Anomaly

A huge black cat against the background of the Sun-a symbol of the independence of TV-2 television company-for a long time stood on the roof of a high-rise building in Tomsk, where, in fact, the television company was located. Not so long ago, the cat was dismantled. For three hours, workers tried to remove her from a raped place. But the cat did not give in. TV company TV-2, which ceased to exist a year before the 25th anniversary, also did not give up for a long time.

From these frames - the dismantling of the independence of the Tomsk television company - and the film "Anomaly" begins. That is how-the "Tomsk media anomaly"-was once called TV-2. However, what happened to the television company is also in a sense anomaly.

The company did not have any legal or financial problems

This documentary tells the story of a small Siberian television company TV-2. One of the most famous and titled regional companies in Russia. It was closed in 2015. Under the battle of New Year's chimes, signalmen (RTRS) turned off the TV-2 from the air. After another month and a half, the license in cable networks ended. Roskomnadzor did not extend the license, and TV-2 completely stopped broadcasting. More than a hundred people lost their work. The company had no legal or financial problems. Exactly, as there were no legal or financial claims from various supervisory authorities. Explanations and comments from state structures, RTRS and Roskomnadzor, why and for what the television company was disconnected from the air, it was not possible to get it all the time.

This is a story about the choice that journalists in Russia have to make, and the price of this choice

"Anomaly" is not only and not so much the history of TV-2 television company. This is the story of the time in which independent media in Russia appeared, bloomed and destroyed. The closure of TV-2 was a logical continuation of a series of murders of journalists and suppressing free media in Russia. This is a story about the value of freedom of speech and independence of the media in Russia. This is a story about the choice that journalists in Russia have to make, and the price of this choice. The history of compromise and uncompromising.

The fact that the decision to close a small regional company was made at the highest level, the leadership and employees of TV-2 understood almost immediately. As well as the fact that their business is political and therefore there are almost no chances to survive.

Mass rallies took place in Tomsk. Several thousand people in the cold went out to support the television company. Collected signatures under a letter to the president. Many believed that if thousands of people enter the shares, the authorities would play back and TV-2 would return to the air.

Although many, even those who sympathized with TV-2, said that the point of no return was passed. That TV-2 paid for its uncompromisingness. That journalists did not feel changes in the country, did not respond and did not want to adapt to changing reality. We did not understand that the way they work, it is no longer possible.

TV-2 did not change its editorial policy, despite the pressure of the authorities, which the company experienced almost constantly. The founder of TV-2 Arkady Mayofis in an interview says that the fate of the television company has long been a foregone conclusion:

"There is a statement about the dismissal with the open date. That is, you write a statement, the boss puts it on the table, and enters the date when it considers it necessary. I think that the team was given to us a long time ago, they simply did not implement this threat, because there were others, they were afraid of the reverse reactions, some waves. We had several reasons for the years by which we were killed. We were different that we were financially independent, we stood on this for years.

In the representation of our enemies, as it were, the true patriots of Russia, we privatized the main scraping

We had no sponsors in power, among the oligarchs, among parties. We did not have a single advertiser whose budgets would be more than a few percent in the total income of the company. Therefore, one could ask for some kind of state structure or a large financial corporation to remove advertising. Or order them. We survived. We were financially independent . We have developed an editorial independent policy, and we valued it. We did not believe that this is part of some principles, the frenzy of our own, we just think that this is the basis of the profession. There is a profession, here it is, it has certain principles, and to find them is to stop doing this profession.

We were absolutely convinced of this. We knew how similar media organizations work in different countries of the world, how they exist, we studied these examples. And in this sense, we were very different from everyone else. Then we were very noticeable. Everyone knew TV-2 in the professional environment of a huge country, and not only Russia, in general, the entire CIS. And we were initiative, we were not indifferent, we liked what we did, we all came up with something. And we came up with the "Immortal Regiment" on our head. In the representation of our enemies, as if the true patriots of Russia, we privatized the main scraping ...

Time was signed by the verdict, we did not fit into it

The sentence was signed a long time ago, and nothing was absolutely impossible to change. We could leave ugly, we could leave cowardly. We could exist for some time, licking some "United Russia", but this would still end the same. And we left with dignity. We lost a lot, we lost part of our lives, we lost money, we lost the profession, but we retained dignity. Time was signed by the verdict, we did not fit into it, ”says Arkady Mayofis.

“What happened to TV-2 happened in the country. In essence, the destruction of regional television happened. It is no longer there,” says the famous Russian journalist Vladimir Pozner, convinced that the closure of TV-2 is a political business. “Regional television is one of the most important at all, and therefore they figured it out. They were considered dangerous. Because people around the world have trusted their journalists, who are met by everyone who meets everyone. On the street, on the bus, it is now unacceptable for our power.

On TV-2 there would be not only joyful screams that women need to work eight years more

Svetlana Sorokina also believes in the fact that it was, among other things, the reason for the closure of TV-2. In the early 2000s, she worked for NTV, one of the best companies in the early 90s in Russia. She left the channel when a change of owner organized from above occurred there. "TV-2, despite a small auditorial coverage, was a company significant for the city. Because it determined the mood of this city. I determined and influenced. Therefore, they killed," she said. According to Sorokina, when everything is averaged, when one position, everything was worked out, when dispensers are not allowed, such television channels are simply impossible.

"Now, when new turns of pension reform and central channels are discussed together, how happy pensioners are ... when these plots have come and there is nothing else, you are honest, you look and think: is there limits? It’s not even funny. Do you want a variety. Probably, there would be not only joyful screams on TV-2, that women need to work for eight years. Someone will straighten the feathers.

“The destruction of TV-2 is, including the destruction of locality. The current authorities are afraid of independence in the field. A TV-2 was the story of local self-expression,” explains the chief editor of TV-2 Viktor Mushnik .

“I imagine our story as a folder,” he says. “Somewhere a folder lies in an unknown place in which our different names and papers are one after another. This, of course, is an archaic view of things, some kind of file should be, but I personally get used to imagining as a folder. And everything is hemmed, he is hemmed. There is a general system that is built, the general system in which we become less and less appropriate, we and we and we are more and less appropriate. At one time, we know the corresponding instructions as we, on the basis of the entire set of circumstances.

The decision was made at the level of the presidential administration - I know this from several sources

Now we know that the decision on us was made at the level that, of course, the administration of the President of the Russian Federation is flattering. Now we even know the content of one of the reports that were filed on us somewhere in the area of 2014-the beginning of 2015, that there three main things were charged with us. The first is the intention of Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky to launch a satellite broadcasting. The second is, within the framework of this satellite broadcasting, to create an alternative information agenda with federal channels with the main theme - inciting separatism, in particular, Siberian regionality. And the third is the "Immortal Regiment", an unauthorized interference in the historical policy of the Russian Federation. I know the content of this note, however, from one source, which contradicts our rules, that there should be two sources at least and better three. But I trust this source, because it fits into the aggregate of information that we know from other sources informed that the decision was made at the level of the presidential administration - I know this from several sources, independent absolutely from each other. "

• 

  Melanie Bachin

  Cooperates with the RS since 2002. From 2002 to 2004 - an employee of the Russian Radio Service Service in Prague. From 2004 to 2016-producer of the evening news “Hour-Pick” TV2 (Tomsk), the host of the information program “Hour-Pick”. Coach in television and radio journalism, three times laureate of the TEFI prize. Since 2016 a full -time journalist in Prague

  Subscribe