Hotels deny check-in, employers deny employment, hairdressers deny haircuts, military registration and enlistment offices deny the right to serve in the army. Russians whose names are not similar to “Slavic” are faced with all this. Contrary to the law, everyday xenophobia has spread to the private business sector and public services, and refusals of service are often explained by completely pragmatic reasons. Lenta.ru tried to understand them and find out how to combat such discrimination.

In mid-September 2013, a photographer from Tashkent, Umida Akhmedova, came to Moscow for the Biennale of Contemporary Art. She decided to stay at one of the hostels on Bryanskaya Street, but over the phone they immediately told her that only people of “Russian-Slavic appearance” were allowed to spend the night. The hostel does not have its own website, but there is an advertisement on the site for finding housing. In the conditions of settlement it is stated: “We are waiting for adequate, decent people of Slavic appearance without alcoholic habits.” This case, of course, is not the only one where potential guests are limited in their occupancy based on their nationality. For example, last year karate athletes from Chechnya were refused accommodation in a hotel in Nizhny Novgorod. As team coach Magomed Nadayev stated at the time, the hotel staff first reported that there were places available, but when they saw the registration marks, they refused to check in, indicating that there were no places available. A message about this was received by the Nizhny Novgorod prosecutor's office. The results of the complaint are unknown.

“Any offer of goods and services is a public offer, and it must be concluded with any consumer. Any consumer has the right to use the services. The entrepreneur himself does not have the right to regulate: I will provide a service to this, I will sell to this, but not to this,” Mikhail Anshakov, chairman of the Society for the Protection of Consumer Rights (OCPP) “Public Control,” refers to documents. His words are clearly confirmed by the Civil Code. According to paragraph 1 of Art. 426, “a commercial organization does not have the right to give preference to one person over another with regard to concluding a public contract,” and paragraph 3 of Art. 423 specifies that “the refusal of a commercial organization to conclude a public contract if it is possible to provide the consumer with the corresponding goods, services, or perform the corresponding work for him is not allowed.”

In some cases, commercial organizations may impose additional rules. Thus, the work of restaurants and cafes, in addition to the Civil Code, is also regulated by the “Rules for the provision of public catering services.” The only thing a restaurant or cafe can do, according to one of the points, is to establish internal rules that do not contradict Russian laws. For example, prohibit smoking or wearing outerwear indoors. And hotels, according to the “Rules for the provision of hotel services in Russia,” can refuse check-in in only two cases: if there are no available rooms or if a potential guest violates public order. “It’s more complicated with hostels,” says Lamshin. - The definition of what it is is only just appearing in the rules and standards. In the meantime, this concept does not exist officially, they feel quite at ease. Hostels are often not registered as legal entities, operate illegally and do whatever they want.”

Discrimination against Akhmedova in Moscow or against people from the Caucasus in Tolyatti who were denied admission to city nightclubs are special cases of everyday xenophobia. As a rule, it is connected not with dislike for certain nations as such, but with a total rejection of their culture. Employees of establishments are afraid that if they allow someone “not their own” in, they will definitely encounter a culture of behavior that is unusual for them and will scare off their regular visitors. In the 1980s, British researchers called this approach “the new racism.” This is no longer a racial prejudice, but a prejudice against the lifestyle of a “stranger” and a fear that his behavior on “our territory” will be provocative and bring many problems.

For example, the owners of Tolyatti clubs directly told journalists that they did not allow people from the Caucasus in because they were afraid of conflicts. Some military people think the same way. In Russia, military registration and enlistment offices are trying not to draft young people from Chechnya and Dagestan into the army. “Unofficially, military registration and enlistment offices say that this is due to the fact that the “buyers,” representatives of military units who come to the assembly point, do not seek to recruit a young man who is a Muslim or a native of the North Caucasus into the unit. In their opinion, because of this there will be problems with the formation of fraternities, hazing, and refusal to perform certain duties,” says Vladimir Trignin, lawyer and chairman of the capital’s Military Bar Association. A similar situation has developed in the area of apartment rentals: very often advertisements indicate that owners will rent out living space only to “persons of Slavic appearance.” “This may not necessarily be associated with xenophobia. Maybe they would rent out housing to foreigners, but they don’t want to rent out, for fear of attracting the attention of law enforcement agencies,” says Elena Burtina, deputy chairman of the Civic Assistance Committee for Refugees.

By law

The ban on discrimination is included in Article 19 of the Constitution. In addition, discrimination committed under any circumstances is an administrative offense in itself, without reference to a specific field of activity. According to Article 5.62 of the Code of Administrative Offences, a citizen who has committed a violation of human rights and freedoms on the grounds that he is of a different nationality or race will face a fine of one thousand to three thousand rubles; If a legal entity is guilty of discrimination, the fine increases to 50-100 thousand rubles. There is a similar article in the Criminal Code - 136th. It concerns those who abuse people “using their official position”; Moreover, the punishment for it is much harsher: a fine of up to 300 thousand rubles, or compulsory work for up to 480 hours, or forced labor for up to five years, or even imprisonment for the same period.

