Read & Riot

by Nadya Tolokonnikova

  The colony also decided that my friend who preferred to look androgynous was not ready to be paroled because she kept performing at prison concerts in low-heeled shoes. The way the colony saw it, performing onstage in low-heeled shoes was too masculine. A woman should wear high heels. My friend was granted parole only after she performed in high heels and thus proved her loyalty to the feminine regimen.

  “You could be stuck in prison for the next seven years,” my guards told me. And they would taunt me. “You’re a beautiful young woman, but when you get out you’ll be old, twenty-nine, nobody will want to fuck you.”

  * * *

  At its core, the word “bitch” is about power. It is said with awe, with rage, and it is said about women who have looked at the world and decided to get what they want. That is too often considered a bad thing. Women are taught to put others first. So we are taking the word back.

  I’m a proud whore and cunt. Throughout history, the women we labeled bad were powerful, strong women. Look at witchcraft, look at witch hunting.

  A bunch of people I’ve met, heterosexual men mostly, claim that they don’t support feminism. But they barely ask themselves, “What is feminism?” Their rejection is rooted in either fear or fantasy. Well, let me give you another definition: “Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.” I love this description given by bell hooks.

  Feminism is beneficial to men too. Feminism is beneficial to transgender people. Feminism is beneficial.

  Let me explain. If you’re a real man and you’re too tough to cry, to grieve, or to love, you’re the one who loses. Feminism would help you make peace with your feelings. It’s okay to feel. It’s called “life,” to feel things.

  Imagine: You’re a man, you live in Russia, and at eighteen, you have to go into the army. They say that a real man has to shoot and fight. It’s obligatory for men but not for women. When you were a kid, girls were your equals on the playground. Institutions like the army deepen a gender gap in your mind; the moment you come back after one year of service, you’ve been successfully brainwashed and you don’t see women as your comrades, mates, buddies, collaborators. As a real man you treat women as another species, people who should be either (a) worshipped and protected, or (b) oppressed and beaten. If you’re an eighteen-year-old man who has to join the army, wouldn’t you rather join forces with women and together demand that service be voluntary and you’re not a slave of the state?

  But it’s not just real men who need to be challenged. A lot of women (mostly heterosexual) still believe that feminism is not needed. For thousands of years our survival was based on our subordinated, masochistic connection with a dominant culture, so it’s perfectly understandable why it can be hard to break these bonds. Women feel uneasy, and that’s why you have women who vote for misogynist douchebags like Putin and Trump. That’s why you have women who are longing for a strong hand. Sometimes it can be challenging to get rid of shackles, but it’s worth it. It’s a good idea to bite the hand that feeds you. Once you’re truly equal, you don’t need that hand anymore. No domination. You eat together. You simply share food.

  I know some women (mostly heterosexual) who still believe that our primary task is to compete with each other over a partner. That we should fight for a dick and not our rights. It’s so comforting for a dominant culture! As long as we continue to think our survival depends on men’s validation, it’s so easy to use us. It’s the old story: force a group to lose their collective consciousness and sense of solidarity, and then toy with them, use them, manipulate them. The belief that our vital energy is based on men’s approval has its roots in history. Indeed, there were times when women were totally dependent economically on men. Those who were not were branded outcasts and witches, and had to be burned. Time has changed a little bit.

  * * *

  The patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church wants to prohibit abortions. Stalin banned abortions in 1936 to increase the birth rate, a prohibition that remained until 1955. The USSR’s experience showed that banning abortion increased not the birth rate but two other indicators: the death rate of mothers from illegal abortions and the number of infanticides.

  Anna Kuznetsova, famous for supporting Putin and the telegony theory (a belief that offspring can inherit characteristics from every sexual partner a woman has had), was made Children’s Rights Commissioner in 2016. Children have so many feelings and emotions, and they are shy, bashful, and unable to ask the right questions. They need a better advocate than someone who believes vaginas have memories. Sexuality is a powerful source of vigor and inspiration. Why suppress it, when you can teach people to use it?

