Russian prosecutors requested a 3½ year prison sentence Friday for a blogger charged with inciting religious hatred for playing "Pokemon Go" in a church.
Prosecutors made the request as the trial of Ruslan Sokolovsky, 22, wrapped up in the city of Yekaterinburg. A judge said a verdict in the case would be issued May 11.
Sokolovsky posted a video on his blog showing him playing the smartphone game in a church built on the supposed spot where the last Russian tsar and his family were killed. He has been in detention since October.
He is charged with inciting religious hatred. It is the same offense that sent two women from the Pussy Riot punk collective to prison for two years in 2012.
Source: ABC News
Video: YouTube
(Score: 1) by Scrutinizer on Monday May 01 2017, @06:42AM (7 children)
Did you have a valid point to make, or was the ad hominem all you had?
Verifiable truth remains what it is, even if both I and the Russian PR office happen to think it makes for good propaganda.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @09:09AM (6 children)
> Verifiable truth remains what it is,
Indeed. The truth is that russia sent pussy riot to the gulag for 2 years and are trying to do the same with this poor schlub.
The fact that other places have problems too does not detract from these problems.
America's problems are of zero comfort to Ruslan Sokolovsky.
(Score: 1) by Scrutinizer on Monday May 01 2017, @09:29AM (5 children)
Agreed.
My original point concerns the year-long drumbeat of anti-Russian propaganda from the mainstream media (owned by corporations in an incestuous relationship with the USA's criminal government), the anti-Russian warlike rhetoric from leading Presidential losers, and the likelihood that this is so because US government criminals are actually interested in ginning up support for a war with Russia.
Russia sounds like dump with a corrupt government, and that sucks for the Russian people. That is still no reason for the USA to start a war with Russia (or anyone else who hasn't actually tried to attack us here in the USA.)
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @10:35AM (4 children)
> My original point concerns the year-long drumbeat of anti-Russian propaganda from the mainstream media
America's failing are failings because America's standards are high. When you make a false equivalency with Russia you trivialize those standards. And that is the thrust of Putin's propaganda - democracy does not make a country any better than autocracy -- just look at these cherry-picked examples of problems that the hypocritical Americans have in their system, they are no better than me. So don't waste your time trying to make Russia more free. Hence polezniye duraki.
> the likelihood that this is so because US government criminals are actually interested in ginning up support for a war with Russia.
When you trivialize America's standards you end up enabling those bad actors because without high standards there is no upside to good behavior.
(Score: 1) by Scrutinizer on Monday May 01 2017, @10:56AM (3 children)
Look at those high American standards! [soylentnews.org] Yet you neglected to explain how despicable behavior by Russia's government against its own people is casus belli for the USA.
Just how do you propose to "make Russia more free" - with freedom missiles? The rational approach would be to make the USA a free country before considering a war over the internal affairs of some other country.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @11:08AM (2 children)
Yet you neglected to explain how despicable behavior by Russia's government against its own people is casus belli for the USA.
I didn't neglect it. I ignored it because its irrelevant.
It's your conspiracy that you injected that into the discussion of this story.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 01 2017, @11:24AM
Then why did you bother to engage in this thread at all, since that was the original parent's point?
You certainly did neglect to mention whether or not you think the USA's freedom missiles will help make Russia more free...
(Score: 3, Touché) by tangomargarine on Monday May 01 2017, @03:04PM
I like how nobody in this thread seems to be capable of understanding that Whataboutism isn't actually arguing against the original parent.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"