I read a thing this morning.

It was just an article on the subject of the Russian treatment of anti-war protesters. There was nothing strange or startling about it [except maybe for the bloke being arrested for displaying a page of asterisks].

There are two old adages – “The first casualty of war is the truth” and “History is written by the victors” and they are both equally true. But it amuses me that we should pillory Russia for censorship when it’s almost as bad here. By remarkable [?] coincidence I happened to receive a mail from Google this morning telling me I would be sanctioned for any “disinformation”.

Due to the war in Ukraine, we will pause monetisation of content that exploits, dismisses or condones the war.

Now I grant that withholding funds isn’t quite in the same league as ten years in Siberia but the principle is there.

This […] includes, but is not limited to, claims that imply victims are responsible for their own tragedy or similar instances of victim blaming, such as claims that Ukraine is committing genocide or deliberately attacking its own citizens.

So everything they say is a lie and everything we say is the unvarnished truth? Are we seriously supposed to believe that the Russians are raping and pillaging across the landscape while the Ukrainians are all squeaky clean with copies of the Geneva Convention in their back pockets? I very much doubt that. The truth, as always lies somewhere in between.

I’m not quite sure how Google is supposed to withhold payments when they don’t pay me anything anyway so their warning falls on deaf ears. But even if they could “sanction” me I’d tell ’em to fuck off. What I write here is basically for my own consumption anyway and if I want to say the Earth is flat or the Moon is made of green cheese then that’s my business. I sincerely doubt any of my meanderings would influence anyone, let alone change the course of a war.

So in these times the world is divided into “Us” and “Them”. I shall presumably continue to read the “Us” version of events but don’t expect me to believe absolutely everything.

Don’t treat me like an idiot.