  Female sexuality is about to be discovered and unchained. My case studies have proved to me that there are a lot of men out there who still have no clue what to do with a clitoris. If you want to fuck me and don’t know the power of the clitoris, you suck. If I find out that someone is too phallocentric in bed, I get up, put on my clothes, and leave. Sometimes I recite a lecture on the false consciousness of phallotheologocentrism while I’m puttin’ my clothes on.

  Female individuals who explore their sexuality are stigmatized. Whore, slut, hooker. You know what I’m talking about. I was convinced for a long time that my ideas had priority and everything carnal was sinful. I had to work hard to restore the connection between the body and the consciousness. I keep on working. The quality of life improves considerably after this connection is finally established.

  * * *

  A group of female rap artists in France recorded a song about licking the clitoris. French YouTube banned the video. Male rappers from all over the world ask us to suck their cocks, but this video contains pornography? Why is the clitoris considered pornography and the penis is not?

  the monster of obligatory perfection

  When I was a teenager I realized the style of behavior I liked was far from what passed for “feminine.” I tried to wear high heels. For six months I tried, but like clockwork they wore down at a slant to the middle, then fell off. I could not sit still and cultivate a smooth bearing, as befits a young woman. I sang loudly in the hallways at school and waddled like a goose.

  I frankly couldn’t understand why I should emulate the behavior expected of a young woman. I couldn’t understand what the benefits were. And if there were no benefits, then why force myself? Because it was obvious how dull it was to wiggle decorously along on high heels clutching a handbag.

  Every time I see a woman in high heels, I am filled with sympathy and want to ask her whether she wants a piggyback ride. I admire men who wear high heels, though. Despite the fact that tradition doesn’t oblige them to do it, they still wear heels. They are my heroes. I like to imagine they do it just to honor all the oppressed women in our history.

  * * *

  There is power in imperfection. Don’t try to be perfect all the time—it’s actually boring.

  This monster of obligatory perfection is a very real thing. It is not just art that is overproduced; human beings are overproduced too. Groomed. Tamed. If you want to know my feelings on that, overproduced people don’t move me.

  When we got out of prison, we understood quite fast that the power of normalization is not a joke. The more active and vocal you become, the greater this normalizing force gets. Don’t wear white tights under a black skirt (or vice versa). Make your hair darker. You need to lose a few pounds. Work on your voice, it’s too nasal. Don’t say “fuck” when you’re onstage with Bill Clinton. Be more social. Why do you Russians never smile? You can’t wear sneakers, wear heels. It scared the hell out of me. I bought the lipstick, heels, hair straightener. But I still felt that I wasn’t perfect enough. Honestly, I felt like shit. I tried not to say “fuck” at Clinton’s event, but five minutes into my speech, I surely did it.

  But I wasn’t brought up in the woods to be scared by owls. The moment of truth happened when they were applying the fifth layer of makeup on me in the CNN studio. I thought that I don’t really n
eed to look like a corpse or a mannequin to talk about politics. I asked them to clean my face.

  I actually enjoy makeup. Sometimes. I would love to see more men wearing it.

  I don’t mind being called beautiful or even being beautiful. But I don’t want to be too busy being beautiful. It’s not my thing.

  I’m writing this book in English, and it’s humbling as hell. There are times when I feel like a dog: I know something, but I can find no human words to express it. It’s a failure, but a good one. I could have a translator, or I could have a nice person to write this book instead of me. Probably it would be a better book then. Sorry to say, but I stick to the DIY principle. If I know that I can (theoretically) do something by myself, I’ll do it. It makes my life path full of challenges, it’s true. But that’s the way to not alienate your own life from yourself.

  I find perfection in attempts, in moving forward, taking risks, and yep, in failing. I would never have learned as much about my government, my country, and the amazing people who’re living in it, and I would never have the voice I have today, without the biggest apparent failure of my life, my prison term.

