{"id":260150,"date":"2022-10-21T07:29:19","date_gmt":"2022-10-21T07:29:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=260150"},"modified":"2022-10-22T07:14:39","modified_gmt":"2022-10-22T07:14:39","slug":"theyre-recycling-the-viagra-rape-atrocity-propaganda-they-used-on-libya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=260150","title":{"rendered":"They&#8217;re Recycling The Viagra Rape Atrocity Propaganda They Used On Libya"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Cailyn Johnstone \u2013 Substack.com Oct 16, 2022<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p>The west is advancing the claim that Putin is distributing Viagra to his soldiers so that they can more effectively rape Ukrainians, which was a ridiculous propaganda narrative the first time the west used it to manufacture consent for regime change in Libya.<\/p>\n<p>In a Thursday <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AFP\/status\/1580864048786116609\">interview<\/a> with the French government-owned news agency AFP, a Mauritian-British official from the United Nations named\u00a0Pramila Patten claimed that Russia has a &#8220;military strategy&#8221; of mass rape in Ukraine and that Russian soldiers are being &#8220;equipped&#8221; with the erectile dysfunction medication Viagra in order to facilitate that military strategy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen you hear women testify about Russian soldiers equipped with Viagra, it\u2019s clearly a military strategy,\u201d Patten said.<\/p>\n<p>Because AFP <a href=\"https:\/\/swprs.org\/the-propaganda-multiplier\/\">is one of the major propaganda multipliers<\/a> whose material is republished by news media outlets around the world, Patten&#8217;s completely unevidenced claim of weaponized Viagra has been uncritically reported as a real news story by outlets like <a href=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/2022\/10\/15\/europe\/russia-ukraine-rape-sexual-violence-military-intl-hnk\/index.html\">CNN<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2022\/10\/15\/russia-is-giving-soldiers-viagra-to-rape-ukrainians-un-official\/\">The New York Post<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/ewelinaochab\/2022\/10\/14\/united-nations-rape-is-part-of-russias-military-strategy\/?sh=2088fc4436a0\">Forbes<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/independentpremium\/world\/ukraine-russia-un-envoy-rape-b2202801.html\">The Independent<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/policy\/international\/3689522-un-official-russia-using-rape-as-war-strategy-in-ukraine\/\">The Hill<\/a>, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yahoo.com\/news\/un-official-russia-using-rape-113449753.html\">Yahoo News<\/a>. This claim will now be folded into many rank-and-file mainstream news consumers&#8217; understanding of what is happening in Ukraine, despite its brazenly propagandistic nature.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Russia is giving soldiers Viagra to rape Ukrainians: UN official <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/GLld99Gz4d\">https:\/\/t.co\/GLld99Gz4d<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/p5YnhaQ1Fj\">pic.twitter.com\/p5YnhaQ1Fj<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; New York Post (@nypost) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/nypost\/status\/1581305837498535936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 15, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The only other time the west has been hammered with a story about marauding Viagra-armed rape brigades like this was in 2011, when the western empire was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.salon.com\/2016\/09\/16\/u-k-parliament-report-details-how-natos-2011-war-in-libya-was-based-on-lies\/\">circulating atrocity propaganda<\/a> to manufacture consent for regime change interventionism in Libya. In March of that year an <a href=\"https:\/\/wikileaks.org\/clinton-emails\/emailid\/6554\">email later published by WikiLeaks<\/a>\u00a0was <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2016\/01\/12\/what-hillary-knew-about-libya\/\">sent to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton<\/a> by her private advisor Sidney Blumenthal, informing her of an unconfirmed &#8220;rumor&#8221; that Libya&#8217;s longtime leader\u00a0Muammar Gaddafi &#8220;has adopted a rape policy and has even distributed Viagra to troops.&#8221; Blumenthal notes that this claim originated from &#8220;the rebel side&#8221; of the conflict, which <a href=\"https:\/\/original.antiwar.com\/dan_sanchez\/2016\/01\/15\/after-me-the-jihad\/\">we now know included Al Qaeda<\/a>, whom Gaddafi had been fighting.