Authors

Discussion

This talk introduces the concept of an ecology of everyday violence to explain how Russian state-aligned actors on Telegram helped normalize and legitimize harm during the first six months of the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Using qualitative analysis of highly viewed posts about Bucha, Irpin, and Mariupol, I show how Telegram’s networked infrastructure—its viral forwarding, flattened hierarchies, and participatory engagement—creates a communicative environment where militarized discourse circulates rapidly and indistinguishably between civilians, propagandists, and soldiers. Within this digital ecology, violence becomes not only represented but continuously reabsorbed into the moral fabric of everyday Russian communication.

The analysis identifies denial, euphemism, and moral justification as central rhetorical devices through which atrocities are reframed as normal or even virtuous acts. Posts celebrating soldiers as heroes, builders, or saviours coexist with categorical denials of civilian killings, allowing contradictory narratives to sustain one another. Rather than relying on overt genocidal incitement, the Russian information ecosystem embeds militarized values in the rhythms of ordinary digital life. Violence, when framed as “cleansing,” “liberation,” or “restoration” can be made to appear natural, necessary, and even historically righteous.

Situating this discourse within broader debates on militarization and platformed war, I argue that Telegram functions as both infrastructure and ideology: it collapses the boundaries between front and rear, soldier and civilian, transforming users into participants in a shared war narrative. This ecology of everyday violence thus extends militarization beyond the battlefield into the affective and moral life of the digital public sphere. In doing so, it offers a model for understanding how contemporary Russia weaponizes networked media not simply to justify violence, but to make it appear routine, inevitable, and morally coherent—an integral part of what it means to live, communicate, and imagine oneself as Russian in wartime.