The YouTube video-hosting site and app have stopped being accessible across Russia, thousands of Internet users in the country said online on August 8.
While this is somewhat true (state funded, but with some level of independence), your statement doesn't jive with reality.
I follow RFE/RL in both English and several other languages. Their reporting is far better than many multi-billion dollar private news companies in the West.
And it's not a minor difference either, the western news companies are not even close.
RT and RFE/RF are state media, but there is a difference. The former does not enjoy freedom and the latter does because of its firewall that prevents political interference.
Although the Trump administration tried to remove firewalls and introduce its inference that could have been harmful during that period.
I think you mean it’s designed to prevent partisan interference. RFE/RL’s purpose is to support US foreign policy which makes it inherently political. It is undeniably a propaganda outlet and therefore comparable in function to RT. You may trust American propaganda over Russian propaganda but that doesn’t mean the former is not propaganda.
I do check out RFE/RL and its sister outlets from time to time. It’s pretty obvious that their agenda aligns 1 for 1 with American foreign policy objectives. To be fair though, the US wouldn’t fund RFE/RL if it didn’t effectively dupe people into believing it was an unbiased source.
Propaganda is usually truthful or exaggerated truth. It's the framing that is important. Some facts are focused on. Some facts are omitted.
I acknowledge that Russia, China and the DPRK have made mistakes and even done things that are deeply questionable. But I'm interested in comparing their mistakes or misguided actions to those of the most powerful military empire on earth. The one involved in hundreds of military actions and dozens of coups since its inception. The one with the largest per capita prison population on earth. The one which controls many of the world's financial levers.
There is a difference in the scale of their mistakes or bad actions. Propaganda distorts that difference of scale. It focuses on the crimes of the "enemies" / "axis of evil" / "rogue states" but doesn't examine context or culpability of the empire. They'll choose one conflict, downplay 9 others, and give a one-sided view of that one conflict.
That's how propaganda works. Every state produces propaganda. One state produces billions of dollars of propaganda each year.