James' World 2

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In February 2012, as Vladimir Putin was gearing up to steal the Russian presidential ‘election’ that year, the performance art group Pussy Riot staged an audacious and provocative work inside the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow. Dressed in colourful outfits and balaclavas, several members of the group burst into the church flashmob-style, dancing in front of the altar and singing expletive-filled ‘punk prayers’ in protest against Putin. Three women from the group were subsequently arrested and later sentenced to two years in prison on the charge of ‘hooliganism motivated by religious hatred’. They had, the judge said, ‘plotted to undermine civil order’.

In a moving interview with the historian Simon Schama in December last year one of those young women, the artist and activist Nadya Tolokonnikova, talked about what happened to her during her time in prison. After being transferred to the notorious gulag IK-14 in the remote region of Mordovia, Tolokonnikova was forced to work in slave labour conditions for 16 hours a day, 7 days a week, sewing police and military uniforms. She described the effect this kind of punishment has on people’s sense of self: within a short time it stripped her of her identity and made her lose any hope, agency or motivation. Her life became meaningless. It’s an experience she has not fully recovered from more than ten years later. Of course, Tolokonnikova’s real crime was to express her thoughts publicly about Putin’s corruption, mocking him in the process.

Our right to political protest is something we take for granted here in the UK. Amusing protest placard expression is like a national sport. But these rights are not set in stone and citizens of democratic countries must always be vigilant for their slow erosion — witness, for example, the current regressive laws on women’s reproductive rights in the USA at the moment.

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Pussy Riot perform at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow in 2012. Photo: Philip Cosores

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