A sense of the absurdity of current events, combined with the need to relieve stress, not to mention censorship that compels an Aesopian approach to self-expression, make fertile ground for satire.
Here, we explain ten recent memes that best capture the current sociopolitical mood across a large subset of Russian society.
In Petrograd, in the autumn of 1922, the Bolsheviks herded a couple of hundred Russian intellectuals considered harmful to the socialist cause onto ships headed for Germany. Among them were several philosophers, including the Christian existentialist Nikolai Berdyayev, the Orthodox theologian Sergei Bulgakov, and the monarchist and political philosopher Ivan Ilyin.
More recently, in the 1990s, another philosopher, Nikolai Khoruzhy, published an article in the influential cultural weekly Literaturnaya Gazeta titled “The Philosophers’ Ship” describing the 1922 expulsions. The phrase was subsequently used to refer to the overall effort during 1922-23 to expel the Russian intelligentsia and generally crush free thought in the country.
A century after the Philosophers’ Ships set sail, Putin announced a mobilization, triggering a large-scale exodus of draft-age men. Those unable to afford the skyrocketing price of plane tickets left by car, on foot, or by whatever means was available.
To avoid the miles-long lines that formed at the borders with Georgia and Kazakhstan, people got creative, using, for example, scooters, which were easy to bring along on a train or to buy on the spot. Although scooters quickly disappeared from border-town stores, including children’s models, for a steep price (or maybe your laptop, if you had to resort to barter) you could procure one from enterprising locals directly at border crossing points. One viral video showed a man traversing the steppe on an electric scooter, a suitcase perched between him and the handlebar.
There are obviously many differences between the men fleeing mobilization and the university professors forced out by the Bolsheviks. But there are some striking historical parallels. For one thing, when we say that the two events occurred a hundred years apart, this is not an approximate figure. The first ship left Petrograd on September 29, 1922, and it was during the final days of September 2022 that the main surge of departures took place. Mobilization was announced September 21, and there were rumors that the border would be closed on the 28th, so the final days of the month, including the 29th, were a particularly busy time at border-crossings.
Quite a few people also used bicycles, so there were also jokes about “philosophers’ bicycles” and even “philosophers’ shuttles” and “poputki [hitchhiking rides].” But, as a symbol of the urban hipster lifestyle torn from its accustomed coffee-house environment and so disconcertingly incongruous with the wrenching tragedy of war, the scooters had the greatest resonance.
In the speech he delivered on the occasion of Russia’s annexation of the Ukrainian territories it was more-or-less occupying, Putin went off topic and launched into a diatribe against non-traditional families: “Do we really want a situation where here, in our country, in Russia, instead of mama and papa we have ‘Parent 1,’ ‘Parent 2,’ ‘Parent 3’ – they’ve really gone off the deep end there!? Do we really want, in our schools, for schoolchildren, starting from the early grades, to be indoctrinated into perversion that leads to degradation and extinction? To have it shoved down their throats that, beside women and men, there supposedly exist certain other genders and for them to be told they can have operations to change their sex?”
Twitter immediately went to work identifying surprising candidates for the roles of Parents No. 1 and No. 2, primarily among well-known pairings from world culture, such as Holmes and Watson from the popular British series or the multiple personalities of the protagonist of M. Night Shyamalan’s Split. There were also antiwar versions, such as a meme showing Hitler and Stalin pushing baby Putin in a stroller.
But the most popular combo was based on a famous line from the popular late-Soviet singer-songwriter Viktor Tsoi, where he describes the state of the soul of a late-Soviet Russian rocker: “Mama’s anarchy; Papa’s a glass of Portwein [fortified wine].” In the song, these words are the response to a question from a soldier. In other words, the song’s protagonist is contrasting his idea of freedom and fun to militarism. At the song’s end, the soldier is covered in paint, provoking a string of obscenities from him.
The Russian authorities have long used inciting hatred against LGBT people as a political tool. In 2013, a law was passed banning “propaganda of non-traditional values among minors.” Since then, organizations, activists, and journalists working with related subject matter have had a difficult time. Anti-gay rhetoric became even more virulent after the war began. Now the State Duma has passed a bill that completely bans public discussion of any sexual orientation other than heterosexuality.
The five stages of grief identified by the psychologist Elizabeth Kübler-Ross in her work with the dying has been the stuff of jokes in many contexts. With the start of the war, there were several variations on this theme, such as “Denial. Anger. Bargaining. Depression. Kazakhstan,” in reference to the difficult decision to emigrate many Russians were making.
