The feminist movement and climate activists on the front line in Russia against Putin's war: Russian dissent defies censorship and spills out into the streets.
Russian dissent against the war launched by President Vladimir Putin against Ukraine — at a time when mainstream media are being censored and street protests broken up by waves of police arrests — is spreading above all via Telegram. A particularly active role is being played by women: Russian feminists who have come together in a group with the evocative name of feminist resistance against the war, and climate activists such as the young people of Fridays for Future. These are movements that even in peacetime opposed the Russian president and his policies — among other things homophobic and anti-abortion, and broadly indifferent to gender equality as well as to energy neutrality. In practice, to the most basic human and civil rights. Groups that are mobilising despite the ongoing repression, to the point that several demonstrations are already planned for March, when they will take to the streets. Together.
Ten years ago there were the Pussy Riot, the punk-rock collective that in 2012 saw two of its members convicted on charges of hooliganism following a series of protest events against Putin's re-election, which had taken place in February of that year. Today, dissent travels on phones, through the Feminist Resistance Against the War channel which, in the wake of the Russian invasion, launched its own manifesto, already translated into French, Polish, Japanese, Bulgarian and Romanian, explaining that "the feminist movement in Russia fights for the most vulnerable and for the development of a just society with equal opportunities and prospects, in which there can be no room for violence and military conflict," and underlining that "war intensifies gender inequality and sets back the gains made for human rights by many years. War brings not only the violence of bombs and bullets, but also sexual violence."
But the call to dissidence from Russian dissent has not been purely virtual: more than 45 different feminist organisations are currently operating across the country, from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok, from Rostov-on-Don to Ulan-Ude and Murmansk, and the manifesto calls on Russian feminist groups and individual feminists "to join the Feminist Resistance Against the War and join forces to actively oppose the war and the government that started it."
These are the calls to action:
On 2 March, from the prison where he is being held in Russia, political dissident Aleksei Navalny managed to put out a message urging protest against the war in Ukraine: "We can no longer wait," Navalny wrote. "Wherever you are — in Russia, Belarus or on the other side of the planet — go to the main square of your city every weekday at 7pm and at 2pm at weekends and on public holidays. If you are abroad, go to the Russian embassy. If you can organise a demonstration, do it at the weekend. And if there is anything in Russia right now that you can be prouder of, it is those people who have been detained because they took to the streets holding signs that said No to war."
Among those people are the women of the feminist resistance against the war, who had already announced a major double event — two marches against the war — to take place on 6 March, simultaneously in Moscow starting from Komsomolskaya Square and in St Petersburg from Sadovaya Square. With a warning issued on the Telegram channel to all activists to avoid pre-emptive arrests: "Don't come directly by metro. Arrive from different points."
The censorship of dissent is the biggest problem. According to the independent outlet OVD-Info, as many as 7,000 people have already been arrested in Russia simply for opposing the war. And so on Telegram, alongside the calls to action, there are many recommendations to act with due caution — as in the case of a mass leafleting campaign launched at bus and metro stations: "We recommend not printing leaflets at copy shops. Do it with your home printers."
But scrolling through the social channel's updates, one also finds heartbreaking appeals from Ukrainian women to Russian women: in Kherson, the first Ukrainian city to officially fall into the hands of the Russian army, "pregnant women are being forced to give birth in basements," writes one desperate woman, who films the moments of an improvised delivery. And then there are feedback campaigns about the workplace retaliation suffered by those in Russia who refuse to express their support for the regime's military operation: "If you are a victim of mobbing, leave a review on antijob.net. If you are forced to take leave or to resign, or if you are dismissed, leave a review on antijob.net" — a sort of employer blacklist.
Alongside the feminists, climate activists are also playing a part in the protests. Arshak Makichyan, of Fridays for Future Russia, previously arrested by police for his protests directed mainly against energy giant Gazprom, recently got married and had two tickets to Armenia, his home country: the trip was postponed and the wedding turned into a protest against the war and local propaganda "which is being used to justify the war in Ukraine. I am addressing those of you who have taken the side of the fascist occupiers. There is no forgiveness for this. The troops must lay down their arms: this is no longer politics. This is a crime."
