#dispatches

[nothing0fnothing]

"Innocent until proven guilty."

Yeah bro. I agree.

So when 5 different accusers and 20 different colleagues all agree he's a rapist guess what? That's proven to me that he's guilty.

[wandering-wolf23]

PSA

Things I should not have to say:

Don't threaten to blow up pro-shippers on social media. That's called a terroristic threat. Don't even joke about it. You might think it's funny and it might get a few eye rolls from the adults in the room, but the DoJ/FBI/Homeland Security/People it gets reported to have no sense of humor.

Trust me. I work with them. I swear any sense of humor gets trained out of them.

At best, they're going to knock on your door and explain to your parents/partners/assorted housemates what you're doing online. At worst, it's a no knock raid because they think you're a terrorist.

All it takes is one person reporting what you said. What may be an obvious joke to you probably isn't to the team of people going through the cyber tip line. While you might be joking, Cletus in Montana with the pile of tannerite talking about how he wants to blow up the government probably isn't. There have been too many Cletuses recently for online threats to be ignored.

TL;DR: Don't be a fucking dumb ass and make threats on social media. It's a good way to ruin your life.

[6thofapril1917]

6thofapril1917's Eastern Front Reading List

So, you're an HBO War fan who wants to learn more about the Eastern Front. Maybe you, like me, wanted to know why Masters of the Air's depiction of the Nazis was so much darker than in Band of Brothers. Below is a list of books on the topic that I've been assigned during my time studying Eastern European and Soviet History. Most of these are scholarly monographs, not pop history, but I found them gripping regardless. I've provided Internet Archive links when available, and links to booksellers when not. If anyone else has suggestions, feel free to add them in reblogs - I focus primarily on Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine.

The Eastern Front, 1941-1945, German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare; 2nd edition by Omer Bartov (Palgrave Macmillan, 2001). Available on Internet Archive.

Originally published in 1985. The first book in English to comprehensively challenge the Clean Wehrmacht myth. Examines the experiences, indoctrination, and crimes of Wehrmacht soldiers.

Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945 by Catherine Merridale (Picador, 2007).

Looks into the day-to-day life and experiences of soldiers in the Red Army. Probably the most accessible of the books on this list in terms of writing style.

A Writer at War: A Soviet Journalist with the Red Army, 1941-1945 by Vasily Grossman, trans. Anthony Beevor and Luba Vinogradova (Pantheon, 2007).

A collection of primary sources and writings from Soviet journalist Vasily Grossman, who was embedded with the Red Army.

Russia at War, 1941-1945: A History by Alexander Werth (Barrie & Rockliff, 1964).

Similar to Grossman, Werth was a British journalist for the BBC and the Sunday Times during the war. Details his experiences while embedded with the Red Army.

The Unwomanly Face of War by Svetlana Alexievich, trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volkhonsky (Random House, 2017).

Originally published in the USSR in 1983. Nobel Prize winner Alexievich's Groundbreaking oral history of women who served in the Red Army during the Great Patriotic War. One of my personal favorites.

Last Witnesses: an Oral History of the Children of World War II by Svetlana Alexievich, trans. Pevear and Volkhonsky (Random House, 2019).

Originally published in the USSR in 1985. Covers the experiences of Soviet children on the Eastern Front, soldier, partisan, and civilian alike.

Marching into Darkness: The Wehrmacht and the Holocaust in Belarus by Waitman Wade Beorn (Harvard University Press, 2014).

Examines the Wehrmacht and its crucial role in carrying out the Holocaust in Belarus.

Fortress Dark and Stern: The Soviet Home Front during World War II by Wendy Z. Goldman and Donald Filtzer (Oxford University Press, 2021).

Comprehensive overview of the Soviet home front over the course of the war, including the mass evacuations of people and industry into Siberia and Central Asia. An absolutely fascinating read.

The Myth of the Eastern Front: The Nazi-Soviet War in American Popular Culture by Ronald Smelser and Edward J. Davies II (Cambridge University Press, 2008). Available on Internet Archive.

Analyzes the creation of the Clean Wehrmacht myth by German war veterans, the myth's popularization in American culture, and its impact on Americans' understanding of the Eastern Front. Spoiler: Band of Brothers does not come out of this unscathed.

[ltwilliammowett]

Dispatches for England, by Terence Lee (1944-)

[marscia]

I recognize your kind

[tf-animated-out-of-context]

[prideandprejudice05]

this thought about the russell brand doc is just playing on my mind rn

the way he like came out early and said “big media” were coming after him when the dispatches doc repeatedly said “we asked the bbc/channel 4/insert big media production company here for a freedom of information request on the complaints made against russell brand but they said no in order to protect russell brand”

like dude you can’t be out here ranting about big media when the only thing protecting you now AND then was big media

[samueltanders]

That dispatches documentary made me feel sick. Russell brand is a truly vile, disgusting man who has pivoted into an "anti media" Internet personality, probably because he knew this day would come and he wanted right wing nut jobs behind him to back him up and say the media is working against him and its all lies ( which he did yesterday).

It's been said that comedians have put jokes in their sets about Brand, a way to bring to light what he did and his lawyers made them remove it. What else has he done that wasn't in yhe documentary because women were scared into keeping quiet because of Brand's lawyers? Massive respect to daniel sloss being the only comedian willing to speak out.

[cassowariess]

Weird shit.

In the UK we have an investigative TV program called Dispatches.

For two weeks in a row, a "mystery Dispatches special" has been scheduled to air on Saturday night, then postponed at the last minute. So now it's possibly airing next week instead (if it doesn't get postponed again).

The last time there was a "mystery special" was in 2023 when Russel Brand was outed as a sexual predator, so someone is clearly trying to keep this thing from airing. Either that or the TV crew are making sure their episode is watertight against a potential libel case.

[artemisia-black]

The pivot towards courting a more conspiracy theory believing (and thus mainstream media questioning) fanbase is actually a chillingly Machiavellian move

[mysharona1987]

[cinematic-literature]

Old Boyfriends (1979) by Joan Tewkesbury

Book title

Midnight Express (1977) by Billy Hayes and William Hoffer

A Book of Common Prayer (1977) by Joan Didion

Going Crazy: An Inquiry into Madness in Our Time (1976) by Otto Friedrich

Living Well is the Best Revenge (1971) by Calvin Tomkins

Heavily Tattooed Men and Women (1976) by Spider Webb

Maya Plisetskaya (1976)

Secret Passages and Hiding Places (1974) by Jeremy Errand

Dispatches (1977) by Michael Herr

Collected Shorter Poems 1927-1957 (1962) by W. H. Auden

Slapstick (1976) by Kurt Vonnegut

Colette: A Taste for Life (1977) by Yvonne Mitchell

The Laszlo Letters (1977) by Don Novello

Cheap Chic (1975) by Carol Troy and Caterine Milinaire

[wandering-wolf23]

Art doesn’t need a moral purpose to exist. If you want to create, create. Let others deal with the headache of assigning it purpose, morality, and meaning.

[6thofapril1917]

maybe if i just focus hard enough i can hypnotize the entire hbo war fandom into watching SAS: Rogue Heroes

[ltwilliammowett]

Evening Dispatches, by Peter Rindlisbacher (1956-)

[draigoneier]

Daniel Sloss being praised so highly for speaking against Russel Brand is what's meant when feminists say all men benefit from the patriarchy