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Podcast rec: Ukraine edition
If you are a podcast listener and looking for a way to feel like you're following Putin's war without doomscrolling, I want to recommend The Eastern Border podcast.
It's made by Latvian journalist Kristaps Andrejsons, and it's been going for over eight years with weekly episodes made for the purpose of educating Westerners about Soviet and post-Soviet history, politics and culture, from the perspective of people from former Soviet states. I actually started listening a year or so ago, because he guested on a paranormal podcast I was listening to when they did episodes about stuff in the region, and he was always interesting. I stopped listening not long thereafter because I use podcasts for escapism and Soviet politics did not feel quite as escapist as UFOs, but before that I had recommended them to a friend who deliberately seeks out podcasts on depressing political stuff, and she alerted me to start listening again.
He has shifted to 10-30 min daily war updates, trying to give English-speakers a local perspective, to combat disinfo, and to share information from Russian-language sources that aren't being widely/well translated in English media. He's currently operating out of the Polish border town of Chelm, working with refugees and trying to make up his mind whether to risk his life sneaking into Ukraine. He is also swearing as required, and has mastered the extremely expressively exhausted sigh, both of which help get through things.
It's good, and 10-30 minutes a day is enough to settle my need to follow events without tempting me into wallowing (and if I do feel the need to wallow, I can go to his twitter where he's posting links and ways to help all day, or I can listen to some of his 250+ back episodes to catch up on historical context, instead of chasing rumors.)
Also in one of the most 2022 things ever, he's posting a lot on Twitter because he is also active in BattleTech fandom, and just a few days before the invasion, a wank in Latvian BattleTech fandom over which faction is best led to a bunch of people being troll-reported to Facebook, so this journalist is banned from Facebook during the most important news event in his lifetime. For supporting the wrong BattleTech faction.
It's made by Latvian journalist Kristaps Andrejsons, and it's been going for over eight years with weekly episodes made for the purpose of educating Westerners about Soviet and post-Soviet history, politics and culture, from the perspective of people from former Soviet states. I actually started listening a year or so ago, because he guested on a paranormal podcast I was listening to when they did episodes about stuff in the region, and he was always interesting. I stopped listening not long thereafter because I use podcasts for escapism and Soviet politics did not feel quite as escapist as UFOs, but before that I had recommended them to a friend who deliberately seeks out podcasts on depressing political stuff, and she alerted me to start listening again.
He has shifted to 10-30 min daily war updates, trying to give English-speakers a local perspective, to combat disinfo, and to share information from Russian-language sources that aren't being widely/well translated in English media. He's currently operating out of the Polish border town of Chelm, working with refugees and trying to make up his mind whether to risk his life sneaking into Ukraine. He is also swearing as required, and has mastered the extremely expressively exhausted sigh, both of which help get through things.
It's good, and 10-30 minutes a day is enough to settle my need to follow events without tempting me into wallowing (and if I do feel the need to wallow, I can go to his twitter where he's posting links and ways to help all day, or I can listen to some of his 250+ back episodes to catch up on historical context, instead of chasing rumors.)
Also in one of the most 2022 things ever, he's posting a lot on Twitter because he is also active in BattleTech fandom, and just a few days before the invasion, a wank in Latvian BattleTech fandom over which faction is best led to a bunch of people being troll-reported to Facebook, so this journalist is banned from Facebook during the most important news event in his lifetime. For supporting the wrong BattleTech faction.