here for support

—

What happens when they do catch you.

This recording was made at a police station, Brateevo, where people arrested for protesting in Moscow were taken yesterday. The recording shows that several police personnel took part in this, but because of the poor quality of the recording and similar voice pitches, they are difficult to distinguish from one another. We’ll call male police personnel M and female F in this transcript.

M: Enter. Last name.

Alexandra (detainee): Kaluzhskikh, Alexandra.

F: Where do you actually live?*

*In Russia, you have to be registered at a permanent address that is printed in your passport, but you can factually live anywhere else. That’s normal.

Alexandra: I refuse to answer, article 51.*

*Article 51 of the Russian Constitution states that no one is obligated to give evidence against oneself, one’s spouse, or close relatives.

F: I see. Fine. Phone number. So that you’d be called to come to court. Just don’t fuck with me here.

Alexandra: No, I want to be notified by mail.

F: To which address?

Alexandra: To the address where I’m registered.

F: Well. Where do you study?

Alexandra: Article 51.

<sound of a blow, something falling>

M: Now it’ll go flying even harder.

<sound of a blow>

M: Get up, remember (as in remember your answer).

Alexandra: Wow.

M: Yeah.

Alexandra: Wow.

M: Yeah.

<sound of multiple blows>

Alexandra: Wow!

M: Yeah!

Alexandra: *** *** [expression of astonishment] Well, it wasn’t as hard as when my father does it, to be honest.

M: Shall we continue?

Alexandra: *sighs*

M: Or Article 51?

Alexandra: Ladies, you’re fine watching this?

F: Where do you study?.. We’re fine. You’re fine going to protests?

M: We’re not fine watching this.

M: Look at her; your fucking tits *** fuck, *** [fuck], udder is hanging out *** [fuck], look at yourself *** [fuck]. Ape *** [fuck].

F: Where do you study?

M: I’ll continue.

F: Where do you study or work? Do you work?

M: Answer simple questions and walk. <...> Now you’ll say (give you) a phone, a subpoena too… They’ll call you, the judge’s assistant will call you. Do we carry on as we started? … Yes or no?

Alexandra: I have already answered.

M: Then… You know what… What goal do you pursue in your, in those, er… We’ll get it. We’re already here, *** [fuck] everyone’s been here already, all lay down. What’s your goal? I’m telling you, I just *** [shit], this will escalate like this, in geometrical progression. We, we don’t give a *** [fuck]. We’ll (do to) you…

Alexandra: Are you threatening me?

M: Yes. I’m threatening you. I’m threatening you with physical violence.

Alexandra: This is awkward.

F: What’s your full age?

Alexandra: 26.

F: What’s your approximate height?

Alexandra: <unclear>

M: Stand up.

F: Where do you work?

M: One meter seventy-eight, no less.

F: Do you work? Do you work?

M: Are you officially employed?

Alexandra: I refuse to answer.

F: How did you know there was going to be a protest?

M: One (once), **** [hit her], it’s clear.

Alexandra: (sighs) Oh God.

F: How did you know about the protest?

Alexandra: I don’t know.

F: What?

Alexandra: Article 51. Listen, you know what, this is awkward – I’m not wearing a bra, stop looking at me like that, please.

M: As if there’s anything to look at…

M: I won’t look. There *** [fuck]

<sound of a blow>

Alexandra: Oh, thank you. <sound of multiple blows> So, they hit me on the head, in the face, with a bottle of water. Ow…

M: Well?

Alexandra: Ow *** [fuck]

M: No, you just… I think she’s enjoying that we’re *** [beating her].

M: Look at her.

M: She’s a punk *** [fuck]. Marginal (person) *** [fuck]. You think they’ll do anything to us for this? We *** [fuck] *** [fuck] (were told by) Putin *** [to beat] *** them up *** [fuck] ***** [morons].

Alexandra: Wow.

