Russia: Pokemon Go Blogger Convicted

Elizabeth R. Cournoyer February 21, 2024

123 6 minutes read

(Moscow) On May 11, 2017, a Russian court convicted a 22-yr-old blogger on criminal expenses of incitement of hatred and insulted to the nonsecular feelings of believers, Human Rights Watch said today. The court gave the blogger, Ruslan Sokolovsky, a 3-and-a-1/2-12 month’s suspended sentence. Sokolovsky had published to YouTube a prank video in which he performs Pokemon Go in a church. The government needs to take steps to have the conviction vacated or set apart and forestall prosecuting individuals for the nonviolent workout of their right to unfastened speech.

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“It’s an alleviation that Sokolovsky is not in the back of bars. However, the reality that he turned into prosecuted and convicted remains a high instance of the Russian authorities using indistinct and broad anti-extremist laws to stifle loose speech and sell self-censorship,” said Yulia Gorbunova, Russia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Sokolovsky’s moves may additionally have indignant some, or indeed many, however, they present no public chance, and crook sanctions in opposition to him are groundless incursions on the right to lose expression.”

The costs against Sokolovsky stem from the August 11, 2016, prank video Sokolovsky uploaded to his YouTube channel. In the video, Sokolovsky is visible playing Pokemon Go, the popular region-primarily based reality sport, on his cellphone in the Russian Orthodox Church of All Saints in Yekaterinburg. At the quiet of the video, Sokolovsky says: “I regret now not catching the rarest of Pokemon: Jesus. They say he does no longer exist.” The video became widely shared online and said inside the media, together with through pro-Kremlin Russia 24, which said that the video insulted the emotions of religious believers and known as Sokolovsky “mentally unwell.”

Also, in August, Sokolovsky published every other video mocking Russian Orthodox recommendations about marriage and family. Citing the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo as his private suggestion, Sokolovsky wrote numerous satirical or vital blog posts about the Orthodox Church. In September, the government searched Sokolovsky’s condominium and arrested him on costs of incitement to hatred and insult to the religious feelings of believers, crook offenses below articles 282 and 148 of Russia’s criminal code. In January 2017, the government initiated a new criminal investigation towards Sokolovsky on charges of “trafficking in special technical gadgets [designed] for the surreptitious obtainment of records” under Article 138 of the crook code, for having a pen with a video camera, which police officers seized from his condominium during the hunt. He changed into being discovered guilty of all offenses at trial.

Following his arrest, a courtroom ordered Sokolovsky held in pretrial custody, first of all for two months. Although he was launched to house arrest following an enchantment, he becomes returned to custody on October 28, 2016, after the court located that he had violated his bail terms. On May 11, the court ordered him to eliminate nine films from the YouTube channel and banned him from attending mass gatherings for the three-and-a-1/2 years of his suspended sentence. Sokolovsky becomes then launched on his own recognizance. Sokolovsky’s legal professional, Alexey Bushmakov, spoke after the decision and stated that the case against Sokolovsky turned into meant to “frighten and intimidate” bloggers and different internet users in Russia and save them from speaking freely online.

The offense of “insult,” one of the crimes of which Sokolovsky turned into convicted, was delivered to Russia’s crook code in 2013, a yr after numerous individuals of the feminist protest punk institution Pussy Riot have been convicted of criminal “hooliganism” in retaliation for their anti-Putin overall performance in a Moscow cathedral. Parliament adopted a law amending article 148 of the criminal code to criminalize “a public movement expressing clear disrespect for society and dedicated to insulting the non-secular emotions of believers.” The law affords no definition of “non-secular emotions” and sets no threshold for “offending” them, permitting prosecutors and courts exquisite discretion to goal vital speech. Sanctions encompass fines and as much as a one-year jail sentence.

Between 2012 and 2016, the Russian authorities received tighter manipulate over freedom of expression via a raft of disturbingly regressive laws, Human Rights Watch stated. The regulations provide the references with equipment to restrict access to information, carry out unchecked surveillance, and sensor data that the authorities deem “extremist,” “separatist,” or otherwise illegal and dangerous to the public. In recent years, those sentenced to or dealing with jail phrases or hefty fines for “extremist sports” have increasingly more protected bloggers, journalists, political opposition activists, ethnic minority activists, and other government critics, in addition to those who mock the Russian Orthodox Church. “Criminal prosecution of bloggers and others for peacefully expressing their perspectives shrinks the already constrained space for public debate,” Gorbunova stated. “Sokolovsky’s conviction over again shines a highlight on the downward spiral of freedom of expression in Russia.”

