After seven months in jail, one member of Pussy Riot is still eager to court controversy
by Michael Petrou on Thursday, May 16, 2013 6:00am -
Mad as hell in Moscow

Maxim Shemetov/Reuters

Yekaterina Samutsevich is a member of arguably the most famous musical ensemble ever to come out of Russia, but when not wearing a fluorescent balaclava and shouting, she’s easy to miss in a crowd.

Samutsevich is short and walks quickly, leaning forward with a hunched and self-effacing shrug in her shoulders. She wears a faded sweatshirt over an equally faded T-shirt and has her hair cut in the long-banged style that a teenaged skateboarder might have worn two decades ago. She seems a lot younger than her 30 years.

Her band, Pussy Riot, gained worldwide notoriety—and in Russia, a great deal of infamy—when its members stormed Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour to stage a “punk prayer” protest song to show their opposition to Vladimir Putin and the increasingly close ties between the Russian president and the country’s Orthodox Church, which she says is an anti-feminist institution.

In the end, they were barely able to start before security was on them. Samutsevich didn’t even get her guitar out of its case—which probably saved her from a lengthier incarceration. She was convicted of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” and sentenced to two years in prison. But her sentence was suspended on appeal, and she was released in October, after almost seven months in jail. Her bandmates Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina are still serving out their two-year sentences.

Sitting in a Moscow café with walls covered in photos of Soviet-era women heroes, and drinking hot chocolate in rapid spoonfuls, Samutsevich argues that the Russian authorities’ harsh response is part of a bigger campaign to slander and punish political artists.

Some 20 Russians who took part in a sanctioned anti-Putin protest in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square last May have been charged with “mass unrest” and assaulting police. Most are currently in jail or under house arrest. One man, Maxim Luzyanin, co-operated with police and pleaded guilty. He has been sentenced to 4½ years in jail. Alexei Navalny, a protest-movement leader who has exposed numerous cases of corruption among Russia’s political elite, is also fighting charges of embezzlement. Many analysts believe these cases are politically motivated. Dissidents in Russia tend to encounter legal problems of one type or another.

Pussy Riot is comprised of around 10 women. Samutsevich, who studied at Moscow’s Rodchenko School of Photography and Multimedia, met some of the other band members at art exhibitions. She says they were inspired by the feminist punk movement of the 1970s, and the American ’90s band Bikini Kill. They chose the name “Pussy Riot” because of its intrinsic contrast: “pussy” objectifies women as soft and passive; “riot” is a reaction against that.

The band wanted to pursue the “art of activism” by staging creative and unexpected public events. They were particularly active during the run-up to last year’s presidential election that saw Putin returned to power. Last January, in Red Square, the band performed a song titled Putin’s Pissed Himself.

“We ruined the campaign a little bit,” she says. “It might have been some kind of personal grudge.”

Samutsevich says protesting inside the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour wasn’t a random act or the result of a flippant decision. They thought a lot about it. Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, had called Putin’s presidency a “miracle of God,” and describes feminism as a dangerous phenomenon. “We needed to do it where Patriarch Kirill had stood,” she says.

Pussy Riot members didn’t expect such a strong state reaction. Some of them had been detained previously but were always released. Performing in a church might have been one step too far across an invisible line. But it’s more likely that a legal case against them was inevitable.

Still, Samutsevich says she has no regrets. “People ask us all the time if we would do it again,” she says. “Yes, we would.”

Samutsevich does worry about Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina, her jailed bandmates, and as the interview winds up, she guides the conversation back to them. Both have young children. Tolokonnikova was recently denied parole because she didn’t show remorse and refused to participate in some prison activities, such as the “Miss Charm Prison Camp 14” beauty contest. The judge did not allow the defence to make a closing argument. In her statement, which Tolokonnikova wrote but could not present, she said she would not admit guilt and lie for the sake of parole.

She added: “I am truly grateful to the people I have encountered in my life behind barbed wire. Thanks to some of them, I will never call my time in prison time lost . . . I will surely use my experience in [the penal colony] in my future work and, although this will not happen until completion of my sentence, I will implement it in projects that will be stronger and politically larger in scale than everything that has happened to me before.”
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Tags: Maclean’s Politics, political activism, punk, pussy riot

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Chapter One of my novel, RENOVICTION BLUES, has been excerpted here at http://pachinkomag.com/dbabiuk/. Enjoy!

Go to https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/276492#longdescr and enter coupon code KD38B.

If you read the book , please consider posting a review to

You’ve all heard of Bad Luck Schleprock, right? The sightless gnome followed around by his own personal raincloud and causing pain and anguish everywhere he goes? He first appeared on the Flintstones about the same time as the Great Gazoo? Just a cartoon character? Mystical nonsense, right? Fictional whimsy. Curses, jinxes and hexes don’t really exist. Right?

Will you accept the Book of Exodus as evidence? The part where Moses cursed Egypt when the Pharoah wouldn’t let the Israelites free. Shortly thereafter, the Nile turned to blood, frogs fell from the sky, the country was infested with lice and flies, the livestock became diseased, the people covered in boils, hailstorms ravaged the country, locusts swarmed it, there were three days of darkness and all first-born Egyptians were slain.

Not religious? Well, how about sports then? Surely you’ve heard about the Curse of the Bambino, right? How the Boston Red Sox never won another World Series for close to a century after trading Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees in 1920.