M: Putin is on our side. You are enemies of Russia. You are enemies of the people *** [fuck]. Now (we’ll) *** [kill] all (of you) *** [fuck] here and that’s it. It’s done. We’ll be rewarded for it (monetary). <unclear>

F: What color eyes?

M: Light brown.

F: Where do you work?

Alexandra: I refuse to answer, invoking Article 51 one of the Constitution.

M: This isn’t an interrogation, this is questioning.

Alexandra: Well, I have already refused.

M: Why is that? Ah?

Alexandra: Ow. (Pulling) my hair, that hurts…

M: (singing) Hurts, hurts…

<sounds of commotion, sounds of blows>

M: She hasn’t washed in a week. All of them are like that. Just look at all of them…

Alexandra: We have been here over three hours… Naturally…

M: We’ve been here for over 24 hours *** [fuck], *** [don’t give a fuck]. <...>

F: How did you know about the protest?

M: You have to love yourself at least a bit, no?

Alexandra: I refuse to answer.

F: ***** [fuck], for the sake of what…

Alexandra: Article 51.

F: I don’t get it either. **** [you’re crazy]. You are *** [crazy].

Alexandra: I’m beaten up by a man in front of you – and I’m **** [crazy], yes?

F: Yes, yes!

M: We need to put electricity here.

M: Yeah, yeah, the fingers <unclear>.

F: You **** [fuck] are living in this country.

Alexandra: Are you talking right now about administering electric shock to me?

M: Yes.

M: We’ll have to (give you) 220 <unclear>.

M: Stand over there; the girl will take your picture now and you’ll go.

Alexandra: No, I refuse to be photographed.

M: No, you’ll have to.

Alexandra: No, I won’t have to.

<sounds of blows>

M: Come on *** [fuck], come on.

Alexandra: Beat me up, go ahead.

<unclear>

M: Get up, get up. <sound of blows> Go stand over there.

Alexandra: I will not stand over there. I refuse to be photographed. I will sign the refusal to be photographed.

F: Go to <unclear>.

M: That’s it, you don’t have a phone anymore, that’s it. <sound of a phone falling> Your phone has taken a little flight. It became a football. You don’t need your phone anymore, it’s broken. Since you didn’t…

Alexandra: Will you not fill out a protocol about confiscating it?

M: Why would I need a confiscation protocol?

Alexandra: You have broken the screen (of my phone)...

M: It was an accident.

Alexandra: An accident, was it?

M: When you walked in, you slipped…

M: Three witnesses.

Alexandra: Thank you. Oh, you didn’t even break it, thank you.

M: Get up.

<seconds of noise>

M: Yakovleva.

The other day they arrested a bunch of kids. Literally kids, four of them, aged seven to eleven. They, along with their mothers were carrying flowers to the Ukrainian embassy and a small simple poster “No to War”. They were all detained and immediately separated, kept locked up for the night. We don’t know how the kids were treated. Mothers had their possessions confiscated, not allowed to call anyone, stripped, yelled at, threatened. The harshest threat was to be stripped of parental rights on the spot, never see their kids again. The kids were released closer to morning when a lawyer from a group that helps people in these situations arrived. I have no idea how these lawyers are still allowed to function. Small mercies. (Support them here: https://donate.ovdinfo.org/)

But it’s not just the pain of punishment or jail sentence. It’s the utter uselessness of it all. He won’t care if half the population comes out to say “No to War”. He won’t care if it’s all of us.

A few days ago, every school in the country received instructions to hold special classes to explain to kids why “the liberating military operation” was necessary and what happens now. The teachers have been given manuals on what to say and how to answer the kids’ questions. Some of the answers include: “Don’t worry if you hear that some countries don’t want to be friends with us anymore. There are other countries who do, and besides, Russia is a very big country, so we have everything you can possibly need right here.” By “other countries”, my guess is, they mean North Korea. After the class, the kids are supposed to take a test. It’s electronic, entered through a QR code, and the answers are automatically logged in. Questions include: “Explain why the liberating military operation was necessary” and “Expand on what the Russian government is doing to help people of Lugansk and Donetsk.” The results of the test are tallied, and if some kid doesn’t give the right ones, their parents are called in for “a talk”.

