Putin didn’t hate Navalny, he envied him

The year was 2007 and it was a warm and sunny spring day in Moscow.

It’s my first rally and I’m nervous.

I’m 16, I’m silly and shy and I fall in love with the brave and loud people around me.

I hear my low voice joining the others shouting: “Russia without Putin”.

We linked our arms and together we pushed the police away from the street.

Russia can be free – it’s a new feeling for me.

Then that’s when I saw Alexei Navalny for the first time.

Over the next 17 years, I watched my friend Alexei grow from a Moscow blogger to a global moral and political figure, giving hope and inspiration to people around the world.

He helped me and millions of Russians understand that our country does not belong to KGB agents nor to the Kremlin’s henchmen.

He also gave us something else: a vision of what he called the “beautiful Russia of the future.”

This vision is immortal, unlike us humans. President Vladimir Putin may have silenced Alexei, who died last week. But no matter how hard he tries, Putin will not be able to put an end to Alexei’s beautiful dream.

The president can Vladimir Putin silenced Alessio, who died last week.

But no matter how hard he tries, Putin will not be able to put an end to Alexei’s beautiful dream.

In the fall of 2011, Putin announced that he would be president again and made it clear that he intended to rule Russia for the rest of his life.

My feminist friends and I went to an opposition conference in Moscow to decide what to do.

Young, rowdy and radical, we walked like zombies through all the usual boring panels with sad speakers, poetry readings and sleepy speeches on human rights and democracy.

It was not inspiring because it was neither practical nor attractive.

Yes, we all believed that Russia should be free.

But how to get it?

And then Alexei talked about his anti-corruption investigations.

I can divide my life between before and after that speech.

“We take a stick and use it to annoy the bad guys and you can do it with me,” he said.

To all of us in that packed room, Alexei made us feel not only that a free Russia was possible, but also that we could achieve it with joy, laughter and camaraderie.

No matter how long the journey is, it must be divided into steps and undertaken one at a time.

That day he was born Pussy riot.

I realized we needed to create our own set of tools to achieve change: direct actions that attracted attention and could be easily replicated, that started a movement.

Alexei gave me the push I needed to create the first music video Pussy riotwhich was based on dozens of dangerous guerrilla actions in Moscow.

She was too proud to admit it to Alexei himself, but the idea to make the video came from his speech that day.

Goals

We set ourselves the goal of being as effective and loud as Alexei, but with a feminist and queer approach.

Months later, when my Pussy Riot colleagues and I were put on trial for allegedly inciting religious hatred, there, standing in the courtroom, among family members and activists, was Alexei.

Despite the support, we were sent to a penal colony for two years, a bleak and hopeless place, where once again my only hope for political change in Russia came from Alexei.

It was 2013 and he was running a fairly popular campaign to become mayor of Moscow.

In an attempt to silence him, the government sentenced Alexei to five years in prison.

Furious Russians took to the streets to demand his immediate release.

Miraculously, he was released the next day, pending his appeal.

I don’t remember any other opposition force in Russia ever having so much power.

People say that Putin feared Alexei.

But I think the reason he wanted to get rid of Alexei was another emotion, darker and more sinister.

It was envy.

People loved Alexei.

With his jokes, his irony, his superhero audacity and his love for life, guided him with charisma.

People followed Alexei because he was the kind of person you wanted to have as a friend.

People followed Putin out of fear, but they followed Alexei out of love.

Putin undoubtedly envied this attraction.

There is no money in the world that can buy love; There are no missiles or tanks that can win the hearts of the people.

As a feminist, I have always found it inspiring that Alexei, unlike many others in Russian politics, chose to surround himself with strong women – Maria Pevchikh, Kira Yarmysh, Lyubov Sobol – and to trust them in the highest positions of power from his part.

And, of course, there was his love and respect for his wife Yulia.

It stands in stark contrast to Putin, known for his caveman sexism, of which he boasts:

“I’m not a woman, so I don’t have bad days.”

Truly confident men don’t need to boost their self-esteem at the expense of women.

“How is life in prison?”

Alexei asked me in a phone call in 2013.

“It’s not ideal, but it’s not that bad either,” I replied.

“You can survive here.”

Alexei’s team later told me that he remembered our conversation when he decided to return to Russia after the poisoning in 2020. We could say that it was a courageous decision. Only three years passed from his return to his death.

We could say that it was a courageous decision.

From his return until his death they only passed three years.

People say that hope died with Alessio.

I look at it another way:

With Alessio’s death a new sense of responsibility was born.

For many of us in Russia, Alexei was like an older brother or father figure, someone who was always there to clean up our messes.

We lost him so painfully early, so prematurely.

Now there is no one else in the room.

We owe it to Alexei and his dream of a new and beautiful Russia to continue fighting with.

c.2024 The New York Times Company