the founders of the #CallRussia campaign said, “At the beginning, they were really angry and yelled a lot, but now we’re sensing a shift in sentiment.” The 250,000 volunteers of the “Call Russia” program believe their personal appeals will disrupt Moscow’s propaganda and help put an end to the deadly war. During the program’s launch, #CallRussia announced, “One conversation cannot overcome Putin’s evil propaganda, but 40 million might. Russians empowered with truth and compassion are the only ones who can stand up against Putin’s lies and end this war.” Hopefully #CallRussia is just getting started and overwhelming success will be the outcome of this brave new initiative.