Protection against discrimination is spelled out in more detail in labor law. There is a ban on it at literally every step of employment. On July 2, 2013, amendments to the law “On Employment” were adopted. They determine that “gender, race, skin color, nationality, language, origin, human status, age, place of residence, attitude to religion, beliefs” and a whole list of “circumstances not related to the business qualities of employees” are indicated in advertisements not allowed. But even before, labor legislation prohibited “direct or indirect restriction of rights or the establishment of direct or indirect advantages (...) depending on gender, race, skin color, nationality” (Article 64 of the Labor Code). There are penalties for violating these provisions. According to Article 5.27 of the Code of Administrative Offenses “Violation of labor and labor protection legislation,” discrimination is punishable by a fine of one thousand to five thousand rubles for officials, and for legal entities - suspension of activities for up to 90 days and a fine of up to 50 thousand rubles.

There are additional requirements for doctors. “The Ministry of Health and Social Development of Karelia confirmed the information that a gynecologist in the republic refused to see a patient because of her nationality,” I read the news out loud to medical lawyer Zhanna Altunyan. This incident occurred in July 2013. As the BBC Russian service reported, the gynecologist refused to see a Muslim woman, saying that “she herself is Jewish and will not see a patient wearing a headscarf.” “Yes, this contradicts all federal laws, codes, and the doctor’s oath, finally!” - Altunyan is indignant. According to the oath, the doctor is obliged to “act solely in his [the patient’s] interests regardless of gender, race, nationality, language, origin.” The lawyer immediately names Art. 11 of the law “On the Fundamentals of Protecting the Health of Citizens”, according to which refusal to provide medical care is not allowed. If the doctor does not accept the patient and this entails a serious threat to life and health, then the doctor immediately falls under two articles of the Criminal Code: Art. 124 - “Failure to provide assistance to a patient” and Art. 125 ― “Left in danger.”

Proving discrimination based on nationality is very difficult. First of all, it is necessary to record that the denial of service was related specifically to nationality. “It is best, of course, to receive a written refusal stating the reasons. However, it is unlikely that you will receive such paper in reality. Therefore, the best way is witnesses. There are many further options for action: contact Rospotrebnadzor, the Society for the Protection of Consumer Rights, or the court,” advises Anshakov. If a patient is denied medical care and this results in serious consequences, then you need to write to the prosecutor’s office.

The situation with employment is more complicated. According to Elena Gerasimova, director of the Center for Social and Labor Rights, law enforcement practice in cases of discrimination in employment remains undeveloped. She gives an example of a case where an employer confirmed in writing that he would not hire one of her clients as a bartender precisely because of his nationality - the person who showed up for an interview turned out to be a representative of the indigenous peoples of the North. “But the employer simply referred to the fact that the decision to refuse employment was made by a person who was not authorized to do so. And this argument is very strong. But in the end we won this case and insisted on compensation,” says Gerasimova. Sometimes you have to resort to tricks. Thus, the easiest way to get a person from the Caucasus to be drafted into the army is to register him for a period of more than three months in another region of Russia, says Vladimir Tringin.

By concept

Discrimination is not always punishable by law. On the one hand, advertisements for apartment rentals with the indication “for rent to Slavs” are illegal. On the other hand, the apartment owner can personally determine to whom he will rent his apartment and not even explain the reasons for the refusal. This manifestation of xenophobia remains in the legal field. But even here it is not always possible to determine that national prejudices are primary. “Only in ten percent of cases do misunderstandings arise. And even then, they are rarely directly connected with xenophobia. As a rule, people simply haven’t made up their minds and haven’t agreed on property issues: rent, price, some claims have arisen, or they first agreed on one thing and got something else. And then people try to find an explanation in the national issue,” says Bakhrom Ismailov, a human rights lawyer and member of the working group of the State Duma Committee on Health Protection.

According to the law, the only one who can completely legally pay attention to a person’s nationality is the policeman. The basis for checking documents or detaining a person, as a rule, is an orientation. Nationality in it is the most important detail, which in itself can already become a reason for suspicion, says Ismailov. Therefore, even if it is proven that the police are stopping hundreds of Kyrgyz based solely on their ethnicity, this will not have any consequences. If there is an indication of a native of Kyrgyzstan, then the policeman has the right to check all Kyrgyz in the city. In the United States, this practice is called racial profiling (literally, “racial profiling”) and means that police officers in absentia suspect all Latin Americans of illegal immigration, Arabs and Muslims of terrorism, and African Americans of selling weapons and drugs. This practice in America has already been repeatedly criticized for violating the presumption of a person’s innocence, but it has not yet been eliminated.

However, Russian researchers believe that the increased attention of police to foreigners in our country is explained not by prejudice, but by purely economic interest. This thesis was put forward back in 2011 by St. Petersburg sociologist Boris Gladarev, a researcher at the Center for Independent Sociological Research. In his study “Police and ethnic migrants. Practices of interaction”, conducted in St. Petersburg and Kazan, he studied the reasons for the tense relationship between police officers on the one hand and migrants and representatives of other ethnic groups on the other. In one of his interviews, the sociologist said: “Our society is very hierarchical, ordinary police officers - often newcomers to large cities, people with financial and cultural problems - are at a low level of the hierarchy, labor migrants and ethnic migrants are also at the bottom of the hierarchical ladder. Both groups want to achieve something in a big capitalist city, and this is simply a redistribution of resources at the lowest level of the Russian hierarchy, and xenophobia and racism are just a means.”

Xenophobia with calculation