Episode #1: Russians Against Politics
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In this episode, Evgenia Kovda takes over and we talk about something that might come as a surprise to a lot of people. It’s the rabid pro-police reaction of most Russians in Russia (and abroad) to the Black Lives Matter protests taking place in America.
While CNN and the New York Times run segments that blame “the Russians” for using the protests to destabilize America, in Russia the exact opposite is taking place: The Russian government — and most of Russian society — is firmly against the protests. Russian society stands with the police. It stands in solidarity with America’s political establishment.
There are two main parts to the episode.
In the first hour, we get into the details of how these protests are depicted in the Russian media. What we see is that there is no real difference between the Kremlin and the liberal opposition. They’re both united in their hatred and condemnation.
But we really get warmed up and going in the second hour, when we try to figure out why Russian society is so united against these protests. It’s a complicated question. But on a bigger more conceptual level, we think it has to do with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the total negation of the Russian Revolution that followed it.
—Yasha Levine
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Recorded on June 16, 2020.
love this episode! as a fellow russian, i've been really frustrated to see my family get so worked up about the protests. you've put a lot of my anger into words and provided a lot of great historical context to their bullshit response. thank you for episode
I found your description of Russians’ “apolitical” and or right-wing attitudes strangely familiar. I was six when I came to Australia in 1992. Even though my father has mostly voted for the left-leaning Greens Party, he nonetheless espouses racist attitudes (Blacks are dumb and aggressive, Jews are shifty, Aboriginal Australians are lazy parasites) and is sexist, and also despises gays. But typical shit like that aside, he also seems unable to sympathise with protesters in general. Any group protesting or talking about discrimination is <качают права> (a very dismissive attitude). He has a “Law & Order” “tough on crime” mindset (“If you want change, you should pursue legal/parliamentary avenues”. IMO living in the “Soviet” system has tainted his opinion of anything associated with socialism or progressive politics.