This bill was introduced in the State Duma today, but not by United Russia as had been expected — by the Communists instead.
A typical example of the tail wagging the dog.
It started with a piece on Znak.com claiming that the presidential administration had supposedly ordered officials to bring home their children studying abroad. The piece was clearly made up from beginning to end. It cited unnamed sources, and no other media outlet found any confirmation of the information.
Even so, the headlines were catchy — they always are with made-up news — and a huge number of media outlets republished it.
After that, nothing happened, but a Communist Party deputy saw that newspapers liked the topic, drafted just such a bill, and today — a month after the original item — submitted it.
He’ll get his share of fame and rise in the Medialogia rankings (a Russian media-monitoring and analytics service). Good for him.
Sadly, this is a constant feature of Russian journalism. The newspaper *Izvestia*, in particular, practically specialized in this sort of thing, which is how it built up such a huge citation index.
It’s done very simply.
First, you invent a story: “Sources in the presidential administration say officials have been banned from wearing expensive watches.”
Then you call political analysts Makarkin and Ivanov and get quotes from them both for and against.
Then you call some deputy who likes to talk and ask: what do you think about this?
You insert a reference to the Patriarch’s watch.
You publish the item and enjoy the fame. Guaranteed pickups by a hundred media outlets with the usual idiotic headline: “Media learn that the presidential administration is demanding a ban on expensive watches.” And two hours later: “Presidential administration denies demanding a ban on watches.” A month later, some deputy suffering terribly from lack of attention will almost certainly introduce such a bill.
That’s it.
As for the substance of this initiative: it’s idiotic.
There is nothing wrong with sending children abroad. Russian education, especially higher education, is in ruins. The best Russian universities are somewhere around the hundredth place in international rankings.
Medvedev had a program to send large numbers of our students to study in Europe and the United States — an entirely sensible program, but it fizzled out, like everything sensible the government does.
I see this figure on their website:
It’s not even funny. We should be sending students abroad by the tens of thousands, like the Chinese do.
In some fields — medicine, for example — it is absolutely vital for us to send students abroad to study: we are already more than 50 years behind. Young lecturers should also be sent abroad, and their studies should be funded.
And officials’ children should study too. Yes, I myself often write about officials’ children abroad, but from the standpoint of the hypocrisy of the fathers and mothers who lecture us on how to love the motherland while sending their own children off to live in London. What is outrageous is not where they study, but the transformation of Russia into an “open hunting ground,” while families are evacuated to the West that is publicly denounced.
There is also an important question: what money are they using to study at foreign institutions that charge $50,000 a year?
That is what needs to be talked about, and talked about constantly. But there is nothing wrong in studying abroad itself — only benefit. Wherever they study, the main thing is that they study.