Russian Culture Minister Claims Netflix A U.S. Mind Control Effort

from the glass-house-propagandists dept

Already on the shitlist of U.S. broadband companies for supporting net neutrality and opposing things like usage caps, Netflix now has a new factually-challenged enemy: Russia. Russia's Culture Ministry took over government film funding through the Cinema Fund in 2012, and more recently unveiled a list of approved subject matter should film makers in Russia wish to get funding. Approved subject matter should include tales that herald "traditional values," "the constructive actions of civil society" or "heroes fighting crime, terrorism and extremism."

With Netflix now pushing into 190 different countries and launching in Russia last January, Russia has clearly become nervous about the influence the US streaming company could have on Russian culture and homegrown production efforts. As such, streaming services like Netflix have been saddled with a significant number of restrictions, including requirements that online video services must be run through a Russia-registered subsidiary, produce 30% of its content locally, and potentially apply for a broadcast license.

Apparently believing these restrictions won't hamper Netflix fully enough, Russian Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky last week upped the rhetoric to 11, proclaiming that Netflix was little more than a US government attempt to control the minds of Russian citizens:

"Vladimir Medinsky, Russia's minister of culture and a loyal supporter of President Vladimir Putin, claims the online streaming service is on the US government payroll. Speaking to a Russian news service, he said the White House had realised "how to enter every home, creep into every television, and through that television, into the head of every person on earth, with the help of Netflix."

"It turns out that our ideological friends [the US government] understand perfectly well which is the greatest of the arts," he said, alluding Lenin's famous comment about the propaganda of cinema. "And you thought, what? That all these gigantic start-ups appear by themselves? That some boy student thought something up and billions of dollars flutter from above?"

Scary! Nobody denies that both countries have used oceans of disinformation and media propaganda to portray the other side in a negative light, but suggesting Netflix has much of a motivation beyond money is an entertaining leap. Medinsky's complaint is particularly amusing given that Russia was just exposed for running disinformation factories twenty-four hours a day whose sole function is to fill the internet with anti-Western bile. But regardless of which side is generating the propaganda; if your social values are so fragile they can be unraveled by a half-hour sitcom or a documentary, you may want to reconsider your ethos.

That said, the real villain in this latest chapter in the information wars isn't Netflix, but Netflix-produced shows and other fare that dare to show homosexuals as something vaguely resembling actual human beings.

Filed Under: american culture, culture, mind control, movies, russia, tv, vladimir medinsky
Companies: netflix