  * * *

  When I was released from prison, I was confused.

  I had to learn a lot of basic things again. How to cross the road. How to use money. How to buy shampoo and not be distracted by the millions of bottles on the shelves.

  I met many people besides just new friends. I met those who offered me $1,000 for an erotic photo shoot with Pussy Riot. The people trying to hustle us assumed that a person who had just got out of prison must be going through financial troubles. I was followed by political cops fucking everywhere, my private phone conversations were leaked to YouTube, and I was casually beaten by Cossacks and state vigilantes every couple of weeks.

  I also had to learn to maintain the clarity of thinking I had found in prison.

  I had discovered a previously unknown, strange and simple beauty in living among outcasts and being an outcast myself. I had learned to see clarity and honesty in being at the bottom of society but still having the courage to smile. I realized that there is life in the darkest circles of hell, circles that are normally and shamefully hidden from the average citizen.

  Nothing could be more breathtaking than seeing a gorgeous, blooming creature growing proudly from rotten prison soil. It’s a pure manifestation of the unstoppable life force. Women who refused to be broken, women who chose joy, love, and laughter. I adored the grace with which they undertook their everyday struggle with the misery, despair, and death in a prison life.

  The most precious thing you can have in prison is self-respect. That’s pretty much everything you can allow yourself to own. You cannot own clothes, food, or money. You cannot have knives, shields, or guns to protect yourself. Your safety and happiness can be provided only by self-respect. It’s dangerous to lose your self-respect, and if you lose it once, you may never be able to pick it up off the floor. You have to take care of your self-respect 24/7. Consistency in your beliefs, behavior, and character is greatly appreciated. You cannot afford to panic, to be indecisive. Your deeds should follow your words; otherwise it’ll become known that you’re a cheap little liar, you’re weak and can be easily attacked and hustled.

  We had to go through normalization and sanitization when we came out. We were expected to say one thing and not say another. Sometimes I would feel like my newborn freedom was dissolving into the air.

  In our everyday lives, we often expect that something from the outside world, a magic pill or a new pair of shoes, can make us feel happier or safer. Usually it’s an illusion. The key to happiness for me is the dignity and self-respect I find in my work, whether I’m a prisoner sewing my uniform quota or a free woman making art. It was hardly possible to explain ideas about simplicity and clarity of life to most of the people who surrounded us after our release.

  * * *

  If you’re honest with yourself, you don’t forsake the revelations that you have found.

  When Pussy Riot was speaking at Harvard, police arrested one man from the audience for speaking his mind. His position was that Harvard should not host public figures who openly supported Vladimir Putin, which Harvard had done before.

  We were supposed to go along with it. Instead, we canceled our upcoming events, and rather than going to a fancy dinner, we went to the police station and stayed there until the man was freed. The looks on their faces! But how could they expect us to do anything different? The dissonance seemed lost on them, their disappointment coupled with the fact that they would never have cared about having dinner with us in the first place if it were the fancy dinners we had chosen in the past.

  Deeds

  revolution is my girlfriend

  Prison is sweet to me and no drudgery.

  I don’t send letters to my husband on the outside.

  He will never ever find out I love Maruska Belova.

  DINA VIERNY, “LESBIAN WEDDING SONG”

  To be fair, the time when you are in love in prison should not count as part of your sentence, because prison stops being punishment. Everybody knows this, so many prisoners look for someone to fall in love with.

  Inspiration does not just happen, but you can pack your things in a bundle and set out on your way in the hope of making discoveries, having adventures, and finding treasures. If inspiration has come, give yourself up to it. Live in such a way that your life could be a movie plot.

  * * *

  Natasha is telling me excitedly about Nina, the number one dyke in our camp. “So Nina comes up to me and she’s, like, ‘Wanna tumble?’”

