Bizarre, Constitutional Law, Free Speech, Politics

Russia Bans Picture of Putin As Gay Clown

C8tOoLnUAAETTWdThe crackdown on free speech and dissent in Russia knows few bounds.  Vladimir Putin’s image or name are often treated as virtually sacred as when people were arrested for showing the authoritarian leader in underwear or spitting on his image in protest.  Now the Russian Justice ministry has banned this image of Putin as a gay clown as “gay propaganda” promoting homosexuality.  Of course, the greater concern may be promoting free speech in a nation rapidly replacing individual rights with a cult of personality.

The image was first produced after the enactment of the “gay propaganda” law in 2013.  It was posted by a man named Alexander Tsvetkov.

This is now the 4,071th banned item for the Russian government.

Of course, shirtless pictures of Putin riding a horse or fraudulent pictures of his “finding” ancient vases under water are perfectly permissible and certainly not propaganda of any kind.

36 thoughts on “Russia Bans Picture of Putin As Gay Clown”

  2. Does not the constitution of the Russian Federation guarantee freedom of expression?

    1. The Bill of RIghts in Russia’s constitution lacks the concision and relative precision of its American counterpart (in which it’s not alone; the French and Canadian constitutions are similarly inelegant). A prohibition of this sort does appear to violate Article 29, paragraph 5. “5. The freedom of mass communication shall be guaranteed. Censorship shall be banned.”

      It wouldn’t be the only provision. M. Putin ignores.

  4. promoting homosexuality. Of course, the greater concern may be promoting free speech in a nation rapidly replacing individual rights with a cult of personality.

    FWIW, Freedom House’s annual assessments indicate that the state of civic life hasn’t suffered any deterioration in the last dozen years or so. Russia was more liberal-democratic during the period running from 1988 to 2004 and from 1905 to 1917. Otherwise, the period in which Russians are living is about the most benevolent of the modern era.

    Well, you don’t want this sort of thing written into enforceable laws and regulation. Cannot help but note the remark of one wag on the public atmosphere in Russia v. the United States (as distinct from the legal regime). In this country, say something in front of an HR snitch considered outre among haut bourgeois types, you’re likely to lose your job.

  5. Good for Putin! The work lacks any artistic value or worth. Plus, who are we to complain about free speech in other countries when conservative speakers on campuses are regularly given the Brown Shirt treatment by the Left?

    Squeeky Fromm
    Girl Reporter

  6. The problem with Russia is not that it is a dictatorship. After all, just about every government we have installed after demolishing a foreign country has been a dictatorship. The United States loves dictatorships as long as they are friendly to the interests of our transnational plutocracy and NOT that of the BRIC nations such as Russia. Dictatorship we install are bought and paid for. They are reliable, easy to talk to. They know how to take directions and obey orders. All they ask in return is shipping containers full of US tax payer dollars coming from our masses who have been trained to believe they don’t know how to manage their money anyway and that getting kicked in the teeth is patriotic. Moreover, dictators we put in place -getting back to the foreign country we destroy – don’t depend on a bunch of local rube constituents that are too stupid to have any idea of what the interests of the USplutocracy are and haven’t been trained like seals to help the masters with cattle prods.

    So the problem with Russia is not that it is a dictatorship, and certainly not utter trivia about clown pictures of its leader – except, of course for propaganda purposes about free speech.

    The problem is that Russia is not our dictatorship.and if you listen to our military leaders it’s a big problem and we probably need to exterminate the human race to resolve it, pronto.

    As to Syria, Putin outsmarted Obama at every single turn. He has proven himself over and over again to be the reasonable one and the more hasty, “tough” and rash the decisions by Obama and his administration, the more fox like Putin’s reasonableness has turned out to be. And now we have someone who doesn’t even make a pretense at being reasonable and who basks in American adulation for “tough guy” gestures (that cost him nothing personally). It didn’t take long to get Trump to see the light.

    The current chemicals scandal is yet another false flag operation designed to pull Trump in line with US military, neocon, and transnational energy conglomerate interests to install yet another US friendly dictatorship in Syria. We have done this over and over and over, and still fall for it every single time. Recently -since 9/11- with weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and very recently with Trump and Putin conspiring against the DNC, and now this. It would be a joke if it were not so lethal to so many innocents.