Censorship by Roskomnadzor (the Federal Service for Overseeing Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media) has long been a fact of life in Russia, but over the past year, it has gone into overdrive. All but the most obscure opposition resources have been blocked, along with popular international social media, such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Despite rumors that Virtual Private Network (VPN) users would somehow be penalized, this has not occurred, yet. A cat and mouse game is underway whereby the authorities constantly block VPN services only to have users sign on with another of the plentiful options.
The paradox is that figures publicly supporting the regime continue to use social media that the Russian courts have labeled “extremist” and that have been accused of “spreading false information.” For example, the Channel 1 anchor Yekaterina Andreyeva, out from behind whom Marina Ovsyannikova famously popped up holding an antiwar poster, discussed the incident not just anywhere, but on Instagram, which was already blocked at the time.
Stages of grief memes are more than just a code to evade censorship. Many Russians actually did go through the stages of denial, anger, bargaining, and depression after the shocking news that the country was at war. This news felt like a fatal diagnosis. And the stage at which people decide to finally download and install a VPN represents acceptance and a decision to go on with their dismal existence, dealing with their suffocating lack of freedom as best they can.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has long been known for his habit of keeping people waiting (the Tweet shown here translates: “For us it’s okay. But Putin is again keeping the English queen waiting too long.”). At events in Russia, people are forced to wait for him for hours. World leaders have it easier: he’s usually just 40 or 50 minutes late. Kremlin loyalists like to bring up a famous quote attributed to Tsar Alexander III in this context: “When the Russian tsar is fishing, Europe can wait.” When Putin was almost an hour late for a meeting with the Pope, the newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets published an article with the title “Putin kept God’s deputy waiting.”
Putin once kept Queen Elizabeth waiting just 15 minutes, but Putin admirers like to cite this incident from the distant past as evidence of the Russian president’s majesty. The recent joke that Putin is again keeping Elizabeth waiting was prompted by Putin’s absence from her funeral last September. Top government officials were present from most countries with which Great Britain has diplomatic relations: only Russia, Belarus, and Myanmar were not invited. European media called the queen’s funeral “the biggest diplomatic gathering in a decade,” but the Russian Embassy in London expressed its intention not to attend. Russian opposition journalists jeered that things had changed since the time when Putin could permit himself to be late for an audience with the queen: now they don’t invite him. Meanwhile, pro-Kremlin outlets called this “rude.”
However, in the joke, the queen is, of course, waiting for Putin not at her own funeral, but in the world beyond. The antiwar community has become obsessed with the idea of Putin’s death. The war is a catastrophe not just in Ukraine, but also in Russia, and Russians’ sense of helplessness to change the situation has left them hoping that a miracle will suddenly take the dictator out of the picture. Rumors of an impending coup or fatal illness proliferate. “A scarf and a snuffbox” serve as a coded reference to this second scenario: these items were involved in the assassination of Russia’s despotic Emperor Paul I in 1801.
The sticker reading “It’s not running away, it’s a regrouping” shows Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov. After the Russian Army suffered defeats in southern Kharkiv Oblast and had to hightail it out of there, Konashenkov put a certain spin on the setback, referring to the need to “regroup Russian forces” and conduct a “scale-down and organized redeployment.”
Konashenkov is not alone in resorting to euphemisms to spin or obscure the truth – this is an approach common to all Russian government officials. Sanctions are characterized as “a historic opportunity,” economic problems are “new challenges.” These sorts of expressions are nothing new. In reports to their superiors, officials have long used terms like “negative growth” instead of “decline” or “limited readiness” rather than “unpreparedness,” but since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, this tendency has intensified. While in the past khlopki (“pops,” as in the sound of a champagne bottle being opened) was the word used to underplay explosions from a gas leak, for example, now the term is routinely used as a euphemism for what happens when buildings are shelled.
Of course, a certain segment of the Russian population takes every opportunity to poke fun of these circumlocutions. You now hear wordings like “My mood is experiencing negative growth” or “The children have made limited homework preparations.”
It should be noted that the Konashenkov sticker is the work of a very specific subset of oppositionists: Russian nationalists who speak out against Putin but are by no means against the war. Stickers like these target the “Noviop,” a derogatory acronym based on the phrase “New Historical Community” (новой исторической общности), the denationalized, multiethnic fusion populating the Russian Federation formerly known as “the Soviet people.” The term “Noviop” is the creation of Russian nationalists who want to retain Russia’s unique Russianness and oppose the tendency to erase Russian national identity. The Noviops, in their view, misguidedly glorify the idea of a multiethnic state, as does Putin, and are a bunch of bunglers who are robbing Russia of its potential greatness.
