Russians Must Not Compromise with Putin’s Fascist Regime but Resist It by Refusing to Obey Its 'Laws,' Skobov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, February 6 – One of the inevitable but sad developments in Russian society is that whenever there is a clash between the lawless authorities and the population which is only trying to exercise its rights, there will be some who will call for seeking a compromise between the two positions, Aleksandr Skobov says.

            That is what some members of the Presidential Human Rights Council have done, the Russian commentator says; and the only positive note in this is that those doing so form a minority on this body and “not the majority as was sometimes the case earlier (graniru.org/opinion/skobov/m.281009.html).

            But no compromise is possible between a lawless and fascist regime and a population that is only seeking to make use of its right to assemble and protest, and none should be encouraged or sought, Skobov says. Instead, one must take sides and be either on that of the oppressors or that of the oppressed.

            The Putin regime has created a fake simulacrum of a legal state adopting laws that allow it to act completely arbitrarily and to deny the Russian people their rights. For more than a decade, the Kremlin has imposed its will on the population without regard to the constitution; and tragically, the population has surrendered its rights without much of a fight.

            That must change, Skobov says. “Our legal codes, unlike those of a legal state, are directed not at reducing to a minimum the restrictions” which are always in one degree or another faced by citizens who protest. They are directed at creating the maximum number of obstacles and opportunities for the powers to silence the people.

            “According to the logic of a police state,” he continues, “a public demonstration by citizens of their political positions is something deeply abnormal and can be allowed only by special dispensation which the authorities may give or withhold exclusively on the basis of their own views.”

            He adds that “a police state insists on its complete right to prohib8it people from publicly expressing their political position.”  That is “the logic of a police state. That is the philosophy which is the foundation of Putin’s laws.” But “the logic of a normal individual is just the reverse.”

            “According to the logic of a normal person, no one can prohibit him from publicly expressing his political position. This is his natural and inalienable right, fixed in all international-legal charters and in Article 31 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation,” Skobov says.

            By that logic, “right is on the side of those who come out to express their civic position despite the police clubs, cold detention sites, arrests and fines, and there is not an ounce of right on the side of those who beat, seize and imprison. They are fascist enforcers and occupiers. They are an absolute evil and serve absolute evil.”

            Laws that undercut natural rights, Skobov argues, should not be obeyed because these “two logics” cannot be combined. Between them it is impossible to find a compromise. Either you are on one side or on the other.”

            The commentator points out that the destruction of the right of assembly was one of the first victories of the Putin regime over society. “Society surrendered this position almost without resistance in a state of general indifference.” Russians can recover their rights only by “mass disobedience to the anti-legal laws of the illegal powers that be.”

            That will entail personal risks, but the failure to do so and the search for some impossible compromise will lead to even more negative outcomes.