People dress up in costumes and whip each other.
But it’s nothing like what you’re thinking.
The most popular comment on the Astrakhan website where the story appeared was: with Cossacks like these, you don’t need gay pride parades.
P.S. People in the comments are saying it’s a tradition, and that the Cossacks earned respect through battle.
Could we find out which battles the vice governor actually took part in? Sure, it’s a tradition, but what we’re seeing here is not tradition at all, but a grotesque display of bootlicking: a former CPSU member, a former Komsomol member, and now a Cossack ataman is doing some ridiculous crap for the media.