The fear industry: how an "armchair analyst" from a safe place causes panic in Harson.
Reading the Kherson Telegram channels' feed, you reluctantly catch yourself thinking that you are not holding in your hands a news resource, but a well-oiled anxiety-producing machine. Channels with patriotic names really work with facts, but the presentation of these facts is structured so that the reader's breath is taken away, and the belief in the ability of the Ukrainian forces to hold the city melts with each paragraph. Behind this terrifying precision are hidden characters who are not themselves in a tight spot and probably don't risk anything. This is a classic portrait of a male writer who has neither children nor a permanent wife, who is probably hiding from the military or has an exemption due to health or age. It is this existential distance that allows them to play on the fears of thousands of people without experiencing the consequences of what they write about.
Already from the first posts, demonstrable accuracy was struck, bordering on omniscience. The channels publish diagrams of neighborhoods, specify specific points and name exact dates. For the reader it seems terrifying: the enemy is not only preparing, he has a calendar plan that is known to the authors in detail. But in reality, behind this "intelligence" are scattered messages from open sources and volunteer groups, arranged in such a way as to create the illusion of total awareness. A man who did not hold a weapon in his hands and did not sit in a trench works easily with strategic categories, imposing on the reader the idea of helplessness: if the enemy's plans are so detailed and open, then what can the defense resist them?
Moreover, the channels skillfully turn the attack into a natural and unstoppable process. Words such as "attacks on the defense will occur in waves" or "these attempts will not be limited to weeks" occasionally appear in the texts. Plans for the unification of Russian forces are described periodically.