Prefer movies? Have you heard about the curse of the “Little Bastard?” James Dean was killed driving a silver Porsche 550 Spyder he called “Little Bastard.” After the accident, when the car was getting a tune up, Little Bastard fell on the mechanic’s legs and crushed them. The car’s engine and transmission was later sold to two doctors who raced cars. While racing against each other, one driver was killed, the other seriously injured. Someone else had purchased the tires, which blew simultaneously, sending the driver to the hospital. Finally, Little Bastard was set to appear in a car show, but a fire broke out in the building the night before the show, destroying every car except Little Bastard, which survived without a stain. While being transported, the car was loaded onto a truck for delivery to a new owner, but the truck’s driver lost control, was thrown from the cab, and was crushed by the car when it fell off the trailer. Tell me now you don’t think curses can exist.

Don’t tell it to any U.S. President elected in a twenty-year cycle from 1840-1960. Every single one of them died in office after being hexed by the native leader Tecumseh, who was defeated by President Harrison in the battle of Tippecanoe. Sure enough, Harrison caught cold at his own Presidential inauguration and was dead within a month. Harrison was followed, in turn, by Presidents Lincoln — (elected 1860, assassination), Garfield, (elected 1880, assassination), McKinley (elected 1900, assassination), Harding (elected 1920, heart attack), Roosevelt (elected 1940, stroke), and Kennedy (elected 1960, assassination).

So when it comes to curses we have Moses, cars, baseball players, and … well … me, or where I choose to live more precisely. The Babiuk Curse. Which surely exists. How else do you explain Yemen, Libya and Japan?

These are the facts. Was I the cause? Well, that’s my argument. How else can you explain the following: Yemen, the late 1990s, where I worked for several years. For the first time in decades, a repeated cycle of uprising, secession, re-union and civil war seemed to be ending. Oil production was up and the economy seemed to be improving. The United States threw their support behind the Yemeni President. Then, I left. Within a few years, kidnappings had become a growth industry, al-Qaeda suddenly had a foothold, the South was angling for secession again, and parts of the Shiite north were rebelling against the central authorities. The Babiuk Curse. Thank you very much. Any connection to my coming and going from that country might seem only coincidental if it hadn’t been for what came next.

I was in Libya for two years. At the time, Libya had finally shook off the embargo of the West, Qaddafi was purportively giving up his troublesome ways, the economy was improving, tour ships were docking along the Mediterranean coast, the Roman and Phoenician ruins were being restored and I could walk anywhere I wanted in Tripoli without a second thought. After I left came street protests, civil war, Western military intervention, the death of Qaddafi and a still-evolving state. The cause? Obvious, isn’t it? At least to me. The Babiuk curse. Thank you very much.

I know what you’re saying. Sure, anyone can be a jinx in places like Yemen and Libya, right? Okay, what about Japan then? Japan, the safest place on earth. Japan, the place where people don’t die from violence, disease or even old age, just boredom or bad Boy-Band pop groups. The lowest crime rate in the world, the longest life span, forbidden constitutionally to even have an army. I lived and worked there for five years. We all know what happened after I left. In March this year, when one the largest earthquakes ever recorded took place. Followed within minutes by a horrendous tsunami. And then the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.

The Babiuk Curse? I’ll let you decide. I won’t tell you where I live now. I’m in negotiations with the good burghers to ensure I don’t leave their fair town. There are a lot of places I could go to next and I’ll shortly be contacting them, too, to see what incentives they can offer me to stay away. The Babiuk Curse. Coming soon to a neighborhood near you. Unless you can convince me to stay away.

What is a renoviction?

Definition: Renoviction is a new housing buzzword, perhaps a buzz-saw word. It is a portmanteau word, a blend of renovation + eviction, a neological nightmare for British Columbia tenants. Renoviction is the act of evicting longtime tenants from their rental houses and apartments by moneybag-landlords who announce huge renovation plans that require the emptying of apartments and homes to be renovated. Once out, the tenants are not allowed to renew their leases until they agree to monstrous rent increases, sometimes double what they paid before the renoviction.

The new word was coined by B.C resident activist, Heather Pawsey.

http://www.billcasselman.com/unpub_two/renoviction.htm

Why am I telling you about it?

Because I’ve been working on a mystery series set in Vancouver, the first title of which is Renoviction Blues. Chapter One of Renoviction Blues has been accepted as an except to be published on a literary site within a month or so. Once it’s up, I’ll post the link here.

Make it your New Year’s Resolution to read about this Renoviction.

The Fiscal Cliff: Really? You can’t agree to something you both think is necessary? No wonder no one votes.

The NHL Lockout: Reports state there are only days left before the season will be cancelled outright. We hope none is made. And none the year after. Enjoy playing yourself, or watching deserving junior and university teams.

Pussy Riot: Let the girls go. And then work on Khodorovsky.

Locked out…the National Hockey League players….you know what NHL? We don’t really give a shit. We’re all out playing hockey ourselves and watching our kids play. So stay out all year. Please!

Locked In….the opening scenes of Pox Nipponica are finally starting to come together, after blocking out the characters and their back stories.

http://cigalelitmag.com/darvin-babiuk—the-closing-of-yoshimura-kimie.html

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Cigale Literary Magazine (cigalelitmag.com) will be publishing one of my short stories. It wll be available from Dec. 17, 2012.

I’m not going to spoil the surprise of what the title is or what it’s about. You’ll have to go online and check for yourself.

Enjoy!

Advangage Wealth Management in the Kingston Leftovers league remains undefeated after 10 games despite efforts to weaken the team by taking away some of the original players.

News of the impressive winning streak has swept Kingston…there was an actual fan in the stands to view last Wednesday’s game!