Snow Blind
When Americans look at Russia, they see what they want to see. And that’s dangerous.
Two of Russia’s most famous dissidents are visiting the United States. I speak, of course, of Nadya Tolokonnikova and Masha Alyokhina, members of the feminist conceptual art group known as Pussy Riot who were recently released from jail by President Vladimir Putin. The U.S. media have been raving. “Pussy Riot gals stun Brooklyn crowd with powerful speech,” blared the New York Post about the duo’s appearance at a charity concert in New York this week. “Pussy Riot stole the show from Madonna” was the verdict from Time. They put in a bravado performance on The Colbert Report and even had the New Yorker gushing about their presumed artistic achievements. Pretty impressive.
In fact, though, there is little evidence that they have any sort of influence on Russian public opinion at all. Most Russians regard Pussy Riot with outright hostility. As one recent public opinion survey revealed, the number of Russians who view the prison sentence the two women received as either fair or too soft has actually grown in the two years since they went to jail: The figure is now 66 percent. (A reminder: Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina were convicted on charges of “hooliganism” after performing an impromptu anti-Putin concert in a Moscow cathedral in 2012.)