Vera Vasilieva: People from the list

The number of Russian citizens who do not consider Stalinist repression by a crime, according to a recent survey of the sociological “Levada Center” , has increased markedly. At the same time, a list of Russian political prisoners , which annually draws up the human rights center "Memorial", also lengthened over the year. A year ago there were 87 people; In the lists published in October 2016, 102 were already listed, and now, according to information on the end of May, 118 people.

In my opinion, a direct dependence between these two facts. In the year of the sad anniversary, the 80th anniversary of the great terror , this topic does not only on the agenda of not only television, but also all other federal media. Instead, we can see the festively decorated station of the Moscow metro station "Sokolniki" with photos of Kaganovich and Stalin. Should it be surprised that, as the same sociological survey testifies, there are twice as many those who know nothing about the big terror?

Back in 2001, the former prisoner of Gulag Semyon Vilensky , abandoned by bars for poems with criticism of the punitive policy of the Soviet regime and passed the Sukhanov prison, one of the worst in the USSR, in his book “There is everywhere there is light ...” wrote about the nostalgic feelings of some people "on the past, non -free, wretched, but familiar, regulated life." Even then, at the dawn of the presidency of Vladimir Putin, he noted: “There was a longing for a strong hand. Some say:“ Stalin is not on them! ”Others:“ We need a Russian kick, dictator, only he will put things in order! ”Do not bring the Lord once again to step on the same rake ...”

It seems to have come.

One and a half decades after writing these lines, one can state: the order in the country has not been increased, corruption in Russia and terrorist threats for Russia only increased, but the sobering of society did not happen. On the contrary, we observe the reverse process, more and more frankly, in my opinion, encouraged by "from above." And if the consciousness of society is not meaningful such an important period in the history of our country as Stalinist and subsequent political repressions, if history itself is subjected to state regulation and its lessons are not learned, then we are doomed to repetition of the passed.

In the life of our country, there was only a very short period of time - less than a decade - when there were no political prisoners in it. The last political affair in the USSR, probably, can be called the case of Valeria Novodvorskaya and Viktor Danilov, terminated on August 23, 1991 "due to a change in the situation." And already on October 29, 1999, the scientist Igor Sutyan was arrested in Putin’s Russia, who spent almost 11 years in the dungeons, whose criminal prosecution of the European Court of Human Rights, as a result, recognized as violating the right of the accused to fair trial.

Which of us will be able to name all these 118 - today - surnames from the list of "memorial"? If the name of Oksana Sevastidi was still hearing thanks to the efforts of human rights activists, lawyers and few independent media, then exactly the same convicted for sending SMS messages to Georgia Marina Dzhanzhgava, Inga Tutisani and Annik Kesyan are practically not known to anyone ...

The less we know, remember and talk publicly about people from the list of "memorial", the sooner it will be replenished with our account

It is hardly better, I think, the situation has long -livers behind bars, for example, with Alexei Pichugin . On June 19, he has been 14 years old since he is sitting - contrary to the position of the Memorial, who recognized the former employee of the Yukos company by political prisoners, contrary to the decision of the Strasbourg Court on the need to revise an unwinearous criminal case. However, the conclusion of Pichugin is not news for a long time, in his life everything remains unchanged for many years, which means that it does not attract public attention. And I had to listen to the opinion (and from the interlocutor from the liberal, besides the lawyer environment) that "it is no longer interested."

The less we know, we remember and talk publicly about people from the list of “Memorial”, the sooner it will be replenished with our account (after all, a countless number of times is negotiated: to illegally get into the dungeons, it is not necessary to be a political activist at all). But for the most part, we seem to have not understood this, and the slogans for the freedom of political prisoners do not cause such a mass response as, for example, protests against corruption or renovation. Although both are a consequence of political lack of freedom. And to eliminate the investigation without correcting the reason, it is hardly possible.

Semyon Vilensky, who determined the special meeting, determined ten years of imprisonment, having served on Kolyma and being released in 1955 without the right to return to the mainland, the purpose of his life believed enlightenment. He organized the Kolyma partnership, after a while registered as the Moscow Historical and Literary Society "Return". He was the organizer of international conferences "Resistance in the Gulag." On the basis of his memoirs, the play "Roads that we did not choose" was staged.

Enlightenment is perhaps what Russia lacks today. Despite the common accessibility on the Internet of a huge array of information about Soviet terror and modern political repressions, it suddenly turned out that all this should be explained again. We need to talk about these phenomena so that they become primary problems in the eyes of society. And then very little time will pass and the truth will return. She, like grass in Harry Bardin’s animated film “Listening to Beethoven”, will germinate through the asphalt.

Vera Vasilieva is an independent journalist leading the Radio Liberty project "Freedom and Memorial"

Opinions expressed under the section may not reflect the point of view of the editorial office