In distant snowy Arkhangelsk, nineteen-year-old university student Olesya Krivtsova is being imprisoned for 10 years for spreading “heresy” about a war that allegedly does not exist in student chat rooms. She has already been included in the official list of terrorists and extremists and will now be judged. The organizations that compile these lists have many faces and names – Rosfinmonitoring, Roskomnadzor, Center "E", the Investigative Committee, but in fact, behind this in Arkhangelsk is the same huge Stalinist building of the FSB in the very center of the city, which the Cheka first took away from honest people for herself in the 1920s, and then repeatedly completed and rebuilt (five years ago, 17-year-old Mikhail Zhlobitsky, who himself died in the explosion, wanted to blow it up “for the persecution and torture of people”).
Olesya Krivtsova is stubborn – she was already fined in the spring, she could have settled down, but no. Since then, they have "restricted some activities" and placed them under house arrest – all in vain. And the uncles from the big gray house got angry. During the search, Olesya naturally stood with a sledgehammer in uniform and conveyed greetings from Wagner PMC.
It so happened that I am well acquainted with both this house and the previous generation of "uncles" – since the time when, in 1982, as a youth in Arkhangelsk, in honor of the war in Afghanistan, I painted the city with signs "Pacific" (one still miraculously survived on the square, which still bears the name of Lenin). There, in this building, five floors are full of malicious loafers who systematically, from generation to generation, crush and persecute the youth. So they “talked” with me, and then I said to them: “Why are you such patriots, you graduated from the Forestry Engineering Institute, and now you’re not in a forest plot, and you didn’t go to Afghanistan either?”
Now their heirs are fighting with the whole crowd with 19-year-old Olesya Krivtsova. I can imagine how scared and lonely she can be, especially considering that one of her classmates denounced her.
All this comes to mind when I see statements that the protest is completely suppressed in Russia, there is no opposition, “everyone has left”, or “everyone is silent” (we love this “everyone” or “overwhelming majority”). What is it like to read to Olesya Krivtsova while she can still do it? And after all, at least Radio Liberty noticed it, and in 1982 neither Svoboda nor any other organization except the KGB noticed my lone action (I only mention this because I am well aware of the feeling of isolation and loss).
But if the “protest is suppressed”, who are these 21,000 people who were detained at protests in 2022? Who created 200 thousand blocked Internet resources? Why were 370 criminal cases initiated only for anti-war statements? And how many people have not yet had time to identify and catch? The FSB has large states, but it’s not rubber, the work is painstaking and difficult, that’s how much paper you need to fill out!
Now the author, who would like to tell the world about the resistance in Russia, has an ambiguous position – he cannot make a list and point his finger at the heroes, this will be FSB volunteer help, a good-natured denunciation. Let's just mention the tip of the iceberg. Of course, the inflexible Alexei Navalny , about whom CNN is going to show millions of Americans his already sensational film in prime time on Sunday. This, of course, is Ilya Yashin – in parallel with Navalny, leading his blog from behind bars, Navalny and Yashin have the main journalism in Russian that exists today, I hope the world's largest publishing houses are already negotiating with relatives about publishing their books. The reader can easily supplement the list with dozens of names of people, not only behind bars, but also in freedom, doing their job openly and boldly. Maybe they don't come out with placards on Red Square, but no one doubts their position.
Navalny and Yashin have the main journalism in Russian that exists today
By the way, about the "legal" dissenters. On Monday , a case was opened against the acting Petersburg deputy Boris Vishnevsky and the former deputy Maxim Reznik (Vishnevsky remains in St. Petersburg as a block of opposition heaviness, Reznik went abroad). They dug up "discrediting" statements back in April, after Bucha, but it is clear that Vishnevsky is to blame for the main thing – the townspeople are drawn to him with their problems and troubles, and the rest of the 49 deputies can only envy and zigue. The Yabloko party remains an open and legal organization, methodically making anti-war statements, and this more than covers the differences with them on some sensitive issues. Nobel laureate Dmitry Muratov and half of the editorial staff of the supposedly destroyed Novaya Gazeta continue to live and work in Moscow. Another collective Nobel laureate, allegedly defeated by Memorial , continues its work both abroad and in Russia (Memorial members from dozens of cities, starting with Moscow, have not gone anywhere).
