A Protest Against Idiocy

Hi, this is the Navalny team, and what you’re about to see

isn’t even really a video — it’s a campaign

against

idiocy, and I’m inviting all of you

to take part in it. Unfortunately, this story

has very little in common with comedy — it’s more

of a tragic farce. Look: this is a photograph from

the cover of an 11th-grade history textbook. You’ve

almost certainly seen it before. It’s a very

well-known photo from the Victory Parade

showing Soviet Army soldiers preparing to throw

the banners of the defeated Nazi army

to the ground. And this is Mikhail Listov from

Arkhangelsk. He is 59 years old, and

in April 2016 — that is, almost two

years ago — Listov posted this photograph

on his VKontakte wall.

“So where’s the idiocy?” you ask. It seems like a perfectly

ordinary situation.

Well, the idiocy began two months ago, on

December 5, 2017, when Senior

Lieutenant of the FSB (Russia’s security service), Ya.N.

Arkhiereysky, was conducting an “inspection of the internet.”

Yes, that is apparently an actual job: an FSB officer

conducts an inspection

of the internet. And since Mikhail Listov

is a volunteer in my election

campaign, then of course this “internet inspection” for

him meant poking around on Listov’s VKontakte

page,

looking for something — anything — to pick on, and he found

this very photograph. After that,

he drew up an inspection report of the internet page,

in which he stated: “The post had attached

five photographs, one of which

depicts soldiers holding in their hands

German banners bearing

Nazi symbols,” and sent this

report of apparent national importance to

the police. And the police, seeing what the FSB sleuths

had uncovered, sprang into action and drew up a protocol in

which they, in turn, wrote that Listov

had posted on his VKontakte page

in public view

images of Nazi symbols, for which

Listov was held liable

under Article 20.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses: propaganda or

public display

of Nazi paraphernalia or symbols. And

there was a trial, and a federal judge named

Kostyleva found Listov guilty and

fined him 1,000 rubles (about $17 at the time). And

I want to draw your attention, my friends, to the fact that this

is not just a fine. In Russia, we have

a special law on combating

extremist activity, under which

people held liable under

this very Article 20.3

can be added to a special list

of terrorists and extremists. After that,

you may, for example, no longer be able to use

banking services, because a person

included on the list cannot withdraw

more than 10,000 rubles per month, which, by the way,

is 329 rubles

below the subsistence minimum.

In addition, you are barred from taking part

in elections, along with many other

restrictions.

You become an official terrorist/extremist,

and getting off that list is practically

impossible. So the entire

state system that you

pay for with your taxes — the FSB, the Interior Ministry, and

the judiciary — worked to

have a person declared an extremist and

punished for posting on VKontakte, on

his own wall, a photograph from

the cover of a history textbook.

To be honest, I could hardly believe this

could really be true. I thought maybe there was

some other photo involved, so I asked

for the case materials to be checked specifically. No —

that’s exactly how it is. There’s a link in the video description; you

can look for yourselves. This is

idiocy. And my campaign is this:

I, too, will post this photograph on my

social media.

If our state fines people

for this photograph from the Victory Parade and declares

them extremists, then let them declare me one too.

And I urge you to do the same:

share this video and post this

photograph. And regardless of your

political views — whether you support me

or not — if you are a normal

person, then stand up against this

idiocy, against this stupidity, against

the fact that our law enforcement

and judicial system is busy with this garbage,

this nonsense,

instead of doing its job properly. We

spend 30 percent of the country’s budget on them,

and so one has to ask: what,

do they really have nothing else to do? Have the problems of

terrorism been solved? The problem of

corrupt officials? Or, I don’t know, with

serial killers?

Are they really so short of work that they have to crawl through

social media and stitch together flimsy cases

out of nothing? And this is a widespread problem.

Just look at how many extremism cases

are opened every week in Russia

over likes, reposts, and so on. Idiocy,

idiocy. Every normal citizen should already be shouting:

“Enough!”

Stop wasting time on this rubbish. Stop

putting up with it. And please

pay attention to one more important thing.

Putin, United Russia, and all our lying

authorities just love to trade on

our victory in the Great Patriotic War (the Soviet term for World War II’s Eastern Front).

They wrap themselves from head to toe

in St. George ribbons at every possible occasion.

The propagandists invoke “victory” in every grammatical case, in a frenzy, in

a frenzy, practically foaming at the mouth, and soon they’ll be

telling us that Putin personally

rode half-naked on a mare straight to the front, and

personally smashed two German tank

divisions, and those same hypocritical crooks do not

hesitate for a second to fine

an opposition activist over a photograph from the Victory Day parade

Why? Because this government

is, in essence,

an occupation regime. They will use any pretext

to infringe on

a citizen's rights, rob him, humiliate him, squeeze

as much money out of him as possible, take from him

more taxes. And those who refuse

to stay silent, like Mikhail Listov from

Arkhangelsk,

they will try to punish

using even the most absurd methods, and they will not

feel the slightest bit ashamed. And our struggle with you

for a normal future for Russia

is precisely a struggle against occupiers and

looters. If you have a

veteran in your family,

then tell him this story. Let him

know what is happening in our country.

In fact, tell everyone about it, post

this stunning, great photograph everywhere.

If

Putin thinks that valuing your country's history

is extremism,

then we will all become extremists.

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