Today we’ll have an unusual video.
We’ll see what the users of one of the most “close-to-people” Russian websites Pikabu say about war and mobilization.
But we’ll start from afar. People who usurp power in a country are in a great need of enemies.
Enemies are the perfect reason to justify dictatorship.
And victories over “enemies” (real or fictional ones) substitute achievements in other spheres – in a social sphere,
economy, culture etc.
It doesn’t matter that they can’t provide gas in their own country properly.
The most important thing is that they’ve left their “foes” without heat!
Enemies’ “selection” and communication with them is a very serious business.
They can fight the “collective West” as hard as they can, but it mustn’t be for real.
Because in the West the elite’s kids are studying, and mansions, villas and wine cellars wait for their masters.
It’s crucial not to go too far. Because if the West really decides to fight, no one will like it.
At some point Putin’s government thought that Ukraine is an enemy you can overpower for real, without pretending.
It looked like weight categories were too different.
Hot war will allow us to defeat Ukraine in 2 days!
However, Oleg Gazmanov’s concert in Kyiv all the TV propagandists joked about didn’t happen on the first day of war, or the second,
or three hundred and second.
When the external enemy you created yourself turns out to be too tough, you have to create the internal enemies.
Russian propaganda and the highest officials are making fun dividing Russian citizens into “our people” and “traitors”.
Vladimir Soloviev, Vyacheslav Volodin, Dmitry Medvedev are people who don’t live like common Russian citizens,
they can’t even imagine the troubles and everyday life of Russian people.
However, they and their numerous colleagues are bold enough to speak on behalf of “people”.
And they say that “people” they haven’t seen for at least 20 years are happy to get rid of an unnecessary burden.
Most Russian citizens are an unnecessary burden, you see. Unprecedented emigration does not mean
that Russians are leaving Russia, it’s a “purification” of the country.
And you ran to Israel, Georgia, the Baltic countries, Armenia, Kazakhstan, doesn't matter where.
Did you try to run away from war? You ran from your Motherland. And don't you dare to come back!
And look at the President who chose to talk about selection on New Year’s Eve, the day which used to unite all the Russian citizens.
He started from this, “It was a year which put everything in its place,
it helped to distinguish courage and heroism from treachery and cowardice!” We’ve seen it so many times.
At first, our country “purifies” itself and gets rid of a burden. And then it panics.
How did it happen that our former citizen Igor Sikorsky is designing helicopters in the US?
Why does the great Russian inventor Vladimir Zvorykin develop kinescopes,
electronic microscopes and night vision devices for Americans and not for us?
Even Putin’s favorite philosopher Ivan Ilyin wrote his works from abroad. What does Putin’s power offer in return for loyalty?
Let’s say, you haven’t left, you’re doing what you do inside the country and don’t argue with anyone.
In return you’ll be disabled or killed. Or they will take your father, husband, brother or son from you.
And they will give you back an invalid you’ll have to take care about for his whole life.
Or a psychologically damaged person who won't be able to live a normal life after he comes back.
Or you’ll get a coffin.
Or they will say that he “went missing”.
Let me translate it into the normal language, “It’s more likely he is dead, but there is no reason we should pay you anything”.
Perhaps, most of them are like this.
Failing to defeat the Ukrainians, Putin’s highest officials and their informational hellhounds decided
to wage war against the Russians.
Like there are “good” citizens – real Russian men. Propagandists even created a name for them – “Kuzmichi”.
And there are “wrong” citizens, the bad ones.
They have plenty of names. The deputy Vitaly Milonov called them “soy c*ckolds”.
And Vladimir Soloviev calls them just “motherf*ckers”.
Even legal prohibition of censored words on federal radio doesn’t apply to him. Dmitry Medvedev likes to use flashy expressions.
So, he says that “bones of cowardly traitors will rot in the foreign land”.
The problem is that he suggests the “courageous heroes” do the same – leave their bones in the foreign land.
And not in their old age, but right now.
Playing with the words “purification” and “liberation” the current government “purifies” Russia from men of working age.
Physically able men have no more option to live peacefully and safely at home, in Russia,
to take care of their families and work to make people’s lives better.
No, they must leave for another country instead – to emigrate or to go to the front.
The division into “people’s friends” and “people’s enemies” is rough, though.
If you are a healthy man, whatever group you end up in, Russia will get rid of your bones anyway.
Just for fun, let’s assume that propaganda is right.
That we are outcasts, soft city boys, soy c*ckolds who have sold their souls the the Western homosatanists
for bubblegum and a pair of jeans.