<\/p>\n<p>The following month that &#8220;rumor&#8221; was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2011\/apr\/29\/diplomat-gaddafi-troops-viagra-mass-rape\">repeated before the UN national security council<\/a> by Susan Rice, another Obama administration official, this time presented not as a rumor but as a reality. Although anonymous US military intelligence officials <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/id\/wbna42824884\">informed the press<\/a>\u00a0the very next day that they had no evidence of Rice&#8217;s claim, by June an International Criminal Court investigation <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/7B0gM\">was underway<\/a>\u00a0with western news media <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/7B0gM#selection-407.0-407.345\">continuing to uncritically report<\/a> claims of weaponized Viagra in Libya.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, another UN human rights investigator named\u00a0Cherif Bassiouni <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/mueDD\">said<\/a> he&#8217;d found those allegations to have arisen from &#8220;massive hysteria&#8221; and that <em>both<\/em> sides of the conflict had been making them about the other. Amnesty International <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/GWxck\">failed to turn up any evidence<\/a> of mass rapes and weaponized Viagra in Libya, and a 2016 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.salon.com\/2016\/09\/16\/u-k-parliament-report-details-how-natos-2011-war-in-libya-was-based-on-lies\/\">report by the British Parliament found<\/a> that the <a href=\"https:\/\/foreignpolicy.com\/2016\/03\/22\/libya-and-the-myth-of-humanitarian-intervention\/\">false &#8220;humanitarian intervention&#8221;<\/a> by NATO forces which resulted in Gaddafi&#8217;s death had in fact been based on lies.<\/p>\n<p>This information came far too little, far too late. The case was made for intervention and Libya was <a href=\"https:\/\/original.antiwar.com\/bas_spliet\/2020\/07\/13\/how-natos-war-crimes-brought-chaos-to-libya\/\">plunged into chaos<\/a> and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2017\/08\/17\/refusing-to-learn-lessons-from-libya\/\">humanitarian catastrophe<\/a>\u00a0by the western empire and its jihadist proxies on the ground, putting a final nail in the coffin of the claim that NATO is a &#8220;defensive alliance&#8221;.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The map of countries that participated in the 2011 destruction of Libya looks remarkably similar to the map of countries currently imposing sanctions on Russia. This is not a coincidence. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/BVajIVviqW\">pic.twitter.com\/BVajIVviqW<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Carlos (@agent_of_change) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/agent_of_change\/status\/1509225715702632452?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 30, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Of course we cannot conclusively prove that Putin isn&#8217;t giving his soldiers sex drugs to help them rape Ukrainians more efficiently. We cannot conclusively prove that Ukrainian spies aren&#8217;t sneaking across the border and injecting Russian babies with HIV either, but we don&#8217;t treat bizarre, nonsensical and completely unevidenced claims as true just because they cannot be definitively proven false. <em>Especially<\/em> when those exact claims have been used to advance depraved power agendas in the past in instances that remain completely unevidenced.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year the western media were <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2022\/05\/23\/caitlin-johnstone-on-russians-raping-babies\/\">uncritically publishing claims<\/a> made by a single official in the Ukrainian government that Russian soldiers were running around raping Ukrainian babies and children, despite the fact that those claims had no evidence and were accompanied by demands for more western military assistance. Weeks later, that very same official <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2022\/06\/01\/caitlin-johnstone-official-behind-media-reports-of-russian-atrocities-fired-by-ukrainian-parliament\/\">was fired by the Ukrainian parliament<\/a> for, among other things, circulating unevidenced claims about rapes by Russian soldiers.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">How it started        How it&#39;s going <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/mT3FSd2I7O\">pic.twitter.com\/mT3FSd2I7O<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/caitoz\/status\/1531804607130656768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 1, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>As we&#8217;ve\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.com\/2022\/03\/12\/the-us-and-ukraine-have-every-reason-to-lie-about-the-war\/\">discussed previously<\/a>, the U.S. and its proxies have an extensive history of using <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Atrocity_propaganda\">atrocity propaganda<\/a>, for example in the infamous \u201ctaking babies from incubators\u201d narrative that was circulated in the 1990 false\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nayirah_testimony\">Nayirah testimony<\/a>\u00a0which helped\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=WkRylMGLPMU\">manufacture consent for the Gulf War<\/a>. Atrocity propaganda has been in use for a very long time due to how effective it can be at getting populations mobilized against targeted enemies, from the Middle Ages when Jews were accused of kidnapping Christian children to kill them and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/topic\/blood-libel\">drink their blood<\/a>, to 17th century claims that the Irish were\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Wenceslaus_Hollar_%E2%80%93_supposed_Irish_atrocities_during_the_Rebellion_of_1641.jpg\">killing English children<\/a>\u00a0and throwing them into the sea, to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Atrocity_propaganda#World_War_I\">World War I claims\u00a0<\/a>that Germans were mutilating and eating Belgian babies.