Pussy Riot Sends a Powerful Message to Vladimir Putin: “You Have Already Lost. You Know It.”

Speak­ing at TED, Nadya Tolokon­niko­va, found­ing mem­ber of Pussy Riot, has a pow­er­ful mes­sage for Rus­sians today: Resist­ing the author­i­ty of Vladimir Putin is an option. It’s a choice. Of that, Tolokon­niko­va has already pro­vid­ed ample proof. For more than a decade, the mem­bers of Pussy Riot have staged high-pro­file protests in Rus­sia … and paid the price, with time served in prison. As she puts it, “Courage is an abil­i­ty to act in the face of fear. And some of us have cho­sen to live coura­geous­ly.” That exam­ple is what makes her a threat:

The rea­son why I became a threat to the sys­tem, not because of any actu­al phys­i­cal pow­er that I have, but because courage is con­ta­gious. And any act of speak­ing the truth can cause incal­cu­la­ble trans­for­ma­tions in social con­scious­ness. And we all have this pow­er. It’s a moral act to use this pow­er. You may or may not achieve the results that you want­ed, but there is eter­nal beau­ty in try­ing to find truth, in risk­ing every­thing you’ve got for what’s right…

As always, she saves choice words for Putin: “Vladimir Vladimirovich, the Krem­lin walls became your prison walls. You have already lost. You know it. That’s why you’re so afraid. You lost in spir­it.” Now we just need Rus­sians at home, and Ukraini­ans on the bat­tle­field, to make the implic­it explic­it.

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Relat­ed Con­tent 

A His­to­ry of Pussy Riot: Watch the Band’s Ear­ly Performances/Protests Against the Putin Regime

Pussy Riot’s Nadya Tolokon­niko­va Tells Pro­tes­tors What to Do–and Not Do–If Arrest­ed by Author­i­tar­i­an Police

Slavoj Žižek & Pussy Riot’s Nadezh­da Tolokon­niko­va Exchange An Extra­or­di­nary Series of Let­ters


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Comments (5)
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  • CC says:

    This woman doesn’t seem to know (or pre­tends she doesn’t) that Putin has the largest rate of pop­u­lar sup­port of any politi­cian today.

  • Steve Bryan says:

    He intend­ed and thought he could absorb Ukraine and its peo­ple into Rus­sia. Cer­tain­ly the reman­ing Russ­ian pen­sion­ers who yearn for a return of a Stal­in­ist Rus­sia approve of his goal but now we know that will NEVER hap­pen. Just deaths of Ukraini­ans and Rus­sians and insane destruc­tion of Ukrain­ian infra­struc­ture.

  • Asta says:

    You can­not be serious…Just where? Among the Siber­ian bears and delud­ed nation­al­ists? The Krem­lin butch­er is respon­si­ble for the demise of 200,000 of his own youth alone. And “this woman” (whose name is Nadya Tolokon­niko­va, btw) has the guts which your hero could only dream about.

  • CC says:

    Huh? Putin doesn’t have major­i­ty sup­port in Rus­sia? Who told you? CNN, the Wash­ing­ton Post, The Times?

  • Asta says:

    CC: You may be sur­prised, but some of us have actu­al­ly stud­ied and lived the his­to­ry. Putin has the same ‘pop­u­lar sup­port’ which one Ceaus­es­cu or Stal­in com­mand­ed — rigged elec­tions, self-imposed dic­ta­to­r­i­al rule, com­plete press cen­sor­ship, wide net­work of secret police which results in impris­on­ment or death of any­one who dares to speak up. We know what hap­pened to all those cults of per­son­al­i­ty and how they went down in his­to­ry. Once this hap­pens to your hero, the Red Square won’t be able to hold all those mil­lions rejoic­ing. P.S. I sug­gest you skip the edu­ca­tion by OANN and Bre­it­bart, and per­chance peek into the first-hand accounts of the ever-grow­ing num­ber of Russ­ian dis­si­dents. For starters, please pull out the For­eign Pol­i­cy report, titled “Putin Needs Repres­sion to Run an Unpop­u­lar War”.

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