While there are normal people in Russia – simple, down-to-earth, provincial Russian people.
Usually, the owners of golden palaces like to speak on behalf of those “right” people.
Russian people can always distinguish true patriots from traitors and scumbags
and just spit them as a mosquito which randomly flew into the mouth.
I'm sure this self-purification will make our country even stronger.
Let’s say that the division of people into sorts doesn’t exist just in the speeches of propagandists
and higher officials, but in reality too.
Let’s ignore the opinion of “wrong people”, some useless liberals and ridiculous human rights advocates.
What do the right Russians think then?
LET’S READ PIKABU
One of the most popular websites in the Russian Internet is called Pikabu. Initially, it was an entertaining platform,
and even now half of its content is an entertaining one.
However, with years Pikabu became one of the most important platforms where our fellow citizens,
who are usually called “common people”, can express themselves.
For example, Pikabu is the place where craftsmen from deep provinces, village inventors and just skilled people can publish
what they can do.
Workers of hot food production sites and distant ambulance stations write about their jobs.
On Pikabu unusual posts about usual life are extremely popular.
Quite often common people share how they fight against serious diseases.
It's interesting that while the economic crisis was becoming stronger after all the events in 2014,
there were more and more posts about acute social topics.
Sometimes you visit an entertaining website, but you get the impression that
you’ve just watched a film “Major” or “Fool” by Yuri Bykov.
I’ll repeat myself, Pikabu posts aren’t written by some protesters, but by those provincial people Vladimir Putin
likes to mention all the time.
By the way, sometimes it happens that even if there are no more independent journalists left in some Russian city,
it’s a Pikabu post which creates the necessary public turmoil.
There is a reason why Pikabu employees have their internal meme “Pikabu Power”.
For some reason, Pikabu community really hates me.
All the popular posts about Maxim Katz in Pikabu are extremely derisive, you won’t find any good words about me there.
You know, for the fairness of the experiment, it’s even a good thing!
There’s no point in hearing opinions on the website which is good to me. It’s clear they will agree with me.
It’s more interesting to read opinions in a place where they don’t like me.
Let’s go to Pikabu and see the most popular posts by the tag “mobilization”.
Let’s have a look at all the posts, just like the search offers them.
So, I’m going to Pikabu. I’m opening the search bar, entering the tag “mobilization”. I’ll put the highest rating –10,000 and higher.
I’m opening the first post and the comments to this post. I’ve set it to show the most popular comments.
I’ll read the first comments, just one after another.
There are different posts, but I’ll read the comments under the first post.
I hope we have a new President next year.
Maybe a former governor, mayor, entrepreneur, oligarch, I don’t give a sh*t. Just please, not someone from the military!
I’ve been sick of them for the last years, of their mindset.
I wish the President thought more about the economic growth, and not about the nation’s greatness, world’s justice,
fight against the evil, revanchism and other bullsh*t.
I want to work and study in peace, improve my skills and level of life, enjoy my hobbies, meet new friends and find a girlfriend.
I’d like to have an opportunity to walk on the streets listening to music without being scared
that some hulk will stop me and give me a conscription notice. You can dislike me as much as you want, I don’t give a sh*t!
He says it and gets more likes than anyone else, and with a great margin too! He’s got 3,000 likes.
The next most popular comment has just 1,400 likes.
Further, there is, “Spell out your wishes properly, or partial mobilization will end and a full mobilization
will start with border shutdown”.
I hope this f*cking disaster will end in 2023 and there will be peace. I was invited, but I refused to come.
May I add something too? So that all the budget thieves would die in prisons. Come back home alive and healthy.
I wish it from the bottom of my heart. Good luck! Come backalive! And try not to kill anyone! And you could just refuse to go.
Why did you go there? You couldn’t find 3,000 rubles to pay the fine?
All the adequate people should drink today for this shameful disaster to end.
I hope you won’t kill or disable anyone, or get your hands dirty with the blood of those people who defend their home.
Those are the most popular comments for the very first post. If you want demobilization so badly,
why did you go to the conscription center at all? Or were you forced to?
I want the special military operation to end and for all those people to come back home,
and for those people who lost their homes – to get another home, even better than the previous one! It's a horrible year,
let the worst stay in 2022.
And the new year will repair everything which can be repaired and will take no one else.
And what will you tell those people whom you leave without homes, making them start their lives from scratch?
Are you defending your Motherland by attacking brotherly Russian-speaking territories – Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odessa?