    The tip off, as is often the case, is that Assad has absolutely no interest in poisoning his people. He gains nothing by it. He is winning the war for heavens sake! He is still very popular in Syria not withstanding US propaganda to the contrary. Our media would never breath a word of it, but he won the 2014 election hands down – in a fair election! It begs credulity that he would ruin this now, just as he is winning thanks to Russian intervention, just to poison a relatively small number of people just as it begged credulity that Russia would hack the US election process JUST TO TELL THE TRUTHabout DNC corruption.

    Yet another indication this is a false flag operation is the fact the US is in such a hurry. It wants no serious inquiry. Just as with weapons of mass illusion in Iraq, everything suddenly has to happen in a rush. If it is proven later that Assad had nothing to do with it, who cares? We will already have our dictator installed taking our orders and our citizens will be happy to pay the taxes for the truck loads of US dollars to make it happen, to dig those pipe lines so our .01% can get vastly richer as the rest of us struggle to make ends meet and keep being told we need to tighten the belt further and further as our economy contracts from our endless gigantic military expenditures.

    Ultimately, we want regime change in Russia as well and for exactly the same reasons. Asset stripping in Russia by our financial elite promises yields beyond imagination. But that one is a long game and Syria is just a piece on the way.

    Anyway, Trump has been tamed. He’s gonna get to be Mr. Tough Guy, instead of Mr. Campaign Promise Guy, and all he has to do is take orders from our MIC and Wall St. And he and his enterprising family that see no problem with using the power of the US Presidency for personal gain (isn’t that what the Constitution is for?) will get to enjoy the spoils as much as anyone. It took all of four or five weeks. And he really doesn’t have much choice. It’s a deal he can’t refuse or those chemical “weapons”, and the next false flag scandal, and the next and the next after that will end up in his lap.

    1. The problem with Russia is not that it is a dictatorship. After all, just about every government we have installed after demolishing a foreign country has been a dictatorship.

      We did not demolish Russia, nor have we demolished any other place. Nor have we imposed a dictatorship on any locus you can name. You just cannot stop lying.

      1. You always fall back on that same tired old meme, “You just cannot stop lying” when ever someone is telling a truth you don’t like. Just like fake news” is mostly spread by those most vociferously attacking others for so called fake news that is actually accurate more often than not, so everything you write, insinuate, and even – I strongly suspect – think, in your little world of anguish and hatred, is predicated on lies.

        Actually, we almost did destroy Russia. First, the cold war almost brought Russia to it’s knees and was largely unnecessary. A bunch of ultra conservative nut case paranoids from the late 40’s that imagined a communist was lurking under every bush and in every hole just ready to leap out and take over our country away from us. Then, once Russia did dissolve – largely due to US cold war efforts and long term sanctions – we just about strip mined it to death with our neoliberals converting every possible state asset to private ownership by oligarchs both American and Russian until Putin put a stop to the worst parts of it.

        As to dictatorships, you are either way out of your depth, or the best you can come up with is meaningless spliting of hairs about the exact definition of a dictator. Try Pinochet who our CIA led by Richard Helms, helped put in place in Chile at the request of tricky dick. Pinochet was a ruthless dictator torturing and dissapearing/killing thousands upon thousands of innocent civilians. He controlled Chile with an iron dictator’s grip for over 17 years thanks almost entirely to support of the US.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_Chilean_coup_d'%C3%A9tat

        The 1973 Chilean coup d’état was a watershed event in both the history of Chile and the Cold War. Following an extended period of social unrest and political tension between the right-dominated Congress of Chile and the elected [emphasis mine] socialist President Salvador Allende, as well as economic warfare ordered by US President Richard Nixon,[2] [emphasis mine] Allende was overthrown by the armed forces and national police.[3][4]

        The military deposed Allende’s Popular Unity government and later established a junta that suspended all political activity in Chile and repressed left-wing movements, especially the communist and socialist parties and the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR). Allende’s appointed army chief, Augusto Pinochet, rose to supreme power within a year of the coup, formally assuming power in late 1974.[5] The United States government, which had worked to create the conditions for the coup,[6] promptly recognized the junta government and supported it in consolidating power.[7] [emphasis mine]

        Then the Shah of Iran. Technically he was a monarch, but he ruled his country exactly as a dictator would, was put in place by the US (and England) because he was willing to serve the US energy Oligarchy and was kept in power by the US until 1979.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat

