In April 2025, British journalist Chris York uploaded an Instagram Reel in which he walked through the streets of Ukraine, detailing a recent Russian ballistic missile attack. It became the first in what would grow into an ongoing series of “rants from Kyiv.”
“Whenever there was a massive Russian missile and drone attack on Kyiv, I would record a video on the way to work, saying what had happened,” he tells CORQ. “It was just my very haggard, tired-looking face shouting into the camera.”
Nearly a year later, York boasts more than 87,000 Instagram followers and balances his role as news operations editor at The Kyiv Independent with explainers about the war in Ukraine and the realities of modern Russia. His most recent as of writing: “Is Donald Trump a Russian asset? No, but the reality is even more depressing.”
The format has evolved slightly, but York still considers the videos as “rants from Kyiv,” which is why he decided to label his feed as such. “It’s stuff which, for me, and for a lot of people, is very important and generally very frustrating,” he says.
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Dissecting Russia
Initially, York put little thought into his content. Rants were born from personal frustration – not only with the war in Ukraine, but with what he considers a fundamental misunderstanding of Russia itself.
“I see so many pro-Russian comments from people in the UK, the rest of Europe and in America who seem to have this idea that Russia is some bastion of goodness and traditional values,” York says. “I was like, ‘I really need to make an effort here to go back to what people in Ukraine see as very basic things.’ They’re very obvious things that have been very obvious for decades, if not longer, to Ukrainians, but which audiences in Europe and the US still don’t understand, which is the true nature of Russian culture.”
Distilling the topic of Russia has resulted in Reels like York’s breakdown of the “5 reasons Russia is a s**thole, not a superpower,” which has 2.7 million views, 108,000 likes and 6,100 comments, and an explainer of why “Russia’s economy is f**ked,” which has 1.5 million views, 39,700 likes and 1,700 comments.
@chrisdavidyork 5 reasons Russia is a sh**hole, not a superpower Number 1 — If you’re a superpower it helps if you at least even notionally have a set of values that seek to better humanity in some way. Russia has none. In fact, the entire country is a death cult that places absolutely no value on human life. Number 2 — It’s a country built on dirt. Once you take away gas, oil, and metals, there is nothing else underpinning the economy except weapons (and we’ll come to that in a bit). Number 3 — It’s also a country built on lies. Number 4 — The only thing Russia contributes to the world is death and disinformation. Number 5 — Just simple logic says Russia isn’t a superpower. #russia #ukrainewar #war #kyiv #ukraine
Structuring rants
The journalist spends about two hours per week producing commentaries while also covering similar topics for The Kyiv Independent. He believes the lack of structure is part of what helps the videos resonate with viewers.
“It’s that personal connection that is very easy to have with a person and a face on social media, but it’s very, very tricky for a news organisation to try and emulate,” he says.
As his audience has grown, York has gradually started pre-planning videos. “It was quite easy to do when it was just off the cuff because it was just me angrily ranting about how many missiles and drones Russia had fired on whatever night,” he explains. “But if you’re going to try to accurately and efficiently explain a quite complicated topic in three minutes, if you can do that off the cuff, then you’re an absolute genius.”
At the same time, York’s content planning doesn’t extend much beyond “[writing] down a few words on a Saturday morning.” His personal passion and knowledge hooks viewers, and it would be obvious if he tried too hard. “I’m not trying to be a personality, it’s just like, ‘This is how I talk, this is what I know, here you go.’” If you like it, great. If you don’t, then it’s not going to work.”
@chrisdavidyork 5 signs that Russia’s economy is f**ked Spoiler alert — Russia’s economy isn’t on the verge of collapse but it is very, very screwed Putin has effectively mortgaged the future of his country to fight the war in Ukraine and you don’t have to be an expert in economics to know that’s probably a really dumb idea — especially when it’s lasted 3 years and 50 weeks longer than you planned for. Here 5 signs that things are going badly for the Kremlin. #ukraine #ukrainewar #russia #kyiv #putin
Engaging audiences
Over time, York has noticed what generates the most interest. While it’s “kind of sad,” viewers engage more with sensational discoveries about Russia than what’s happening in Ukraine.
“Russia has always been this enigma to Western audiences that no one really fully understands, but they want to,” he says. “Obviously, there is interest in Ukraine, but I feel like people are more intrigued by Russia and what they’re doing and perhaps trying to understand why they act like they do, even though that is probably a fruitless task.”
Still, York’s platform draws much of its appeal from the fact he reports directly from Ukraine. His proximity to the conflict and granular understanding of the situation give his content greater credibility – especially in a landscape where some personalities reporting on the situation “don’t have that sense of what you can say, what you can’t say, how much you have to verify your facts.”
York explains: “It’s so different [from] what most people in the West can comprehend that it does need explaining from the bottom up because people still don’t understand the threat that it poses.”
The topics at hand are vast, so he keeps things concise. “I think people appreciate an information-dense explainer that covers a relatively broad topic, but delivers a lot of information in a short time.” For the most part, his videos are under three minutes, with most sitting closer to two.
@chrisdavidyork So Ukraine needs to give up Donetsk Oblast or be destroyed by Russia? Rubbish. Let’s get one thing straight — it wasn’t Trump’s threats of Tomahawks that brought Putin to the so-called negotiating table. It was Ukraine’s drone campaign that has been hammering Russian oil refineries since August. The Kremlin wasn’t panicking about Tomahawks because they posed a distinctly new threat, they were panicking because they would speed up something Ukraine is already doing, and which they are largely powerless to stop. Russia is already in a really bad situation — Ukrainian drones have knocked out a fifth of Russian oil refining capacity and this is really messing up the Russian economy. Russia is not winning this war. It’s not even close. And it’s certainly not in a position to be demanding more Ukrainian territory. And yet for some unfathomable reason, Trump and his clueless lackey Steve Witkoff seem to think that it’s perfectly reasonable for Ukraine to cede all of Donetsk Oblast to Russia as part of a peace deal. Here’s some very crucial context that they need to know about that — Russia has been trying to take Donetsk Oblast since 2014 — 11 years. And for 11 years Ukraine has resisted them. Does that really sound like an army that’s in a position of strength and capable of destroying Ukraine? And does that really sound like a country that’s in any position to demand being handed something which it has been utterly incapable of taking itself? Nope. #ukrainewar #war #ukraine #donaldtrump #russia
Future rants
When it comes to inspiration, York describes Russia and its aggression towards Ukraine as an “endless well of ideas.” But the nature of his content also lends itself to general rants about current affairs.
To date, York’s most successful Reel explores the new multipolar world order and its implications for Europe. With 2.8 million views, 164,000 likes, 5,100 comments and 69,300 shares, it’s proof that the continent’s wider political climate is ripe for analysis on social media.
“I’ve got no intention of leaving Ukraine anytime soon,” York says, “but even in the longer term, if I do leave Ukraine, Europe is still going to be on the front lines of what is an increasingly violent world.”
By Chloe James, insights correspondent for CORQ.
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