Or 200K will not earn themselves. For some reasons, our missiles don’t reach the “Nazi’s headquarters” – Lviv, Rivne and Ternopil.
“Nazi’s headquarters” is in quotation marks. We… you are bombing people who have always spoken Russian.
And now, thanks to you (not us) they hate Russia. He writes this Will you wish them a healthy and happy family life too?
Come back alive and healthy. And don’t kill! Why in f*ck’s sake did you go there?
I’ve read 20 comments in a row. It’s the first post with a lot of likes.
This year I have just one wish – so that mobilization would end and I would come back alive and healthy.
That’s what he wrote. And these are the comments.
LET’S CONTINUE READING PIKABU
We’ve chosen several popular posts we liked.
All of them were written from February 24.
We thought that the posts we've chosen and its comments reflect the mood there.
No one realized then that this war was for long. There was even no information about deaths among the Russian soldiers then.
The post: February 24.
Do you remember the feeling when terror acts happen or some other horrifying events everyone knows about.
You are sitting in a public place, in transport, it doesn’t matter where, and you feel that people
around you are thinking about the same thing as you are.
And now, I’m sitting in an underground train, I’m looking around and I can read the same thoughts in people’s eyes staring down
in people’s eyes staring down at their smartphones, “God, I can’t believe, all that is for real…”
Comments:
1. I’m on a business trip now in the North, I’ve learnt about this disaster there.
Since the morning I can’t stop thinking that it can’t be happening, it can’t be true. My brain refuses to believe in what’s going on.
2. I hate this government! I might go and protest or go striking. For how long should we suffer?
They just can’t let us live peacefully. Either they devalue money or start a war.
I f*cking hate living with a bomb ticking, what in f*ck’s name do they need in a foreign country?
3. And they dare to complain that people refuse to have children. How should we do it?
I’m not sure I’m able to earn enough money for food and healthcare for myself, let alone a wife and a child.
F*ck this! It’s good I’m alone, at least I’ll survive this way.
4. I don’t like to feel that we are being dragged to this meat grinder under the sounds of the chief's emotional speech.
5. I just wonder what the real reason for our Tsar’s actions is. He doesn’t give a sh*t about LNR, DNR, his people,
Ukrainian people, the West. He’s got plenty of money, power, the elites are scared of him.
He will manage to be on the throne till the rest of his life.
6. Why in f*ck’s sake do they go to a FOREIGN country? WHAT do we want there at all?
The post: February 24. Hi, everyone! I’m Danil. I’m from Kyiv. I’m writing this just to vent out.
We all know what has started between our countries – Russia and Ukraine. I’m sorry it’s happening.
Please find strength to stay human, be near your family and close ones.
Strength to all of us! I’ll tell you about myself. I’m 25 years old. I used to be a border guard on the border with Poland.
I have been mobilized today.
Comments:
1. I’m against the war! I want peace! Stavropol (Russia)
2. Stay strong! No war!!!
3. Come back home alive. I hope this horror will end soon and everyone will return home. We don’t need this war. Irkutsk (Russia)
4. My relatives from there (Ukraine) called. I thought they would curse me, but they are crying, and I’m crying too.
5. Krasnoyarsk (Russia) is against the war/the aggression too!
6. Hi, Danil. I’m Russian and I live in Russia. I don’t participate in battles, I don’t support this war.
I don’t respond to provocations and have no savings in foreign currency.
So, I’m not interested in this war like most normal people in my country.
7. Hi! I’m Darya from Krasnodar (Russia). I’m soooo scared. All the flights have been canceled today here.
This year my son is to be conscripted into the army. I’m scared out of my wits for him.
I don’t want him to kill anybody or be killed himself.
8. You may believe it or not, but the Russians don’t need this war at all. It’s only losses and damages for us.
And who knows how many of our and your people will die. It would be better if the speaking heads on zombo TV programs
fought each other and left common people alone.
Those people who write nasty things on the Internet won’t go to war and die there.
They will stay safe on their sofas behind their PCs.
Please, don’t pay attention to them and don’t judge us as if we are like them.
Here are two examples. One the most recent post, it has just been written. And the second one is dated February 24.
ON BEHALF OF WORKING PEOPLE…
Vladimir Putin simply adores to say “as common people say…”
As common people say, we have many things...
And I suggest to start, as common people say, from the center of the field
But what can such a person know if he thinks that the middle class in Russia starts from 17,000 rubles ($250) per month?
A person who doesn’t understand the phrase “to subscribe to on YouTube” and asks again, “What should I sign there?”