  I sit sewing opposite Natasha, who is talkative, svelte, and fast. She is the quickest seamstress on the line. Everyone likes going with Natasha to the baths, because she is thin but has large breasts, like in a painting. Everyone stares in amazement.

  “‘Tumble’?”

  “Tumble, tumble. What, you don’t know what it means? She was inviting me to the tool shack to have a fuck.”

  “Ah, that Nina of yours is cool. But what, you turned her down?”

  “I did.”

  “What the fuck?” I said.

  * * *

  Nina takes two cigarettes from the pack, clamps both between her lips, and lights them. She proffers one of the lighted cigarettes, keeping the second for herself. She is wearing a gray down shawl. Because of her big nose, she looks like a fledgling eagle when she wears it. The shawl is a gift from one of the women in love with Nina.

  Nina has been incarcerated for nine years. She was young when she was sent down. In the camp, she became a boy. Talent, disposition, and an education on the streets made her a tomboy, someone who climbs in and out windows. She has black hair, a smoker’s husky voice, and long eyelashes. She has legs, gracefulness, height, and a figure. And she completely lacks feminine affectation. Instead, she has boyish, aggressive desire and the ability to take what she wants.

  Nina has a deliberately burly, wading gait, her head held high, her legs spread wide as she walks. She wears her kerchief in the underworld manner, tying the ends not in front, like little Alyonka on the famous Russian chocolate bar wrapper, but in the back, like Jack Sparrow or something.

  Nina douses herself heavily with a simple men’s cologne. Perfume and cologne are forbidden in prison because they contain alcohol, but you can get hold of them for a large amount of money and by going through trustworthy channels. It is harder than buying drugs on the outside.

  It is nine in the evening. Night has fallen in the villages of Mordovia. The cows have stopped mooing, and the horse-drawn carts loaded with sauerkraut have stopped running.

  Opposite us are the lit windows of the machine shop. Female prisoners are sent there when they are severely lacking in physical intimacy. “It’s time for you to go to the machine shop,” they say. Four dudes work in the machine shop, all four of them alcoholics. For some women, a trip to the machine shop has ended with their giving birth in the Mordovian prison camp hospital in Barashe
vo.

  It is deserted outside the sewing shops; there is not a soul in sight. It is a time when you are not supposed to leave the shops. We have left. We are strolling and smoking.

  “Why do you open the door for me?” I dig into Nina when we exit the shop into a wet March blizzard. “When did you first decide you would open the door for women?”

  “I don’t remember,” she shrugs.

  The outcome of my discussions about gender with Nina are as paltry as if you asked a man on the first date why the fuck he has brought you flowers. He brought them just because. He could have not brought them. Traditions are inexplicable.

  Nina comes to life alongside me. Seducing women and falling in love with them is the life she has found during her nine years in prison. And I am thrilled and grateful to be learning her means of overcoming death and boredom.

  Beyond the colony’s flimsy, rotten wood fence are dark woods and swamp. Nine years. Nine years behind a rotten fence.

  But at that moment I am not bored behind this fence.

  * * *

  We are drinking instant coffee, the strongest instant coffee I have ever drunk, coffee as potent as absinthe. I would later learn to drink such coffee in the camp every morning. Nina treats me to chocolate bars, while I pull a Snickers from my sock. I snuck it through the frisk at the gate to the manufacturing zone.

  “You learn quickly,” laughs Nina. She is bashful about her chipped teeth and wants them replaced when she gets out. But I think the chipped teeth contribute to her brassiness, and that is a good thing.

  I speak very little: I am afraid of my own words. For conversing with Nina, my words are excessively even and regular; they are educated words. My language is like dead Latin compared with her temperamental Italian. When she listens to me, Nina is ashamed of her own language, which she imagines is simple and obscene. But I think there is much more life in Nina’s language than in mine, more nuances and shades of meaning. The decisive element is intonation. The same word spoken with a different intonation can mean different things.