Until now Abby Martin, a presenter for the Russian government-funded TV station Russia Today, has been a faithful follower of her employer’s propaganda line.
So it was rather remarkable for her to say on the air that “what Russia did is wrong” in Ukraine.
Can you imagine George Galloway saying anything remotely critical of the Russian government on his RT program? Me neither.
Russia Today responded as follows:
“Contrary to the popular opinion, RT doesn’t beat its journalists into submission, and they are free to express their own opinions, not just in private but on the air. This is the case with Abby’s commentary on the Ukraine.
We respect her views, and the views of all our journalists, presenters and program hosts, and there will be absolutely no reprimands made against Ms. Martin.
In her comment Ms. Martin also noted that she does not possess a deep knowledge of reality of the situation in Crimea. As such we’ll be sending her to Crimea to give her an opportunity to make up her own mind from the epicentre of the story.”
We shall see. In the meantime, I can’t help wondering: Does she have a choice about being sent to Crimea? And once she gets there, will she be allowed to leave?
Update: Laura Bennett observes at The New Republic:
[T]he most telling part of Martin’s rant on Russia Today was its aftermath, during which RT’s image management seemed to go off the rails. The Telegraph reported that RT executives told the UK’s Channel 4 that Martin had been “misled by American media.” Meanwhile RT released a statement yesterday praising itself vis a vis Martin’s behavior: “Contrary to the popular opinion, RT doesn’t beat its journalists into submission, and they are free to express their own opinions, not just in private but on the air.” The statement then added: “In her comment Ms. Martin also noted that she does not possess a deep knowledge of reality of the situation in Crimea. As such we’ll be sending her to Crimea to give her an opportunity to make up her own mind from the epicenter of the story.” But alas Martin hadn’t heard about her employer’s generous offer until the media reported it, and promptly replied on her Twitter feed that she would not in fact be going to Crimea. This whole murkiness of message helps explain why RT’s public perception as a Kremlin-managed monolith is off-base: these days much of RT’s programming is less a well-oiled Russian propaganda machine than a defensive, shapeshifting retort to the Western media—less focused on a coherent foreign policy agenda than on asserting itself as an alternative to American cable news, its ideological chorus so miscellaneous that it somehow includes both Abby Martin and Larry King.
