“Not sitting on the couch” right now does not mean going to vote from a car trunk; it means making at least some effort to persuade the “silent majority.”
We tested this through polling: persuasion is working extremely well on people right now. Any word, any example, even simply explaining that what is happening is really about extending Putin’s rule, leads people to view this “vote” negatively. They may respond in different ways: by not going, or by going and voting “no.” But we achieve the main thing: we increase the critical mass of our fellow citizens who are opposed to Putin ruling forever.
The problem seems to be getting the message across—especially to the proverbial “Odnoklassniki crowd” (users of Odnoklassniki, a Russian social network popular with older people). Our leaflet campaigns (print one at home and hang it in the elevator) work fairly well, but there is an even better tool.
What has replaced the campaign leaflet in 2020? What does every grandma and every middle-aged guy constantly have in their hands? A phone. And on that phone, they are on WhatsApp, forwarding funny videos to each other.
That is the new leaflet. Don’t want to sit on the couch? Here it is: https://putinfriends.com/
In fact, even while sitting on the couch, you can go to the Putin’s Friends website and forward your friends, acquaintances, and elderly relatives short videos in which well-known public figures tell the plain truth about the “vote on resetting presidential terms.”
Each video can be shared, and each one can be downloaded (hover your cursor over the video, and the site will prompt you to do so) for further forwarding. We can see that people are happily spreading them on social media.
So they need to be thoroughly “seeded” in WhatsApp and Telegram—especially in WhatsApp, where the tradition of forwarding little videos is thriving.
If ten thousand people send them to three acquaintances each, then within three days the total audience will be two million people.
Don’t sit on the couch. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you got off it by “voting.” Do something to persuade the people around you. People are convinced and change their minds only when someone actually tries to convince them.