For some time, Putin’s ministers, as well as visiting heads of state, have had to sit several meters away from him during meetings. The Kremlin press service claims that this is a coronavirus-related precaution. But when the war began and the pandemic faded into the background, the suspicion grew that Putin had some other reason for wanting to keep his distance.
The comical sight of meeting participants at opposite ends of such a ridiculously long table naturally became a target for social media jokesters. Memes included an ad for a ridiculously elongated Scandinavian-style table branded “Putin,” playing on Ikea’s tradition of giving their furniture models names, and images of a gymnast resembling the president’s lover Alina Kabayeva backflipping down a long table.
This table really is long enough to make a major contribution toward fixing the Crimean Bridge. But the joke also hints at the economic problems gradually emerging thanks to sanctions. With building materials in short supply and problems importing them, soon there might be no other option for infrastructure repairs than the Kremlin’s lavish furnishings.
The explosion on the bridge connecting Crimea and Russia’s Krasnodar Krai occurred on October 8, 2022. Since the bridge symbolized Russia’s annexation of the peninsula, the bombing quickly sparked an outburst of bitter humor. Many jokes mimicked Russian officialese, along the lines of “Negative growth in bridge footings can be observed” or “The Crimean Bridge has been placed under the command of the cruiser Moskva.”
The tradition of giving waves of emigrants from Russia food-related names started with the “sausage [kolbasnaya] emigration.” Such was the label assigned to those who fled the empty grocery store shelves of the late Soviet Union, where procuring sausage involved time spent hunting it down and then waiting in long lines. Although there’s nothing shameful about seeking a better life, the name had a negative connotation. It was used not only by Soviet propaganda to express disdain, but by the emigrants themselves. In the case of propaganda, the idea was that those departing had betrayed the lofty ideals of socialism for sausage, while in the case of the emigrants, the term was used to distinguish high-minded political emigrants who left in search of democratic freedoms from those following the lowly desires of their bellies.
The next wave of emigrants came after the 2014 annexation of Crimea. This wave is referred to by some as the “cheese emigration.” The economic sanctions imposed by the West and the food embargo imposed by Russia in response led to the disappearance of a number of items from grocery-store shelves, most noticeably cheese, specifically various well-known European cheeses that had come to symbolize the good life. These cheeses had taken the place of the sought-after (due to short supply) sausages of Soviet times.
The name fit, since it was primarily members of the big-city middle class who were able to emigrate, and poor people from the provinces never had the chance to get hooked on camembert or parmesan in the first place.
Now, we may have a candidate for a food-related designation for the current wave of departures. Tatyana Sheremet, who recently departed St. Petersburg for Israel, asked around her émigré community where she could find a Pumpkin Spice Latte in Haifa. The expat was stunned to learn that there wasn’t a single Starbucks in Israel. She bemoaned her bitter fate, complaining of her inability to maintain her fond tradition of enjoying the autumnal beverage.
By then, grumbling was already being heard in Israel about the behavior of overdemanding Russian repatriates. New arrivals were full of complaints about bad service, the time it took ride-share taxis to show up compared to Moscow, and other shortcomings of the Promised Land. While there’s nothing wrong with an emigrant trying to recreate their familiar rituals, many were angered by Sheremet’s online lament. In their eyes, the expat was a spoiled brat who was failing to appreciate the many blessings her new host country was offering. If the phrase “the Pumpkin Spice Emigration” takes hold, it will refer to people who gripe over the loss of their bougie pleasures at a time when many faced with war and repression are willing to suffer any deprivation to find safety.
Alla Pugachyova, superstar singer of the Soviet and post-Soviet era, has inspired countless memes. Her significance and omnipresence on airwaves are best captured by the following joke: “A twenty-first-century schoolboy is asked who Brezhnev was. His response: ‘A minor political figure from the Alla Pugachyova era.”
The joke about Putin blaming Pugachyova for the Soviet Union’s demise has a different focus: the Russian authorities’ tendency toward blame-shifting. After February 24, this tendency was, unsurprisingly, exacerbated. Like the war itself and any other problem afflicting Russia, the fault always lies with some alien “other,” be it with the “collective West” or the LGBT community, “foreign agents” or bio-lab-infected bats, Halloween jack-o’-lanterns or Santa Claus – the list of Russia’s nemeses is endless.
