For over a decade, Hungary’s Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán has been waging a war against the country’s free press and he is succeeding. Most of Hungary’s 10-million people do not speak another language.
Orbán’s fake-news factories, trolls and misleading “political analysts” dominate the media and the result is that today the Hungarian public seems to be one of the most misinformed and misled in Europe.
When Századvég, a pro-government think tank, recently asked who is responsible for the „deterioration of the conflict” between Ukraine and Russia, 47% claimed that BOTH Putin and Zelensky are responsible. 13% of the responses put the blame exclusively on Zelensky for the Russian attack against Ukraine, his own country. Overall 60% percent of Hungarians think that Ukraine’s President is to be blamed for Putin’s aggression.
Fully 66% of Hungarians are satisfied with Viktor Orbán’s friendship with Russian President Putin and think that it is advantageous to the country. This survey was taken AFTER Putin’s attack and Ukraine is Hungary’s neighbor. In 1956 Russian tanks rolled into Budapest to defeat the Hungarian Revolution. It seems that the Hungarian public has a short memory.
Not surprisingly 91% of Hungarians oppose sanctions against Putin’s Russia.
Hungarian media gives a distorted view of the world. In Budapest most people have access to differing views and foreign media, but the countryside is Orbán’s base and it is kept in the dark. They hear that the West is collapsing, children are indoctrinated with LBTQ propaganda, and millions have sex-change operations. The taxpayer-funded gibberish propaganda was described by an employee of network MTVA as “migration, migration, Soros, Soros, a new baby panda was born at the zoo.”
The European Federation of Journalists’ 2019 report noted: “Since 2010, the Hungarian government has systematically dismantled media independence, freedom and pluralism, distorted the media market and divided the journalistic community in the country, achieving a degree of media control unprecedented in an EU member state.”
George Lazar
George Lazar continues his disinformation campaign against Hungary and Viktor Orbán. The press and media freedom is healthier and free in Hungary, much more so than in the United States or Western Europe!
@ Andrew Ludanyi
If only I would know what makes you so determined to make a fool of yourself Ludanyi. in front of those who have taken a pledge to pursue the truth along a path paved with empirically verifiable facts. Pray tell, were you always so blind or you just ran out of your Covington tablets? By joining the side of the fortune hunters who derive their profits by destroying their fellow citizens ability to distinguish facts from fiction, illusion from reality, you have shown that intellectually and morally you inhabit the same space as that Artificial Blond Bomber, who managed to hoodwink over 100 million Americans that he scored an overwhelming victory in the 2020 American Presidential elections. In other words. You stink Ludanyi.
Andrew L is a shameless liar with the above (and generally like Orban and his stooges).
Many statistical studies prove the points of Mr. Lazar, e.g. the KESMA “foundation” controlled by Orban grouped over 500 media entities, from national TV stations to local rags. Where in the western world can one find such a phenomenon?
Mr.Lazar,
The 91% agreed that “… the tension should be reduced” which obviously is what everyone would like to see. The trick of the government funded Százdvég “institute” is to bundle this largely rhetoric questions with the different issue of the means to achieve de-escalation and we have the two faced question of “Threats to Russia don’t help now, rather …. the tension should be reduced”, and voilá – this is immediately interpreted as an opinion against sanctions.
This is why Százdvég is considered the most sophisticated unit of the Orban propaganda machine.
Can the author argue that there is no blame to go around? In reality, it is neither Ukraine’s fault or Russia’s. It is the 2013-2014 CIA-orchestrated insurrection (Maidan) that is at the root of this. Ever since then, the hope has been that Ukraine can become a battleground in order to drain Russia economically, through a combination of war and heavy sanctions.
As to why? It all started at the beginning of this century, when oil & gas discoveries fell behind yearly demand and fell short every year since then. Last year, 5 billion barrels of oil equivalent were discovered, while 45 billion barrels were consumed. Plan A was the invasion of Iraq, under the pretext of WMDs, where the idea was to quadrupple production, in order to buy the world as much as another 20 years. It turned out that Iraq’s reserves were greatly overestimated. Plan B was shale oil & gas that started in 2008. With a loss of $300 billion to companies & investors, shale oil & gas did provide us with an extra decade. It stagnated in 2019, so that is done now. Plan C is Russia, the largest oil & gas exporter on the planet. Not an opportunity to increase production, but rather an opportunity to install a puppet government, control those resources, thus control the world. The alternative is to let Russia become ever more powerful as what they have, the world increasingly needs. It is just as bad of a plan as the Iraq war was, except this will cause immense economic pain world-wide, with analysts trained in the finest brainwashing facilities of the Western World, advising for this plan to be implemented, with little understanding of the chain reaction.
Within a few months, the world will be in a new economic crisis due to spiking energy prices, followed by the most painful famine the world has ever seen. Right now, Russia finds it is unable to export its wheat, while Ukraine cannot due to the conflict. Russian & Belorussian fertilizer exports are also curtailed, even as fertilizer plants throughout EU were stopped due to high natural gas prices for months now. So, in addition to curtailing Russian wheat exports, global food output is set to plummet this year and next due to fertilizer shortages. In conclusion, 2013 Maidan plan was another “genius” Western idea. A sign of where we are headed as a society.
Hungarian point of view on this is, therefore, the most reasonable within Western World, that is lately gripped by one hysteria outbreak followed by another. This is insanity, once more gripping our society, fueled by MSM manipulation. Just a year ago almost everyone was convinced that defunding the police was a great idea. It took a severe breakdown in basic law & order and an extra 10,000 murders for people to wake up. This time it will take a massive recession & a brutal humanitarian catastrophe that will feed instability the whole decade for us to wake up. Just like the 2015 migrant crisis and other problems, Hungarian point of view is proving to be an island of reason, within a sea of idiocracy.
@ Joe
What about plan D, Joe? Hooking yourself up to a custom fitted pipeline so you could send your endless supply of natural gas directly into Mr. Orbán’s dwelling in Felcsút ? I’m sure that former pipe-fitter, Mr. Orbán’s neighbor, that everyone calls Lölö, would be happy to hook you up in a jiffy. What do you say, huh?
I say, that once more your ability to discuss complex subjects, such as I brought up is a testament to the priceless resource the Western World has in academia. No wonder things are going so well. You shaped the crem de la crem of our society, after all, thus I am not at all surprised.