Reykjavík Grapevine - 24.08.2012, Page 18

18
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 13 — 2012
Being in a punk band should never be grounds for imprisonment. End of story.
Right? Unless maybe you're that guy from our letters page who thinks we're
Björk. Then it definitely is.
Politics | International
jerking their limbs, wearing of-
fensive clothing and conspiring to
play a guitar. These are just a few of
the charges brought against three
members of punk band, Pussy Riot.
The three women, who have danced
their way into a two-year prison
sentence in Russia, have along the
way caught the imagination of ac-
tivists around the world.
Icelandic pussy
In Iceland, four people who protested
outside of the Russian embassy on
July 11 have been charged under a sel-
dom-used law, which could see them
spending up to two years in prison.
The charge relates to their “dancing
on the f lag,” protest organiser Snærós
Sindradóttir told The Grapevine. This
happened after they successfully took
the Russian Embassy’s f lag down and
replaced it with a balaclava that has
become the emblem of the Pussy Riot
movement.
The charges were pressed on Au-
gust 17—the day of Pussy Riot’s convic-
tion—during another protest outside
of the Russian embassy in Reykjavík.
Snærós and María Lilja Þrastardóttir
were approached by a police officer in
plain clothing who informed them that
they would be facing charges under
Article 95 of the Icelandic Penal Code,
which states the following:
“Anyone who officially disgraces
a foreign nation or a foreign State, its
superior official, Head of State, f lag or
other recognised symbol of nationality,
the f lag of the United Nations or the
f lag of the Council of Europe, shall be
subject to fines, or imprisonment for up
to two years. In case of gross offence the
penalty may be imprisonment for up to
six years.”
“It is a severe approach,” Snærós
said. “I do not think that I have done
anything wrong. It is my democratic
and human right to protest against in-
justice.”

Russian pussy
Meanwhile in Russia, the court’s judge,
Marina Syrova found Ekaterina Samut-
sevich, Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda
Tolokonnikova guilty of “hooliganism
motivated by religious hatred and en-
mity.”
The three women had been detained
without bail since they were arrested in
March for performing a song, the punk
prayer “Holy Shit,” in the pulpit of a
Russian Orthodox church on February
21. All of their appeals were rejected,
though Maria’s lawyer Nikolai Polozov
said, “there is nothing in Russian law
that could qualify their actions as crimi-
nal. The case is full of procedural vio-
lations and they are trying to speed up
the hearing to ensure that we don't have
time to respond to them all.”
The minute long performance has
since become notorious. It was filmed
by several people, edited and put on
YouTube with a recorded version of
their song over the top. It features five
women going into Christ the Saviour
Cathedral in Moscow, a few blocks away
from the Kremlin, dressed in brightly
coloured dresses and knitted balacla
vas doing high kicks, or “jerking their
limbs in a disrespectful way,” as Judge
Marina described it.
Chaplin and Kirill
The video footage posted on YouTube
caused outrage in Russia, with the
main point of contention being, at least
at first, that the women had performed
in a sacred part of the church reserved
for ordained priests.
On February 22, Vsevolod Chaplin,
a senior representative of the Russian
Orthodox Church, reportedly stated
that the women had violated God’s law
and Russia’s anti-extremism law, in-
terpreting the protest as anti-religious
rather than politically motivated. In the
blog Orthodox Politics, he said: “Now
let’s ask politicians if they are ready
to do so and if they condemn the per-
formed action. I think that those who
won’t denounce it can stop hoping for
the support of Orthodox Christians.”
Patriarch Kirill, the highest-ranking
member of the clergy also condemned
Pussy Riot’s actions, calling them
“blasphemous.” In response, the band
accused the Patriarch of letting the
church become “a tool in dirty electoral
intrigues."
International pussy
Multiple attempts to get the girls re-
leased, including that by Amnesty In-
ternational, which declared the women
“prisoners of conscience” were refused,
despite mounting media and interna-
tional attention.
Whilst the world seemed to talk
about nothing else, the president of
Russia did not acknowledge the case
until August 2. While in London, he
stated that they should not be punished
“too harshly.” Even if Vladimir seems
blissfully unaware of the international
attention, the accused women seemed
to take comfort in it. In her closing
statement, Maria told the court, "we are
not guilty—the whole world is talking
about it."
In Helsinki, Björk dedicated her
song “Declare Independence” to Pussy
Riot and told her Facebook followers,
“in my opinion the Russian authorities
should let them go home to their fami-
lies and children.”
In Iceland, Reykjavík's mayor, Jón
Gnarr dressed as a Pussy Riot mem-
ber on a f loat in our annual Gay Pride
parade. He played their punk prayer
whilst parading in a bright pink dress
and balaclava. Various videos of Jón’s
performance received over 100,000
views on YouTube and the performance
was reported worldwide.
Elsewhere, protests have been grow-
ing fast, with some notable arrests. In
France, for instance, three women were
arrested last week for wearing balacla-
vas on the metro in support of Pussy
Riot. They are being charged under a
new law designed to prevent Muslim
women from wearing the niqab or full-
face veil.
The trial
“We are representatives of our genera-
tion,” said Maria, whose opening state-
ment to the court went viral. Asked
if she understood the charges levied
against her, Maria, stared defiantly at
the judge and said, "I don't understand
the ideological side of the question.”
"Absurd" was a word that many, in-
cluding The New York Times, used to
describe the trial. Repeatedly denied
the right to call on witnesses, make ob-
jections and even to speak, the defence
lawyers resorted to smirks, shouts and
insults. The accused argued from the
outset that judge Marina was biased,
repeatedly demanding her recusal. She
responded by consulting with herself
and dismissing the demand.
Around 100 journalists attended
Khamovnichesky Court on August 17 to
hear the by now predictable finale: Two
years each in prison. The statement
took roughly two hours to read out, with
sporadic shouts of “shame!”
What happens now?
In what seems like a battle between
youth culture and stern faced patri-
archs, hackers responded by posting a
message denouncing President Vladi-
mir Putin on the Court’s website while-
Pussy Riot released a new single, “Pu-
tin Lights Up the Fires.”
Although the defence has ten days
to appeal the decision, they have made
it clear that they plan to go directly to
the European Court of Human Rights.
The European Union and the US gov-
ernment have said that the sentence is
disproportionate. Russia’s Foreign Min-
ister Sergei Lavrov dismissed criticism,
saying people should not "go into hys-
terics" about the case.
Punk and religion never did sit qui-
etly side by side. More than Madonna’s
“Like a Prayer” video filmed in a Catho-
lic church, more than the Sex Pistols
on the Queen’s Jubilee, John Lennon’s
infamous line “we’re bigger than Je-
sus” comes to mind in the case of Pussy
Riot. Not better, just bigger, more rel-
evant and more representative of youth
culture than the Russian authorities
dare to realise.
Pussy For Everyone!
Pussy Riot’s international success
Words
Álfrún Gísladóttir
Photos
Eyþór Árnason/DV