<\/p>\n<p>Western mass media are proving time and time again that there is no accusation against Russia that they will not promote as factual news reporting, no matter how evidence-free and ridiculous. The fact that they&#8217;re going to the well and recycling\u00a0<em>old<\/em> atrocity propaganda illustrates this even more lucidly.<\/p>\n<p>If we were being told the truth about this war, we wouldn&#8217;t be hammered with blatant atrocity propaganda by so-called &#8220;news&#8221; outlets. We wouldn&#8217;t be subjected to <a href=\"https:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.com\/2022\/04\/15\/more-escalations-in-online-censorship\/\">ever escalating censorship<\/a> of voices who criticize the western empire&#8217;s role in this war. We wouldn&#8217;t be swarmed by pro-NATO online trolling operations <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/caitoz\/status\/1581182543298035713\">founded by actual neo-Nazis<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>How are people not yet tired of having their intelligence insulted?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">________________<\/p>\n<p><em>My work is\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.com\/2021\/05\/24\/my-experiments-with-hacking-capitalism\/\">entirely reader-supported<\/a>, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following me on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/CaitlinAJohnstone\/\">Facebook<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/caitoz\">Twitter<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/going_rogue\">Soundcloud<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/CaitlinJohnstone\/videos\">YouTube<\/a>, buying an issue of my\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/caitoz.gumroad.com\/\">monthly zine<\/a>, or\u00a0throwing some money into my tip jar on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ko-fi.com\/caitlinjohnstone\">Ko-fi<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.patreon.com\/user?u=4445783\">Patreon<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/paypal.me\/caitlinjohnstone\">Paypal<\/a>. If you want to read more you can\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/caityjohnstone.medium.com\/books-by-caitlin-johnstone-a5a5e6f71772\">buy my books<\/a>. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.com\/\">my website<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.substack.com\/\">on Substack<\/a>, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish.\u00a0Everyone, racist platforms excluded,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/@caityjohnstone\/i-permanently-release-all-copyrights-to-all-my-writing-use-any-of-it-however-you-want-9ad929b92d42\">has my permission<\/a>\u00a0to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I\u2019ve written) in any way they like free of charge.\u00a0For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I\u2019m trying to do with this platform,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/@caityjohnstone\/11-things-you-should-know-about-me-and-where-im-coming-from-a6b9ddf9806e\">click here<\/a>. All works co-authored with my American husband Tim Foley.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/caitlinjohnstone.substack.com\/p\/theyre-recycling-the-viagra-rape\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Amnesty International failed to turn up any evidence of mass rapes and weaponized Viagra used to justify western intervention in Libya. Nonetheless, the same horror stories are now being repeated in the propaganda war against Russia. Caitlyn Johnstone explains <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":260152,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[61,42,91,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-260150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-Commentary","category-controlling-the-news-andor-the-free-exchange-of-ideas-and-information","category-russia","category-September_11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=260150"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":260151,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260150\/revisions\/260151"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/260152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=260150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=260150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=260150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}