        Following the coup in 1953, a government under General Fazlollah Zahedi was formed which allowed Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran (Persian for an Iranian king),[20] to rule more firmly as monarch. He relied heavily on United States support to hold on to power.[9][10][11][21] According to the CIA’s declassified documents and records, some of the most feared mobsters in Tehran were hired by the CIA to stage pro-Shah riots on 19 August. Other CIA-paid men were brought into Tehran in buses and trucks, and took over the streets of the city.[22] Between 200[3] and 300[4] people were killed because of the conflict. Mosaddegh was arrested, tried and convicted of treason by the Shah’s military court. On 21 December 1953, he was sentenced to three years in jail, then placed under house arrest for the remainder of his life.[23][24][25] Other Mosaddegh supporters were imprisoned, and several received the death penalty.[11] After the coup, the Shah continued his rule as monarch for the next 26 years[10][11] until he was overthrown in the Iranian Revolution in 1979.[10][11][26]

        Just two examples, the list goes on and on and I leave it to others to add instances.

        1. In summary, I point out that you always use the same tired old meme, you never stop lying when ever someone tells a truth that you don’t like.

          You are the quintessential example of Glen Greenwald’s assertion that those most vociferous in accusing others of fake news turn out to be the ones who are the real liars.

          The world is replete with dictatorships (or equivalents) we have put in place and yes we did almost destroy Russia by the Cold War and subsequently by exploitation of it’s economic transition to it’s current form of Capitalism.

        2. First, the cold war almost brought Russia to it’s knees and was largely unnecessary.

          I gather the dynamics of the state system eludes you, as does most of recent history.

        1. In summary, I point out that you always use the same tired old meme, you never stop lying when ever someone tells a truth that you don’t like.

          You are the quintessential example of Glen Greenwald’s assertion that those most vociferous in accusing others of fake news turn out to be the ones who are the real liars.

          The world is replete with dictatorships (or equivalents) we have put in place and yes we did almost destroy Russia by the Cold War and subsequently by exploitation of it’s economic transition to it’s current form of Capitalism.

          1. In summary, I point out that you always use the same tired old meme, you never stop lying when ever someone tells a truth that you don’t like.

            You don’t tell the truth. You recycle prefabricated phrases because neither you, nor Steve Groen, nor Jill know even bits and fragments of actual history.

            1. It’s difficult to respond to you when my comment goes into moderation.

              That said, there is one thing that your comment has made me review where I think I could have been clearer. Namely, I don’t mean to say we installed a dictator in Russia by destroying the country. Although oddly, that may actually have some truth to it, it was not my point.

              I meant that from the US point of view, the fact that Russia’s form of government is, for all intents and purposes, a dictatorship, shouldn’t bother anyone because that form of government is all we ever put in place when we go in to a foreign country and force regime change.

              As to the rest of your drivel, I appreciate your putting me in the same group as Jill and Steve. Thanks! 🙂

              1. because that form of government is all we ever put in place when we go in to a foreign country and force regime change.

                Except that’s never happened. Neither Korea nor VietNam had any history of electoral institutions prior to 1945. The Johnson Administration’s efforts to induce them in VietNam in 1966 and 1967 came a-cropper. As for Korea, the primary purpose of American military action was to defeat the reds, not to force ‘regime change’. As it happened, Korea was governed by a political machine from 1948 to 1960 and by the military conjoined to a syndicate of civilian politicians from 1960 to 1992. Neither was an artifact of the U.S. Government, except insofar as American military action prevented a Communist takeover. No American military effort in Latin America or the Caribbean after 1935 resulted in any dictator being installed. The most authoritarian figure among them was Jean Bertrand Aristide, but he was more of a machine boss than a dictator (and not on particularly good terms with the U.S. Embassy); Haiti’s not promising material for electoral institutions in any case. Neither did we install any dictators prior to 1935. The mode in Latin America in that era was a sort of gentry factional politics which made some use of electoral contests. The five countries which saw American military operations over the period running from 1898 to 1935 were no different. The most abusive figures during the era (e.g. Gerardo Machado in Cuba, Elie Lescot in Haiti, and Anastasio Somoza pere in Nicaragua) all post-dated American withdrawal by a number of years. (Somoza deposed the constitutional president who actually had been installed during the Marines’ time in Nicaragua). The U.S. has never occupied any country in tropical Africa. As for the Arab world, what Libya and Iraq suffer from is not dictatorship but an absence of public order.

                This isn’t that esoteric or difficult.

