Went on joke, not seriously

In Luzhniki, a concert was held in support of Crimea and war. Vladimir Putin quoted the Bible on it, and Margarita Simonyan asked Russia-Mother to protect children. Report "Medusa"

On Friday, March 18, rallies and concerts were held throughout Russia, dedicated to the anniversary of the annexation of Crimea. However, the main theme of these shares was still not Crimea, but a war. In order to demonstrate popular support for the “special operation”, the Russian authorities took advantage of the long -tested methods - the supply of state employees, the distribution of food and performances of pop stars. The Moscow Central Internal Affairs Directorate reported about 200 thousand participants, and Moscow Deptrans reported that even more people came to the concert than it was at the stadium during the matches of the World Cup five years ago. "Medusa" tells how the rally concert in Moscow "Luzhniki" went-to which Vladimir Putin also came to.

A group of strong young people stands out in the crowd at the stadium. On them - white T -shirts, worn over jackets, on the backs - the letter Z, drawn in the colors of the St. George ribbon, and the inscription "Army of Putin." On the chest is a portrait of the Russian president. They came to support "our boys who spill blood for our relatives, our wives at the front."

When asked why the symbol of this support is the letter Z, one of the young people, who introduced himself to Huttab from Makhachkala, replies: “Because it is most like a swastika.” He laughs and adds: “Z - for the world. Now the whole world is in English, so we drove. ”

At this time, a group of people with a canvas of the St. George ribbon in their hands - about a meter wide and several dozen long - are built in the form of the letter Z at the monument to Lenin.

Young people in T -shirts with a portrait of Putin claim that they are the military from the Donbass. “For eight years we are ********* [fought] with these fagots there. Now the unprofessional army has been removed, and since we are not professional military, us, rabbits, [also] removed from there because more rigid wars began, more equipment, at all manually, ”Khattab explains. Huttab went to fight in the self-proclaimed LPR after he left his collection due to an injury.

He believes that the war is “not against the Ukrainian people, but against NATO and the legionnaires”: “We cannot be against Ukrainians, against normal Ukrainians, but if other Ukrainians are on our way, we will also sweep them out.” Hattab now lives in Makhachkala, he came to the rally himself.

The guys in the T -shirts of the Putin Army remained at the entrance to the stadium - they, like thousands of other people who came to the concert in honor of the anniversary of the annexation of Crimea to Russia, did not.

The start of the concert in Luzhniki was scheduled for three in the afternoon, but in the morning organized groups of spectators reached for the stadium. They arrived on the metro and MCC, on custom -made buses, walked. Crowds of people who are not at the Luzhniki metro station even during a peak hours, formed there on Friday until noon.

At two in the afternoon, before the concert, when organized groups of people continued to go to the “Luzhniki” - headed by the head with an identification sign like a flag or umbrella in their hands - some of the promotion participants were already reached out in the opposite direction, to the exit.

Three interlocutors from the two departments of the Moscow government told Medusa that they were warned at work - the entrance to the concert only by tickets (their state employees were issued at work), and it will be possible to leave the stadium only after its completion. However, it is not necessary to serve the event to the end - it was enough to come to the “Luzhniki” during the day and stay there for at least an hour and a half (and not go to the arena itself).

As a result, the organizers continued to urge people to go to the stadium and not stay at the entrance. But having reached the "Luzhniki", people were in no hurry to go inside.

The doors of the stadium closed quickly - after 14:30, even the owners of tickets stopped starting.

The event externally repeated the rallies in support of Putin and 2012 and 2018 - then not all participants in the rally went to the stadium, many were content with entertainment near it: at the previous time for the audience, they organized battles on foam rubber, firing from onions, bast shoes and even cerling. This time, only pearl barley and buckwheat porridge with military cuisine, sausages and tea were offered free of charge from the outside.

“We were almost crushed in the sector D! Vladimir Mikhalych said to go to the stage and dance there! ” -A middle-aged woman explained to someone on the phone. She had not yet desperate to go to the concert and led a group of people to another entrance. A dozen young people carried flags with a Russian tricolor and the letter Z in the colors of the St. George tape in the opposite direction to it. They walked with a quick step to the exit.

“Only if you enter the tank, the sectors are crowded,” so the student of Mai Vasily explained to Medusa why they leave the “Luzhniki” even before the concert. “My friends went, but I walked into the tube and did not have time,” he squeezes a ticket in his hand, which he never came in handy. - The tickets were handed out at the institute. We went on jokes, not seriously. ” What does Z mean on the flag that the girl carried next to him, he found it difficult to answer.

