This episode of The Russia Guy takes place a week after the staged murder of Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko, who was dead to the world for almost 24 hours, from May 29 to May 30, until he was gloriously resurrected by Ukraine’s National Security Agency, which revealed that his killing had been a hoax apparently designed to obtain a hit list with the names of 47 prominent Ukrainian and Russian journalists. The hired hitman was in on the sting operation, and the man arrested for hiring him — Boris German — says he was actually working for Ukrainian counterintelligence. This episode isn’t about the investigative drama behind Babchenko’s murder hoax, however, but the consequences of lying to the public and the media about the death of a prominent journalist. To learn more about the significance of this deception, Kevin spoke to Natalia Roudakova, a cultural anthropologist working in the field of political communication and comparative media studies. Natalia is the author of a new book called “Losing Pravda: Ethics and the Press in Post-Truth Russia.”So what are you going to learn about on today’s episode of The Russia Guy? Kevin asked Natalia to put the Babchenko murder hoax in the context of Ukraine and Russia’s Soviet legacy. She explained what truth in journalism actually is — how it’s constructed and understood in different societies. And she discussed why many journalists in Russia and especially Ukraine feel betrayed and manipulated by the Ukrainian authorities’ decision to lie about Babchenko’s murder. Check out Roudakova’s book, “Losing Pravda: Ethics and the Press in Post-Truth Russia,” at Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Losing-Pravda-Ethics-Post-Truth-Russia/dp/1316629775If you enjoy this podcast, please consider showing your support with a pledge at Patreon, where you can contribute as much or as little as you like. I’d like to thank those in the audience who are already pitching in.https://www.patreon.com/kevinrothrock

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