Well, howdy there internet people, it's Bell again.

So today we're going to talk about a question from one of you about foreign policy.

In expanding the table analogy a little bit, we got a question about how Russia gets framed in the media and

whether or not it plays directly into the way they want to be seen. Adding a

little bit of imagery to a long-running analogy on the channel might help explain why things

sometimes get framed the way they do.

Here's the question.

Why is it that whenever the West does something, the narrative is that Russia will react to it?

Escalate, full stop. Are none of the West's decisions reactions themselves?

Why is it that these discussions always seem to me to be from the stance of that Russia is never acting only reacting?

Is that not Russia's own propaganda dictating how we discuss these things.

So first, let's take a look at how and why Russia is seen as reacting, and whether that's

always the case.

Now domestically, inside of Russia, sure, that's always how everything gets framed.

That's also true for most countries. The governments of various nations around the world

tend to frame things as them reacting to an outside stimulus.

And they act like they had no role in any proceeding events.

At the beginning of the most recent escalation in the war, Russia wasn't framed as reacting.

It was an elective war they chose to pursue when they invaded.

Sure, you had some people try to draw back to other events and justify it, but there weren't

a lot of those people.

Overall, Russia was seen as acting and the West reacting.

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