Alla Pugachyova made the list only recently. For a long time, the singer kept her opinion of recent events to herself, although it was generally known that she and her family had left for Israel. This fall, after some antiwar satire earned her husband, the comedian Maxim Galkin, the “foreign agent” designation, Pugachyova published a tongue-in-cheek appeal to the Russian Ministry of Justice: “I request that I be listed as a foreign agent of my beloved country, since I am in solidarity with my husband, an honest, upstanding, and sincere person and a true and incorruptible patriot of Russia who wants his native land to enjoy prosperity, peace, and freedom of expression, and for our boys to stop dying for illusory goals that have turned our country into a pariah and made life more difficult for our citizens.” This of course generated a new wave of jokes about the national sweetheart, including:
“They’re Russia’s most malicious enemies.”
“Who? Galkin and Pugachyova?”
“No, Reagan and Zelensky.”
On September 24, Alisa Klimentova, a woman from the southern Urals city of Tyumen, chalked «Нет в***е» (No to w*r) on the asphalt.
Such inscriptions signifying the forbidden word “voina” (war – ending in e because it is in the dative case in this phrase) are all over the place. Suffice it to write “*** *****” and everyone understands what the asterisks stand for.
Whether or not this graffiti triggers a police response depends on where it is written, and on chance.
Klimentova was charged with “a public action aimed at disparaging the armed forces of the Russian Federation” and fined R30,000. However, in her trial, she successfully argued that the asterisks were by no means intended to represent the word voina but rather vobla, the Russian word for the Caspian roach, since she finds “this species of fish to be particularly repellant.”* This absurd and uplifting story generated what could be the No. 1 meme of the awful year that has just passed, or rather a slew of them.
The deluge of drollery ran from doctored covers of War and Peace substituting Vobla for the first word to pictures of vobla hanging on strings to dry (the fish is typically salt cured and hung to air dry) with a caption «развязывать нельзя» (literally, “do not untie,” or rather “unleash,” since развязывать is the Russian equivalent of “unleash” in the Russian expression for “unleash war”). And of course, enterprising jokesters couldn’t resist using «Нет вобле» as a caption for the ubiquitous Soviet-era temperance-promoting poster where a man’s outstretched hand shields him from an offered shot of vodka.
Salt-cured and dried vobla is one of the most popular accompaniments to vodka and beer in Russia, which adds extra richness and broader appeal to the joke. People are writing songs to the vobla and using the word as a substitute for voina (war) in public and private discussions – a coy act of rebellion against the official euphemism “special military operation.” Now, if you draw three asterisks and a fish on the sidewalk, the message will be clear. This popular graffiti is even being compared to the famous Ichthys symbol used by oppressed early Christians as an encoded way of expressing allegiance to Christianity (the Greek phrase “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior” forms an acronym spelling the Greek word for fish).
When, in late February 2022, Putin issued an order to “bring deterrent forces into a special state of operational readiness,” the country was gripped by an expectation of nuclear catastrophe and independent political commentators began prefacing their forecasts with the stipulation “if we live that long.”
Last summer, by which time everyone was exhausted from constant stress and the fighting had moved toward the Russian-Ukrainian border, the situation calmed down a bit. But after the mobilization was announced and the conflict went through yet another escalation, talk of nuclear war resumed and grew louder still. Although Putin, his press secretary, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs all claim that Russia has no intention of using nuclear weapons, their statements on the matter – along the lines of “If a nuclear strike should occur, we won’t be the ones responsible, we will have been forced into it” – seem designed to sow doubts.
Meanwhile, there was an effort to refurbish bomb shelters in border regions and Moscow. Here as well, the picture was ambiguous: the Emergency Ministry reported that this was a “grassroots initiative” and that no order to fix up the shelters had been issued.
Russians have enough to keep them up nights without the threat of a nuclear apocalypse: worries over staying out of trouble while opposing the war; fears that supplies of everyday necessities will dry up; and the question of what to do if a loved one receives a summons to the military commissariat. The situation looks very uncertain, so conversations reflect a very short time horizon. In émigré circles, this tendency has to do with the fact that many people left for the first available country, often with no intention of staying there long-term. Many of them are constantly weighing the question: to return or not to return?
The sarcastic meme/response “Well, you’re an optimist” is now the response to the most ordinary questions, such as “Where do you plan to celebrate New Year’s?” or “Shall we have a beer on Friday?”
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