We will either end up with a bunch of really smart kids or another generation of completely deluded people. The last time something like this had happened was in 1991, when the Soviet Union was falling, and my classmates and I were asked to make a choice of do we want to pledge allegiance to the communist party or not. I was ten. My class, as I remember, was split roughly in two. The kids who voted “yes” looked at the rest of us with teary eyes and whispered “our parents told us to do it, they are too afraid.” And we got it. We all got it. Nobody hated anybody for the choice, because we all knew that fear and we all knew what it was like, to be hostage of the regime. We who voted “no” knew what we were risking. At ten years old, we were more politically savvy than a lot of full-grown adults across the ocean. It’s not a good thing.

For roughly twenty-something years, we lived in the illusion that we were out of that prison. Sure, our democracy was not perfect, but whose is? It was maybe incredibly naïve of us, but can you blame us that we wanted to believe it? That we still desperately want to, which is why there are a lot of really confused people in the country right now who still can’t grasp that their leadership has betrayed them?They will, in fact, believe anything but this. They will sooner believe him and ignore the facts, because a) they’re not getting the facts, and b) the truth is terrifying.

Nothing has changed. We’re still in the USSR. Yesterday, in Nalchik, students of the local university were ordered to go out and express their support for the president. They had no warning. At some point the university staff members entered their classrooms, handed out banners and t-shirts, and ordered them to go outside “to stand in solidarity” with the president. Refusal was not an option on pain of expulsion. Among other statements, they were made to hold up banners saying #wearenotashamed which should tell you everything you need to know about how the Russian people really feel.

I’m not going to talk about the independent media, because the last survivors of this extremely rare breed are being shut down as we speak. Meduza is still holding up by some miracle, but their turn can be any hour. They have been declared “a foreign agent” some years back, which means that they can no longer be properly financed and have to preface every single post and article with a huge all-caps statement that this information was created by a foreign agent, presumably to turn “loyal citizens” away. They have been subsiding on crowd-funding this whole time, can’t imagine how, since all transactions are now traceable and giving them money is not without consequences. (Support them here: https://support.meduza.io/)

The world has turned away from us, and I get it, but they don’t understand what they’re doing. Or maybe they do but don’t care. I don’t mean this on an emotional level, but purely practical. The more they punish the Russian people, the more, unfortunately but sadly naturally, the Russian people will unite in their support of He Who Must Not Be Named. He will feel even more legitimate in his actions and he won’t stop. Not that I can imagine anything that could make him stop now but… It’s not helping. It might make a lot of people out there feel better about themselves, but it’s not helping.

Worst of all, we can’t help Ukraine. So much as saying that we’re fighting a war or that we are losing that war can earn you up to 15 years in prison for “spreading misinformation.” It’s impossible to send over money, and as for supplies we can only gather those for the refugees that are fleeing to Russia. Our economy is on the brink of collapse, and the people that are running from the war and come here will have to share it with us. We’re doing what we can for them. It’s not enough.

And personally… My mornings these days start like this. I wake up. I don’t want to get up. I do eventually. Splash water on my face etc. Take my heart medication. Wait for it to take effect. Then I open Telegram and see if Meduza is still broadcasting. Read the overnight update. Learn that the horror continues in a multitude of fresh new horrifying ways. Remind myself that I have no right to sympathy or feeling sorry for myself or any of that. I was not the one who spent the night in a bomb shelter. I was not the one whose house was destroyed. I wish I was but I’m not. I’m just a useless spectator who’s too chickenshit to even go get beaten up and who rationalizes her cowardice any way she knows how. I want you to know this about me before you decide to continue knowing me. I am unaccountably grateful having known all of you.