                1. Purposefully narrow drivel.

                  Read comment above. Pinochet and the Shah of Iran. Both were democracies before. The US was largely responsible for creating the conditions in which they could be forced in and supported them thereafter. Both were functionally dictators even if one was called a monarch.

                  These are hardly the only examples. don’t think for a minute that “forced” must mean full military intervention. We can force things to happen in many ways as we proved during the Cold War.

                  1. Read comment above. Pinochet and the Shah of Iran. Both were democracies before. The US was largely responsible for creating the conditions in which they could be forced in and supported them thereafter. Both were functionally dictators even if one was called a monarch.

                    Chile had a long history as a constitutional state. It had also had troublesome periods in the past and was in a state of politico-economic deterioration from about 1955 onward. The U.S. Government did absolutely nothing to encourage Salvador Allende and his commie confederates (“economic romantics” as the Latin American scholar Wm. Ascher charitably put it) into engaging in the sort of gross economic mismanagement which finally destroyed him. Again, Ascher, on the event precipitating the 1973 military coup: “It was a truckers’ strike. Not some cabal of plutocrats. A guy who owns one truck”.

                    As for Iran, it had had a constitution of sorts since 1906 and parliamentary institutions intermittently. As a multi-ethnic state wherein the literate population had only recently reached double-digits, Iran was not promising material for the maintenance of electoral institutions in any circumstances. In the Near East, North Africa, and Central Asia, you had a couple dozen countries, of whom maybe six maintained some sort of political pluralism more-often than not over the period running from 1953 to 1978. Cyprus, Israel, Lebanon, Kuwait, Turkey, and Pakistan – four countries who could not be more dissimilar to Iran and one other (Pakistan) which was for decades quite hopeless. As for Iran, Mohammed Mossadeq had prorogued parliament and remained in office unconstitutionally and was attempting to disestablish the monarchy to boot. The whole outcome is quite unsurprising. The main contribution of the CIA was to see to it that you had a practically-minded royal dictatorship rather than something along the lines of Nasser or Qassem.

                    You really should read something other than talking points supplied by The Nation.

  7. I can think of much stupider laws, like the laws that encourage rape by continually increasing the power that rapists have over women’s lives. Or the laws that encourage violent people to use guns. Or the laws that require taxpayers to pay for killing defenseless people all around the world. I’d take a photo-banning over any of those laws.

  10. I rather like the painting/poster. It has a Warhol feel to it. Putin should feel honored, he can use all the help he can get.

    1. PS must not know that Putin is regarded as the best, or one of the best/most admired leaders in the world.
      Which fact is one of the reasons why your eating up anti-Putin propaganda is greatly appreciated by the 1% here and especially ISRAEL.

  11. What’s more important is how Putin is going to react to Trump’s bombing in Syria. Damn neo cons want perpetual conflict.

    1. So much for draining the swamp. 🙄
      The neocons and the neolibs love war.

  12. I do wonder how many putative liberals who were aghast with Draw Mohammed will shortly be changing their Facebook profile photo to Gay Putin Clown.
    _________________

    I KNEW it!

    Took all of FIVE comments for some sick loser to get around to liberal bashing…

    Da libruls! Da libruls! da libruls! Da libruls! Da libruls! da libruls!Da libruls! Da libruls! da libruls!

    You guys are a HOOT!

    Uh… btw… you need to open a window in here… the smell is getting to be a bit much…

  13. Turley, you’ve really gone in the phooking tank! You’ve got your girly knickers in a knot over what’s going on in Russia vis a vis freedom of speech but not a peep out of you about Jeff Bezos’ Amazon banning the works of author’s works in scientific studies and historical researchthat call into question much of the orthodox historiagraphy (Hysteriagraphy?) of the HollowHoax! COWARD!

  14. The photo is worse than the one of Hillary looking at her smartfphone. The photo Putin published and spread so that Hillary would lose the election. The photo often seen on this blog. But this Putin photo is worse. Does he have to win a re-election? Or is he a dicktacker? I mean dictator?

  15. I do wonder how many putative liberals who were aghast with Draw Mohammed will shortly be changing their Facebook profile photo to Gay Putin Clown.

    2. And upon what verifiably factual evidence do you so confidently assert that “Putin is a clown! More evil than gay, though….”?

      I’ve seen and heard more evidence that Trump is a fascist, luffah face shit gibbon than evidence of any clownishness or evil in Mr. Putin never mind, homosexuality.

Comments are closed.