Sergei Mitrokhin’s blog at the Ekho Moskvi web-site, 19.12.2013

People must uphold the law as the walls of their city.

Heraclitus

Tomorrow the State Duma will adopt another law strangling our freedom. This time the law will be regulation of the Internet .

This will hit [the society] no less than the law [restricting] rallies and demonstrations adopted in June 2012.

My prediction is like this: only YABLOKO activists will come to a real protest action tomorrow to the State Duma so that to protect the freedom of the RF users in the World Wide Web. As it was, when the Duma was adopting the law on toughen responsibility for rallies. Or when the State Duma was expanding the powers of the Federal Security Bureau. Or when it was toughening the law on non-profit organisations. Or was adopting amendments to the Housing Code imposing a compulsory charge for capital repairs of housing on the residents.

Or like it was last week when Russian citizens were turned into serfs be means of toughening penalties for failing to register at the place of their residence.

Something wrong has been happening with the Russian opposition. When there is an opportunity to repel another “attack” on human rights and freedoms undertaken by the authorities, then the opposition is nowhere to be found. Though they obviously know what is happening.

However, the opposition loves once in six months to hold large rallies with very broad and equally unrealistic slogans.

After each such five-minute-of-hatred under the slogan “Russia without Putin!” the authorities calmly and inexorably put more “screws” on laws. Moreover, the authorities are certain that they will cope with this easily, because only YABLOKO out of all the 76 registered political parties will come to protest, and all other civil society activists – supporters of the White Ribbon, or Eduard Limonov or Alexei Navalny – will be ‘buzy’ with other things.

Speaking about Eduard Limonov supporters. It was them who laid the tradition of the rhetorical protest. On the 31st of every second month of the year they started making rallies in Triumphalnaya Square in Moscow, but on the 6th of June, 2012 , when the State Duma [was adopting the law virtually ristrciting all the rallies] violating Article 31 [on the freedom of assembly] of the Constitution they preferred to stay at home or at work.

Tomorrow when the Kremlin’s ‘snipers’ will be already using the new amendments of the repressive law so that to calmly closing websites, all they will howl with pain and will habitually start stigmatising the authorities.

You should stigmatise yourself. You could come and stop it, but did not come and did not stop. You should have read Heraclitus in your early years.