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Bloggers: As the Spirit Moves You

My spouse and I belong to a Liberal, Progressive Reform Jewish Congregation in vital New Jersey – Congregation Kol Am of Freehold. Our prayer books (siddurim) were authored through our outstanding and discovered Rabbi Brooks Susman. Inappropriate weather, our Friday night services (Shabbat) are held outside most of the multi-hued and candy-smelling vegetation of a lush Garden of Eden. The extraordinary fragrances of the spring and summer season are frequently followed by the choir’s angelic voices and the smooth guitar instrumental, which add to the heavenly environment of our setting.

Our bucolic and sensorial worship experience is more desirable by using the poetic phraseology of inspiring and melodious stanzas and prayers written and recited through Rabbi Susman (see one such example, blanketed right here) some stage in services. Oh, how stunning it is while the heart is advocated to sing soulful music. Within the pages of our prayer books are many passages that call for congregant participation. Everyone is encouraged to actively participate in our services and emerge as an unmarried voice united in reverence for God. There are many italicized stanzas certain to be read aloud by way of people. These religious and secular phrases comply with those spoken by Rabbi Susman in a call and response way.

Passion Resides in All of Us: Let it Out.

“Within the triangle of coronary heart, soul and thoughts are discovered a properly tended, often walked in, the lawn of affection. An area for memory stands before a bench, on which we sit, lost in reverie for those we cherished. Though a few vegetation may be dead, the scent in their being lingers, joining with the aromas of these plants blooming nevertheless. They have left their mark long when they have left our presence. And we, tenders of that garden, deliver thanks for all that was, for all that we held treasured. We recognize that simply as seasons bypass, so also cherished ones are born and then die. We, the residing, inhabit the oasis between those certainties of delivery and death. We reminisce, and as did the gardeners earlier than us, we present at the location where the plants we cherished once bloomed and smile tenderly at their remembered splendor.

The Rabbi requests participation “because of the spiritual actions you.” Congregants reply under their personal free will; frequently moved via a few personal references to phrases and meanings. It is an incendiary flame that ignites a passion inside people to examine those words aloud with genuine conviction. It is like that when expressions inspire us. Is it no longer? Those we refer to because the “Masters” are respected for their masterpiece works, which have persisted at some stage in a while. They probably produced their most extraordinary contributions to the arts and sciences as the spirits moved them.

Motivated with the aid of his passion, Michelangelo spent four years developing his image of heaven above the altar of the Sistine Chapel. He did so with the utmost admiration for artwork and Christianity and a particular interest in the element and near perfection. Michelangelo’s every and every brushstroke changed into guided via his loving hand – seemingly – beneath the watchful eye of the God he so needed to please. He painted heaven on plaster and moved humans to accept it as accurate, with it become God’s “sky” on the eve of creation. It took Beach Boy Brian Wilson forty uncompromising and passion-crammed years to – finally – entire and launch his “unfinished album,” higher known to most as SMILE. In 2004, the critics acclaimed it as his long-awaited masterpiece – the watermark of his brilliant career. We applaud Wilson’s ability to overcome his many private demons – moved via spirit – to create this exquisite music for his many fanatics to experience.

Rabbi Susman’s personal requirements have been equally uncompromising, as he magnificently wordsmithed each stanza of his inspirational prayer book. The completed product serves as inspirational paintings, designed to transport the spirit and praise God, celebrating his mastery in growing the universe and populating the earth with a diversity of existence bureaucracy. We are humbled and moved by every written phrase and stanza of this prayer ebook. We are inspired by the Rabbi’s personal passionate words, as well as the Torah excerpts and Talmudic verses he selected to consist of in praise of God. Rabbi Brooks Susman’s work may also simply be an undiscovered masterpiece within the mainstream. However, it’s miles already mentioned as a number of the Kol Am small and growing congregation.