July 30, 2026

Soldiers: Better than Anime?


Soldiers: Better than Anime?
Role models? The Russian Life files.

On July 26, it was revealed that the head of RusNews was fined for a post quoting a "government official" who said that children should admire "special military operation heroes" rather than anime characters.

A Moscow court fined RusNews editorial head Sergey Aynbinder R30,000 ($384 USD) for "disseminating unreliable information under the guise of reliable information." Authorities opened a case against Aynbinder due to a post published on RusNews' Telegram channel on March 8. The text was titled, "Roskomnadzor found a replacement for anime and Mickey Mouse. These are the participants of [Russia's war in Ukraine]." 

The RusNews post was analyzing a proposal by Andrey Tsyganov, Roskomnadzor's former head of the Commission for the Protection of Children from Destructive Content. According to the publication, Tsyganov wanted to require children to "learn about positive heroes" rather than Western images, which he called a "legacy of the nineties." The former Roskomnadzor commission chair argued that Ukraine war soldiers and historical figures like Alexander Nevsky and Dmitry Donskoy should become role models.

Roskomnadzor's press service distanced itself from Tsyganov, saying that he was not a full-time government official (this being the reason the RusNews statement was incorrect). The court upheld the government institution's position. On July 25, it was revealed that the owner of the Telegram channel Daily Storm, Ksenia Shardt, also received a R30,000 fine for quoting Tsyganov in a post. The decisions for Shardt and Aynbinder's administrative cases were both reached on July 1.

 

 

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