The concert began at 15 o’clock, the songs of Oleg Gazmanov, Polina Gagarina and Timati were interrupted by the speeches of the presenters - commentator Dmitry Guberniev and TV presenter Maria Sittel - and speeches in support of the Donbass. Among the speakers were actor Vladimir Mashkov, actor and State Duma deputy Dmitry Pevtsov in a T -shirt with the Z sign, Olympic champions .

Mashkov from the stage read the poem by Fedor Tyutchev “Vain Labor”, focusing on the lines “Verily labor - no, you can’t reason - the more liberal, the more they are.” Pevtsov promised that the parade of the entire Russian people would take place on Red Square, where Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians will take place in a single system.

The remaining at the stadium - at least several tens of thousands of people, saw them on the screens placed around the perimeter of the stadium, there were at least five of them. Screens, like the scene, were decorated with banners with the slogan “Za World without Nazism ZA Russia ZA President”. People on the street sang along with hits that sounded from the stage, or stood in lines for porridge and sausages.

Some viewers of the concert came prepared, two men got plastic bottles of alcohol from each other from the hoods. Nearby, a group of men of about fifty years old - about 10 people - drank vodka, completely not hiding. The fact that they had a bottle of Khortitsy - the vodka of the Ukrainian brand - they were not embarrassed.

“In general, the Slavs were scorching, the Russians are fighting against the Russians - this is how one of the participants in the impromptu feast, a gray -haired man in a cap, appreciated the special operation in Ukraine. - The Americans are sitting behind the hill and watching how we brothers are killing a friend to a friend. I was always surprised how Lenin had a civil war in Russia. And now the Americans arranged it. ”

Meanwhile, at the monument to Lenin, the participants of the ultra-patriotic "folk liberation movement" chanted "give non-vagnada." They refused to communicate with the Medusa correspondent.

The audience near the stadium stood in groups of five to several dozen people. From their colleagues for work or study with whom they came to the rally, no one tried not to leave. The discussion of the symbolism of the special operation was at an impasse of many participants in the rally concert. Those who agreed to talk were offered different versions.

“Z is the west because they go. The troops go there. Hot spot. V is the East. Or ... a *** [devil] knows, ”Dima reasoned cheerfully, a guy in sunglasses. The girl from his group pulled Dima by the sleeve and asked to stop. “Are you a journalist? Why don't they turn on the rapper on stage? Chester is there? " - Dima did not calm down. At this moment, the singer Agnia sang “Russia, my Russia, your spaces - green meadows” from the stage.

“Why is the letter Z? Because. Petrovich, how do you understand the letter Z? No one explained to us what it is. And you yourself explain to me! ”, - said a man of about fifty from the GBU" Housing ".

"Zorro watched the film" Film? Why did he fight? For ordinary people! Just for justice. That's why Z. A lot of good words begins with the letter "z". For example, Earth, ”explained an employee of the Ministry of Emergencies named Alexander. He came to the rally voluntarily, support the "Operation on the Liberation of our Motherland."

“We are not fighting,” Alexander explained. - If we fought, we would have spent two weeks ago on Khreshchatyk. We restore justice. We are trying to reach out to people like a cat Leopold: "Guys, let's live together."

Vladimir Putin went to the audience at 16 o’clock, after the performance of his favorite group “Lube” with their classic repertoire: songs “Come on ...” and “Combat”. In a short speech, the president focused on the support of the inhabitants of Crimea, although it seemed that most of the audience came to the concert not at all in order to celebrate the eighth anniversary of the annexation of the peninsula. From the question of what kind of event it is noted today, the gathered either left or said that they were “supporting”, but what exactly they supported were difficult to say.

The president mentioned Donbass in his speech. Speaking about the goals of the special operation he had begun, he quoted the Holy Scripture : "There is no more love, as if someone had given his soul for his friends." “It is precisely to save people from these suffering, from this genocide, and is the main, main reason, the incentive motive and the goal of the military operation, which we started in the Donbass and Ukraine,” Putin said.

On television, with the broadcast of the president’s speech arose, when Putin recalled that the beginning of the operation coincided with the date of birth of the “great Russian commander Fedor Ushakov”, the picture with the president disappeared and the video with the performance of Oleg Gazmanov disappeared instead of it - even before Putin’s appeal, he sang the song “Forward, Russia!”. Presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov explained this incident by technical problems.

