Motherland. Freedom. Putin: “A society of pure spectacle”
An inside look at the loss of truth and the deterioration of press freedom in Russia by journalist and playwright Natalia Antonova
This is part of an ongoing series looking at press freedom around the world, leading up to World Press Freedom Day on May 3. Find out more about the series below the story.
By Natalia Antonova
Having spent years as a journalist in Russia, I can only describe the situation surrounding press freedom there as aggressively postmodern.
Censorship is expressly illegal. Yet it is everywhere — and it is usually preemptive, with media organizations censoring themselves as a means of avoiding officials’ wrath.
There is no official ideology in Russia, but the rules are always changing. There is rule by signal, which is confusing and stressful, because you never know when you will be overstepping an invisible line. Keeping journalists and media executives confused and stressed ensures that they never get too confident (not to mention making them drink a lot).
Perhaps most distressingly to me, there is very little public demand for a free press that encourages genuinely competing narratives. I used to blame this solely on Russia’s Soviet past, when everyone understood that the press would write only what the government told it to, and hence never bothered to examine what its actual role should be.
Yet, as writer Peter Pomerantsev has pointed out, modern Russia is now a “society of pure spectacle.” This transition began in the turbulent 1990s and solidified under President Vladimir Putin’s rule.
The Russian public now prefers extravagant political theater over hard news. The mainstream press is thus meant to be a gathering of sideshow clowns entertaining the public, as opposed to keeping it informed. And if you believe in the concept of truth, you’re a loser, horribly naïve, a Fox Mulder-like figure (but not nearly as sexy), chasing a mirage, because the truth is never “out there,” the truth is whatever suits officials today.
This is all aside from violence against journalists that usually goes unpunished. For me, one of the saddest aspects of working as a journalist in Russia was how blasé society can be in the face of such attacks.
“Well, what did you expect?”
a very nice old lady from Moscow told me when prominent journalist Oleg Kashin was nearly beaten to death just a short walk from where I used to live.
“If you cover politics, you might pay with your life — or at least your health. It’s childish to think it could be otherwise.”
Covering Russia for foreign media outlets comes with its own, albeit less sinister, brand of censorship. There are many stereotypes of Russia that people hold way too dear — and they can seriously skew coverage. I once had an editor in the United States, a man who’d never set foot in Russia, call me a “naïve girl” (bonus points for raging sexism!) when I tried to explain to him that Putin does not personally control every single news bulletin that goes out in Russia (otherwise where would he find the time for hanging out with bikers and annexing bits of neighboring countries?).
And good luck trying to write anything remotely positive, or at least not entirely depressing, about Russia in the Western press. Most memorably, I once had a young editor turn to me for what was supposed to be a lighthearted feature on Russian geek culture and its colorful enclaves. The young editor was overruled by a senior colleague who said that, “As long as those geeks aren’t being thrown into the gulag, they’re not interesting.” Cosplay in Russia can only be interesting if it’s being done in a Siberian prison camp? Right.
Ultimately, for me, press freedom in Russia means not having to constantly look over your shoulder. It means being supported by the public in your right to do your job, even if the news you bring may be discomfiting. It means working to keep officials honest, rather than putting on an elaborate sideshow act for their benefit. And it also means respect from colleagues outside the country, especially if they’ve never been to it themselves.
I’m not really holding my breath on any of those counts, though. You can call me a pessimist, but I prefer the term realist, myself.
Natalia Antonova is a journalist and playwright based in Moscow. Among her various bylines, she has written for the Guardian, Mashable, the Moscow Times and Foreign Policy. Formerly she was acting editor-in-chief of the Moscow News, before the agency that owned it, RIA Novosti, was liquidated. Currently she is working on a memoir about the turbulent past two years in Russia and Ukraine.
This post is part of a week-long AJ+ series looking at firsthand accounts of press freedom worldwide — and we want to hear from you.
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