Or it’s a misleading way to attract funding. The hard thing about sabotage is that it’s dangerous, not that it’s expensive. Either they are doing it, then publicly fundraising for it shows they have poor judgement and money they get will soon be confiscated by the government. Or they’re not doing it, then talking about it is (perhaps unintentionally) misleading. I think it’s the latter, because overwhelming majority of opposition activists are not capable of executing that kind of thing. On the other hand, I heard quite a few stories about Russian opposition activists stealing laptops, borrowing money and never returning etc. Not saying Russian opposition is unusually untrustworthy, but they are no more trustworthy than an average person. Meaning you should apply your regular amount of caution to check that you are not donating to a scam. And if you send money hoping they will be spent on X, even though no one actually promised that and officially money are spent on something else, that’s not even a scam. That’s you scamming yourself.
Or it’s a misleading way to attract funding. The hard thing about sabotage is that it’s dangerous, not that it’s expensive. Either they are doing it, then publicly fundraising for it shows they have poor judgement and money they get will soon be confiscated by the government. Or they’re not doing it, then talking about it is (perhaps unintentionally) misleading. I think it’s the latter, because overwhelming majority of opposition activists are not capable of executing that kind of thing.
On the other hand, I heard quite a few stories about Russian opposition activists stealing laptops, borrowing money and never returning etc. Not saying Russian opposition is unusually untrustworthy, but they are no more trustworthy than an average person. Meaning you should apply your regular amount of caution to check that you are not donating to a scam. And if you send money hoping they will be spent on X, even though no one actually promised that and officially money are spent on something else, that’s not even a scam. That’s you scamming yourself.