Bone in the throat of the cannibal. Dmitry Gudkov about how repressions rallyed Russians instead of intimidating

More than 600 people of political prisoners, according to the “Memorial” base, are the main result of the year. Of course, we could talk about the elections, collection of signatures, legislative initiatives, economic statistics, geopolitical victories and overcoming, but somehow it does not work out. All this is not just that does not matter, but not so important. And another thing is important: to any person at any moment they can break life just like that, walking around, from some very state reasons. And these are no exceptions from the rule, but the system.

Let's take one Moscow business: this is my own “result of the year”. And I was lucky - just a little more than a month behind bars against the backdrop of other sentences - so, an excursion. What is common between Samariddin Rajabov, Konstantin Kotov or Eduard Malyshevsky? There is a common - chance. A hundred investigators repressed random people in the calculation that through their fate it would be possible to intimidate everyone else.

It would seem, who will stand up for the son of a migrant? For a young programmer? For the former prisoner? After all, the calculation was almost ideal: to transplant once so that they startle in the mass. But in that miracle that this calculation did not work.

Some deadlines were fulfilled, the bowls were overflowed-and it turned out that there is in the country ... I would not say “civil society”, the term is pretty blurred. There are people who do not care, and there are a lot of them, a lot. For every court in Moscow on weekdays, with a willing way to spend many hours a hundred people come there (and at the peak - much more). Money for political prisoners and their families is going very quickly. Help of the repressed became the norm - and, if I am not mistaken, this has not been in Russia for more than a hundred years.

It is impossible to imagine the collection of money for those sent to the Gulag under Stalin. And with Brezhnev with some Andropov, such a story has never been massive. And now - on the contrary. All leaders of opinions, tops-vips at least once participated in the help of prisoners. From scientists to actors, without exception. Some prisoners (unfortunately, not everyone) even manage to recapture, although each time it is still a lottery.

All leaders of opinions, tops-vips at least once participated in the help of prisoners, this became the norm

Repressions have achieved the opposite effect. When a taxi driver passing by the Meshchansky court, where Samariddin is tormented at that time, he knows perfectly well who he is, this is the failure of the entire repressive policy. The taxi driver was also born in Dushanbe, and he perfectly understands: the Moscow business concerns everyone. How did he know? From the news? From the metro? From conversations with friends? Information seeps like water, and to no senator Klishas, ​​dress in at least three pajamas, do not interfere with this.

Solidarity is born with torment, through pain, but it is. And this solidarity is political, because, unlike the help of the victims of natural disasters, for which society used to unite, here it is completely clear not only “what to do”, but also “who is to blame”. Without eliminating the reason - not to eliminate the investigation. Help for political prisoners is now on the verge of turning into a political struggle, because without a change in power, the prisoners will only multiply. Cannibals - they are also tasteful, they also have their own cannibalism, solidarity.

Thus, the third force actually appeared in Russia: it is not power with all its imitation structures of the parliamentary party and not a political opposition, which successfully mastered the hopeless struggle for this very power. 20 years struggle - how are successes? The third force is now aware of itself, it is formalized, while still in pickets, Telegram channels and charitable auctions, but already stands on the face when it requires a political representation. And here the most important thing begins.

The third force is now aware of itself, it is formalized, while in pickets and Telegram channels

After all, what was the problem before? Politics is activated under the election. In between - a positional struggle against specific officials. "Where is your constructive agenda?" -Propagandists are grimacing because of the towers and tower. Well, now she, now hold a “constructive agenda”: ​​freedom to everyone, now. I/we are the whole country. And the cannibal was completely not ready for such a constructive agenda. It is one thing to discuss what color to repaint the Kremlin, to vote for this in an “active citizen” (someone remembers about it now?), To answer the fatal question “whose Crimea” and discuss the many of those in which either nothing depends on us, or they do not matter. And a completely different matter is a specific requirement: freedom to everyone, immediately.

The authorities cannot go to this, here is the needle in the egg of our Koshcheyushka. Thus, the task of the opposition now is to comply with new realities. Elections are, of course, great, but after 20 years the dictatorship is slightly utopian. “In 1943, the Communists finally won the Reichstag elections.” Remember how they declared impeachment to Hitler? So I don't remember.

The struggle for people is the struggle for power. One struggle for power in itself is impossible. And if candidates X and Y will come across the elections again and remember what irreconcilable fighters they are, who will believe them? I am still sure that the only possible criterion for voting in this September was the answer of the candidates to the question: whether you will stand up for political investigators. Everything else is a husk, which, in essence, is now obvious.

The other day, we met with the mothers of political prisoners - they are now united and hold a hunger strike with a demand for freedom for everyone. But they are not heard, because in traditional Russian politics, on the battlefield of power and opposition, there is no place for ordinary people. We fought for them for so long that we almost forgot about them. It's time to remember - otherwise why is this all? And, unlike opposition parties, mothers were able to unite-from Moscow to the case of the “network”, from “new greatness” to Hizb Ut-Tahrir. There is no difference, under what sauce you will be eaten if you are already lying on a plate.

Unlike opposition parties, the mother of political prisoners were able to unite

And the second thesis. Now, at the end of the year, we are finally starting to feel like a single country. Not from case to case, not from tragedy to tragedy, but constantly. When do we remember the Kuzbass? When the Winter Cherry burns there. About the Irkutsk region? When the city washed off there. And the rest of the time, united Russia is only in quotation marks and with a capital letter. In 2015, or something, a year, I wrote an article with a question where Kyzyl is located and whether we want to pay attention to him instead of Ukraine. I will not say to the specific capital of Tuva, but a general understanding about the collective Kyzyl appears. Because each Kyzyl has its own political prisoners.

Whatever region you take - it will have the same Moscow/Kyzyl business, albeit with its own characteristics. Somewhere a blogger is planted for the rehabilitation of Nazism (a comparison of life under Putin and in occupation). Somewhere a journalist is pursued for an article on an explosion near the FSB building. Somewhere they throw drugs-and not Golunov. Somewhere feminist pictures are pornography and a reason for a criminal case. Well, approximately everywhere, terrible extremists are not praying as Gundyaev with Bortnikov ordered. And these are only those stories that come to the surface, these are only the first items from the cannibal -eaten menu - so, the second breakfast, purely eat.

If we want to summarize on the Internet next year, and not in the cell, considering the remaining days of imprisonment, then there is no more important task than in practice to embody the slogan from Moscow rallies: “One for all - and all for one.”