When last February Putin addressed the Ukrainians, he had no idea who the Ukrainians were.
And when Putin speaks on behalf of the Russians, he takes way too much upon himself. Because he has no idea who the Russians are.
And he doesn’t want to. He despises the citizens of Russia. I’ll tell you one story.
I’ve never told you about that on this channel before because I have nothing to prove it with.
But I’ve decided to tell you now.
I talked to Boris Nemtsov once, and he shared his conversation with Vladimir Putin when he had just become President.
Putin decided then to get the music of the Soviet anthem back. Boris objected – what for?
Old music and three-times edited words by Sergey Mikhalkov.
According to Nemtsov, Putin then answered, “Like people, like songs!” Poor Putin,
he is so unlucky to have such a country and such people!
When the native pro-war propaganda started talking about how resilient and undemanding
“a simple Russian Kuzmich” is, we told you at once that this ostentatious admiration
is nothing else than the most merciless Russophobia.
Please, watch this video if you haven’t. It’s horrible. Yes, propaganda praises the Russian men Putin has sent to war.
But it uses the expressions as if it’s about some serf peasants and not about the citizens of Russia.
A good Kuzmich is as resilient as a horse! You can send him to the trenches without hot food and warm clothes – and he is just fine!
Moreover, according to propaganda, “a Russian Kuzmich” is useless in a peaceful life.
He can really show himself just in the war.
It’s not a personal opinion of propagandists who sit in their warm studios and urge the Russians to go and die
because they have nothing else to live for.
There is no higher honor and happiness for a man to give his life for his Motherland and comrades.
This message comes directly from Putin. Remember? A Russian is better to die in the front.
Otherwise, he will be killed in a car accident or because of vodka or will just live for nothing.
Life is overestimated anyway! After closing all the independent media and introducing criminal liability for “wrong opinion”,
Putin’s system creates the illusion of “public consensus”.
Like, the Russian citizens are not talented, educated and hardworking people,
but some “crayfish which prefer to be boiled alive”.
They have such a good understanding what they are fighting for, why they are fighting and, of course, it's such a boost of spirit.
It’s easy to fall into the bait of propaganda when the government wipes out the whole informational space
for professional propagandists. It’s easy to start feeling as an outcast.
As if you, a person who wants to create, not to destroy, who wants to live happily and kill no one,
who studied half of his life and got experience, are just the society’s burp which Vladimir Soloviev called “2 percent of sh*t”.
The devilish political technology built on censorship, repressions and such a “cancel culture” Hollywood never dreamed of,
this political technology makes dozens of millions of normal people feel as if they are “2 percent”.
What’s even more interesting is that lately there are no more ways left to become “a good Russian”.
Even if you went to the front and died (that is to say, you did everything the government ordered you to)
even in this case you’ll be the one to blame.
Some General will come out and say to the controlled media in his trained voice,
“It’s all your own fault, you, stupid oaf, clueless Kuzmich.
You’ve violated safety rules, you’ve made a Ukrainian missile hit you because you’ve turned on your cell phone in the wrong place.”
And if someone says it’s bullsh*t and the Ministry of Defense is just making excuses, this person discredits the Armed Forces.
And if someone says that no one should have been sent there, no one should have attacked the neighboring country,
no one should have started this war - these people should be imprisoned for 8 years right away.
Anyway, no living Russian can make Putin’s government happy.
And when he dies, it becomes so convenient to blame him for everything.
Yes, propagandists say that there is some “right” majority. And the Commander-in-Chief himself speaks on behalf of this right majority.
But the common Russian if he is not from Putin’s team will never get into this “majority” even if he wants to.
Dozens of millions of our fellow citizens who work physically and mentally for the sake of their families and our country,
who carve wood in free time, create programs and assemble different mechanisms, play guitar, draw and embroider.
Thanks to the Internet all those people got an opportunity to speak out.
Not some Kuzmichi invented by propaganda but real Russian citizens write about their life, job, hobbies,
troubles, joys and sorrows.
And even when the government tries to shut them, punishes people for their opinions, makes them feel uncertain,
even then a lot of our fellow citizens, real people find available platforms to say what they really think.
Thanks to all of you who breaks this informational blockade. It’s very important.
While there is the Internet in Russia, we can write, we can read and we can communicate
to destroy those artificial barriers the government tries to separate people with.
Roskomnadzor will never be able to close all the websites of the Russian Internet anyway.
Well, you can go to Pikabu...
Till tomorrow!