The first minutes of the president’s speech, people gathered at the Luzhniki were shot on smartphones, but then everyone gradually returned to their affairs: some went for the addition of tea and porridge, others to the exit. Putin finished, and the doors of the stadium almost immediately opened. People moved to the metro stream, in the same organized groups that came.

Following Putin was the official representative of the Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, who declared Russia a country that "values ​​[the world] and protects the world and fights evil." Then, the turn of the head of the Russian Today TV channel Margarita Simonyan: she complained that the Ukrainian authorities opened a criminal case against her for the phrase “Russia, mother, take the Donbass home, and her children, relatives and friends call threats. “I want to repeat: Russia, mother, take Donbass home. Russia, mother, protect her children, ”said Simonyan and asked to punish all those who are bombing Donetsk, Melitopol, Mariupol.” The Ukrainian authorities of bombing accuse Russia.

“Do not erase us like an account in social networks, because we are a nation that cannot be broken. Russia will never kneel! " - shouted from the stage the next speaker - TV presenter Tina Kandelaki.

Young participants in a concert rally-concert understood the meaning of Russophobia not fully understood. They remembered much more a concert.

“I have never been to Luzhniki. For the sake of interest, they came. All in beauty, I liked everything very much. Who are they fighting against? We will never understand this, ”the schoolboy Alexei shared his impressions after the concert.

“How did you release? With a high! We ourselves, no one forced us. There is war, I don’t get into these affairs, ”said a student named Alexander. He left with classmates wrapped in Russian flags and was responsible for the entire company. - The rise in prices worries us. But how can I influence this at 16? Go to Navalny's rally? "

“Good concert, sausages are delicious, Polina Gagarina is cool. How to like it on Instagram now? VPN! ”, The student of the sports school shared her impressions.

“What will happen. We are no longer powerful over this, ”the employee of the“ Housing ”commented on the economic situation. He came to the concert organized, with colleagues. At work, according to him, all employees, in order to go to the rally, signed a statement about the runs from the authorities.

“Any solutions need support. I am not a politician to draw conclusions, to conduct a discussion - a special operation or war. I came to rally, ”Andrei, a student of MAI, explained his campaign to the rally. And he admitted: "There is an excitement where to go further [after graduation from the university]."

True, then Andrei confidently added that he sees “positive glimpses” in Western sanctions against Russia: “The economy can be strengthened, freeing from Western intervention. The generation under Stalin was also not very well lived, but the following! The first in space, a great country. "

The opinion of his friend, an employee of one state organization (which exactly, he flatly refused), differed: “The prospects are not especially visible, I do not support it. And I didn’t want to go here as much as possible, but I had to. The requirement [from the authorities] to gain the maximum number of people. Today the day is paid as usual. But it was impossible to refuse. ”

The young man was afraid to say not only what his name is and where he works, but why he does not support the war. He was one of the few who came to a rally in a medical mask. His comrade joked: "Why are you in a mask like a fsbsh?"

Two women from the budget organization admitted that the employer obliged them to come to the rally - as a result, a group of more than 100 people came from the organization. However, they still experience "a sense of patriotism for their country." They were afraid to answer other questions of the Medusa correspondent.

From other pro-government rallies, which are often provided with budget organizations, a Friday rally-concert was distinguished by the fact that its participants practically ran away from any issues.

- Tell us why you came to support?

“Oh, I can't,” the woman answers about 50 years old, accelerating the step.

- What can not?

- It is unable to speak beautifully.

- Tell me how it is.

-No, no, no.

A gray -haired man with a flag goes under Putin’s speech towards the metro. Why he did not listen to her to the end, he does not answer. When asked whether he came in his desire, he answers: “You are a journalist? You already know everything. ”

At least two participants in a concert rally near Luzhnikov were specially warned at work that they are forbidden to communicate with reporters: “They gave the instructions not to communicate.”

The rally and a large number of youth were distinguished - not only students, but also minor schoolchildren, who in previous years had almost never happened at such concerts.

Those who left the Luzhniki to the president’s speech acted prudently. By five o’clock in the evening, the Sportivnaya metro station, which was closest to the stadium, closed to the entrance. By six, the crowd also formed on Frunzenskaya. People walked through the cordon of riot police and the Russian Guard from the stadium to the garden ring. The woman who left the stadium with an armful of blankets twisted her head in confusion, not understanding where to put what she gathered from her group. “Don’t worry, put it in a flea market tomorrow,” her colleague reassured.

In the square near Frunze, there were schoolchildren who did not get on the subway. The teenage girl was indignant: “And for the sake of this ***** [nonsense] I got up at six?!”