But I wanted to say thank you. You can’t know what your compassion means. Even knowing that there are people out there who are willing to at least listen is... I have no words. Thank you.

There were also some questions, and what the hell, in for a penny, right. So here goes, another long post.

@widgenstain​

Do you have any ideas or suggestion what useful sanctions would be? I'm on this side here absolutely enraged how deep Europe has sunk into its toothlessness and I'd be grateful for any input I could scream at my useless politicians rn, since they actually let me scream at them.

@sedintelligere

What do you suggest the EU does in this situation?

This is a very good question. Let me preface this by saying that I’m no political expert. In fact, I’m as layman as they come. I might be in equal parts extremely naïve and too cynical. And yes, I’m biased. I’m extremely biased. I don’t want my people to die. The Ukrainians are dying now, and our need will never supersede theirs, not in a million years. But hate only begets more hate. I am in no position to ask for anything, and yet I am asking. For us, yes. But mostly for peace.

I don’t know what the EU can do now. The EU was in a perfect position to do something before. It was very simple. If peace was the goal, that is. Accept Ukraine as a member, get NATO troops in to protect its borders. None of us had expected any of this, but now looking back, it seems to me (layman) that it was a question of who gets there first. If it had been NATO, he would not have dared start anything.

But what’s done is done. If the EU goes down that road now… I don’t know. I don’t see it happening, because one scenario rolls down all too easily. The EU accepts Ukraine and demands he take his troops out. He says no, because he will. The EU/NATO has an obligation to protect its members. And suddenly what we’re looking at is WW3. My guess is, the EU – and let’s be real here, the US won’t risk it. Even now they’re going to great lengths to signal that’s not an option they’re considering. There’s a direct line between the Kremlin and the Pentagon “to clear possible misunderstandings”. I’m not making this up, it’s from the State Secretary’s briefing. We should all be grateful for that.

The world stands with Ukraine, yes. But they will not protect it. Considering the threat of the above scenario, it’s tragic but understandable.

The world instead takes it out on ordinary Russians. It’s an open hunt season on anyone and anything Russian. We are easy to hate. We have always been easy to hate, and now it’s practically a requirement. The problem is, if the sanctions are designed to diminish his power, someone somewhere has to understand that they’re having the opposite effect. They make him stronger. Every time in the past decade we were hit with sanctions, it gave him more power, because it brings the only resource he can’t have otherwise to his side – the Russian people. Why? Story time.

My mother is 75 years old. She’s already lived through two periods of extreme poverty and famine – once following WW2 and again in the 90s. She’s now facing a third, in the sunset of her life. And it might be just me, but she doesn’t deserve it. Her only crime this entire time is having been born here. Do you think she’s angry at him? I wish. She feels that we are under attack. An unprovoked attack. We are being punished for something we have no control over. And he is the only thing standing between us and the people who want us dead.

I’m not saying it’s logical. It isn’t. It’s predictable, though, it’s utterly predictable to anyone familiar with post-Soviet era mentality. It’s especially predictable because we’ve seen this exact thing numerous times on a lesser scale in the last ten or twelve years. The westerners are too used to thinking like members of democratic societies. They think “if it were us, we’d react this way” and they can’t understand, despite abundant evidence, that people who have come out of 70 years of oppressive totalitarian regime will respond differently. Abuse victims don’t have the same reactions as healthy people. Repeat abuse victims even less so. It is at best unwise, and at worst cruel to expect them to. I would like nothing better than to be able to cut through my mother’s conditioning and ingrained brainwashing by sheer force of magic, but I can’t. And my mother is at least half of Russia.

Here’s the kicker. The world’s response to this does *nothing* to contradict her view of things. It only makes it stronger.

Some sanctions are beyond painful, but some are just counterproductive in a very obvious way. Russian scientists can no longer publish papers in international journals. Here’s the thing, the Russian Academy of Science is an institution that has been in some form of opposition to him from the beginning. They have proved to be extremely resistant to his attempts of controlling them. He hates them, he wants them gone. They are the voice of reason, and he doesn’t want to hear it. Can you guess what is happening now, after the West declared they want nothing to do with Russian scientists anymore? If you guessed the Academy is rallying behind the president who wants them dead and buried, you guessed right.