The Insider recently reprinted verses from Disbelief , a book of anti-war poetry published in London, but most of its authors remain in Russia. And the musician Yuri Shevchuk ? And what about other writers, musicians, actors who categorically refuse to perform under the letter Z (as happened recently in the former famous Chinese Pilot Club)? For the reasons already mentioned, I do not give the names of clubs, theaters and concert halls, where, if business as usual takes place, it is only in the sense that they still tell the truth from the stage, risking both their life work and freedom, unlike some top directors .
I put the word “legal” in quotation marks, because Vishnevsky and Shevchuk are just as legal and legitimate as Navalny, Gorinov and Yashin are legal. In the inverted world called "Russian Federation", illegal criminals are just in power, they have to constantly lie, "encrypt" and dodge.
But back to earth. Recently, I have been constantly in touch with a Moscow photographer and artist, whom we, with her consent, jokingly or not jokingly decided to call "Radio Operator Kat". She spent several months abroad, but returned to Moscow, explaining that this was her hometown and she wanted to do something so that the war and the killings would stop as soon as possible. In severe January frosts, Radio Operator Kat walks around Moscow and transmits photos and videos from there about small protest installations around the Kremlin and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. A sign “VV Khuilo” with a rope loop floats along the Moscow River to the Kremlin. On the giant letters “We are together” at the entrance to the Zaryadye park there is a small but clear postscript “killer” , and everyone understands where we are. On the bridge near Bolotnaya there is a jug with the inscription "Glory to Ukraine". On the observation deck of the XXC – bloody babies with the inscription "450 children". I write to her: "Be careful, for God's sake, there are paddy wagons all around, police, cameras are poked." But no, I can't stop her.
And this is how she, at five in the morning, frozen, returning home from filming, opens some website, and there the former world chess champion mints: “There is no anti-war protest in Russia today.”
Garry Kimovich, do you understand that you are telling a person that he does not exist? Do Navalny and Yashin exist? Is Olesya Krivtsova a phantom? If only statistics matter, who are these 21,000 detainees? Excuse the obvious, but what about seven Soviet citizens in August 1968?
Another obvious thing is that, of course, in this war, only the Armed Forces of Ukraine, equipped with modern guns, tanks and missiles from NATO and all countries of good will, will stop the evil, mad with blood and armed to the teeth. But it does not logically follow from this that "there is no anti-war protest in Russia today." Turn on chess logic. When the dungeons collapse, who will meet you at the entrance to Russia? Not abstract freedom, which is still far away, but all these people who, in your opinion, do not exist.
When the dungeons collapse, at the entrance you will be met not by abstract freedom, which will be far away, but by all these people
January 9 marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Kharkiv poet Boris Chichibabin, who in his life went through war, prison, and bag. When he was expelled from the Writers' Union and deprived of all literary work, he worked for 23 years until his death as an accountant for a tram and trolleybus depot. He was recognized and was familiar with literary celebrities, with a real elite in Hamburg itself, but continued to go to work in this tram depot every day and "simply" write poetry. Finally, I remembered his poem of the deaf and hopeless 1971, artless and intelligible, like all his work:
God bless you from roots to crowns
to gather without trouble.
To the outgoing – bow.
The rest is brotherhood.
Remember our snowball
in the midst of someone else's heat.
For the departing – a horn.
The rest – punishment.
Every share according to the mind:
both good and evil.
Departing – I understand.
The rest, I know.
The edge of the soul, sick Rus', –
chime, primordial
(with the departing – I will make peace,
with the rest – I will stay) –
give us blizzard and ice,
reckless and reckless
departing – love,
the rest – help.
The one who is weak and the one who is cool
chooses between:
leaving – sword and labor,
the rest is hope.
But shine at the end of the road
according to the commandments of hosts,
departing – Sinai,
the rest – Golgotha.
I'm tired of judging
measure temporal immensity.
Departing – sadness.
The rest is loyalty.