Athletes, artists, musicians – that’s just to humiliate people. No one can seriously believe that this will affect him or his decision making in any way, and yet. Gergiev is a world heritage level conductor, and he has nothing to do with this. I will be the first one to admit that kicking our football team out of Euro Cup might be doing the world football a huge favor, but my heart breaks when I think of our Paralympic athletes. All this is accomplishing is pissing him off. Does anyone really think he needs to get more pissed off?

The other day I learned that the Russian cats were disinvited from FIFe, which is like the world cat expo or something. I’m not an expert, and I don’t have all the facts about the war down, but I’m pretty sure we can all agree: the cats didn’t do it.

Let’s review. Science, sports, art, culture. By cutting ties in those areas in the most humiliating way possible, the West cuts off any connection to sane Russians - something that hadn’t even been done in the Soviet era when people used those ties to, among other things defect, but mostly to remind each other that we are all human on both sides of the curtain. This may very well be the reason the planet is still around.

With every new measure of this nature, he’s gaining support. And none of it is doing anything to help Ukraine. I understand, I do, this need to punish someone. But if you can’t touch the man, taking it out on his already abused wife is just… emotions aside, counterproductive.

“The Russian people are not our enemy” is a lovely sentiment, but it has no effect when the *actions* of those saying it convey that we very much are. And if we are collateral damage, that means the other side doesn’t care any more about it than he does.

What can be done? No clue. I’m no expert. My – assumption would be that, if we really want this nightmare to stop, the hypothetical leader needs to be separated from power. I’m scared to type this, I’ll be honest. Today our Duma (parliament) ratified a new law under which anyone spreading “fake” news and “discrediting” information can get 15 years in jail. As we have established, I’m a coward, and as much as my life sucks right now, I don’t want to go to jail. “Fake” news and info obviously include anti-governmental talk. There’s also another law they’re discussing, under which anyone arrested at an anti-war protest will get send to Ukraine to fight. Some say it’s a joke, but the thing is, it has become impossible to tell terrible jokes apart from terrible reality. I know one thing, if it’s not a joke, it will definitely pass.

That said. For one thing, stop growing his power base by forcing ordinary Russians to take his side or die. When has starving out the people ever helped to overthrow a dictator? Look at the history of the world dictatorships, current and past. When has that ever worked?

For another, in a hypothetical situation such as this, the leader needs to be separated from sources of power, the military, the oligarchy. How that can be accomplished, I have no idea. My suggestion would be some sort of a carrot and a stick variation. See, as long as the West treats us all the same, he will exploit this to rely more heavily on the people, arousing their patriotic feelings and survival instincts. There needs to be a clear line between how the culpable and the rest are treated. Imagine a situation where he knows that the people aren’t in trouble, but he is. Only then will people start asking questions, only then will they be hesitant to pledge their support to him and his. Only then someone in the inner circle can be flipped, I imagine. I don’t know how this can be done, but there has to be a way. For the people to rise up, they need to not be in survival mode. And I hate to say it, but he’s not the one who activated it. He’s simply using it to his advantage.

Here's another thing I’m scared to type, because it can be interpreted as outright treason. But I am a proud Star Trek fan and a patriot of the human race, so here it is. The world needs to use us, not discard us. Russian people are a powerful resource. I don’t think this needs proof. We are dying to be part of the solution, but under current conditions, it’s impossible. He’s oppressing us and now the rest of the world is oppressing us, which makes it easy for him to oppress us even further. It’s a triple bind we can’t get out of. He is stuck in his megalomania and egomania and what not, and he won’t change his mind. You were there. If the cats didn’t change his mind, nothing will. It’s… not smart to expect him to. The rest of the world has options.